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December 31, 2005
Clarifying Update
A clarifying update has been made to this post on New York Times chief music critic, Anthony Tommasini (see update of 31 Dec at 2:01...Originally from sounds & fury, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 05:37 PM
A contemporary composer is very lucky ....
Let's play out the old year with a really positive story.
Vanessa Lann (right) graduated from Harvard, and now lives and composes in the Netherlands, check out her excellent web site for a full biography. (Why are there so many exciting women composers around? - I have also written recently about Judith Weir, Jane O'Leary, and Odaline de la Martinez). Vanessa's compositions include elements of ritual, ceremony or contemplation. She experiments with breaking from the conventional concert-hall approach to the performance and programming of music, and explores alternative ways of sharing sound, media and time with audiences, with the end objective of blurring the boundary between art and daily experience.
Earlier this month I previewed the December performances in the Netherlands of Vanessa's new composition for cantor, choir and instrumental ensemble 'Illuminating Aleph'. So I was delighted to receive today this wonderfully positive and appreciative update from Vanessa on the concerts:
Dear Pliable,
The concerts went really well! I was quite fortunate to work with a fantastic choir (Cappella Amsterdam), as well as an extraordinary cantor from Chicago (Alberto Mizrahi). I attended 5 out of the 7 performances, and it was also interesting to have a different acoustic in each hall, as well as a different atmosphere and expectation from the audiences (for instance, some audiences approached the event from a "new music" perspective, others from a "spiritual"/holiday one). The instrumentalists and conductor, David Porcelijn, were also totally heavenly! I was very, very lucky. These situations don't come around all that often for composers, as you know...
Thanks again for your posting of the info, and for your interest! I really do love reading your blog, by the way. And Happy Holidays!
All the best,
Vanessa Lann
..... let's hope 2006 is as productive and positive for other composers, musicians, fellow bloggers and readers.
yle="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot ukPhoto credit - Gerhard van Roon photographer via www.lann.dds.nl
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. If bandwidth is a problem with your permission I will host your image.
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Hildegard comes to Norwich via IRCAM and Darmstadt
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 05:36 PM
Four Songs from Webern
I.The day has gone,
the night is already here,
goodnight, O Maria,
stay always with me.
The day has gone,
the night is approaching.
Give eternal rest
also to the departed.
II. The Mysterious Flute (Hans Bethge)
Upon an evening
when the scent of flowers
and trees pervaded the air,
the wind brought me the song of a distant flute.
I cut a twig from the willow tree
and my song, giving answer,
flew through the blossoming night.
Since that night,
when the earth is asleep,
the birds hear a discourse in their own language.
III (August Strindberg)
It seemed to me as I saw the sun
that I glimpsed the hidden one;
blessed is he who practices the good.
For the angered deed which you committed,
do not repent with malide;
with goodness console the one you saddened
and it will do you good.
Only he who has sinned fears;
it is good to live without guilt.
IV The perfect Match (Goethe)
A flowerbell blossomed early
from the ground in lovely bloom;
there came a little bee and sucked:
They must have been made for each other.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 05:35 PM
Eerie
When I was writing my long piece on John Adams's Doctor Atomic last summer, I listened again to Benjamin Britten's towering setting of the Holy Sonnets of John Donne, wondering whether there was any resemblance between Britten's version of "Batter My Heart" and Adams's great aria for Robert Oppenheimer, based on the same poem. I couldn't hear any obvious links, although Adams's use of a chaconnelike bass line seemed in some way a nod in Britten's direction. I gave no more thought it. Just now, looking through the catalogue of Britten's published works, I came across a list of the dates on which the Donne songs were composed. As usual, Britten worked with astonishing speed, spending no more than a day on each one. The date for "Batter My Heart"? August 6th, 1945.
Originally posted by Alex Ross from Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 05:35 PM
Pieces for Violin, Cello and Piano Part Two (XI-XXI) by David Salvage
Pieces for Violin, Cello and Piano Part Two (XI-XXI) by David SalvageFrom the Sequenza21 Listening Room - http://netnewmusic.net/wiki/index.php?title=Listening_Room
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 02:49 PM
Pieces for Violin, Cello and Piano Part Two (I-X) by David Salvage
Pieces for Violin, Cello and Piano Part Two (I-X) by David SalvageFrom the Sequenza21 Listening Room - http://netnewmusic.net/wiki/index.php?title=Listening_Room
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 02:49 PM
Der Engel (1988) for Organ by Steve Layton
Der Engel (1988) for Organ by Steve LaytonDer Engel (1988) organ Improvisation for organ; but each note of the "melody" has its own chord attached to it, that is identical every time that note sounds. More Steve Layton Music - http://www.niwo.com/steve/music/Mp3workspage2.html
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 02:49 PM
two sets for string quartet by david toub
two sets for string quartet by david toubA MIDI realization of a string quartet written between 1990 and 1991. Score and other works freely downloadable at http://homepage.mac.com/dtoub/dbtmusic.html .
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Eel-Foot" exhibiton for 6 trumpets
"Eel-Foot" exhibiton for 6 trumpetsrecorded performance at Peabody Conservatory: Peabody Camerata 2001, other performances include trumpet ensembles in Frankfurter Hochschule fuer Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Connecticut University, Baldwin-Wallace College (premier)
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Fanfare for Four Trumpets
Fanfare for Four TrumpetsPremiered atop a building in downtown Berea (OH), Fanfare for Four Trumpets was written for the opening of the Berea Arts Festival
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Yesterday Interests Us Overnight, by Dolf Kamper
Yesterday Interests Us Overnight, by Dolf KamperFor Flute, Guitar, & Electronic Projection
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Drums of Winter" by John Luther Adams
"Drums of Winter" by John Luther AdamsRecorded live at Storrs, CT, this is a three-player reduction of Adams' piece arranged by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Bordello", by Astor Piazzolla (from "History of the Tango")
"Bordello", by Astor Piazzolla (from "History of the Tango")Arranged by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Cafe", by Astor Piazzolla (from "History of the Tango")
"Cafe", by Astor Piazzolla (from "History of the Tango")Arranged by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Concert of Today", by Astor Piazzolla (From "History of the Tango")
"Concert of Today", by Astor Piazzolla (From "History of the Tango")Arranged by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Nightclub 1960", by Astor Piazzolla (from "History of the Tango")
"Nightclub 1960", by Astor Piazzolla (from "History of the Tango")Recorded live at UCONN (Storrs, CT). Arranged by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Shaking From Within" by John Johnson
"Shaking From Within" by John JohnsonRecorded live by Loop 2.4.3 on the Ray Terlaga show on WPKN
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Second Construction" by John Cage
"Second Construction" by John CageLive recording by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
"Story" by John Cage, from "Living Room Music"
"Story" by John Cage, from "Living Room Music"Recorded live on the Ray Terlaga Show on WPKN by Loop 2.4.3
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Derek Bailey, 1930-2005.
I can't remember the first time I heard British guitarist Derek Bailey, but I do remember being utterly perplexed at the arid, unsettling chaos his music seemed to present. A pioneer in the European free-improvisation scene of the late '60s and early '70s, Bailey was among the foremost proponents of a... style? genre? Okay, a territory of performance that took its formative leads from a potent mix of American free jazz and the experimental composition of John Cage and his peers.
Bailey combined a workmanlike ethic honed in British dance bands with a cussed revolutionary streak; the music he and early peers such as John Stevens, Tony Oxley, Evan Parker and Gavin Bryars created was the sound of spontaneous creation, unregulated by notions of structure or genre. In its ideal form, European free improvisation was -- and remains -- an instance of deep listening and fleet reaction, a musical conversation that unfolds in real time. Karyobin (Island, 1968; reissue Chronoscope 1993, likely out of print), by Stevens's Spontaneous Music Ensemble, provides a gracious, eminently listenable example of the movement's birth pangs, which would provide momentum for such Bailey collectives as Joseph Holbrooke (a trio with Oxley and Bryars, named for an obscure British composer of Wagnerian leanings) and the Music Improvisation Ensemble (with Parker, instrument-builder Hugh Davies and percussionist Jamie Muir -- the last of whom would shortly defect to King Crimson.)
Throughout his life, Bailey railed against complacency; when regular mates became too familiar, offering the easy path of rote response, Bailey responded with Company, a semi-regular meeting of performers from differing musical backgrounds, most of whom had never encountered one another. A fragmentary list of Company participants extends well beyond Fred Frith and John Zorn to take in Lee Konitz, Ursula Oppens, Don Byron, Diamanda Galas and veteran tap dancer Will Gaines. Practically to the very end of his life, Bailey continued to seek out new encounters: with jazz icon Tony Williams, with free-jazz percussionist Susie Ibarra, with pipa virtuoso Min Xiao-Fen, with Japanese prog-punk duo Ruins and with a steady stream of young drum-and-bass DJs. A substantial portion of Bailey's activity, and that of his peers, was documented by Incus, the hardy little cottage label he founded with Parker and Oxley (of which he later became sole proprietor); many of those aforementioned later encounters, equally important, were captured on John Zorn's labels Avant and Tzadik.
But back to the beginning: While the kinetic excitement of Evan Parker's saxophone playing was immediately affecting, Bailey's crabbed chords, splintery lines, ringing sustained tones and glowering feedback washes took longer to assimilate. I don't remember the point at which it all fell into place for me, but I suspect it might have been a 1993 performance at Roulette with Gregg Bendian, Paul Plimley, Tomas Ulrich and others. It was my first time to actually see Bailey perform live -- and somehow the intensity of the setting, and the ability to connect sound to action and reflex, made the guitarist's work seem transparent, magisterial, inimitable. (Not that there haven't been imitators; in fact, I'd hazard to state that Bailey is probably the most influential guitarist of the late 20th century, after Jimi Hendrix -- at least in avant-garde circles.)
After that event, I became a Bailey fanatic, collecting probably more than 80 percent of his available recordings even as I acknowledged that his was an art best encountered live. Greater familiarity brought on an intense realization of just how much his art changed over the years, despite a similarity of surface contours. Those skittering figures and tolling tones amounted to a language, a distinctive personal utterance, as well defined and recognizable as that of any great musician in history -- whether it be Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Louis Armstrong, Anton Webern, Albert Ayler, Tony Iommi or Toshimaru Nakamura.
Bailey's final decade of recording presented evidence of a renewed appreciation of formal structure, certainly in a solo setting -- Drop Me Off at 96th (Scatter, 1995, out of print), for me the greatest of Bailey's solo albums, is as deftly balanced in terms of its weights and valences as any through-composed symphony. One performance on that disc, a funny example of Bailey's droll accompanied chats, included a brief snatch of "I Didn't Know What Time It Was" -- incandescently shocking in context. That moment provided a precursor to Bailey's most controversial late recording, Ballads (Tzadik, 2002), in which John Zorn coaxed the guitarist to etch cubist takes on standard songs such as "Stella by Starlight," "Rockin' Chair" and "Gone with the Wind." It was with this disc that Bailey came full circle, transfiguring the material he might well have been called upon to play during his apprentice years.
Ballads wasn't Bailey's final studio document; at present, that would be Carpal Tunnel (Tzadik, 2005). Following some amount of inexplicable trepidation, I finally picked this up about two months ago. To call it perhaps Bailey's most painful record would be meaningless without some amount of explanation: The guitarist, who had moved to Barcelona for the last few years of his life, explains in a spoken introduction that he'd recently been diagnosed with the condition that lent the disc its title, and as a result could no longer play with a pick. Each of the subsequent selections tracks his convalesence, at two- to three-week intervals. It was a heroic effort, and not a bad record -- although Bailey's speaking voice had never sounded so utterly aged to my ears as in his intro.
Having attended the majority of Bailey's New York City appearances since that original 1993 encounter -- although not the epochal meeting with Cecil Taylor at Tonic in 2000, alas -- I'd been biding my time since May 2002 awaiting his next visit. Like everyone else, I'd long heard rumors of failing health. But after reading Derek Bailey and the Story of Free Improvisation (Verso, 2004), Ben Watson's alternatingly admirable and risible biography, I allowed myself the luxury of believing that Bailey would indeed return -- after all, many of the men in his family lived well into their 90s. Zorn apparently agreed with me; I know that he planned to have Bailey curate a month of performances at the Stone in 2006.
As it happened, carpal tunnel syndrome was an early manifestation of the motor neuron disease that claimed Bailey's life on Christmas morning in Barcelona. That long-awaited reunion, I'm forced to admit, will never happen. And I just don't want to. Despite not knowing Bailey personally (though I've enjoyed several conversations with his longtime partner, Karen Brookman), despite having exchanged no more than two sentences with him, despite my hand having been engulfed in his massive paw only once, I miss him deeply, and sharply.
It's hard to know where to direct a newcomer curious about an artist as singular yet multifarious as Bailey -- not to mention one so vastly represented in the recording catalog. Were Drop Me Off at 96th still available, I wouldn't hesitate for a moment to recommend that disc. Another oft-cited solo recital, Aida (Incus, 1980; reissued Dexter's Cigar, 1996), also appears to be out of print. Incus mail order might still have copies of both titles, but probably won't be available for at least a while, I'd have to imagine. LACE (Emanem, 1996) is another fine example of Bailey's solo art, while Fairly Early with Postscripts (Emanem, 1999) offers a valuable overview of early-'70s solo performances as well as a few more recent tracks.
But for my money, the richest recent example of solo Bailey is In Church, the first in a series of home-burned CD-R solo-guitar releases available exclusively from the Incus website. All the hallmarks of Bailey's questing art can be found in these two performances, recorded in resonant chapels in 1994 and 2001. So, too, are a patience, a warmth of feeling, a breadth of utterance and a quiet dignity that are all hallmarks of late Bailey.
Among Bailey's encounters with other musicians, The London Concert (Incus, 1975; reissued Psi 2005) is a crucial document of Bailey's relationship with Evan Parker, before it was sundered by business differences and personal animosity. Yankees (Celluloid/OAO, 1983; several reissues available) offers a spirited encounter with Zorn and trombonist George Lewis. Village Life (Incus, 1992), with drummer Louis Moholo and percussionist Thebe Lipere, is seldom cited as crucial Bailey, but I love its seductive sound world. Soho Suites (Incus, 1997) offers an illuminating pairing of duo concerts with percussionist Tony Oxley from 1977 and 1995, while Joseph Holbrooke '98 (Incus, 2000) is a highly successful latter-day reunion of Bailey's seminal trio with Oxley and Gavin Bryars. Two late intersections with different drummers, BIDS (Incus, 2002) with Susie Ibarra and Sevens (Incus, 2002) with Ingar Zach, are varied and always engaging. Of Bailey's later intersections with unlikely rhythm teams, all are intriguing, but the ones that most reward investigation are Saisoro (Tzadik, 1995), the first encounter with Ruins, and Mirakle (Tzadik, 2000), recorded with the muscular harmolodic-funk team of Jamaaladeen Tacuma and G. Calvin Weston. Finally, controversial or no, an exploration of Bailey's art can't be considered thorough without a dip into the abovementioned Ballads.
Despite my having gone on at length, I still feel that nothing I could write would be sufficient to truly honor Derek Bailey, nor to give voice to the deep and genuine void I feel at his loss. Here, then, is a list of additional resources for information on an unreplaceable artist.
John Fordham's heartfelt, informative obituary in the London Guardian.
The Derek Bailey index on Peter Stubley's comprehensive European Free Improvisation website.
Richard Shapiro's exhaustive Derek Bailey sessionography, housed on Stubley's site and still commanding despite not having been updated since November 2004.
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Correction.
Dan Warburton -- fine improvising musician, exceptional writer about musicians who improvise, and editor-in-chief of the outstanding new-music journal Paris Transatlantic -- has gently clarified that while Derek Bailey spent his final years in Barcelona, he actually passed from this life in London.
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
One Final Note Reviews
The latest from One Final Note:
19 December 2005
Rob Brown Quartet
Radiant Pools (RogueArt)
by Troy CollinsFeaturing a different lineup and a change in overall intensity from last year’s The Big Picture, this is a far more measured, yet still dynamic session.
Trio X
Moods: Playing with the Elements (CIMP)
by Dan RoseSpace, emotion, and creative attention abide in every moment on this disc.
Blue Collar
Lovely Hazel (Public Eyesore)
by Derek TaylorWooley, Swell, and Nakatani’s shared sound is reminiscent of Bill Dixon’s work, but with a more industrial bent.
Objets Trouvés
Fragile (Intakt)
by Jay CollinsFriedl, Streiff, Schlegel, and Ulrich make an attuned unit that is able to switch gears easily, often making improvisatory moments sound codified and vice versa.
Jacob Garchik
Abstracts (Yestereve)
by David DupontGarchik favors a language that always seems to be negotiating the terms of tonality: not quite out, not quite in.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Erik Friedlander Interview
Friedlander is interviewed about his recent tour and release.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Long Derek Bailey Overview
The Night After Night blog has a long article on Bailey.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Taylor Ho Bynum Free Download
A track from THB’s latest is the All About Jazz featured download.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Henry Grimes News
The latest from Henry Grimes:
Upcoming concerts, Jan., ‘O6:
Thursday, Jan. 5th, ‘O6, 1O p.m. (Juini Booth playing solo at 8pm): Marc Ribot’s Spiritual Unity Quartet w/ Roy Campbell, Jr. & Chad Taylor & featuring Henry Grimes, the Stone, northwest corner of Ave. C & 2nd St., New York City (no phone), www.thestonenyc.com/calendar.php, F or V train to 2nd Ave. or 14th St. buses traveling east on 14th St. and south to Houston St.
Saturday, Jan. 14th: Jemeel Moondoc w/ Connie Crothers & Henry Grimes, the Stone (see above), 8 & 1O p.m.
Saturday, Jan. 21st: Henry Grimes & Roswell Rudd, the Stone (see above), 8 & 1O p.m.
Sunday, Jan. 22nd: Marc Ribot’s Spiritual Unity (see Jan. 5th, above), Winter Jazzfest, showcases for Association of Performing Arts Presenters at the Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard St. betw. Church St. & Broadway 5 blocks below Canal, New York City, 212-219-3OO6, www.knittingfactory.com, 15 groups playing from 6 p.m. (Dave Burrell/ Vijay Iyer/ John Medeski/ Pyeng Threadgill, & more), #1 train to Franklin St. or #6 to Canal St. or any other trains that stop at Canal St.
EXCITING ADVANCE NEWS!!:
Saturday, Feb. 25 at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY:
Henry Grimes workshop in Bard Hall at 4 p.m; Henry Grimes Quartet featuring Marilyn Crispell & Tani Tabbal + special guest Roswell Rudd, concert in Olin Auditorium at 8 p.m., 845-876-7666, -7425 (Bard Center), 800-227-3265, www.bard.edu/jazzatbard, StPierre@bard.edu, corleone62@aol.com.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
DMG Newsletter
Don’t look now, its the DMG Newsletter.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Hear Last Week's Program Again
MUSIC FROM OTHER MINDS 30 Dec 2005 : Rebroadcast of Program 20 - Feldman/Beckett NEITHER Listen AgainOriginally from MUSIC FROM OTHER MINDS - KALW 91.7 San Francisco, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
Hoodoo Zephyr (1993). John Adams
And to complete the Amoeba Holiday Trifecta...
In SF today for other reasons (including seeing the superb Felicity Huffman at the Bridge Theatre) but swung by Amoeba in the Haight. I didn't have time to peruse the bargain bins but did end up with four CDs:
- John Adams. Hoodoo Zephyr. I can't find my old copy so this was a used replacement. In a first re-listen, for electronic music, it sounds surprisingly mundane. Adams apparently needs real instruments for his orchestration to shine.
- Mexican Piano Music by Manuel M. Ponce. Expanding the "a" in "aworks."
- Konono No. 1. Lubuaku. Haven't heard this yet. I think it's some budget live concert. CD was manufactured in Austria.
- Copland Chamber Music. Vanbrugh Quartet. I'm still trying to understand why Copland didn't achieve much with respect to chamber music.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?
The little woman and I will be preambulating six blocks north to see Die Fledermaus at the Met for what seems like the 400th time but is probably only our ninth or tenth. We started going there because it is easy walking distance and the chances of gettiOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:45 PM
David Salvage Reviewed at Free Albums Galore
The S21/NNM Wiki Listening Room gets a little exposure. David's Pieces for Violin, Cello and Piano is currently being featured at Free Albums Galore. This is a site/blog that promotes legal and legitimate online album releases on a regular basis, treatinOriginally posted by Jeff Harrington from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 31, 2005 at 01:44 PM
December 30, 2005
Echo Weighs in on Webern
In the comments section, which most people don't read (unless they're Biblical literalists, apparently):My personal view is that I have personally moved forward from the superficial , and initial "novelty" value of the 30-second and microscores project.
In our modest opinion, the Microscores format are merely a vehicle from which to engage in further debates on issues of composer/perfomer relationship, a departure from the conventional temporal structures and ways of perceiving as a listener (and pefomer!), an invitation to develop methods to skillfully manipulate materials (yes, instruments are inculded in that also. not just compositional method).
Basically I love that in 30-Seconds of Work composers reveals so much of themselves. And in turn, we have to also put ourselves in many varied and dangerous positions. (see Adam Overton's website and the duos he wrote for us. But espically his new duo for viola and cello, "Up to and including her limits")
Score for Up to and including her limits
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 30, 2005 at 03:34 PM
Derek Bailey, 1930-2005.
I can't remember the first time I heard British guitarist Derek Bailey, but I do remember being utterly perplexed at the arid, unsettling chaos his music seemed to present. A pioneer in the European free-improvisation scene of the late '60s and early '70s, Bailey was among the foremost proponents of a... style? genre? Okay, a territory of performance that took its formative leads from a potent mix of American free jazz and the experimental composition of John Cage and his peers.
Bailey combined a workmanlike ethic honed in British dance bands with a cussed revolutionary streak; the music he and early peers such as John Stevens, Tony Oxley, Evan Parker and Gavin Bryars created was the sound of spontaneous creation, unregulated by notions of structure or genre. In its ideal form, European free improvisation was -- and remains -- an instance of deep listening and fleet reaction, a musical conversation that unfolds in real time. Karyobin (Island, 1968; reissue Chronoscope 1993, likely out of print), by Stevens's Spontaneous Music Ensemble, provides a gracious, eminently listenable example of the movement's birth pangs, which would provide momentum for such Bailey collectives as Joseph Holbrooke (a trio with Oxley and Bryars, named for an obscure British composer of Wagnerian leanings) and the Music Improvisation Ensemble (with Parker, instrument-builder Hugh Davies and percussionist Jamie Muir -- the last of whom would shortly defect to King Crimson.)
Throughout his life, Bailey railed against complacency; when regular mates became too familiar, offering the easy path of rote response, Bailey responded with Company, a semi-regular meeting of performers from differing musical backgrounds, most of whom had never encountered one another. A fragmentary list of Company participants extends well beyond Fred Frith and John Zorn to take in Lee Konitz, Ursula Oppens, Don Byron, Diamanda Galas and veteran tap dancer Will Gaines. Practically to the very end of his life, Bailey continued to seek out new encounters: with jazz icon Tony Williams, with free-jazz percussionist Susie Ibarra, with pipa virtuoso Min Xiao-Fen, with Japanese prog-punk duo Ruins and with a steady stream of young drum-and-bass DJs. A substantial portion of Bailey's activity, and that of his peers, was documented by Incus, the hardly little cottage label he founded with Parker and Oxley (of which he later became sole proprietor); many of those aforementioned later encounters, equally important, were captured on John Zorn's labels Avant and Tzadik.
But back to the beginning: While the kinetic excitement of Evan Parker's saxophone playing was immediately affecting, Bailey's crabbed chords, splintery lines, ringing sustained tones and glowering feedback washes took longer to assimilate. I don't remember the point at which it all fell into place for me, but I suspect it might have been a 1993 performance at Roulette with Gregg Bendian, Paul Plimley, Tomas Ulrich and others. It was my first time to actually see Bailey perform live -- and somehow the intensity of the setting, and the ability to connect sound to action and reflex, made the guitarist's work seem transparent, magisterial, inimitable. (Not that there haven't been imitators; in fact, I'd hazard to state that Bailey is probably the most influential guitarist of the late 20th century, after Jimi Hendrix -- at least in avant-garde circles.)
After that event, I became a Bailey fanatic, collecting probably more than 80 percent of his available recordings even as I acknowledged that his was an art best encountered live. Greater familiarity brought on an intense realization of just how much his art changed over the years, despite a similarity of surface contours. Those skittering figures and tolling tones amounted to a language, a distinctive personal utterance, as well defined and recognizable as that of any great musician in history -- whether it be Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Louis Armstrong, Anton Webern, Albert Ayler, Tony Iommi or Toshimaru Nakamura.
Bailey's final decade of recording presented evidence of a renewed appreciation of formal structure, certainly in a solo setting -- Drop Me Off at 96th (Scatter, 1995, out of print), for me the greatest of Bailey's solo albums, is as deftly balanced in terms of its weights and valences as any through-composed symphony. One performance on that disc, a funny example of Bailey's droll accompanied chats, included a brief snatch of "I Didn't Know What Time It Was" -- incandescently shocking in context. That moment provided a precursor to Bailey's most controversial late recording, Ballads (Tzadik, 2002), in which John Zorn coaxed the guitarist to etch cubist takes on standard songs such as "Stella by Starlight," "Rockin' Chair" and "Gone with the Wind." It was with this disc that Bailey came full circle, transfiguring the material he might well have been called upon to play during his apprentice years.
Ballads wasn't Bailey's final studio document; at present, that would be Carpal Tunnel (Tzadik, 2005). Following some amount of inexplicable trepidation, I finally picked this up about two months ago. To call it perhaps Bailey's most painful record would be meaningless without some amount of explanation: The guitarist, who had moved to Barcelona for the last few years of his life, explains in a spoken introduction that he'd recently been diagnosed with the condition that lent the disc its title, and as a result could no longer play with a pick. Each of the subsequent selections tracks his convalesence, at two- to three-week intervals. It was a heroic effort, and not a bad record -- although Bailey's speaking voice had never sounded so utterly aged to my ears as in his intro.
Having attended the majority of Bailey's New York City appearances since that original 1993 encounter -- although not the epochal meeting with Cecil Taylor at Tonic in 2000, alas -- I'd been biding my time since May 2002 awaiting his next visit. Like everyone else, I'd long heard rumors of failing health. But after reading Derek Bailey and the Story of Free Improvisation (Verso, 2004), Ben Watson's alternatingly admirable and risible biography, I allowed myself the luxury of believing that Bailey would indeed return -- after all, many of the men in his family lived well into their 90s. Zorn apparently agreed with me; I know that he planned to have Bailey curate a month of performances at the Stone in 2006.
As it happened, carpal tunnel syndrome was an early manifestation of the motor neuron disease that claimed Bailey's life on Christmas morning in Barcelona. That long-awaited reunion, I'm forced to admit, will never happen. And I just don't want to. Despite not knowing Bailey personally (though I've enjoyed several conversations with his longtime partner, Karen Brookman), despite having exchanged no more than two sentences with him, despite my hand having been engulfed in his massive paw only once, I miss him deeply, and sharply.
It's hard to know where to direct a newcomer curious about an artist as singular yet multifarious as Bailey -- not to mention one so vastly represented in the recording catalog. Were Drop Me Off at 96th still available, I wouldn't hesitate for a moment to recommend that disc. Another oft-cited solo recital, Aida (Incus, 1980; reissued Dexter's Cigar, 1996), also appears to be out of print. Incus mail order might still have copies of both titles, but probably won't be available for at least a while, I'd have to imagine. LACE (Emanem, 1996) is another fine example of Bailey's solo art, while Fairly Early with Postscripts (Emanem, 1999) offers a valuable overview of early-'70s solo performances as well as a few more recent tracks.
But for my money, the richest recent example of solo Bailey is In Church, the first in a series of home-burned CD-R solo-guitar releases available exclusively from the Incus website. All the hallmarks of Bailey's questing art can be found in these two performances, recorded in resonant chapels in 1994 and 2001. So, too, are a patience, a warmth of feeling, a breadth of utterance and a quiet dignity that are all hallmarks of late Bailey.
Among Bailey's encounters with other musicians, The London Concert (Incus, 1975; reissued Psi 2005) is a crucial document of Bailey's relationship with Evan Parker, before it was sundered by business differences and personal animosity. Yankees (Celluloid/OAO, 1983; several reissues available) offers a spirited encounter with Zorn and trombonist George Lewis. Village Life (Incus, 1992), with drummer Louis Moholo and percussionist Thebe Lipere, is seldom cited as crucial Bailey, but I love its seductive sound world. Soho Suites (Incus, 1997) offers an illuminating pairing of duo concerts with percussionist Tony Oxley from 1977 and 1995, while Joseph Holbrooke '98 (Incus, 2000) is a highly successful latter-day reunion of Bailey's seminal trio with Oxley and Gavin Bryars. Two late intersections with different drummers, BIDS (Incus, 2002) with Susie Ibarra and Sevens (Incus, 2002) with Ingar Zach, are varied and always engaging. Of Bailey's later intersections with unlikely rhythm teams, all are intriguing, but the ones that most reward investigation are Saisoro (Tzadik, 1995), the first encounter with Ruins, and Mirakle (Tzadik, 2000), recorded with the muscular harmolodic-funk team of Jamaaladeen Tacuma and G. Calvin Weston. Finally, controversial or no, an exploration of Bailey's art can't be considered thorough without a dip into the abovementioned Ballads.
Despite my having gone on at length, I still feel that nothing I could write would be sufficient to truly honor Derek Bailey, nor to give voice to the deep and genuine void I feel at his loss. Here, then, is a list of additional resources for information on an unreplaceable artist.
John Fordham's heartfelt, informative obituary in the London Guardian.
The Derek Bailey index on Peter Stubley's comprehensive European Free Improvisation website.
Richard Shapiro's exhaustive Derek Bailey sessionography, housed on Stubley's site and still commanding despite not having been updated since November 2004.
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 30, 2005 at 03:28 PM
Correction.
Dan Warburton -- fine improvising musician, exceptional writer about musicians who improvise, and the editor-in-chief of the outstanding new-music journal Paris Transatlantic -- has gently clarified that while Derek Bailey spent his final years in Barcelona, he actually passed from this life in London.
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 30, 2005 at 03:28 PM
Philadelphia: Phil Kline's Dream Parade
Unsilent Night marches a few hundred strangers into the surreal.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 30, 2005 at 03:28 PM
Music Theory with Non-Majors
Arnie the puppy dog says: WOOF! Music Theory and Music History are two different subjects. Why try to suggest a linear path that 20th century music has followed? Didn't the 20th century bring forth a synthesis of and openness to a huge variety ofOriginally posted by Corey Dargel from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 30, 2005 at 03:27 PM
December 29, 2005
Twisted Tommasini
(Note: This post has been updated (3) as of 2:01 AM on 31 Dec. See below.) Here's the lede graf of New York Times chief...Originally from sounds & fury, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:04 PM
'The Google Story' searches in vain
What exactly does 'Pulitzer Prize-winner mean? The list of recipients contains a lot of distinguished writers including Annie Proulx, and the music prize's distinguished winners include Howard Hanson, Aaron Copland, and just about every other well-known American composer from the second half of the 20th century. But there seem to be an awful lot of Pulitzer Prize winners around, and the writers aren't all up to the standard of Annie Proulx.David A. Vise has all the right credentials. He graduated magna cum laude from the University of Pennnsylvania, has written four books, won a 1990 Pulitzer Prize for his journalism, and is a staff writer for The Washington Post. His latest book is 'The Google Story' which promises to take us 'inside the hottest business, media and technology sucees of our time.'
The problem with books about online developments is that they are really redundant. You can read it all on the internet anyway, and the pace of change is such that the book becomes obsolete soon after its published. Or in the case of 'The Google Story' redundant even before it is published.
Vise seems to be writing for pre-teen children - "Then they built streamlined computers, stringing them together, stringing them together with software, wiring, and the special sauce that made Google lightning fast" - sauce? Well, culinary topics are strong in the book, and Google's celebrity chef gets a lot more pages than more important subjects such as web censorship and blogs.
It doesn't help that the book is so poorly written - "As Bechtolsheim engaged in dialogue with the students that morning ... " - talked? "What the auction failed to achieve was a dearer price for Google stock" - higher? "He and his wife, a native of Great Britain ... " - British wife?
The book is clearly an irony free zone, as it appears is Google - the parentheses are Vise's: "In war-torn Liberia, Prince Charles Johnson lll, a college-educated driver for a U.N. mission, was able to use Google for most of his class assignments in economics and management while in school. Now he likes to keep up with news about American politics and President Bush. 'I love this guy,' Johnson writes. 'It was because of Google that I knew the entire First Family, Laura, Barbara, Jenny, Barney, Miss Beazley (dogs) and Willie (cat)."
If you think it can't get much worse that that - it does; as is shown by this perceptive passage about the indigenous population of Brazil: "Google CEO Eric Schmidt sees his company's reach ultimately extendijg to every place on Earth. 'When you look at the Amazon and you say, 'Why aren't there any Internet users?' it is because there is no power,' he explains.'And people are working on this. So we'll get them all, even the people in the trees."
The biggest flaw in a book that turns creating flaws into an Olympic sport is the superficial treatment of serious topics. Google's investment
in Chinese search engine Baidu.com is simply positioned as another cool success story for the indomitable 'Sergey and Larry'. Baidu's involvement in music piracy and censorship, which I covered in my recent article, doesn't get a mention - which as the book is being published in China is predictable. Google's controversial book digitisation project is not placed in the context of the far-reaching intellectual property debate. Copyright questions relating to Google's image search feature are not aired. And unbelievably the rise of blogging, and Google's weak blog tracking capabilities, receives no coverage at all. 'The Google Story' is an unashamed attempt to cash in on the Google phenomena by a print journalist who simply doesn't 'get the internet'. The web site of the book is no more than print on the web. There are no updates, corrections, or reader debate, and it contains all of four links. (This article contains twenty-eight). The real value of this book about 'cutting-edge web technology' is measured by the fact that in its three hundred and eleven pages there is not one web site URL. This means that neither the book nor the web site carry any information on the biggest Google story for years - their purchase of 5% of AOL on 16th December. There is a double irony in that the Washington Post story about the AOL stake which doesn't make it onto the book web site (or the Post's own booster page for their staffer's book) was written by David Vise.
The Pulitzer Prize web site says: 'The board typically exercised its broad discretion in 1997, the 150th anniversary of Pulitzer's birth, in two fundamental respects. It took a significant step in recognition of the growing importance of work being done by newspapers in online journalism. Beginning with the 1999 competition, the board sanctioned the submission by newspapers of online presentations as supplements to print exhibits in the Public Service category. The board left open the distinct possibility of further inclusions in the Pulitzer process of online journalism as the electronic medium developed.'
Hopefully 'A Google Story' is just an isolated example of a leading print journalist, and Pulitzer Prize winner, failing spectacularly to connect with the electronic medium.
'The Google Story' by David A Vise is published by Random House, ISBN 0405053712. The co-author is Mark Malseed, but he doesn't get cover billing - no Pulitzer Prize perhaps?
Image credits: Header - www.labor.iu.eu
Book jacket - 'The Google Story'
Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. If bandwidth is a problem with your permission I will host your image.
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Access Denied
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:04 PM
Valediction
As I close out 2005, I'm stunned by the wonderful moments I've been blessed with over the past year: my wedding, the arrival of Asa Minchew, the completion of the prospectus for my Masters thesis, and the solidification of compositional ideas. I also knoOriginally posted by Alan Theisen from Alan Theisen, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:01 PM
2005 in the rear-view.
Sorry about the longer-than-usual absence. Chalk it up to a general lack of live performances over the last few weeks, the transit strike, my girlfriend's return from Virginia and the year-end crush at the magazine. Speaking of which, the December 29 issue of TONY -- which went to print three weeks ago -- is hitting newsstands even as I type this, which means I can finally go ahead and post my year-end Top Ten lists. (In the classical list, the "more" links take you to ArkivMusic.com, except in cases where a recording was not available there; in the non-classical list, the links take you to barnesandnoble.com, except in one case where the recording couldn't be found.)
Top Ten Recordings, Classical:
1. Richard Wagner - Tristan und Isolde - Plácido Domingo et al., Antonio Pappano conducting the Royal Opera, Covent Garden (EMI Classics) [more]
2. J.S. Bach - The Sonatas and Partitas - Gidon Kremer (ECM New Series) [more]
3. Osvaldo Golijov - Ayre; Luciano Berio - Folk Songs - Dawn Upshaw and the Andalucian Dogs (Deutsche Grammophon) [more]
4. Joseph Haydn - The Paris Symphonies - Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducting Concentus Musicus Wien (DHM) [more]
5. Esa-Pekka Salonen - Wing on Wing; Insomnia; Foreign Bodies - Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra (Deutsche Grammophon) [more]
6. and 7. Alvin Lucier - Wind Shadows - The Barton Workshop (New World) [more], and Alvin Lucier - Charles Curtis and Anthony Burr (Antiopic) [more]
8. Jordi Savall - Du temps & de l'instant (Alia Vox) [more]
9. Matthew Welch - Dream Tigers - Flux Quartet, Andrew Sterman, Matthew Welch with the CSU Percussion Ensemble (Tzadik) [more]
10. Pierre Boulez - Le marteau sans maître; Dérive 2; Dérive 1 - Pierre Boulez conducting the Ensemble InterContemporain [more]
Among 2005 recordings that didn't make the cut, the ones I most regretted omitting from my TONY list were Richard Hickox's otherworldly Death in Venice (Chandos), with Philip Langridge's feverish Aschenbach; Fabio Biondi's starry Bajazet (EMI Classics); Marc Minkowski's stylish Rameau pastiche Une symphonie imaginaire (Archiv); the Pacifica Quartet's poised Mendelssohn cycle (Cedille); and Rolando Villazón's ardent collection of Massenet and Gounod arias (Virgin). I greatly admired Alan Curtis's vivid Rodelinda (Archiv), although much of that admiration can probably be chalked up to my Simone Kermes fetish. Toss in René Jacobs's bewitching Saul (Harmonia Mundi); the always admirable Maggini Quartet's take on Frank Bridge's Quartets Nos. 2 and 4 (Naxos); the Takács Quartet's magisterial view of Beethoven's late quartets (Decca); and the infinite riches of Gérard Grisey's magnum opus, Les Espaces Acoustiques, as performed by Garth Knox, the Asko Ensemble and the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln under the direction of Stefan Asbury (Kairos), and 2005 looks to have been a very good year, indeed.
Top Ten Recordings, Non-Classical:
1. Antony and the Johnsons - I Am a Bird Now (Secretly Canadian) [more]
2. Nickel Creek - Why Should the Fire Die? (Sugar Hill) [more]
3. Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine (Epic) [more]
4. Made Out of Babies - Trophy (Neurot) [more]
5. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois (Asthmatic Kitty) [more]
6. Ulver - Blood Inside (The End) [more]
7. Napalm Death - The Code Is Red... Long Live the Code! (Century Media) [more]
8. Dave Douglas - Mountain Passages (Greenleaf) [more]
9. Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane - ...at Carnegie Hall (Blue Note) [more]
10. 4g - Cloud (Erstwhile) [more]
The list above should not be read as a ranked survey by the way. Instead, it should be parsed as my five top pop releases, my top-two metal discs, my top-two jazz sets and my single-favorite electroacoustic improv release -- although Made Out of Babies's caterwauling lurch could easily trade places with Ulver's skyscraping blend of vintage prog and Smile-ing vocal arrangements. It's kind of like compiling a single list of the year's best apples, blood oranges, hand grenades and a door knob, but I wanted to be sure that my favorite discs from all of the main "genres" with which I'm regularly consumed were represented.
Albums that didn't make the cut but could have include Shakira's Fijacion Oral, Vol. 1 (Epic), the Fiery Furnaces' Rehearsing My Choir (Rough Trade), Bell Orchestre's Recording a Tape the Colour of Light (Rough Trade), Kanye West's Late Registration (Roc-a-Fella), the Mars Volta's Frances the Mute (Universal), Arch Enemy's Doomsday Machine (Century Media), Meshuggah's Catch 33 (Nuclear Blast), Marty Ehrlich's News on the Rail (Palmetto), Semi-Formal by John Hollenbeck's Claudia Quintet (Cuneiform); and ErstLive 005 by Keith Rowe, Sachiko M, Toshimaru Nakamura and Otomo Yoshihide (Erstwhile).
Top Ten Live Events (chronological):
1. Radu Lupu, Franz Welser-Möst conducting the Cleveland Orchestra, Isaac Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall, February 1-5. Beethoven's piano concertos expertly rendered with no muss or fuss, cutting straight to the heart of the music -- which was boldly paired with Birtwistle, Dutilleux, Roy Harris and more.
2. Don Carlo with Sondra Radvanovsky, Luciana d'Intino, Richard Margison, Dwayne Croft, Feruccio Furnlanetto, Paata Burchuladze; Fabio Luisi conducting; Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, March 7. The very model of ensemble work, in one of Verdi's greatest achievements.
3. Der Rosenkavalier with Angela Denoke, Laura Aikin, Susan Graham, Peter Rose, Håkan Hagegård; Donald Runnicles conducting; Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, March 15. Another superlative cast, highlighted by Denoke's heart-rending Marschallin.
4. Joe Maneri Quartet with Matt Moran, Barbès, April 20. In the first of three final shows with his long-lived quartet, microtonal composer and klezmer-revival forerunner Maneri turned this tiny Park Slope boîte into one big, warm bearhug of sound.
5. Gang of Four, Irving Plaza, May 17. Plenty of younger bands have been making hay with the terse, angular punk-funk sound that Gang of Four perfected (but apparently never patented) back in the ’80s; what made this surprising reunion of the band's four original members so satisfying was the realization that no one has done it better than they did.
6. Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center, June 3 & 5. Imaginative programming, tellingly played and (in the case of Ives's The Unanswered Question) evocatively staged. Other highlights included the marvelously weird original version of Mussorgsky's St. John's Night on the Bare Mountain, and John Adams's luminous nod to Lou Harrison, The Dharma at Big Sur.
7. Charles Rosen, Rolf Schulte, Stephen Gosling and the IFCP Ensemble led by Marc Ponthus, Mannes College of Music, June 20. The Institute and Festival for Contemporary Performance at Mannes presented a fine series of programs this summer, including this brilliantly realized all-Elliott Carter bill featuring Rosen in the Piano Sonata, Schulte and Gosling in the Duo for Violin and Piano, and a crack teacher-and-pupil band in the Triple Duo.
8. James Finn Quartet, The Stone, September 7. This ecstatic-jazz saxophonist surpassed his normally high levels of incantory abandon in this impassioned set, which he and his bandmates -- bassist Jaribu Shahid, drummers Warren Smith and Newman Taylor Baker -- turned into a holy-rolling fundraiser for victims of Hurricane Katrina. Subtle moments (such as a percussion duet of chest pats, leg slaps and stomped feet) packed as much power as did raucous exhortations.
9. ErstQuake II, Collective: Unconscious, September 23-25. Uneven, unwieldy and sometimes unbearably loud, a three-evening festival of electroacoustic improvisation mounted by Erstwhile's Jon Abbey and Quakebasket's Tim Barnes reminded hardy listeners that this particular musical frontier continues to resist attempts at demarcation and codification.
10. James Levine conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Isaac Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall, October 10. A bold bill of American works (Ives, Carter, Foss, Gershwin) lovingly savored by conductor and performers, including standing ovations for Carter and Foss, and a Three Places in New England that I suspect will never be surpassed in my mind's ear.
Most of these events appeared either on my "Best of 2005" list in the classical section of TONY or in the pop staff's aggregate "Top Live Shows" box in that section of the magazine; two, the all-Carter concert and ErstQuake, did not appear on either list. And it should be immediately apparent that the roll is limited to New York-based events only; were that not the case, Doctor Atomic would surely have made this list, as would the Boston Symphony Orchestra's October 29 performance of Mozart's "Posthorn" Serenade and Michael Tippett's A Child of Our Time as conducted by Sir Colin Davis.
Normally, I'd tack on lists of favorite books and films for the hell of it, but I can't really do that this year. To begin with, I only read one new book in 2005: I, Wabenzi (Farrar Strauss Giroux), the first book in a woolly, four-volume memoir by reluctant jazz critic-turned-prizewinning novelist Rafi Zabor. Ideally, I would at least have read the latest offerings by Haruki Murakami and Zadie Smith. Instead, I spent January through September obsessively reading the almost-complete New Yorker essays of Andrew Porter -- that is, everything that was ever collected in hardcover form -- chronologically from start to finish. And after I interviewed Zabor for a piece on Wabenzi, I felt compelled to finally read the book he deems the greatest novel in the history of literature: War and Peace. I'm currently on page 1,011...
...and would no doubt be even further along, were I not constantly interrupting myself with the new DC Showcase Presents anthologies: gloriously inexpensive, 500-page black-and-white anthologies of Silver Age Superman, Green Lantern and Metamorpho comic books (with Jonah Hex and Justice League of America waiting in the wings). Unsurprisingly, the Superman and Green Lantern volumes have been fairly formulaic if tremendously enjoyable -- but good grief, the Metamorpho collection is priceless! True, virtually every single story sticks to a basic template, but the wild energy that animates every panel comes straight out of the golden age of newspaper adventure and humor strips. Of the several artists whose work fills these pages, the two creators with whose styles I was already familiar -- Joe Orlando and Mike Sekowsky -- are equalled and often bettered by co-creator Ramona Fradon, whose work combines a vivid streak of fantasy with a serious aptitude for emotional expression, particularly in the case of this most offbeat hero. As far as comics go, this was my overdue discovery of the year.
As for films, I originally thought that I'd only seen three all year: March of the Penguins and Batman Returns, both of which I enjoyed, and Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, which was a let-down. Scanning the shelves at Blockbuster the other night reminded me of two more that I was apparently desperate to forget: the mostly laughable, gaffe-filled Fantastic Four and the completely disheartening War of the Worlds.
I aim to do better on the literary front in 2006…and who knows, maybe I'll see a few more films as well. (I'm heading out to catch Syriana with girlfriend Lara and our friend Karissa, just as soon as I file this post.) Until next time, then, here's hoping that your holidays are happy, peaceful and fulfilling. And once again, thanks to Alex, Marion, Sieglinde, Marc, Danny, Anastasia, Molly and everyone else who made my splash into the blogosphere this year so eminently worthwhile and enjoyable.
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:01 PM
More Derek Bailey Info
The WordsAndMusic blog has a few recent entries on Bailey’s life and death.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:01 PM
482 Music to Release New Tom Abbs
482 Music has announced a new release.
482 MUSIC TO RELEASE THE ANIMATED ADVENTURES OF KNOX JANUARY 24TH
AVON, CT — 482 Music will kick off its 2006 release schedule on January 24th with Tom Abbs & Frequency Response’s The Animated Adventures of Knox (482-1039), a two-disc set featuring a DVD movie and its CD soundtrack. A combination of avant-jazz and avant-cinema, this project was produced, directed and edited by New York-based multi-instrumentalist/filmmaker Tom Abbs and is based on his narrative and video graphic score. This is Frequency Response’s second release, and features Abbs, violinist Jean Cook, cellist Okkyung Lee, multi-reedists Oscar Noriega and Alex Harding, and drummer/vibraphonist Chad Taylor. The complete list of film credits is available at http://www.knoxmovie.com“The Animated Adventures of Knox tells a story of innocence, treachery, madness and redemption,” Abbs explains. “It depicts an internal struggle that nearly tears our hero apart: an escalating war of sound and color. Each character is represented by a single musician and is symbiotically tied into the dream-like visuals. >From the perfection of Knox’s infancy to the complex neurosis of his adulthood, the interaction of the characters and images fight for balance. The music was recorded to a video graphic score giving entrances, texture and emotion for each role. The movie was then shot and edited to match the recorded musical story. If you listen carefully you can hear the moment madness comes.”
Abbs plays a number of instruments (including dijeridoo, cello, violin, and flute), but critics have singled him out as a “force of nature on the bass and tuba” (Time Out-New York) capable of being “exceptionally tasteful and supportive” (Chicago Reader), “a field of energy that feeds the group” (Cadence) and “a virtual mountain of polyrhythmic bedrock” (One Final Note). In the liner notes for a recent release, acclaimed bassist William Parker called him “a link to the future and the past…a living, growing musician who only reminds me of one other musician and that is Tom Abbs.” Abbs has performed and recorded since age eleven, and attended the New School’s Jazz and Contemporary Music Program before embarking on a full-time performing career in 1992. His sideman credits include work with Lawrence “Butch” Morris, Charles Gayle, Daniel Carter, Cooper-Moore, Steve Swell, Roy Campbell Jr., Sabir Mateen, Ori Kaplan, Jemeel Moondoc, Assif Tsahar, Borah Bergman, Billy Bang, Andrew Lamb, Warren Smith and many others. He is currently a member of the collective groups Triptych Myth, Yugnaut and Transmitting, and in addition to leading Frequency Response tours with his solo multi-media project, Multifarious. Along with his performing career, and artist residencies though the New York public school system, he is the founder of Jump Arts, voted “Best Arts Collective in New York City” in 2000 by New York Press.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:01 PM
Coltrane’s Comeback
An article discusses how brisk sales of the archival Coltrane / Monk release has overshadowed living legends of jazz.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:01 PM
Writing Music For Young Players
Many composers shy away from writing music for young players, thinking that this is a "dumbing down" of their talents or time unwisely spent on musicians who have little interest in their work. Well, nothing could be further from the truth.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:01 PM
Margaret Garner (2005). Richard Danielpour
Mark Strykyer mentions five major American opera premieres this year:
- Margaret Garner. Richard Danielpour. Michigan Opera Theatre.
- A Wedding. William Bolcom. Chicago Lyric Opera.
- Lysistrata. Mark Adamo. Houston Grand Opera.
- Doctor Atomic. John Adams. San Francisco Opera.
- An American Tragedy. Tobias Picker. Metropolitan Opera.
I'll quote Stryker quoting Alex Ross on An American Tragedy:
Though Picker, 51, began his career as an atonal composer, he has long since retreated into a comfy neo-romantic Americana, which on paper appears a good match for Dreiser's literary naturalism. (Gene Scheer wrote the libretto.) The reviews have been mixed, but it's worth noting the reaction by the perspicacious New Yorker critic Alex Ross: "The opera is a fitfully inspired creation, wavering along the fine line between tragedy and turgidity, but, on a primal, Pucciniesque level, it hits the mark."
And let's not forget Philip Glass' Waiting for the Barbarians which debuted in eastern Germany:
Examining state-sponsored torture and repression, the opera explores the way in which modern-day white society is coming to terms with its legacy of centuries of repression of indigenous black cultures.
In 2007, the opera will be staged in Austin, Texas. That should prove interesting.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:00 PM
Evan Johnson On the Record: Inside Alvin Lucier's Space
In Memoriam Stuart Marshall, 40 Rooms, In Memoriam Jon Higgins, Letters, Q, A Tribute to James Tenney, Bar Lazy J, Fideliotrio, Wind Shadows Alvin Lucier The Barton Workshop New World 80628-2 (2 CDs) Alvin Lucier’s music uniquely requires space. Not juOriginally posted by Evan Johnson from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:00 PM
No. 100 With a Bullet
Mark Stryker has a swell profile of Sean Hickey in the Detroit Free Press today that reveals, among other things, that selling 119 copies of a CD in a single week will get you onto the Billboard Top 100 Classical charts. At Naxos prices, that's a bargainOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 29, 2005 at 02:00 PM
December 28, 2005
Derek Bailey... 1/29/30 - 12/25/05... a personal appreciation...
Derek Bailey – An appreciation...
I never managed to get to a live Derek Bailey gig... which is a great hole in my aesthetic life. I had planned that in 2006 I was going to make an effort to go and see him somewhere – maybe in Barcelona where apparently he had made his home – or anywhere within geographical reason. Now – this will not happen. I first heard him on one of Charles Fox's radio three shows – 'Jazz Today' if I remember correctly, sometime back in the late 70's or very early 80's. Playing several solo pieces mainly on acoustic guitar. It was unlike anything I had ever heard – and by then I had been following the jazz avant garde for years. Maybe that was the point – that Derek (along with his cohorts in the sixties improv underground) went beyond 'jazz', 'white jazz', the tradition he came out of (passing throught the danceband and session years, the guitar vocabulary used in those areas very much rooted in the practice of jazz) and had essayed into the uncharted oceans of what he called in his superb book 'Improvisation etc' 'non-idiomatic improvisation.' As a guitar player, he had a profound effect on me and inspired my own fumbling attempts to free my playing up – I taped the show and somewhere have the old cassette – (if I can find it I'll copy it into mp3 format and put it out)– and listened to it over and over down the years.
Bailey was a formidable guitarist who, paradoxically, seems to have travelled back to the very ur-basics of music to explore the materiality of his instrument - wood and steel and the collisions of fingers and mind with these - and forwards at the same time, sending the notes spinning and skittering out into the world, conscious in the knowledge of what had gone before as he forged new sound spaces. I do not want to explore the technical side of his music too deeply here (maybe at a later date?) just to say that he was someone with wide ears and a conscious deep knowledge of the tradition – inside jazz and in the classical/serious world as well – hence the nuances of Webern, to clutch for a quick correlative.
There is a surface steely and difficult brilliance to his playing. (Maybe he was our English Cecil Taylor?) But give it the space it deserves and you can hear the depth of it: the technique certainly – whatever sounds he brought forth they were never fumbled or accidental in the execution but ring with the austere clarity of the sonorities of Thelonious Monk, say. The humour – unlike many on the avant-garde side and certainly the author of the recent book about him (a figure from the dead realms of Late Marxism it seems), he has something of the deadpan stand-up about him. The generosity - think of Company, the yearly festival he established to bring an amazing variety of players from many different disciplines together into a sprawling vibrancy in which he subsumed himself – famously saying on several occasions that he preferred playing with other musicians rather than solo – and a soloist supreme at that. Last of all – the essential integrity of the true questor. Uncompromising in days of extreme compromise musically and elsewhere and rescued from any sense of pomposity thereof and therein by the other qualities I have listed above – especially, maybe, humour. One section I remember from that old 'Jazz Today' radio shot was a 'suite' of interlinked pieces he called 'The only good jazz composer is a dead one.' Mordant and very funny.
RIP Derek Bailey...
Originally from wordsandmusic, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:34 PM
American Romanticism
On the other side of the Atlantic, however, the Enlightenment did not fail. For many, the American Revolution was a sign of the solidity of its ideals. Romanticism developed in this country, but its proponents (Emerson, Whitman, Ives) were raging populists. "I love to go to hear Emerson, not because I understand him, but because he looks as though he thought everybody was as good as he was." They had "prophetic" visions, but they also felt them to be within the reach of the common man.
Along with the composer-audience relationship, there is also the composer-performer relationship. The overly-exact notational habits of many 20th century composers did not help this one much. Some composers still think that it's okay to hand a performer an unplayable score and just have them "deal with it." Composer knows best. Lou Harrison on this issue: "Write what you want. Sooner or later a generation of musicians will come along who haven't been told that it's impossible to play. And they will play it!" He has some of the mindset that says that composers are only beholden to themselves, but he doesn't completely discount the capabilities of his performers. American Romantics may not believe in compromising themselves, but they never lose faith in their audiences.
Originally from Form/Content, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
2005 in the rear-view.
Sorry about the longer-than-usual absence. Chalk it up to a general lack of live performances over the last few weeks, the transit strike, my girlfriend's return from Virginia and the year-end crush at the magazine. Speaking of which, the December 29 issue of TONY -- which went to print three weeks ago -- is hitting newsstands even as I type this, which means I can finally go ahead and post my year-end Top Ten lists. (In the classical list, the "more" links take you to ArkivMusic.com, except in cases where a recording was not available there; in the non-classical list, the links take you to barnesandnoble.com, except in one case where the recording couldn't be found.)
Top Ten Recordings, Classical:
1. Richard Wagner - Tristan und Isolde - Plácido Domingo et al., Antonio Pappano conducting the Royal Opera, Covent Garden (EMI Classics) [more]
2. J.S. Bach - The Sonatas and Partitas - Gidon Kremer (ECM New Series) [more]
3. Osvaldo Golijov - Ayre; Luciano Berio - Folk Songs - Dawn Upshaw and the Andalucian Dogs (Deutsche Grammophon) [more]
4. Joseph Haydn - The Paris Symphonies - Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducting Concentus Musicus Wien (DHM) [more]
5. Esa-Pekka Salonen - Wing on Wing; Insomnia; Foreign Bodies - Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra (Deutsche Grammophon) [more]
6. and 7. Alvin Lucier - Wind Shadows - The Barton Workshop (New World) [more], and Alvin Lucier - Charles Curtis and Anthony Burr (Antiopic) [more]
8. Jordi Savall - Du temps & de l'instant (Alia Vox) [more]
9. Matthew Welch - Dream Tigers - Flux Quartet, Andrew Sterman, Matthew Welch with the CSU Percussion Ensemble (Tzadik) [more]
10. Pierre Boulez - Le marteau sans maître; Dérive 2; Dérive 1 - Pierre Boulez conducting the Ensemble InterContemporain [more]
Among 2005 recordings that didn't make the cut, the ones I most regretted omitting from my TONY list were Richard Hickox's otherworldly Death in Venice (Chandos), with Philip Langridge's feverish Aschenbach; Fabio Biondi's starry Bajazet (EMI Classics); Marc Minkowski's stylish Rameau pastiche Une symphonie imaginaire (Archiv); the Pacifica Quartet's poised Mendelssohn cycle (Cedille); and Rolando Villazón's ardent collection of Massenet and Gounod arias (Virgin). I greatly admired Alan Curtis's vivid Rodelinda (Archiv), although much of that admiration can probably be chalked up to my Simone Kermes fetish. Toss in René Jacobs's bewitching Saul (Harmonia Mundi); the always admirable Maggini Quartet's take on Frank Bridge's Quartets Nos. 2 and 4 (Naxos); the Takács Quartet's magisterial view of Beethoven's late quartets (Decca); and the infinite riches of Gérard Grisey's magnum opus, Les Espaces Acoustiques, as performed by Garth Knox, the Asko Ensemble and the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln under the direction of Stefan Asbury (Kairos), and 2005 looks to have been a very good year, indeed.
Top Ten Recordings, Non-Classical:
1. Antony and the Johnsons - I Am a Bird Now (Secretly Canadian) [more]
2. Nickel Creek - Why Should the Fire Die? (Sugar Hill) [more]
3. Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine (Epic) [more]
4. Made Out of Babies - Trophy (Neurot) [more]
5. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois (Asthmatic Kitty) [more]
6. Ulver - Blood Inside (The End) [more]
7. Napalm Death - The Code Is Red... Long Live the Code! (Century Media) [more]
8. Dave Douglas - Mountain Passages (Greenleaf) [more]
9. Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane - ...at Carnegie Hall (Blue Note) [more]
10. 4g - Cloud (Erstwhile) [more]
The list above should not be read as a ranked survey by the way. Instead, it should be parsed as my five top pop releases, my top-two metal discs, my top-two jazz sets and my single-favorite electroacoustic improv release -- although Made Out of Babies's caterwauling lurch could easily trade places with Ulver's skyscraping blend of vintage prog and Smile-ing vocal arrangements. It's kind of like compiling a single list of the year's best apples, blood oranges, hand grenades and a door knob, but I wanted to be sure that my favorite discs from all of the main "genres" with which I'm regularly consumed were represented.
Albums that didn't make the cut but could have include Shakira's Fijacion Oral, Vol. 1 (Epic), the Fiery Furnaces' Rehearsing My Choir (Rough Trade), Bell Orchestre's Recording a Tape the Colour of Light (Rough Trade), Kanye West's Late Registration (Roc-a-Fella), the Mars Volta's Frances the Mute (Universal), Arch Enemy's Doomsday Machine (Century Media), Meshuggah's Catch 33 (Nuclear Blast), Marty Ehrlich's News on the Rail (Palmetto), Semi-Formal by John Hollenbeck's Claudia Quintet (Cuneiform); and ErstLive 005 by Keith Rowe, Sachiko M, Toshimaru Nakamura and Otomo Yoshihide (Erstwhile).
Top Ten Live Events (chronological):
1. Radu Lupu, Franz Welser-Möst conducting the Cleveland Orchestra, Isaac Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall, February 1-5. Beethoven's piano concertos expertly rendered with no muss or fuss, cutting straight to the heart of the music -- which was boldly paired with Birtwistle, Dutilleux, Roy Harris and more.
2. Don Carlo with Sondra Radvanovsky, Luciana d'Intino, Richard Margison, Dwayne Croft, Feruccio Furnlanetto, Paata Burchuladze; Fabio Luisi conducting; Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, March 7. The very model of ensemble work, in one of Verdi's greatest achievements.
3. Der Rosenkavalier with Angela Denoke, Laura Aikin, Susan Graham, Peter Rose, Håkan Hagegård; Donald Runnicles conducting; Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, March 15. Another superlative cast, highlighted by Denoke's heart-rending Marschallin.
4. Joe Maneri Quartet with Matt Moran, Barbès, April 20. In the first of three final shows with his long-lived quartet, microtonal composer and klezmer-revival forerunner Maneri turned this tiny Park Slope boîte into one big, warm bearhug of sound.
5. Gang of Four, Irving Plaza, May 17. Plenty of younger bands have been making hay with the terse, angular punk-funk sound that Gang of Four perfected (but apparently never patented) back in the ’80s; what made this surprising reunion of the band's four original members so satisfying was the realization that no one has done it better than they did.
6. Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center, June 3 & 5. Imaginative programming, tellingly played and (in the case of Ives's The Unanswered Question) evocatively staged. Other highlights included the marvelously weird original version of Mussorgsky's St. John's Night on the Bare Mountain, and John Adams's luminous nod to Lou Harrison, The Dharma at Big Sur.
7. Charles Rosen, Rolf Schulte, Stephen Gosling and the IFCP Ensemble led by Marc Ponthus, Mannes College of Music, June 20. The Institute and Festival for Contemporary Performance at Mannes presented a fine series of programs this summer, including this brilliantly realized all-Elliott Carter bill featuring Rosen in the Piano Sonata, Schulte and Gosling in the Duo for Violin and Piano, and a crack teacher-and-pupil band in the Triple Duo.
8. James Finn Quartet, The Stone, September 7. This ecstatic-jazz saxophonist surpassed his normally high levels of incantory abandon in this impassioned set, which he and his bandmates -- bassist Jaribu Shahid, drummers Warren Smith and Newman Taylor Baker -- turned into a holy-rolling fundraiser for victims of Hurricane Katrina. Subtle moments (such as a percussion duet of chest pats, leg slaps and stomped feet) packed as much power as did raucous exhortations.
9. ErstQuake II, Collective: Unconscious, September 23-25. Uneven, unwieldy and sometimes unbearably loud, a three-evening festival of electroacoustic improvisation mounted by Erstwhile's Jon Abbey and Quakebasket's Tim Barnes reminded hardy listeners that this particular musical frontier continues to resist attempts at demarcation and codification.
10. James Levine conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Isaac Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall, October 10. A bold bill of American works (Ives, Carter, Foss, Gershwin) lovingly savored by conductor and performers, including standing ovations for Carter and Foss, and a Three Places in New England that I suspect will never be surpassed in my mind's ear.
Most of these events appeared either on my "Best of 2005" list in the classical section of TONY or in the pop staff's aggregate "Top Live Shows" box in that section of the magazine; two, the all-Carter concert and ErstQuake, did not appear on either list. And it should be immediately apparent that the roll is limited to New York-based events only; were that not the case, Doctor Atomic would surely have made this list, as would the Boston Symphony Orchestra's October 29 performance of Mozart's "Posthorn" Serenade and Michael Tippett's A Child of Our Time as conducted by Sir Colin Davis.
Normally, I'd tack on lists of favorite books and films for the hell of it, but I can't really do that this year. To begin with, I only read one new book in 2005: I, Wabenzi (Farrar Strauss Giroux), the first book in a woolly, four-volume by reluctant jazz critic-turned-prizewinning novelist Rafi Zabor. Ideally, I would at least have read the latest offerings by Haruki Murakami and Zadie Smith. Instead, I spent January through September obsessively reading the almost-complete New Yorker essays of Andrew Porter -- that is, everything that was ever collected in hardcover form -- chronologically from start to finish. And after I interviewed Zabor for a piece on Wabenzi, I felt compelled to finally read the book he deems the greatest novel in the history of literature: War and Peace. I'm currently on page 1,011...
...and would no doubt be even further along, were I not constantly interrupting myself with the new DC Showcase Presents anthologies: gloriously inexpensive, 500-page black-and-white anthologies of Silver Age Superman, Green Lantern and Metamorpho comic books (with Jonah Hex and Justice League of America waiting in the wings). Unsurprisingly, the Superman and Green Lantern volumes have been fairly formulaic if tremendously enjoyable -- but good grief, the Metamorpho collection is priceless! True, virtually every single story sticks to a basic template, but the wild energy that animates every panel comes straight out of the golden age of newspaper adventure and humor strips. Of the several artists whose work fills these pages, the two creators with whose styles I was already familiar -- Joe Orlando and Mike Sekowsky -- are equalled and often bettered by co-creator Ramona Fradon, whose work combines a vivid streak of fantasy with a serious aptitude for emotional expression, particularly in the case of this most offbeat hero. As far as comics go, this was my overdue discovery of the year.
As for films, I originally thought that I'd only seen three all year: March of the Penguins and Batman Returns, both of which I enjoyed, and Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, which was a let-down. Scanning the shelves at Blockbuster the other night reminded me of two more that I was apparently desperate to forget: the mostly laughable, gaffe-filled Fantastic Four and the completely disheartening War of the Worlds.
I aim to do better on the literary front in 2006…and who knows, maybe I'll see a few more films as well. (I'm heading out to catch Syriana with girlfriend Lara and our friend Karissa, just as soon as I file this post.) Until next time, then, here's hoping that your holidays are happy, peaceful and fulfilling. And once again, thanks to Alex, Marion, Sieglinde, Marc, Danny, Anastasia, Molly and everyone else who made my splash into the blogosphere this year so eminently worthwhile and enjoyable.
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
Luc Ferrari Feature
Luc Ferrari is the focus of a recent article.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
Chicago Underground Duo to Release New Album
The CUD (new acronym) will release their ninth album in February.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
Soupsongs Live: The Music of Robert Wyatt
This new release is a retrospective of Wyatt’s career with emphasis on his mid-seventies period. Wyatt does not perform on the album, but is said to enjoy it.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
Article on Sun Ra’s Legacy
An article discusses the remaining Arkestra members and their rehearsal house in Philadelphia.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
I Am Sitting in a Room (1970). Alvin Lucier /living minimally/
To represent various decades, New York Magazine profiled people whose fashion and style personify each era. For the nineties, some bloke is living minimally after selling most of his possessions:
Of the one small sofa, a George Nelson daybed, he says: “I can only sit in one place at a time.” ...Needless to say, Freeman isn't exactly stoking the economy; mostly he buys food. His few CDs -- hidden in a built-in drawer -- are minimalists Philip Glass, Steve Reich, and La Monte Young.
The sixties mod woman is at least respectable. The seventies rocker guy scares me.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:33 PM
Dog Years
It was a dog of a year, Elodie Lauten writes. Go read her lament and then come back here and tell us what the highs and lows of your year were--musical or otherwise. (Hey, it's a slow week and a perfect time for navel-gazing)...One of the high spots ofOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 28, 2005 at 01:32 PM
December 27, 2005
New music from Vincent Bergeron
After the Casse-tête de l’Existence, i naturally wanted to continue in the same line (futuristic epic songs), but this time with an emphasis on melody and with a certain primal energy. Synthetic atmosphere and electroacoustics effects are still numerous, but were less important in the composition of this album. They are hiding behind a greater harmony and a cleaner chaos. I learned to select the best ideas. I do think i got a lot better at singing. The album works well to document the recent evolution of my voice : strange androgyny lately (a lot of female singers in my mind). Also, transitions between tracks was a new preoccupation. This time, the lyrics (some english this time) have precise meanings (fighting against nostalgia and in favor of the outsiders of this world) ; Vincent...Van Gogh is based on real facts in the painter’s life. Also, right now, i’m writing music with a vocal in mind. Sometimes, this vocal never appeared because of my personal preference for the instrumental. It happens two times : Machiavélisme Magnifique and Introversion Extravertie.
You can find the music I’m talking about here, but as Monsieur Bergeron said, "This music will remain free for a few months only..." so listen to it while you can. I have had problems on the site trying to open the files with my winamp but i am successful when opening the tracks by simply clicking on "mp3" and using QuickTime player to play the music. The following links will connect you to the music itself, which may take a moment to load.
I have been listening to his new album L’Art du Désarroi, and I have to say, I am impressed! This is very much collage-based experimental music mixed with electronica, classical - atonality and Messiaen (sort of), rock influences, maybe even minimalist influences, its all over the place and practically impossible to describe. Certainly this music will stretch your ears. What I can say simply, and without exaggeration is that is different from what I’m used to listening to.
This is intense music, sometimes harsh and biting, sometimes hitting on some surreal beauty. There is a constant stream of sounds, violins to drums to high and practically non-harmonic electronic frequencies. It takes a bit to get used to. The track the disk is named after, L’Art du Désarroi reminds me of another collage-based group: The books. There is something beautiful in this, but its hard to put one's finger on it.
The singing is a also a little harsh, with all due respect to Monsieur Bergeron, more lyricism can be attained by more on-pitch singing, but the near-sprechstimme adds to the surreal feel of the music. If more lyricism is not the goal, so be it, the instrumentation is beautiful too, frequently bordering on atonality, but beautiful in an expressionistic sense, if that makes sense.
The final track, most lyrical of all the pieces, Nostalgie-Euthanasie , utilizes a traditional descending diatonic on the piano along with the percussion, violins, woodwinds, some electronic sounds found in the other tracks. This music, like others on the disk, is built up into very thick layers resulting in very unusual and constantly shifting textures, but the first half of this track seems to be lighter than most of the others.
Overall, this music can be a little t0o heavy to listen to all at once, but it still very new to the ears. These tracks are all different but they all contain similar traits and a similar feel. Thank you again, Monsieur Bergeron for your fascinating music and your email!
Originally from Music in a Suburban Scene, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 02:22 PM
textbook: music of descending landscapes in hyperspace by david toub
textbook: music of descending landscapes in hyperspace by david toub2'09" piano piece from the 1980s realized through Finale 2006a with Garritan Personal Orchestra - see http://homepage.mac.com/dtoub
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
two sets for string quartet
two sets for string quartetA MIDI realization of a string quartet written between 1990 and 1991. Score and other works freely downloadable at http://homepage.mac.com/dtoub/dbtmusic.html .
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
Newsbits
The CalArts Center for Experiments in Art will hold a performance on January 28th in the LA area. Experimental sound artist Palocsay Lester Leland has opened a MySpace page featuring his music. The Performa 05 festival is reviewed. And finally, Na will be playing a number of east coast dates next month.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
The Net Is a Boon for Indie Labels
An article discusses how sales of indie labels as part of the whole is higher online than at brick and mortar stores.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
Derek Bailey Tribute Available
A three-hour tribute to the late Derek Bailey from WFMU is posted for download.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
Duran (1969-70). Miles Davis
aworks version of the meme of four:
four jobs: dormitory janitor, software engineer, marketing engineer, engineering manager
four tv shows: mclaughlin group, the original bob newhart show, dragnet, ballykissangel
four movies: most mystery science theatre 3000s, fever pitch, return of the secaucus seven, wall street
four living places: saginaw mi, kokomo in, palo alto ca, menlo park ca
four vacation places: edinburgh, mono lake, cabo san lucas, nova scotia
four rather be places: amoeba sf/la/berkeley, any college music library, any arid mountain, any place while wearing headphones
four web sites (mostly real-life blog division): fearful symmetry, deconsumption, markham's behavorial health, google blog search: gable (clark, dan, jenny, et al)
four favorite foods: coconut lemongrass chicken with vietnamese hot sauce at zao's, applewood pizza, nectarines, dark-green vegetables (hi, laura)
four teams i've given up on: detroit tigers, san jose earthquakes, heart of midlothian, indiana pacers
four from john adams: shaker loops, nixon in china, violin concerto, china gates
four from miles: circle in the round, duran, in a silent way/it's about time, bitches brew
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
Your Table is Ready, Mr. Camus
Okay, I'll say it. I hate Christmas. Discovering that Santa Claus really works for Wal-Mart and the whole thing is an elaborate con to move merchandise may only be the first in a series of lifelong disallusionments, but it's one that sticks, especiallyOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
Wilma delays, but doesn't stop, new music in South Florida
Just as the musical season was getting under way down here in South Florida, Hurricane Wilma came along (on Oct. 24) and gave us quite a beating. The storm temporarily derailed what was beginning to be rather an interesting season with plenty of new musicOriginally posted by Greg Stepanich from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 27, 2005 at 01:36 PM
December 26, 2005
Derek Bailey... RIP...
A first brief post to mourn the passing of the great avant-garde guitar player Derek Bailey – and to celebrate his work. Two tracks from the 1975 album: 'Improvisation.' Here's a great interview with Derek on Ubu Web. (This might not be working today as Ubu web have been having some problems). Another one from 1996 here...
More general information about his life and work here...
Download
M3
M9
Buy
Originally from wordsandmusic, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 26, 2005 at 05:24 PM
The Bloody French Do It Again
Leave it to the French, this time in the person of film director Christian Chaudet, to vandalize utterly yet another masterpiece: Stravinsky's lovely and eloquent...Originally from sounds & fury, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 26, 2005 at 05:23 PM
RIP Derek Bailey
This is still hitting the wires, but Derek Bailey passed away yesterday at age 75.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 26, 2005 at 05:01 PM
Jazz From the Vaults in 2005
An article discusses the trove of “new” old jazz that was released this year and goes on to lightly snub today’s jazz scene, which just goes to show that people need to get out more often.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 26, 2005 at 05:01 PM
December 25, 2005
Five Pieces
II. Lebhaft und zart bewegt
III. Sehr langsam
IV. Fließend, äußerst zart
V. Sehr fließend
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:27 PM
Stick Shift Chevy Shake
Stick Shift Chevy ShakeFor more information on this song, please see the liner notes page at http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net/liner/Stick_shift_Chevy_Shake.htm
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
textbook: music of descending landscapes in hyperspace by david toub
textbook: music of descending landscapes in hyperspace by david toub2'09" piano piece from the 1980s realized through Finale 2006a with Garritan Personal Orchestra (see http://homepage.mac.com/dtoub)
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
TetraMnemosyne VII for String Trio by Jeff Harrington (Rehearsal Recording )
TetraMnemosyne VII for String Trio by Jeff Harrington (Rehearsal Recording )http://jeffharrington.org
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Trio for Horn, Violin and Piano by Jeff Harrington
Trio for Horn, Violin and Piano by Jeff HarringtonOriginally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Music by C. HUTCHINS » Blog Archive » Train Filter
Music by C. HUTCHINS » Blog Archive » Train FilterOriginally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Steve Layton - November for Piano
Steve Layton - November for PianoOriginally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Trio for Clarinet, Violin and Piano by Jeff Harrington
Trio for Clarinet, Violin and Piano by Jeff HarringtonOriginally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Some Novel Uses of the MP3 Tag
I've been seeing a few downloads with the referring page, All items tagged system:filetype:mp3. So, a del.icio.us user can use that URL to find all MP3's. That RSS feed at the bottom, FWIW, of the page, can be slurped into many Podcast progs including iTunes.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Music by C. HUTCHINS » In Fifths
Music by C. HUTCHINS » In FifthsOriginally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Welcome to cacophonous.org - the New Music Announcement Blog
Cacophonous.org hopes to become an addon service to a series of systems for announcing and aggregating newly available contemporary classical MP3's. It will provide a listing of new MP3's, a space for commentary, and a series of RSS feeds and ready-to-play playlists. As a first pass, when you click on the Play This Page link on the right, you'll be taken to a Webjay playlist where you can listen to any of the MP3's listed on the cacophonous.org home page.
Use del.icio.us to tag URL's for deep-linked (or not so deep-linked) MP3's. You'll need to set up a del.icio.us account which takes approximately 2 seconds. I propose one tag for our community for right now, but can envisage a few more:
Whenever a new work is tagged in this fashion, it'll show up for anybody who has subscribed to mp3_classical_contemporary tag in their inbox. You 'post' your MP3 URL and tag it with one of those tags. I'd suggest we begin using it for new works and not for our entire catalogs. Please post an MP3 URL not a webpage URL. Otherwise your music will not be included in the automatically generated podcasts and playlists. You can post other URL's and notes in the notes section of the entry forms at del.icio.us. We're doing some pretty nifty RSS re-generation here so if you want all the benefits, please play along.
Users that want to see these new works can subscribe to these tags in their inbox or the RSS feed at cacophonous.org or by visiting the cacophonous.org website.
Use URL: for the MP3 or OGG URL, Description: for title and composer name (don't forget the composer name) and Notes: for a URL of your homepage, and any information you might want to include, (URL's will be automatically turned into HTML) and Tag: mp3_classical_contemporary.
Cacophonous.org is basically going to be a addon service provider to the del.icio.us tag feed, for adding comments, and getting the service into full blown activity.
Originally posted by cacophonous from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Drift Dhikr by Dave Seidel
Drift Dhikr by Dave Seidelhttp://mysterybear.net/article/12/drift-dhikr
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Presenters to Honor Ornette Coleman
Coleman will receive an award next month.
The Association of Performing Arts Presenters will give its award of merit to alto saxophonist and avant-garde icon Ornette Coleman at its annual conference in New York next month.
The conference, which runs January 20-24 at the Hilton New York and Towers, will also include workshops, panel discussions, exhibitions, and more than 1,200 performances. The opening speaker will be actor, singer, and activist Harry Belefonte; an address from pet and musician Sekou Sundiata will close the event.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
DMG Newsletter
Don’t look now, its another DMG Newsletter.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Jason DuMars - Songs from Oil City Available for Free Download
Jason DuMars has released his latest album directly on the net. Check out his page for a free download.
This album was mostly recorded during the first half of the year in our tiny little apartment, and was particularly challenging since I played all of the parts (over 15 different instruments) myself and did the recording part too. The project started out as a series of very loose, rhythmically-ambiguous layered improvisations, but transformed into something more thematically coherent as I progressed. The order of the songs is basically chronological and shows a sort of de-evolution into simplicity — really culminating in the last 6 minutes of the last song. I realized at the end of doing this that it was a very personal reflection on my own struggles with living in the waning years of the Age of Oil. By the way, the real Oil City was located where the Hoh River meets the mighty Pacific Ocean on the Olympic Peninsula, and indeed there is nothing left of it other than memories and driftwood.
In other news, Jason’s jazz trio has a 30 minute video available.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Bagatellen Reviews
A few new reviews this week from Bagatellen.
Decision Dream - Steamroom Variations - 19 Dec 05
Dieter Scherf - Inside-Outside Reflections - 19 Dec 05
Three with Jack Wright - 17 Dec 05
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Medeski, Martin and Wood Article
An article focuses on MMW, previewing their New Year’s Eve performance in Japan with DJ Olive and others.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Maxifest in Baltimore
January 21st is the date for a mini-festival hosted by Thee Maximalists and featuring members of the Muffins.
The festival that features Thee Maximalists, the band that never rehearses, playing music they won’t have written until they take the stage, performed by a lineup that will likely be undetermined until late in the afternoon of the day of the show. Also in attendance and performing for your discerning ears will be a number of other (as yet undertermined) stellar avant rock acts and performers. Paul Sears (weilder of sticks and mallets for The Muffins and part-time pipe banger for Present), who is organizing the fest, promises this show will “put the R.I.O. in oRIOn for the next ten years”. I would urge you to watch this space for updates as things take shape - but I’m guessing you have more exciting things to do, like watching grass grow or paint drying, so I’ll simply urge you to be there. This is an event that may, in fact, start in the afternoon and run fairly late into the evening as we do hope to actually put together a mini avant rock festival. So stay tuned and, ah, watch this space for updates. After all, the grass isn’t growing right now anyway, and you know you’re never going to actually getting around to painting that spare bedroom.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
New Steve Roach Release
The latest effort from Steve Roach is out.
immersion : one is the first of an ongoing series of long form, steady state “zones” created specifically as tone meditations for the living space. the effective low volume, non-dynamic nature of the series can support sleeping as well as creative states and other functions where “music” is considered invasive. purposely untitled, minimal in nature and sonically uninterrupted for 74 minutes, this music brings steve’s years as a sound painter of deep subtlety to a point where the “brush” has only a few bristles and nothing more is needed. immersion : two will appear later in 2006.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
New Releases From ReR USA
ReR USA has announced a few new releases and reissues.
This Heat s-t
Bob Drake “What Day Is It ?”
The Work “Live in Japan”
Skeleton Crew “Learn To Talk/Country of Blinds”
K-Space “Going Up”
Nimby “Songs For Adults”
Louis Pernot “Lute Book”
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Village Voice Top Tens
The Voice is featuring top ten jazz lists from Tom Hull, Nate Chinen and Francis Davis.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Cacophonous.org is Ready for Business
Got the parsing and generation of blog entries working this afternoon. Cacophonous.org now periodically grabs and parses the mp3_classical_contemporary tag RSS feed from del.iciou.us and, using the Movable Type reBlog plugin generates blog entries for every new MP3 that is announced over the service. I'll be adding playlist creation and a player shortly. Comments are open, but moderated, so feel free to praise or diss any of the first few announced works. My provider, doesn't give subdomains except to full packages, so I went ahead and got the cacophonous.org domain too. The basic principals of the service: Use del.icio.us to tag URL's for deep-linked (or not so deep-linked) MP3's. You'll need to set up a del.icio.us account which takes approximately 2 seconds. I propose 2 tags for our community, but can envisage a few more: mp3_classical_contemporary Whenever a new work is tagged in this fashion, it'll show up for anybody who has subscribed to mp3_classical_contemporary tag in their inbox. You 'post' your MP3 URL and tag it with one of those tags. I'd suggest we begin using it for new works and not for our entire catalogs. Users that want to see these new works can subscribe to these tags in their inbox or the RSS feed at cacophonous.org or by visiting the cacophonous.org website. Cacophonous.org is basically going to be a addon service provider to the del.icio.us tag feed, for adding comments, and getting the service into full blown activity. Also, please ignore that default bloggy look at the site. Will be spiffing it up into coolness this weekend....Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
New Music is Too Cacophonous.org
Cacophonous.org is really getting into shape now. There's a Cacophonous.org Podcast RSS Feed and when you add notes to your del.icio.us entry it now turns links into valid HTML. This will let composers add program style notes to their announcements with links to scores and parts and commentary. The coolest thing about setting up something like this is watching how usage generates new ideas about how the service should be run. Please visit, listen and add your comments. Unfortunately for the few comments that were there I accidentally deleted them in part of my code tweak. This won't happen too often, I hope! And please, lets keep it down to only new MP3's and not overburden the system. I'm still approving by hand, so they won't get through anyway, hehe... but it's a pain for me. This means, write lots of new music people, so we can aggregate it into oblivion! Oh yeah, I've also added a XSPF Flash MP3 Streaming Player at the top of the page. If you'd like your MP3's to stream well, of course, keep them encoded 128K or below. And I'm going to try and add those cute little play buttons that Fabricio uses in his GreaseMonkey script next to the MP3 URL's. Any more ideas, please cough them up... Cya at cacophonous.org...Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
Merry Cat-mas (Or Whatever You Say At Your House)
Originally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 25, 2005 at 06:26 PM
December 24, 2005
Teaching the Twentieth Century at Brooklyn College
So I get to teach the fourth (and final) semester next Spring of Brooklyn College’s undergraduate theory sequence: Music 7.4, Twentieth Century Music. Now, good heavens, there are so many different kinds of music in the twentieth century – and so many faOriginally posted by David Salvage from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 24, 2005 at 03:00 PM
S21 Takes Over the Heartland
The unstoppable cultural superpower that is Sequenza21 has officially infiltrated America’s heartland. The innocent, unsuspecting staff of Shoku, a swell little Japanese restaurant in Grandview, OH, found no other recourse but to capitulate this afternoOriginally posted by David Salvage from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 24, 2005 at 03:00 PM
Welcome to cacophonous.org - the New Music Announcement Service
Cacophonous.org hopes to become an addon service to a series of systems for announcing and aggregating newly available contemporary classical MP3's. It will provide a listing of new MP3's, a space for commentary, and a series of RSS feeds and ready-to-play playlists. As a first pass, when you click on the Play This Page link on the right, you'll be taken to a Webjay playlist where you can listen to any of the MP3's listed on the cacophonous.org home page.
Use del.icio.us to tag URL's for deep-linked (or not so deep-linked) MP3's. You'll need to set up a del.icio.us account which takes approximately 2 seconds. I propose one tag for our community for right now, but can envisage a few more:
Whenever a new work is tagged in this fashion, it'll show up for anybody who has subscribed to mp3_classical_contemporary tag in their inbox. You 'post' your MP3 URL and tag it with one of those tags. I'd suggest we begin using it for new works and not for our entire catalogs. Users that want to see these new works can subscribe to these tags in their inbox or the RSS feed at cacophonous.org or by visiting the cacophonous.org website.
Use URL: for the MP3 or OGG URL, Description: for title and composer name and Notes: for a URL of your homepage. I'll be adding support for the notes field shortly. And Tag: mp3_classical_contemporary.
Cacophonous.org is basically going to be a addon service provider to the del.icio.us tag feed, for adding comments, and getting the service into full blown activity.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 24, 2005 at 12:57 AM
TetraMnemosyne VII for String Trio by Jeff Harrington (Rehearsal Recording)
TetraMnemosyne VII for String Trio by Jeff HarringtonOriginally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 24, 2005 at 12:57 AM
December 23, 2005
The Mozart Year Ahead of Us
I am very curious about the upcoming Mozart year. There have already been some serious shots at the bow of the current popular image of Mozart. (Norman Lebrecht's shot is so peculiar, that that it must be parody. Nothing could be more false than when Lebrecht identifies Mozart's music as "dissonance free" (if there is any single characteristic to identify Mozart's music, it's in his unique ability to maximize the dissonance-to-consonance ratio)).
That popular image does deserve some renewal, but it turns on some real subtleties, and I'm not terribly optimistic that those subtleties will be widely taken in. The Peter Schaffer play (and the Milos Foreman film) Amadeus has, for example, taken a central place in the image-making process, but this is due to the fundamental confusion that the play (and film) were biography. Amadeus was not a biography of Mozart; it was quite literally a study in the "love of God" (hence the name) and the creator's apparently arbitrary assignations of gifts on this planet. (It was also a great chance to show off Prague, but that's another case of arbitrarily assigned gifts!)
There are many Mozart's to choose from: the child prodigy, the court musician, or the freelance professional, the virtuoso or the master of simplicity, the provincial Salzberger or the urbane Viennese, the church and court organist or the freemason. Similarly, contemporary performance practice for Mozart's music is anything but the product of a consensus. I have no idea how well Mozart's music and reputation will survive the next year, but I expect that the question of Mozart's balancing between complexity and clarity will play a central role in the discussions to come.
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:35 PM
£1 million legal bill rocks Hyperion
'One of the best-loved institutions in the world of classical music is threatened following a legal ruling which may have far-reaching implications for the ownership of recordings of masterpieces. Hyperion record company is facing potentially devastating bills of £950,000 after losing a case focusing on the entitlement to copyright and royalties.
The battle centred on an acclaimed recording of the French baroque composer Michel-Richard de Lalande for the court of the Sun King, Louis XIV. For the recording an expert on Lalande, Lionel Sawkins, was commissioned to edit the scores. Dr Sawkins regarded his endeavour as amounting to a new musical work, entitling him to copyright and royalties.
After suing, he won at the high court, and again at the court of appeal. Hyperion last week settled costs with Carter Ruck, the firm which represented Dr Sawkins, after receiving an invoice for £758,000. The final settlement left Hyperion with a total bill of £950,000, which included their own costs and damages to Dr Sawkins - close to what Hyperion would spend on music-making over an entire year. Carter Ruck described the ruling as "likely to have far-reaching implications for the music industry". Dr Sawkins told the Guardian he had tried to settle with Hyperion and that the legal defeat was a self-inflicted wound. Simon Perry, managing director of Hyperion, said: "What has happened is the equivalent of finding a new Shakespeare play with spelling mistakes and other minor errors. If you correct those mistakes, would that make it a new play, not by Shakespeare?"
From today's Guardian, follow this link for the full story.
Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Image credit - London Criminal Justice Board
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. If bandwidth is a problem with your permission I will host your image.
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Paying the piper
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:35 PM
One Lore to Another
Michael Finnissy on his own "Folklore II"
Of the many characteristics which define FOLK-music, so wisely and clearly expounded in A.L.Lloyd's Folk Song in England, the preoccupations here are with melody (line) without harmonisation (without reference to Harmonic System); a critique of traditional models (though these might stem equally well from art-music); PRIVATE utterance (as distinct from PUBLIC - some folk singers would not divulge certain songs to collectors because they were too precious); a lack of commerce (none of the pieces were written for money, but for love, or to find out what would happen).
In general these pieces are composite and dialectical rather than singular, drwing on different (not necessarily harmonious) cultures and aesthetic-values. 'We are all bearers of some sort of
folklore' writes Llod, and Folklore is intended as an investigation of my own cultural - primarily musical - assimilating. The second (and longest) of the four chapters is dedicated to Sir Michael Tippett (a controversial 'assimilator' himself), making reference to the Afro-American spiritual song Deep River which concludes Tippett's A Child of Our Time . The chapter is self-sufficient, though it shares materials with the rest of the work- most noticeably the elaborately ornamented modal-line (sustained by the pedal_ derived from piobaireached - traditional Scottish highland bagpiping.
Other elements are drawn from Rumanian lullabies, ancient Chinese music, Blues, the work of Christian Wolff and Cornelius Cardew, Sussex folksong ('Yonder stands a lovely creature'), reminiscences and variants of Norwegian folk material from Chapter One.
from English Country-Tunes (1977)
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:33 PM
Tribute
Stephen Lucky Mosko, a long time composition faculy and friend of CalArts passed away earlier this month. Click here to read the obituary written by composer/conductor Rand Steiger also a CalArts alum.
Lucky's String Quartet was one of the compositions which I saw performed around three years ago.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:33 PM
The Friday Informer: Look For Me In Times Square
I'm outta here early this week, kids, so a safe and fabulous Christmakwanzahanukkah to you and yours. A few last tidbits to get you through the last days of 2005.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:29 PM
Because No One Needs Another Fruitcake
How's this for a last minute gift idea: The complete abolition of transposition.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:29 PM
Cacophonous.org is Ready for Business
Got the parsing and generation of blog entries working this afternoon. Cacophonous.org now periodically grabs and parses the mp3_classical_contemporary tag RSS feed from del.iciou.us and, using the Movable Type reBlog plugin generates blog entries for every new MP3 that is announced over the service. I'll be adding playlist creation and a player shortly. Comments are open, but moderated, so feel free to praise or diss any of the first few announced works. My provider, doesn't give subdomains except to full packages, so I went ahead and got the cacophonous.org domain too. The basic principals of the service: Use del.icio.us to tag URL's for deep-linked (or not so deep-linked) MP3's. You'll need to set up a del.icio.us account which takes approximately 2 seconds. I propose 2 tags for our community, but can envisage a few more: mp3_classical mp3_classical_contemporary Whenever a new work is tagged in this fashion, it'll show up for anybody who has subscribed to mp3_classical_contemporary tag in their inbox. You 'post' your MP3 URL and tag it with one of those tags. I'd suggest we begin using it for new works and not for our entire catalogs. Users that want to see these new works can subscribe to these tags in their inbox or the RSS feed at cacophonous.org or by visiting the cacophonous.org website. Cacophonous.org is basically going to be a addon service provider to the del.icio.us tag feed, for adding comments, and getting the service into full blown activity. Also, please ignore that default bloggy look at the site. Will be spiffing it up into coolness this weekend....Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:29 PM
Speculum Musicae concert
Looked like an interesting program Speculum Musicae did Monday at Merkin: Druckman's Dark Wind, Wuorinen's Fortune (for those of you still scratching your heads over what the rest of us hear in Wuorinen, give Fortune a try--it's one of his better chamberOriginally posted by Christian Hertzog from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:29 PM
Jack Frost Nippin' at Your Nose
Sorry for the bleak outburst below. Sometimes the wife and I like to swap meds and see what happens. This is hardly more cheerful but there are lots of nice tributes and personal remembrances of Stephen "Lucky" Mosco, the West Coast composer and teachOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:29 PM
Nutcracker - A Love Story
Speaking of cruel and unusual punishment, David Thomas has played The Nutcracker more than 400 times...A funny thing happened when the French government tried to crack down on file-sharing. Hat tip to Seth Gordon. Now Playing: Shostakovitch Trios 1 andOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 23, 2005 at 06:29 PM
December 22, 2005
CD sales fall as downloads rise
It should not surprise anyone that in 2005, downloading has more than doubled while CD sales dropped 7%, according to a recent article.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:54 PM
Cuneiform on Tour
The latest tour dates from Cuneiform artists.
AHLEUCHATISTAS
Friday, January 27th, 2006, 8PM - -Static Age Records - 82-A North Lexington Avenue, Asheville, NC 28801 - CD release show!BIRDSONGS OF THE MESOZOIC
Sunday, October 15th -, 4pm - Oral Moses and Birdsongs of the Mesozoic: Extreme Spirituals - Forsyth Chapel at Forest Hills Cemetery - 95 Forest Hills Avenue, Boston, MA (617) 524-0128GUAPO
January 15 - The Spitz - London, UKJanuary 19 - Waterfront - Rotterdam, The Netherlands
January 20 - Aarschot - De Kliner, Belgium
January 21 - Oetinger Villa - Darmstadt, Germany
January 22 - Juz Saarlouis - Saarlouis, Germany
January 24 Hirscheneck - Basel, Switzerland
January 25 - Usine - Geneva, Switzerland
January 26 - Bronson - Ravena, Italy (tbc)
January 27 - Init - Rome, Italy (tbc)
January 28 - Bloom - Milan, Italy (tbc)
January 29 - Lyon, France (tbc)
Sunday, June 25th - NEARFest - Bethlehem, PA
RICHARD LEO JOHNSON
Saturday, June 24th - NEARFest - Bethlehem, PAGARY LUCAS (of FAST ‘N’ BULBOUS)
Thursday Dec. 29th - solo acoustic - The 12-Bar Club, Denmark Street, London England, 9pmSaturday, Jan. 14th - World Financial Center Wintergarden, New York City - Gary plays as part of The Nebraska Project, interpretations of Bruce Springsteen’s songs from the Nebraska album, opening night of the New York Guitar Festival, with Vernon Reid, Jesse Harris and others
Wednesday, Jan. 25th - New York Guitar Festival, Merkin Concert Hall, New York City - Gary plays as part of a Tribute to Skip James, with Alvin Youngblood Hart, Chocolate Genius, and Charlie Sexton
Friday, Feb. 10th - Rubin Museum of Art - 150 West 17th Street - NYC - Gary plays his original solo guitar score live to “The Golem” (1920)
Saturday, Mar. 26th - James River Film Festival, Plant Zero, Richmond, Virginia - Gary plays “Sounds of the Surreal”, accompany silent surrealist film classics by Fernand Leger, Rene Clair and Ladislaw Starowicz with his original solo guitar music; Gary will also play with Hotel X after the performance
Saturday, Apr. 1st - The Flynn Theater, 147 Main Street, Burlington, Vermont - Gary plays “The Golem”
ALEC K. REDFEARN AND THE EYESORES
January 27th - Warehouse Next Door - 1017 7th Street NW - Washington, DC (202) 783 3933 with Garland of Hours and Make A RisingJanuary 28th - Millcreek Tavern - 4200 Chester Avenue, University City, Philadelphia, PA with Make A Rising
SOFT MACHINE LEGACY
February 1 - Milton Keynes, UKFebruary 24 - Rome, Italy
February 25 - Cagliari, Italy
March 3 - Exeter, UK (Vibraphonic Music Festival)
May 18 - Birkenhead, UK (Into The Cool Music Festival)
July 15 - Bad Doberan, Germany (ZAPPAnale Fest, including TriPod and John Etheridge?s Zappatistas)
July 22 - Burg-Herzberg, Germany (Open Air Festival, including TriPod + Hatfield & The North)
UNIVERS ZERO
January 20th - THÉATRE COMMUNAL DE LA LA LOUVIÈRE - Place Communale - 7100 LA LOUVIÈRE, Belgiium (tél 0032 64 215121)
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:54 PM
Frank Zappa “Imaginary Diseases”
To follow up on yesterday’s entry, it looks like the new Zappa release is indeed the long-awaited “Petit Wazoo” live performance. Pre-orders are being taken. In the mean time, here is the info.
Imaginary Diseases
Tracks Produced by Frank Zappa. Vaultmeistered by Joe Travers. Liner notes by Steve Vai. 10 Piece Band! Live! Yes, for more than an hour & you’ll still have over 22 left to do it again every day! Imagine that…!
Tracks:
1. Oddients
2. Rollo
3. Been To Kansas City In A Minor
4. Farther O’Blivion
5. D.C. Boogie
6. Imaginary Diseases
7. Montreal
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:54 PM
RonRuins Live
A rare RonRuins performance is scheduled this evening for New York.
December 22 - the return of RonRuins! This time out the band will be Yoshida Tatsuya, Jesse Krakow, Ron Anderson. Yes, that is Yoshida the drummer from Tokyo’s Ruins with Ron and Jesse from PAK. At the Stone Avenue C and East Second Street, New York City. Two Sets - 8 and 10. $10 www.thestonenyc.com
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:54 PM
Happy Solstice
In the tradition of Jerry's much appreciated postcards from New York (my home town!), I thought I'd share with my S21 friends a couple of postcards from my home of the past 12 years, Malibu, to celebrate the winter solstice. These were taken about 23 miOriginally posted by Alex Shapiro from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Sic Transit
We have a new record. Rodney Lister's Composers Forum post The Poietic Fallacy Fallacy had 121 comments last time I checked and now seems to have morphed into Evan Johnson's post A Gnarly Composer Speaks to His Audience. The discussion got way over my hOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:53 PM
A Book of Diamonds
One of the things you don't think about much when you're a young person is what happens to your stuff when you go to the big Woodstock in the sky. Having now helped clear out homes of a few departed relatives, I can tell you what happens to it. Most ofOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 22, 2005 at 02:53 PM
December 21, 2005
The last tw0 days i've just been listening to Irid...
And i'd also like to thank villanefille for her very kind email. je l'apprécie!
Originally from Music in a Suburban Scene, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 03:19 PM
One Final Note Reviews
The latest from One Final Note:
12 December 2005
:. String Trio of NY w/Oliver Lake Frozen Ropes (Barking Hoop) by David Dupont
:. Joey Sellers’ Jazz Aggregation El Payaso (Nine Winds) by Jason Bivins
:. Decision Dream Steamroom Variations (Red Toucan) by Troy Collins
:. O’Leary/Stanko/Hart Levitation (Leo) by James Beaudreau
:. Jon Lundbom Big Five Chord (no label) by Jay Collins
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Yet Another Year End List
This one is Fred Kaplan’s Jazz A-List, and its got some good ones.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Coming in January at the Tonic
NY’s Tonic has a January schedule that is shaping up.
Thu, Jan 05
8pm The Jamie Saft Blues ExplosionTue, Jan 10
8pm Joe Morris Trio with Ken Vandermark
10pm Ravi Coltrane QuartetWed, Jan 25
8pm Jenny Scheinman String QuartetFri, Jan 27
10pm Marc Ribot’s Ceramic DogTue, Jan 31
8pm & 10pm Vandermark 5
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
JJA 2005 Top 10s
The Jazz Journalists Association has published a set of top 10 lists.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Zappa Petit Wazoo Tease?
The Official Frank Zappa Site seems to be teasing, in their cryptic fashion, that a long-awaited Petit Wazoo live recording is going to be available…maybe.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
The Avant Boutique vs. the Cultural Straphangers
Should we really be satisfied with a narrow cast, even if that's what we've had all along?Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Atlanta: What Has 18 Strings and a Quartertone Fretboard?
Intimate venue gives concertgoers an up-close look at a one-of-a-kind invented instrument.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Charles Ives's Approach to Intonation
It is generally thought that, except for a few pieces with specifically notated quartertones, the remainder of Ives's music was conceived for conventional twelve-tone equal temperament. Johnny Reinhard argues, however, that there is a general tuning for Ives's music that can best be described as Extended Pythagorean tuning.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
A Gnarly Composer Speaks to His Audience
Towards the end (as of the evening of 12/19, anyway) of the hypertrophied comment thread a couple entries below here, Jerry Bowles contributed the following: Let me try again. Because I am not a composer or a musician, I react to music viserally. It doesOriginally posted by Evan Johnson from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Transit Strike Tuesday
Because the buses and trains aren't running, the S.E.M. Ensemble concert tonight at Paula Cooper Gallery is free to anyone who can get there. Elodie Lauten has details. Elodie also has her contribution to the four memes game...Lawrence Dillon has some gOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 21, 2005 at 02:53 PM
December 20, 2005
Lebrecht's Mozartian Wisdom
How does this guy still get work? Some quotes from a recent "article" by Norman Lebrecht:
- Mozart is the superstore wallpaper of classical music, the composer who pleases most and offends least. Lively, melodic, dissonance free: what's not to like?
- Musical genius he may have been, but Mozart was no Einstein. For secrets of the universe, seek elsewhere.
- The key test of any composer's importance is the extent to which he reshaped the art. Mozart, it is safe to say, failed to take music one step forward. Unlike Bach and Handel who inherited a dying legacy and vitalised it beyond recognition, unlike Haydn who invented the sonata form without which music would never have acquired its classical dimension, Mozart merely filled the space between staves with chords that he knew would gratify a pampered audience. He was a provider of easy listening, a progenitor of Muzak.
- In this orgy of simple-mindedness, the concurrent centenary of Dmitri Shostakovich -- a composer of true courage and historical significance -- is being shunted to the sidelines, celebrated by the few.
Mozart is a menace to musical progress, a relic of rituals that were losing relevance in his own time and are meaningless to ours. Beyond a superficial beauty and structural certainty, Mozart has nothing to give to mind or spirit in the 21st century. Let him rest. Ignore the commercial onslaught. Play the Leningrad Symphony. Listen to music that matters.
This has got to be the most chortle-inducing musical article ever written! I'm no huge Mozart fan, usually preferring Haydn for my Classical-era satiation, but this is just so chock-full of misinformation.
Lebrecht is frustrating because he takes on this provocative tone which draws people with little to no classical knowledge to his writings, and they take what he professes at face value. What's even more frustrating is that those readers, who probably only know classical music as "Mozart", are now reading this and feel comfortable to dismiss the entire genre. It's as if somebody suddenly came along and told angsty adolescents that Dali and Klimt were crappy, worthless, superficial artists. Why not take the much more constructive approach of using these familiar (and, perhaps, hackneyed) artists as a starting point and leading the less well-versed but interested fan into new realms of artistic discovery.
I mean, Lebrecht claims that Haydn invented sonata form, which is as fallacious as Al Gore claiming to have invented the internet. It wasn't "invented" at any one time, it emerged gradually, and D Scarlatti and CPE Bach, to name just two obvious examples, were contributing to the development of this form earlier than and concurrently with Haydn.
But hey, maybe Lebrecht is right. Send the newsflash to Britten, Carlos and Erich Kleiber, Mitropoulos, Bruggen, etc. etc. etc. that they all wasted portions of their lives on this "orgy of simple-mindedness." Fat chance
Originally posted by Marcus Maroney from Marcus Maroney - Sounds Like New, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:35 PM
Popes, Advent Calendars, Pillars of Salt
You can't excommunicate him! He's Pope John Paul II!Via Alex Ross, you got yer Bach-themed Advent calendar, and via the Corner, it's yer Narnia-themed hip hop from Saturday Night Live. I forgot to review the Narnia movie, probably because I was so relieved simply to have survived the experience. I would give it an A-; it failed to do the impossible of living up to the book, but it avoided any eye-rolling embellishments, which is more than you can say for the LOTR movies. In fact, the most significant addition (a whole new talking fox character) was actually sort of almost in line with Lewis' creations.
Congratulations are due to Renewable Music on its first bloggiversary, and thanks to Daniel Wolf for squandering part of his celebratory post on some very kind words for the Fredösphere. And yes, if he and I were ever so reckless as to enter the same room, we would turn into pillars of salt, the mountains would melt like wax, the moon would turn to blood, and a flock of geese would fly by in the shape of a swastika.
Originally from Fredösphere, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:34 PM
Making Music for Games
My girlfriend, whose gamer credentials far exceed my own, recently turned my attention to this article. Unfortunately, the author never really approaches an answer to its Cage-referencing opening paragraph. However, it does do a good job of summarizingOriginally posted by Lanier Sammons from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:22 PM
Monday, Monday
Elodie Lauten has seen An American Tragedy and has a positive take...New reviewer Eric J. Bruskin is outraged at a certain record company for butchering some of his favorite Korngold...Tom Myron channels Gil Evans...Jacob Sudol has a poem...Pliable is appOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:22 PM
Last Night in L.A. - "El Nino" as an Oratorio
The Los Angeles Philharmonic first performed John Adams’ “El Nino”(2000) in 2003. The cast was outstanding, but my memory is dominated by the Peter Sellars’ film that accompanied the music. The film transformed the Nativity to Los Angeles, and the FamilOriginally posted by Jerry Zinser from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:22 PM
PM Update
Our amazing saxophonist friend Brian Sacawa has filed a dispatch about Tucson's First Annual boom box Christmas parade, featuring Phil Kline's Unsilent Night (see picture)...Lanier Sammons wants to know what you know, or think, about writing music for viOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:22 PM
Meme of four
Taken up from Alex Ross who took it up from Our Girl in Chicago and Terry Teachout: Four jobs you've had in your life: farmer, newspaperman, corporate magazine editor, consultant to multinationals Four movies you could watch over and over: The UmbrellasOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 20, 2005 at 05:22 PM
December 19, 2005
A joyful NOISE
Tonight we performed Phil Kline's Unsilent Night in Tucson's First Annual boom box Christmas parade--an event that, judging by this year's enthusiasm, will only get better and more exciting each time. We had a good crowd--filled out by several youngsters and three very fanatical four-legged groupies--and could have been confused for an angry mob walking down the street had it not been for the ethereal sounds emanating from our boom boxes. This evening's festivities began as we gathered outside of Centennial Hall just as another large crowd was loitering outside, waiting for the performance of Oklahoma! to begin inside. Tapes and CDs were distributed, directions were given, and the we pushed PLAY. What a sound. Those waiting for the musical turned around to stare and wonder what the hell we were doing! But it seemed like they were enjoying the music--and perhaps secretly wishing they'd brought their boom box so they could ditch the musical. Their loss, I say. The journey down University Ave was fraught with strange looks here and there but then always a smile as we passed by. On 4th Ave we were invited inside a grocery store to parade around the aisles but denied access to Che's Lounge by the bouncer despite some of the patrons' passionate pleas. It was a very beautiful event and everyone had a great time making a really big noise. Thanks to everybody who came out. See you next year!
Originally posted by Brian Sacawa from Brian Sacawa: Sounds Like Now, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 02:01 PM
Tobias Picker's An American Tragedy
Opera Hot. The New Yorker, December 26, 2005.
(Title by Wellsung.)
Originally posted by Alex Ross from Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 02:01 PM
New Piece - Trio for Clarinet, Violin and Piano Available
The draft score and a synthetic realization are now available for my new trio for clarinet, violin and piano. This piece, the first piece I've written since the whole Katrina nightmare, reflects a more sombre and grotesque style of expression...Originally posted by jeff from The Music of Jeff Harrington, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 01:46 PM
Albert Marcoeur on Tour in January
Albert Marcoeur has announced a smal tour of France for next month.
The Tour
11 january 2006 à POITIERS
Scène nationale - 1, place du Maréchal Leclerc
86000 Poitiers
tél. : 05 49 39 40 00
www.letheatre-poitiers.com13 january 2006 à DIJON
Théâtre des Feuillants - 9, rue Condorcet
21000 Dijon
Location : Gibert Musique, place des Ducs, Dijon17 january 2006 à VANDOEUVRE-LES-NANCY
Centre Culturel André Malraux - 1, place de L’Hôtel de Ville
54 500 Vandoeuvre Lès Nancy
tél. : 03 83 56 15 00
www.centremalraux.com19 january 2006 à MAYENCE (Allemagne)
Frankfurter Hof - Augustinerst. 55
55 116 Mainz (Germany)
tél. : 49 6131/22 04 38
www.frankfurter-hof-Mainz.de28 january 2006 à DUNKERQUE
Les 4 écluses - BP 3128
59377 Dunkerque cedex
tél. : 03 28 63 82 40
www.4ecluses.com31 january 2006 à BELFORT
Le Granit - 1, faubourg de Montbéliard
BP 117 - 90002 Belfort cedex
tél. : 03 84 58 67 50
www.theatregranit.com2 and 3 février 2006 à LYON
Le Croiseur (la Scène Gerland)
4, rue Croix-Barret - 69007 Lyon
tél. : 04 72 71 42 2628 march 2006 à REZE
ARC - 24, rue de la Balinière
44400 Rezé
tél. : 02 51 70 78 00
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 01:46 PM
Sun-Treader (1931). Carl Ruggles /itunes/
Hmm, that was interesting. I've been struggling with a cold all morning, while trying to blog. Then, the rain came down quite heavily, my Firefox browser crashed, I rebooted my PC, the rain stopped and now my cold is better. Blog post is lost however. Cause and effect is not clear to me...
Since I'm also mentally challenged right now and don't feel like recreating my post, I'll answer Don Nunn's iTunes meme (and why his post from February showed up in today's Bloglines, I have no idea):
How many songs?
- 10030 items, 40.6 days, 73.60 Gb.
Sorted by song title, the first and last songs:
- '84 Pontiac Dream. Boards of Canada
- ZX-1. Matthew Shipp
Sorted by artist, the first and last songs:
- Hymn to St. Cecilia Op.27. II. Benjamin Britten. Courtesy of cddb, the artist field says "I cannot grow". The leading quote will prove significant later.
- Spiegel Im Spiegel. Arvo Part. The artist field is empty.
Sorted by album, the first and last songs:
- Miles Davis_ John Coltra. Miles Davis. 'Round Midnight.
- Spiegel Im Spiegel. Arvo Part. The album field is also empty.
Top 10 most-played songs:
- A Spider. Helen Boatwright. Ernst Bacon although the composer tag says John Cage.
- Hymn to St. Cecilia Op.27. II. Benjamin Britten. "I cannot grow." In the old iPod, this was at the top of the songs menu and I would accidentally select it (not that I have anything against Benjamin Britten).
- Go to Sleep (Little Man Being Erased). Radiohead. This reminds me -- would someone go out in the rain and get the paper so I can read the SF Chronicle Datebook little man reviews?
- Souvenir. John Cage. Stephen Drury.
- Beneath the Southern Cross. Patti Smith.
- Paint the Silence. South.
- Everywhen. Massive Attack.
- I Saw Drones. Boards of Canada. 27 seconds long.
- Endangered Species. Alvin Curran. Didn't realize I listened that much to this.
- Suicide in an Airplane. Leo Ornstein. Marc-André Hamelin.
Top 10 recently played songs:
- Ascension (Don't Ever Wonder). Maxwell. I don't have a clue who Maxwell is but the last 10 tracks I've played are all black artists.
- D's Choice. Matthew Shipp.
- ZX-1. Matthew Shipp.
- Yaphet. Miles Davis. The Bitches Brew 4-CD set was on sale last night at Tower.
- Corrado. Miles Davis.
- Trevere. Miles Davis.
- Ndiwa. Kerfala Kante. Le Blues est ne en Afrique (Africa Mother of the Blues).
- Diarabi. Boubacar Traore. Le Blues est ne en Afrique.
- Nyamatoutou. Nahawa Doumbia. Le Blues est ne en Afrique.
- Eighty Nine Ten. Snooky Prior. Chicago Blues Harmonicas.
Find “sex”; how many songs? 25, including "sextet" and "le sexisme" (Hi, Kim Gordon).
Find “death”; how many songs? 22 and how come I don't recognize Death of the Machines by George Antheil? Similarly, I just finished The Long Emergency where Kunstler uses (Ira) Gershwin lyrics to make a point about the end of modernity. Try the Amazon search inside this book link that may or may not work. Scroll down to the last paragraph on the page and then to the next page. Scary book by the way.
Find “love”; how many songs? 199, including the group "Love." I really enjoy their alternate track (Your Mind and We Belong Together) where Arthur Lee is captured for eternity pointing out screw ups by the guitarist -- shades of Buddy Rich, in a way. I recognize not everyone, at least in my household, sees this as humorous.
Find “peace”; how many songs? 9 including FrogPeace by Kristine Burns.
Find “rain”; how many songs? 133 including the group "Train."
Find “sun”; how many songs? 98 including the genius "Sun Ra."
aworks bonus question - Find “sun-treader”; how many songs? 1 although again the composer tag says John Cage rather than Carl Ruggles.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 01:46 PM
Unsilent Night (1992). Phil Kline /tradition/
This is turning into a holiday tradition. Again I won't be able to attend Phil Kline's Unsilent Night in San Francisco. From the announcement:
A moving piece of ambient public art, Unsilent Night can be compared to a holiday caroling party, except that participants don't sing. Instead, each carries a boombox playing a separate cassette, CD, or MP3 that becomes part of the piece. In effect, Kline and his co-performers become single elements in a huge, mobile sound system.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 01:46 PM
Full of Color and Utterly Boring
Full of color and utterly boring... haha your comment, Ian Moss (in a comment at S21), reminded me of the NY Times article this morning about movie flops:Where Have all the Howlers GoneBut the very worst films achieve a special distinction, soliciting membership in a kind of negative canon, an empyrean of anti-masterpieces. It is this kind of bad movie - the train wreck, the catastrophe, the utter and absolute artistic disaster - that seems to be in short supply.And this is very bad news. Disasters and masterpieces, after all, often arise from the same impulses: extravagant ambition, irrational risk, pure chutzpah, a synergistic blend of vanity, vision and self-delusion. The tiniest miscalculation on the part of the artist - or of the audience - can mean the difference between adulation and derision. So in the realm of creative achievement, the worst is not just the opposite of the best, but also its neighbor. And another comment Elsie made a few weeks ago, after listening to too much Murail and Hurel, that 'spectralists aren't bungee jumpers.' And something I say all the time on my blog and in the newsgroups for years it that it is mediocrity that is recognized today, and has always been recognized in the day. Trying to write something different is dangerous and if you depend on your reputation for your $$$, such as most academics do, or even most careerists do, then it is problematic to say, 'ah fuck iit' and write something totally off the wall, disgusting, dirty, or even perfect and clean, but totally true to yourself. That was a decision I made after a family incident... to just go ahead and risk it. Even if it was horrible, eventually something awesome would come out or else I would prove that I do in fact suck. Anything is better than sticking with the tried and true, the muddling middle, the competent and forgettable....Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 01:46 PM
Ring Ting Tinglelin' Too
Originally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 19, 2005 at 01:46 PM
December 18, 2005
here's a tunnel vision preview of the opening pia...
here's a tunnel vision preview of the opening piano cadenza to the incredible Xenakis violin and piano duo, Dikhthas.
claude helffer, pianno
irvine arditti, violin
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 18, 2005 at 02:39 PM
more X
In Tetora for string quartet, I'm hearing modal, microtonal-type tuning leaning towards Japanese/Indonesia music.
Or something of the kind.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 18, 2005 at 02:39 PM
They've Got Ann!
James Newton Howard's music for the new King Kong film is decent enough but if you want the real deal, pick up Max Steiner's complete film score from the 1933 original movie, now available on Naxos, lovingly restored by John Morgan and performed by the MOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 18, 2005 at 01:15 PM
December 17, 2005
The good old days
Originally from The Rambler, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:45 PM
Too busy to post something new so here's that meme I forgot to post in March
You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?Gravity's Rainbow. So I can happily quote Proverbs for Paranoids ("You hide, they seek") and tell my kids goodnight stories about Byron the Bulb, gauchos in the Alps, and explain the difference between Rossini and Beethoven.
Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
Could be. Among her names, my daughter has both Emma and Miranda.
What are you currently reading?
The Parmenides poem, The Winters Tale.
The last book you bought is:
A guide to the archaological sites on Delos.
The last book you read:
Iron Council by China Meliville.
Five books you would take to a deserted island:
Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
The Recognitions by William Gaddis
The Tempest (I assume that it's no fair to take a complete works!)
The Venture of Islam by Marshall G.S. Hodgson
Seeing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees: A Life of Contemporary Artist Robert Irwin by Lawrence Wechsler
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:44 PM
First Annual
(I'm still interested in doing a group effort. It could be a good vehicle for promoting new music and the world around it. But it would have to be a group of five to seven composers who are each equally committed to posting at least once a week in order to insure that the readers keep coming back at a regular rhythm. Anyone else?)
Among the musicians in the blogoplan* that I've encountered in the past year, it's possible that I most enjoy reading Fred Himbaugh of the Fredösphere. Now, given our differences in musical taste, religion, politics, etc., I would guest that if he and I were in the same room, it's possible that we'd either turn into pillars of salt or disappear into the interdimensional void in an act of spontaneous and total cancellation. But nevermind, for one of the joys of the blogoplan is never having to be in the same room, and that gives one the luxury of reading with as much or as little distance and passion as one wants. Fred Himbaugh really is a musician who likes to write about music more than himself, and does so always with good humor. That's plain decent.
Moreover, he likes dirigibles and cooking, two interest that are infinitely recommendable in my books.
*blogoplan: the set of blogs known to flat-earthers.
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:44 PM
Christmas music trivia
New music for an old instrument: 20th century composers who wrote works using a harpsichord included Ernst Krenek, Carl Orff, Rudolf Moser, Bohuslav Martinů, Wolfgang Fortner, Darius Milhaud, Hugo Distler, Lou Harrison, Vittoro Rieti, Florent Schmitt, Iannis Xenakis (Komboi), György Ligeti (Continuum) Elliot Carter, Milton Babbitt, and of course Francis Poulenc, and Manuel de Falla. Additions to this list please using the comments facility.Old music in the New World: John Frederick Wolle conducted the first American performance of Bach's B minor Mass in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in 1900, one hundred and fifty-one years after the composer's death
Music to be terrorised by: In the 1936 'Hitler' Olympics young gymnasts in the opening ceremony performed to music by Carl Orff scored for a large ensemble of recorders and percussion. At the 1972 Olympics, which were overshadowed by a terrorist attack, Orff arranged the medieval canon 'Sumer is icumen' for choir and a mixture of early and modern instruments.
Strange but true: Edgar Varèse (below) studied at the Schola Cantorum in Paris, and conducted performances of early
music for many years. In New York in 1947 he conducted a programme titled 'Modern Music of the 16th and 17th century' which comprised works by Grigny, Couperin, Monteverdi, Charpentier, Frescobaldi, Schütz and Grandi. Other students at the influential Schola Cantorum, which was a leading force in the 20th century early music revival, included Albert Roussel, Erik Satie, Isaac Albéniz, Joaquín Turina, Bohuslav Martinů, Georges Auric, Arthur Honegger, and Quincy Porter.Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Image credits: Header - Pliable, taken on Nikon F50 SLR on 200 ASA film using built-in flash. Berlin Christmas 2005
Footer - Edgard Varèse from Wikipaedia
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. If bandwidth is a problem with your permission I will host your image.
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Diary for evening of 12th May 2005
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:44 PM
Mini v. Maxi
All art may aspire to the condition of music, as per Pater, but music has the nasty habit of aspiring towards art's labels, which leads to terribly botched brandings like "impressionism".Another dreadfully off-the-mark label is minimalism. Quite often, the one thing John Adams and Philip Glass' music is not is minimalist. Webern, on the other hand, is a verifiable minimalist. He uses the barest of materials. Even his rows aren't really rows at all, but variations on a slight three-note cell. His scores usually contain more rests than notes, and each figuration is a world unto itself, freighted with meaning and capable of doing in ten seconds what Mahler does in ten minutes.
Those who tend to cling to music's misbrandings counter with the claim that Webern is, in fact, a maximalist: making the most out of every last note. Again, a woeful misapplication of a term that's widely used in other art forms to describe fellows like David Foster Wallace who submit telephone directories to their publishers and call them novels. Maximalist is the last thing Webern is.
Six Bagatelles
I. Mäßig
II. Leicht bewegt
III. Ziemlich fließend
IV. Sehr langsam
V. Äuerst langsam
VI. Fließend
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:43 PM
Bagatellen Reviews
The latest reviews from Bagatellen.
Joe Fiedler Trio - Plays the Music of Albert Mangelsdorff - 14 Dec 05
Tomas Korber/Dan Warburton - Conspiracy Theory - 13 Dec 05
Joe McPhee & John Snyder - Pieces of Light - 13 Dec 05
Rich Halley Trio - Mountains and Plains - 07 Dec 05
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
Odyssey the Band - Back in Time Release in Pi
The latest effort from James Blood Ulmer is out on Pi Recordings.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
Latest Dusted Reviews
A handful of new reviews from Dusted:
Artist: Mats Gustafsson and David Stackenäs
Album: Blues
Label: Atavistic
Review date: Dec. 11, 2005Artist: Albert Ayler
Album: Slugs’ Saloon
Label: ESP-Disk
Review date: Dec. 11, 2005Artist: Alvin Lucier / The Barton Workshop
Album: Wind Shadows
Label: New World
Review date: Dec. 5, 2005
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
DMG Newsletter
Hey, yo, another DMG Newsletter.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
Zorn / Haino Set Reviewed
A rather irreverent review of a recent Zorn / Haino performance has been posted.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
Newsbits
Polish label Not Two will be putting out an Anthony Braxton / Chris Dahlgren duo CD entitles ABCD. In related news, the Braxton discograpy has recently been updated. Composer/performer Barry Schrader has updated his site with his latest release and performance news. Faith Strange Recordings has a new release from experimental duo Gods of Electricity.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
Bay Area Creative Music Calendar
The latest set of shows in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Thu 1/5 8:00 PM Luggage Store Gallery New Music Series [1007 Market St. @ 6th Street SF]
9pm: Isreali saxophonist Ariel Shibolet with Damon Smith (double bass)
8pm: Jerome Byerton (snare/cymbals) solo and duo with Kristian Aspelin (guitar)Fri 1/6 8:00 PM 21 Grand [416 25th St @Broadway Near 19th Street BART Oakland]
Ariel Shibolet (Tel Aviv, Israel)…………soprano saxophone
Jen Baker (Oakland)………………..trombone
Damon Smith (Oakland)………….double bass
Jerome Bryerton( chicago)………percussionSat 1/7 8:00 PM 1510 8th St Performance Space [1510 8th Street Oakland]
improvised music with israeli food Ariel Shibolet
2 sets:
Ariel Shibolet (Tel Aviv, Israel)…………soprano saxophone
in various combination with:Aurora Josephson……………………………voice
Tom Bickley……………………………………..recorders, voice
Jon Raskin………………………………………Eb saxophones
Phillip Greenlief………………………………reeds
Josh Allen……………………………………….tenor saxophone
Jacob Lindsay………………………………. Ab, bass & contrabass clarinets
Henry Kaiser………………………………….acoustic guitar
Tim Perkis…………………………………….electronics
Scott R. Looney……………………………..hyperpiano & electronics
Damon Smith ………………………………..double bass
Jerome Bryerton…………………………….percussionSat 1/7 8:00 PM 1510 8th St Performance Space [1510 8th Street Oakland]
2 Sets of Improvised Music
Featuring Israeli saxophonist Ariel ShiboletTue 1/10 8:00 PM Hemlock Tavern [1131 Polk Street Between Post and Sutter SF]
The Weasel Walter QuartetWeasel Walter……………………………………….drums
Josh Allen……………………………………………..tenor saxophone
Randy Hunt…………………………………………..amplified double bass
Damon Smith………………………………………..amplified double bassWed 1/11 8:00 PM Meridian Gallery [545 Sutter Street SF]
Philip Gelb will perform pieces on shakuhachi inspired by and dedicated to the painter, Robert Kostka.Thu 1/12 8:00 PM Luggage Store Gallery New Music Series [1007 Market St. @ 6th Street SF]
Jon Brumit CD release eventSat 1/14 8:00 PM ImprovGarage [4514 West Street Oakland, CA 94607]
Evander Music Presents Tony Malaby & Friends at ImprovGarageSun 1/15 1:00 PM ImprovGarage [4514 West Street Oakland, CA 94607]
Evander Music Presents Tony Malaby WorkshopMon 1/16 8:00 PM 1510 8th St Performance Space [1510 8th Street Oakland]
improvised music food:8pm
Tony Malaby…………………………………………tenor saxophone
Phillip Greenlief…………………………………….reeds
Noah Phillips…………………………………………prepared guitar
Damon Smith………………………………………..double bass
9pm
Tony Malaby………………………………………….tenor saxophone
Scott R. Looney……………………………………..piano
Randy Hunt……………………………………………double bass
Timothy Orr……………………………………………drumsMon 1/16 8:00 PM 1510 8th St Performance Space [1510 8th Street Oakland]
Balance Point Acoustics Presents Tony Malaby in 2 different quartet setttings at 1510 Performance Space - OaklandWed 1/18 8:00 PM Stork Club [2330 Telegraph Avenue Oakland]
The Weasel Walter QuartetWeasel Walter……………………………………….drums
Josh Allen……………………………………………..tenor saxophone
Randy Hunt…………………………………………..amplified double bass
Damon Smith………………………………………..amplified double bassThu 1/19 8:00 PM Luggage Store Gallery New Music Series [1007 Market St. @ 6th Street SF]
8pm Daniel Martin-McCormick, solo prepared guitar/electronics
9pm TBAFri 1/20 8:00 PM Moody’s [10007 Bridge Street Truckee, CA]
Todd Sickafoose’s Blood Orange at Moody’sSat 1/21 8:00 PM Trinity Chamber Concerts [Trinity Chapel 2320 Dana Street Berkeley, CA 94704]
Pianist Sarah Cahill performs recent music by Bay Area composers including Terry Riley and Daniel David Feinsmith, as well as a few phantasmagorical pieces by Leo Ornstein.Sun 1/22 8:00 PM Canvas Gallery [1200 9th Avenue (@Lincoln) San Francisco, CA]
Todd Sickafoose’s Blood Orange - West Coast TourThu 1/26 8:00 PM Luggage Store Gallery New Music Series [1007 Market St. @ 6th Street SF]
8pm Solos & Duos
Marc Elzweig - clarinets (Chi)with
Michael Perlmutter - saxophones Plus more TBA
9pm TBAFri 1/27 8:00 PM ODC Dance Theatre [3153 17th Street at Shotwell SF]
The San Francisco Tape Music FestivalSat 1/28 8:00 PM ImprovGarage [4514 West Street Oakland, CA 94608]
Evander Music Presents
Paul Rutherford - Torsten Muller - Harris Eisenstadt Trio
@ImprovGarageSat 1/28 8:00 PM ODC Dance Theatre [3153 17th Street at Shotwell SF]
The San Francisco Tape Music FestivalSun 1/29 8:00 PM ODC Dance Theatre [3153 17th Street at Shotwell SF]
The San Francisco Tape Music Festival: A full evening devoted to the music of Luc Ferrari (1929-2005).Mon 1/30 8:00 PM Yoshi’s [510 Embarcadero West Oakland]
Nels Cline Plays the Music of Andrew Hill
Bobby Bradford - cornet; Ben Goldberg - clarinets; Andrea Parkins - electric accordion; Devin Hoff - contrabass; Scott Amendola - drums; Nels Cline - guitar
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
Subdivided We Stand
If nothing else, can digital technologies discourage composers from creating multi-movement compositions?Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
The Friday Informer: But Tell Me What You Really Think
Win commissions and influence conductors with some clever word play, keep your drummer in line, and more...Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
The Morning After
We're resting on our laurels around S21 today (or maybe we're just goofing off) but it was great fun for me to meet Elodie, Jeff, and Ian last night for the first time in the "real" world, whatever that is these days, and chat with friends like Jeff JamesOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 17, 2005 at 02:40 PM
December 16, 2005
Damn Art Newspaper
Originally from ionarts, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:51 PM
College Choir Memories
I'm listening to Aaron Copland: A Centenary Tribute. Hearing the Fanfare for the Common Man reminded me of choir tour during spring break one year back in my undergraduate days, when the brass ensemble with us would play that piece while the choir processed into the sanctuary du jour. (It was a religious college choir giving concerts of sacred music in churches.) We basses would take our natural, superior place on the topmost step of the risers as the trumpet soared and the gong roared and some terrified baby inevitably screamed its head off. It was during one of those moments I concluded the piece would have been better titled Fanfare for the Common God.I'm also enjoying a recording of Brahms' Liebeslieder-Walzer sung by an all-star quartet. "Brahms needs the most mature voices." You hear that said if you hang around choirs long enough. There's a kind of old-school choral sound -- dark, rich tone with unbuttoned vibrato -- that is particularly suited to Brahms and which is produced naturally by older voices. My undergraduate choral experience was dominated by a director who loved that sound and made it his single-minded mission to beat all that was youthful, thin, and shrill out of our voices. (He would occasionally turn to the sopranos and say, "you are all 50 years old, you weigh 300 pounds, and you're Russian: now sing!") This was in the time before it was widely appreciated what can be achieved by smalls voices with straight tone in the right repertoire. Thus, although he achieved much in the pursuit of the sound he wanted, the result suffered from one-dimensionality, and the whole enterprise had a quixotic air about it.
I suppose the ideal performance of these waltzes by Brahms would be by a mid sized choir of obese, 50 year old Russians, but this quartet is great nevertheless. Of the four, I particularly admired Olaf Bär, who possesses one of the most exquisitely perfect bass names I've ever heard (and he sings real good too).
Originally from Fredösphere, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:51 PM
thimbles + cello =
It took me awhile to get round to this, however it is better late than never. This is a long overdue tribute to Rachel Johnston and Miranda Wilson (two fellow kiwi colleagues) and their work in the premiere recording of the Sofia Gubaidulina Cello Quartet, Quaternion, on Chandos. (Featuring also Russian cellists, Alexander Ivashkin and Natalia Pavlutskaya)
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Contempo 2006 Concert Schedule
Several promising chamber classical performances in the first half of 2006 from this Chicago based organization.
Double Bill
Contempo and Patricia BarberSaturday, 7 January 2006, 7:30pm
Museum of Contemporary ArtMusicians to include:
eighth blackbird
Pacifica Quartet
Cliff Colnot conductorPatricia Barber vocals and piano
Joe Locke vibraphone
Patricia Barber Quartet
Choral ThunderGyörgy Ligeti
String Quartet No. 1 (Métamorphoses nocturnes)
Yao Chen
Transience for chamber ensemble
Joan Tower (arr. Allen Otte)
Petroushskates for sextet
Patricia Barber
MythologiesIn its second annual double bill and first appearance at the MCA, Contempo continues to seek the common ground between some of today’s finest music, regardless of genre. Complementing a performance of recent favorites by Contempo’s celebrated resident ensembles eighth blackbird and the Pacifica Quartet, jazz pianist, singer and songwriter Patricia Barber will preview her highly-anticipated new song cycle Mythologies, inspired by Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Also featured on the program will be a rare Chicago appearance by vibraphonist Joe Locke and participation by the gospel choir Choral Thunder.
For ticket information, click hereContinental Divide
Sunday, 5 March 2006, 5:00pm
Roosevelt University, Ganz HallMusicians to include:
eighth blackbird
Pacifica Quartet
Julieanne Klein soprano
John Sampen saxophone
David Schrader harpsichord
Marilyn Shrude piano
Cliff Colnot conductorBarbara White
Learning to See for sextet
Vache Sharafyan
Sonata for saxophone and piano
Sofia Gubaidulina
Meditation on the Bach Chorale “Vor deinen
Thron tret ich hiermit” for string quintet and harpsichord
Betty Olivero
Kave’i Avi’r (a volo d’uccello) for chamber ensemble
Roberto Sierra
Cancionero Sefardi for soprano and quintetExamining the intersections between creative inspiration, personal style and cultural identity, Contempo presents the Chicago premieres of works from three separate continents and five very different artistic perspectives. From Barbara White’s vibrant and quirky set of visually-inspired miniatures, through Betty Olivero’s mysteriously evocative homage to Luciano Berio, to Roberto Sierra’s festive and exotic set of songs, this program will delight in both its richness and its depth.
For ticket information, click herePierrot Lunaire: a Cabaret Opera
directed and designed by Blair ThomasThursday, 30 March; Friday, 31 March; Saturday, 1 April 2006, 7:30pm
Museum of Contemporary ArtMusicians to include:
eighth blackbird
Lucy Shelton voiceArnold Schoenberg
Pierrot Lunaire for voice and chamber ensemble
Jacob Druckman
Reflections on the Nature of Water for marimba
Jennifer Higdon
Zango Bandango for sextetContempo’s acclaimed resident sextet eighth blackbird and soprano Lucy Shelton team up with Blair Thomas in a staging of Arnold Schoenberg’s seminal atonal song-cycle Pierrot Lunaire. Pierrot — the comic stock character from Italian commedia dell’arte — is reflected through the dark lens of late nineteenth-century European cabaret. Richly emotive and overflowing with expressionistic longing, Schoenberg’s masterful setting of twenty-one poems by the Belgian symbolist Albert Giraud summons the spirit of Pierrot in a search for artistic inspiration. Thomas’s evocative staging of puppetry, shadows, and costumed members of eighth blackbird visually underscores Schoenberg’s powerful, hallucinatory musical landscape.
Tomorrow’s Music Today
Performance of works by young talent has always been an integral part of Contempo’s mission. In these annual concerts, some of today’s finest young composers turn their mental sound images into reality, interacting with Contempo’s world-class artists-in-residence throughout the compositional and rehearsal process. Come hear the results!
Concert 1
Friday, 12 May 2006, 7:30pm
The University of Chicago, Fulton Recital HallMusicians to include:
eighth blackbird
Pacifica QuartetNew works by Eric Brinkmann, Simon Fink,
Carmel Raz and Steve WinfieldConcert 2
Friday, 19 May 2006, 7:30pm
Roosevelt University, Ganz HallMusicians to include:
eighth blackbird
Pacifica Quartet
Tony Arnold soprano
Cliff Colnot conductorNew works by David M. Gordon, April Mok
and Krzysztof Wolek
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Google Music Search
Google is now offering a music search service. Not too bad for quickly hunting down information, though it doesn’t contain entries for the truly obscure…
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Obituary: Donald Martino (1931-2005)
Steven Mackey reminisces about his former teacher Donald Martino, a composer of sensual and sometimes even schmaltzy serial music, who died last week.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Cleveland: Is Cavani the New Kronos?
After a concert of contemporary music by American women, you might say the homegrown Cavani Quartet is on track to become the next Kronos Quartet.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Generalizing the Announcement Service
So, I'm starting to see how there's a real need for all types of musicians to have this service. I'm not sure if I want to create a community for commenting on all types of new music, but I think it would be interesting to have hundreds of genre-specific RSS feeds representing announcements of new MP3's as they come online. I've got a XML-RPC server up and running and am getting to the API. It'll be like a blog ping server where an artist or an OMD or a rep can do a XML submit of the info I need, or a full blown XSPF playlist or fill out a form DIY style. Comments?...Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Shoobee Bop Bop
The first in a two-part series of concerts called composer=performer: plugged unplugged is tonight at 8 pm Symphony Space and it features clarinetist Derek Bermel, flutist Valerie Coleman (of Imani Winds) and pianist Beata Moon, who will perform their owOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
red fish blue fish Nov. 19
Steven Schick is, if not the finest percussion soloist in the world, certainly on the short list for that title. Ever since he came to University of California, San Diego to teach percussion, talented performers from around the globe have come to study wiOriginally posted by Christian Hertzog from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
ASCAP Deems Taylor Award Ceremony
Some stalwarts of the Sequenza21 community who made it to this evening's 38th ASCAP Deems Taylor Award ceremony at Rose Hall. That's Ian Moss on the left, me with the award, Jeff Harrington, Elodie Lauten, with a display of a S21 web page, and David SalOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 16, 2005 at 01:50 PM
December 15, 2005
Links for the week
Originally from The Rambler, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:55 PM
cac.ophono.us
Originally from The Rambler, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:55 PM
Baltimore diary
I'm back in Tucson now after a fun and successful trip to Baltimore. Actually, the previous post was a little misleading because I didn't really go home on the 11th as planned. A combination of delays and bad weather at Chicago Midway forced me to rebook my flight for the following day. Well, I wasn't forced, but there was a chance that they wouldn't hold my connecting flight in Chicago and the last thing I wanted was to be stranded in the Chicago airport for a sleepless night. Besides, I wasn't really ready to leave Baltimore anyway.
My set at the Red Room on Saturday night was one of the best live performance experiences I've had in recent memory. My being there was a little bit of a stretch for the folks who book the talent simply because I was playing composed music--despite how experimental it might be. But they take chances at the Red Room and I'm glad that gave me the opportunity. I was humbled by the crowd--which included a surprise appearance by a couple of great friends--that absolutely filled the room. This was not a normal crowd though. Everyone was completely engaged with the music. I was an incredible experience and one that I wish I could have everytime I perform. A room full of individuals interested in experimental music and improvisation makes for a very embracing and warm atmosphere. John Berndt and the rest of the crew there have done an amazing job of developing a loyal and appreciative following for the venue. They deserve an immense amount of credit for cultivating an audience for music on the edge.
There is something to be said for the intimacy of venues like the Red Room. Performer and audience are on the same level--literally, as there is no stage figuratively elevating the performer. Those who come to shows places like that are usually very engaged in the moment of music making. Being up close and almost "wrapped up" in an audience like that transmits a certain energy. The audience wants to concentrate intensely, which in turn augments the performer's mental state and communicative abilities. At the Red Room, some were swaying to music that didn't have a pulse while one was moved to do yoga poses during Michael Pisaro's trance-inducing, mediatative here (2/2). The experience was truly cool.
The rest of my time in Baltimore was as anticipated--very fun. I was able spend time eating at some of my favorite old spots like the ever hip City Cafe. I also got some very good uninterrupted practicing in and was able to reconnect with a very special girl. Ah, Baltimore.
Originally posted by Brian Sacawa from Brian Sacawa: Sounds Like Now, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:54 PM
Rilke/Webern
Two songs for medium voice & eight instruments
You, whom I do not tell
that I lie awake weeping
at night,
whose manner makes me sleepy,
like a cradle;
you, who does not mention
when she is awake because of me.
How if we were to endure
this glory
without remaining silent?
Behold the lovers:
once they have begun to confess,
how untruthful they become.
II.
You alone create me.
You alone I can interchange.
For a while it is you;
then again it is the rustle,
or it is a fragrance
disappearing.
Ah, in my arms I have lost them all;
you only, you are always born again:
because I never held you,
I hold you fast.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:53 PM
James Dillon
traumwerk book 1 for two violins (1995-96)
violinist: irvine arditti & graeme jennings
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:53 PM
December agenda
Before checking out for what has unfortunately become an annual book-finishing holiday hiatus, I'd like to commend to your attention scattered events around New York. The St. Lawrence Quartet, one of the most passionately committed chamber groups in North America, are losing their co-founding violinist Barry Shiffman to the Banff Centre in Canada. It's a very amicable parting of ways (in contrast to the remarkable ugliness that has attended the split-up of the Audubon Quartet). You'll have several more chances this season to see the St. Lawrences in their classic incarnation; they'll be participating in Lincoln Center's Osvaldo Golijov festival in February, and they're playing a free show Monday (12/5) at Mikhail Baryshnikov's new arts center (see Steve Smith's blog for more on this innovative series). Other events that seem worthy: the Philadelphia Orchestra, giving New Yorkers a taste of their Beethoven-plus-modern series at Carnegie on Tuesday (new Jennifer Higdon piece; I wish they'd brought the new Daniel Kellogg, too); the Keys to the Future piano festival on Tuesday and Thursday at Greenwich House in the West Village, with Lisa Moore, Joseph Rubinstein, Molly Morkowski, and Tatjana Rankovich playing Ligeti, John Halle, Martin Bresnick, David Del Tredici, Paul Lansky, and others; the young British pianist Steven Osborne at Zankel on Thursday; the category-confounding Anti-Social Music will hold a "CD release kegger" with the Hold Steady on Saturday night, and, on the same night, Eighth Blackbird celebrates its tenth anniversary; the master Lieder singer Christoph Prégardien undertaking Winterreise at Lincoln Center on what will hopefully be a bleakly beautiful Sunday afternoon; a composer=performer concert at Symphony Space on Dec. 14, in which Derek Bermel (now blogging), Beata Moon, and Valerie Coleman will assist in the performance of each other's music; and Prism Concerts, Judith Clurman's promising new series at Central Synagogue, presents a Handelathon with such feisty young singers as Jennifer Aylmer and Kevin Burdette, Dianne Berkun's Brooklyn Youth Chorus, and the Orchestra of St. Luke's. Also, the masterly Charles Curtis will be presenting modern cello works over the next couple of weeks under the auspices of La Monte Young's MELA Foundation; Morton Feldman's Patterns in a Chromatic Field falls on Dec. 14. Happy holidays, and see you in 2006.
Filmic postscript: Brokeback Mountain is not merely the great serious gay movie that some of us have been waiting for our whole lives, but a classic portrait of American loneliness and longing. There's a haunting score by Gustavo Santaolalla, Golijov's collaborator on Ayre. The New Yorker web site has the Annie Proulx story on which the movie is based. Personal footnote: Kate Mara, who plays opposite Heath Ledger in the quietly shattering final scene, was the maid of honor at my and Jonathan's wedding last June.
Originally posted by Alex Ross from Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:53 PM
New Live Recording of Tetra-Mnemosyne VII On its Way
Nigel Keay informs me today that his string trio's recording of Tetra-Mnemosyne VII is almost ready and should be available shortly. Premiere performance should be sometime early in 2006 in Paris. I expect to have an MP3 sometime very soon...Originally posted by jeff from The Music of Jeff Harrington, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Bob Drake Interview
Bob is interviewed about his latest album by the Woozy Review
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
New Zappa
A stocking stuffer has arrived almost in time for the holidays. Joe’s XMASage is the latest from the Zappa vault.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
New From Tompkins Square Records
Tompkins Square Records is releasing two new CDs.
NEW SOLO PIANO CDS FROM CHARLES GAYLE AND RAN BLAKE COMING MARCH 7TH
NEW YORK, NY — On March 7th, Tompkins Square Records will release new landmark solo piano recordings from two of America’s most enigmatic musicians, Charles Gayle and Ran Blake. Gayle’s Time Zones (TSQ 2839) is his first recording to feature all original piano improvisations and only the second solo piano recording of his career. Blake’s All That Is Tied (TSQ 1965), his 35th release, was recorded 40 years to the month after his first solo piano recording, 1965’s Ran Blake Plays Solo Piano (ESP), and also marks his 70th birthday with a program that revisits original compositions from throughout his career. Gayle and Blake will celebrate the release of their new recordings, which will be distributed in the U.S. by Fontana/Universal, with performances at The Stone in New York on Friday, March 10th.Critics have called Charles Gayle “a master of musical improvisation” (Portland Tribune), “certainly a talent not to be taken lightly” (All Music Guide) and the purveyor of “a visionary music forged by spiritual exploration and sonic discovery” (Philadelphia City Paper). Although he is known primarily as the indefatigable tenor saxophonist with a sound that blends the spirituality of John Coltrane with the free expression on Albert Ayler, his first instrument was the piano. Since putting his long and storied past as a homeless New York street musician behind him, and recording for the first time in the late 1980’s, he has steadily integrated piano into his performances, leading AllAboutJazz.com reviewer Dennis Hollingsworth to declare, “Charles Gayle is without question one of the most intriguing figures in modern jazz today. Like with his saxophone playing, Gayle uses the entire range of the piano. His style is highly personal, yet firmly grounded in the playing of past masters like Art Tatum and Bud Powell.” More information is available at http://www.charlesgayle.com
A cult figure surrounded by the same mysterious aura that permeates the classic Film Noir scenes which so inspire him, pianist/composer/educator Ran Blake has been one of improvised music’s most respected and incomparable voices for more than 40 years. His noteworthy collaborators on record have included Anthony Braxton, Clifford Jordan, Steve Lacy, Jeanne Lee, and Houston Person among others, but his seminal solo recordings have always defined his discography and his career. As former student John Medeski puts it in the All That Is Tied liner notes, “alone at the piano is how Ran Blake reveals the depth of his musical universe most completely.” Critics write that Blake “ranks among the music’s most brilliant and engaging improvisers” (Boston Herald), “demonstrates an eloquence of touch and a sense of improvisational design surpassed only by Thelonious Monk” (Philadelphia Inquirer) and “is so hip it hurts…a pianist who can make you laugh at his wry humor one second and wring a tear the next” (DownBeat). Writing for the Boston Globe, Fred Kaplan asserted, “There is no pianist alive, except possibly Cecil Taylor, who can elicit so many colors from the keyboard as Ran Blake, and Blake, it should be quickly noted, paints from a broader, more accessible palette.” More information is available at http://www.ranblake.com
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Wadada Leo Smith Show Reviewed
A review covers Smith’s recent New York performance of a piece that meshes middle-eastern classical with free jazz.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Clean Feed Releases Transit CD
Clean Feed Records will soon release a new one from Jeff Arnal and company.
January 4, 2006
Transit
Jeff Arnal - percussion
Seth Misterka - alto saxophone
Reuben Radding - contrabass
Nate Wooley - trumpetTransit celebrates their debut CD on the Clean Feed record label. From the
liner notes: “… an aphoristic study in timbre, which sounds as if magic
mushrooms had united Helmut Lachenmann, Morton Feldman, György Ligeti, and
Evan Parker” - Dietrich Eichmann, Berlin.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Newsbits
Like to hear a combination of IDM and modern classical? Try Alarm Will Sound. Discount label Sachimay Interventions has released three new CDs. Solo sax player Patrick Brennan has a show tonight at the Deep Listening Space in Kingston NY. Finally, Balance Point Acoustics has a new release from the quartet of Aurora Josephson, Joelle Leandre, Damon Smith, and Martin Blume.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
New Nels Cline
Nels Cline and Jeremy Drake has a new release on Experimental Musical Research featuring a twin guitar and electronics attack.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Living American Woman
Being a composer channels all the perceptions of my outer and inner lives. It affects everything, from how I act in the private sphere (as wife and mother) to all emphases of my work as thinker, scholar, and teacher, and my perceptions of and responses to professional and world events.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Contempo, Chicago
Originally from NetNewMusic Contemporary Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
New Music In New Places - Edmonton
Originally from NetNewMusic Contemporary Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
The Poietic Fallacy Fallacy
Any devoted reader of Richard Tarusking will recognize the phrase 'the poietic fallacy.' He explained the meaning of the word poeitic in an fairly recent article in The Musical Times in which he bashed Schoenberg and Allan Shawn's book about him (and AllaOriginally posted by Rodney Lister from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
A Postcard From New York
Originally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Old Music, New Music
When does music stop being "new music" and become old or classical? Fascinating question raised by Frank J. Oteri over at the NewMusicBox. My answer would be that some music is born old and some music is always new...The Boston Globe reports that DonaldOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 15, 2005 at 01:51 PM
December 14, 2005
This is classical music, folks
There's a group of musicians in new york who call themselves the alarm will sound ensemble and they are doing everything i want to do... sort of. They have a myspace site where you can listen to 4 tracks of their making. There are two of Steve Reich's works on there that they've performed, the gorgeous tehillim and desert music- but my personal favorite is the track titled Cock ver 10, -Edit: its an aphex twin cover- thanks meg for the correction.The instrumentation and approach endears me to them, i would love to be doing what they're doing. The only problem is that they got there first, the bastards. Personally, I think they emphasize the drums a little too much and some of the music itself isnt always to my liking per se- but, like i said, the concept is there exactly. The New York Times says- "the future of classical music", if that means anything to you.
There are several composers working in the group, and the instrumentation is too diverse to list, they list their influences as*:
Gyorgy Ligeti, Steve Reich, Aphex Twin, John Adams, Harrison Birtwistle, Frank Zappa, Michael Gordon, J.S. Bach, Benedict Mason, Conlon Nancarrow, Jelly Roll Morton
Why Beethoven, Debussy and Stravinsky arnt there, i dont understand. Nonetheless, i really like what they're doing and i wish i could be in new y0rk to see them perform/meet them.
* this information and more is on the myspace site, so why im posting it is somewhat of a mystery to me.
Originally from Music in a Suburban Scene, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:54 PM
Primetime TV for new opera
"There are good and bad pieces in every style but the thing that does worry me is the enormous prominence in broadcasting to some really very wooden sounding music. To take the most obvious example the Górecki 3rd Symphony, how can anything which has so little life in its sound be so important? There are other composers I don't mind mentioning in the same category like Pärt and Nyman. I don't understand how the situation has arisen that there is so much of this, and I fear commercial interests are behind a great deal of it"Fighting talk from a fighting lady whose new opera about a fighting subject gets prime TV airtime on the UK's Channel 4 on Christmas Day. Judith Weir is one of the most widely performed contemporary composers from the UK. Her 50 minute song cycle woman.life.song was commissioned by Jessye Norman, while We are Shadows was composed for Simon Rattle and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Her most recent work includes The welcome arrival of rain for large orchestra written for the Minnesota Orchestra, and Tiger under the Table for the London Sinfonietta. She studied composition with John Tavener while at school in London, and with Robin Holloway while at King's College, Cambridge . For six years she taught composition at Glasgow University and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, and she has also held visiting professorships at Oxford and Princeton Universities.
Judith Weir (picture below) was born in Cambridge of Scottish parents, and as a contemporary Scottish composer numbers Sir Peter Maxwell Davies and James MacMillan
among her peers. Theatre, narrative and folklore are important to her, and she has written three full length operas. In collabaration with storyteller Vayu Naidu she created the musical narrative 'Future Perfect' (header picture) which has been performed in England and India. She is a true evangelist for contemporary music, and it is interesting that the three contemporary composers that have featured recently On An Overgrown Path have all been women, Odaline de la Martinez, Jane O'Leary , and now Judith Weir.An approach to composition as uncompromising as her views on Górecki is another characteristic of Judith Weir. Her new opera Armida (picture below) is a retelling of Torquato Tasso's 16th century poem Jerusalem Delivered. The original is a romantic story about a Christian crusader and a Muslim witch. Some pretty illustriuous names have already turned the poem into operas, including Gluck (1777), Rossini - which created one of Maria Callas' greatest roles (1817), and Dvorak (1904). But Judith Weir is undaunted. In her contemporary setting Armida is turned from Muslim sorceress into an 'embedded' TV news reporter covering a middle-eastern desert war.
The opera has a strong anti-war message, and in the closing scenes war-mongering is replaced by what the composer describes as 'cultivation and repose'. The music is scored for a group which is a hybrid of half chamber ensemble, and half jazz band.Pretty heady stuff. And if you can receive UK commercial TV Channel 4 you can see the whole 50 minute opera on Christmas Day,thankfully interrupted by just one commercial break. The photo to the right is from the TV production.
Judith Weir's uncompromising outlook was reflected in her music for BBC Radio 3's Private Passions programme. Here is the choice of music of one of our most wide-ranging contemporary composers:
* Trad. arr. Copper, 'The Sweet Primroses,' Bob and Ron Copper Topic TSCD 600
* Stravinsky, Oedipus Rex (excerpt from Act II), Tatiana troyanos (jocasta), Lajos Kozma (Oedipus) / Chorus and Symphony Orchestra of RAI Rome / Claudio Abbado Memories HR 4128
* Brahms, Sextet No. 1 in B flat Opus 18 (second movement), L'Archibudelli Sony SK 68252
* Kevin Volans, White Man Sleeps (first movement), Smith Quartet Landor CTLCD 111
* Trad., Dzil Duet (from Accra, Ghana), performers unknown Nonesuch 7559-72082-2
* Britten, 'Carol' (from Sacred and Profane), The Sixteen / Harry Christophers Collins 13432
* Bach, Gloria (from Mass in F, BWV 233) Gächinger Kantorei Stuttgart / Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra of Budapeat / Helmut Rilling Hannsler CD 98924
* Loewe, 'Herr Oluf', Kurt Moll (bass)/Cord Garben (piano) Harmonia Mundi HMA 1905171
There is an excellent article on Judith Weir's opera Armida on the Guardian web site
Opening quotation from BBC Radio 3 web site, listen to the audio file via this link -
Programme broadcast on 13th December 1997.
Listen to the latest BBC Radio 3 Private Passions programme with this link.
Information reproduced from Private Passions by Michael Berkeley, published by Faber ISBN 0-571-22884- 4
Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dott uk
Image credits:
Header - Scene from Future Perfect linked from Vayu Naidu Company
Judith Weir - BBC
Scene from Armida – Guardian
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed.
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Cure for Marin Alsop fatigue
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:52 PM
banning + center
Nels Cline and Jeremy Drake do some serious damage with electric guitars and electronics in the interest of experimental sounds."Banning + Center" is the first full-length release of record label, experimental musical research. Grab it now.
Here's the first track.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:51 PM
Something missing.
On the street and the subway this evening, as I left the office and headed to the Met, I listened to Rolando Villazón's recording of arias by Massenet and Gounod -- a fine disc, and one that easily claims a spot on my list of "Top Ten Recordings That Didn't End Up on My TONY Top Ten List."
Little did I know that this was to be the only Villazón I would hear tonight.
Mindful of Anne Midgette's nice recent Times article on operatic covers (which isn't available for free any more, thus no link), it's got to be a hellish gig. So kudos to tenor Raúl Melo for hanging tough tonight in front of a crowd primed for the Second Coming. His opening "Questa o quella" sounded constricted and boxed-in, but he warmed into the role as the evening progressed... mostly. Melo's initial scenes with Gilda were fine, as was his "Ella mi fu rapita" and each reprise of "Questa." On the other hand, that sinusoid tightness returned in the Duke's brief soliloquy following his posse's brag of Gilda's kidnap -- a passage that earned Melo's sole boo, from a single audience member.
Of the rest, all I can think is that my revelatory initial Rigoletto -- the Houston Grand Opera performance I've mentioned in previous posts, with a reckless young Marcello Giordani, an ineffably lovely Maureen O'Flynn and a magisterial Leo Nucci -- might actually have been more accomplished than I reckoned in my utterly benighted newbiedom. I say this because despite Carlo Guelfi's exemplary acting, I felt a lack of vocal oomph at center court. (And then remembered feeling exactly the same way about his Iago, opposite Ben Heppner and Barbara Frittolli last year.)
Moreover, despite Anna Netrebko's obvious beauty and unquestionable agility -- both physical and vocal -- I didn't buy her Gilda until the final act. Bravas rang out at length after "Caro nome," but for me Netrebko didn't hit the mark despite directing her opalescent instrument toward Verdi's targets and striking most of them squarely.
This isn't the first time I've felt ambivalent about Netrebko; it was quite in keeping with my response to her debut CD. As I left the Met, I was disposed to reject the hype altogether. But in my virtually inevitable post-Lincoln Center visit to Tower Records, the canny classical jocks were spinning the new Netrebazón recording of La traviata... and I found myself thinking that there's still almost certainly something there -- just maybe not in the Rigoletto pairing. Even so, I'm positive that I'll tune in for the broadcast this Saturday, and will likely try to catch the show on stage in '06, just to see if this pairing is more than the sum of its parts.
Meanwhile, back in the big house, when's the last time you caught a Rigoletto in which the most gripping performer was the Sparafucile? I add this because it's true, and also mindful of what Maury -- or "Maury," as birthday-celebrating JSU would have it -- said. Eric Halfvarson was the unquestionable center of gravity every time he entered a scene. Nancy Fabiola Herrera's hesitantly slutty Maddalena was another brief but telling highlight, although one more physical than vocal. Asher Fisch steered a solid-enough performance despite a wobble caused by the tenorial rent at center stage, then knocked further askew by the collective gravity of expectation.
Oh, yeah, I also saw An American Tragedy again last night, as promised. And that's about as far as my reliability will extend this evening. No post, because the conflicts raging in my head -- which have less to do with the piece than with my continued, even exacerbated unease with the consensus of my professional caste -- demand more reflection. I get the sense that there may be a serious blurt coming just after TONY closes its doors for the year late next week.
Still, lest my hesitancy cast me among the disapproving crits, let me state for the record that I believe Picker has created a seriously effective piece of music theater, and more surprisingly one in which both operatic neophytes and sophisticates will find much to enjoy.
And one with legs, I'll wager... assuming it isn't strangled in its crib.
Playlist:
Joseph Haydn - Symphonies Nos. 82 and 83 - Concentus Musicus Wien/Nikolaus Harnoncourt (DHM)
Felix Mendelssohn - String Quartet in E-flat (1823); String Quartet in E-flat, Op. 12; String Quartet in F minor, Op. 80 - Pacifica Quartet (Cedille)
Dave Douglas - Keystone (Greenleaf Music)
Rolando Villazón - Massenet/Gounod Arias - Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France / Evelino Pidò (Virgin Classics)
Giuseppe Verdi - Rigoletto - Maria Callas, Giuseppe di Stefano, Tito Gobbi, La Scala / Tullio Serafin (EMI Classics)
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Vandermark 5: The Color of Memory Tour
The Vandermark 5 is going to tour for most of January and offer two new collector’s item CDs.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Lots of Downloading Articles
A few articles have come out in the last couple of days regarding online music and new business models. Shaking off the CD-jeebies discusses the current backlash against DRM’ed CDs. Another find the UK to be where the most money on average is spent on downloads, while this one posits that online sharing can be a sales driver due to most people relying on personal recommendations for music purchases.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Wadada Leo Smith’s Kabell Years Reviewed
This 4CD boxed set, which was released at least a year ago, is reviewed.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Contact with Stockhausen
A rare Stockhausen interview has been posted.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Obituary: Soong Fu-Yuan
Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
"No Longer New" Music
All too often when new work ceases to be new, it resides in a cast-off limbo, no longer welcome at the table with the new and not yet embraced by the avatars of the tried and true.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
The Alcotts (1915). Charles Ives /1943/
I'm listening to the 1943 recording of Charles Ives playing Charles Ives, in particular, The Alcotts. What I wonder is whether by this time was Ives getting any recognition for his music? I know Lou Harrison conducted the premiere of his Third Symphony but that was several years later (and it went on to win the Pulitzer Prize).
Project Gutenberg copy of his Essays before a Sonata
Wikipedia on Piano Sonata No. 2 and noting that Elliott Carter reviewed its second performance, at Town Hall in NYC in 1939.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Dec. 14th - Theo Bleckmann
I know I have been too long absent from the Composers Forum. Though I've been reading along, I haven't posted in quite some time. My fall has been unusually busy, but as the holidays approach I am looking forward to more time to go a-bloggin'. MeanwhilOriginally posted by Corey Dargel from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Talking About My Generation
Just listening to Coyote. Poor, doomed Jaco pounding out a mean bass line. If there is a cooler song then Joni wrote it, too. Maybe A Case of You or maybe that one with "knit you a sweater, write you a love letter." We coulda been contenders. BlackdOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 14, 2005 at 01:50 PM
December 13, 2005
New music in Norwich
Saturday 10th November - to Norwich for the first UK performance of a new work by Jane O'Leary. Born in Hartford, Connecticut, and with degrees from Princeton University and Vassar College, Jane O'Leary has lived in Galway in Eire since 1976, and is a central figure in the musical life there, both as administrator and composer. (The photo below shows her with Irish new music ensemble
Concorde
). For the past three years the Con Tempo Quartet from Romania have been Quartet-in-Residence in Galway, and they came to Norwich with Jane O'Leary to perform her Piano Quintet No 2, which was funded by the Arts Council of Ireland, with the composer taking the piano part.The Quintet, which was given its first performance in Dublin three weeks ago, is a four movement work without programme or formal structure. It uses the strings almost as a single voice to compliment the piano and produce abstract sound pictures.
This is very much a contemporary work, and the pianist works the strings of her instrument with her hands as well as the keys. But judging by the positive reaction of the essentially conservative Norwich audience this is new music that connects with the past as well as the future. Kudos to Norwich and Norfolk Music for bringing this praiseworthy new work and its composer from the extreme west of the British Isles to the extreme east. The excellent pre-concert talk and discussion by Jane O'Leary also helped build an audience for this new music.The rest of the Con Tempo's programme had James Lisney as pianist, and comprised Elgar's Piano Quintet (if the truth be told not the most persuasive adviocacy of this beautiful and moving work), and George Enecu's 1940 Piano Quintet (Op 29). Enescu is a very underrated 20th century composer, and his Piano Quintet is a superb work that deserves a much wider audience. The Con Tempo Quartet were clearly in their element playing the music of their fellow Romanian, and James Lisney is a longtime advocate of Enescu's music. The closing pages of the Quintet are quite overwhelming, search out a performance or recording if you possibly can.
Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
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Footer - SPNM
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If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to First performance - Douglas Weiland's Second Piano Trio, Pavey Ark
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:40 PM
ANAPHORIA: the creation of the worlds,
assembled by Kraig Grady - Part One
Interview with Banaphshu: "...we need to clear up some of the misunderstandings surrounding the creation of the world. many still see it as a rehash of musical ideas found in the preceding compositions. it is not a recapitulation but a representation of the original world before they are passed on to us in the form of experience..."
intense, it's only by a matter of degrees. Together the two make for both an enjoyable conclusion to the original series and a grand standalone effort. ~ Ned Raggett, All Music Guide
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:39 PM
wiki drug spam
Originally from david's waste of bandwidth..., ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:38 PM
One Final Note Reviews
Some new reviews from One Final Note.
5 December 2005
:. FME Cuts (Okkadisk) by Jay Collins
:. Michael Musillami Trio Dachau (Playscape) by Troy Collins
:. Quartet Noir Lugano (Victo) by Jesse Goin
:. Karayorgis/McBride/Newton We Will Make a Home for You (Clean Feed) by Dan Rose
:. Cuong Vu It’s Mostly Residual (ArtistShare) by David Dupont
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
Happy Birthday Elliott Carter
Yesterday Elliott Carter turned 97. Here’s to him with wishes for many more birthdays.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
Free Downloads on Screwgun Records
Screwgun Records is offering some older Tim Berne recordings for MP3 download (for a decent price), but is also offering a free download of Julius Hemphill’s Dogon A.D.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
The Crack in the Bell (1986). Daniel Lentz
Kyle Gann has a post about Paul Griffiths' comments on Messiaen. In the middle, Gann says this:
I’ve defended a lot of my favorite Downtown music that uses synthesizer from people who say that music with synthesizer reminds them of ‘80s rock, as though that were the most heinous grievance with which a piece of music could be charged.
Ok sorry, but Daniel Lentz's The Crack in the Bell, while not necessarily sounding like '80s rock, nonetheless uses synthesizers, resulting in a timbrally-dated sound. I can't help but think of the U.S. Bicentennial and all the excitement from those scintillating Gerald Ford/Jimmy Carter/Foreigner years. Maybe this reaction is pecularly to those who were there at the time. I also grant it may be the Angel/EMI recording. A second, updated performance would be helpful.
Gann enthuses here. Betty Freeman commisioned the work, by the way.
I wil point out the simple and absorbing Music for Three Pianos with Lentz, Harold Budd, and Ruben Garcia.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
Applying Myself
Applying to grad school can bite me. Getting into grad school is great, and attending grad school even better. But the application process -- it can bite me. So yes, dear reader, that's why I've been absent -- what little free time I have has been devoOriginally posted by Galen H. Brown from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
Picks to Click
Lawrence Dillon writes of the durable stillness of Kenneth Frazelle...Tom Myron makes friends with David Darling...Kyle Gann has a question over in the Composers Forum. The massive Sibelius web site now has an English version. It opened on December 7, tOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
Zankel Dispatch
It was nice last night to chill out with the Cygnus Ensemble at Zankel. Cygnus, along with their many friends, paid tribute to composer Dina Kosten. Kosten, whose music was new to me, writes relatively dissonant music of thin, delicate textures. On theOriginally posted by David Salvage from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 13, 2005 at 01:37 PM
December 12, 2005
Blogged by the Guardian
Overgrown Path's views on the BBC's free file downloads get an airing in the Guardian's Culture Vulture Blog this morning.Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Image credit - Journalism.co.uk
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. If bandwidth is a problem with your permission I will host your image.
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Music-like-water
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:40 PM
RIP Donald Martino
The dash, to performer one (a string player) is a bowing indication whose attack characteristics might range from relatively incisive to barely audible; to performer two (a wind player) it means a soft attack. Performer three reads this sign as tenuto: a term which is variously interpreted as “hold the note its full value” or “hold the note a bit longer than its full value.” Attack for this player has never been of great concern. To performer four, a dash means that the note is somehow invested with great expressive significance and, therefore, he is free to play in whatever manner seems most appropriate. And to performers five through infinity it means things the aural results of which are too horrible to contemplate.
Donald Martino, “Notation in General — Articulation in Particular,” Perspectives of New Music, 4/2 (1966), 47.
Originally from Musical Perceptions, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:39 PM
Schadenfreude
But after two ratings books, two fund drives and nine months of the new programming -- a mix of news and talk shows from National Public Radio, the BBC and other outside sources, much of it oriented to foreign affairs -- WETA's audience is smaller, no more generous than the classical audience was, and no more reflective of the demographics of the Washington area.Allow me to roll around on the floor, laughing my ass off now. Thank you, Marc Fischer: you made Christmas come early to the Ionarts house. The station is reportedly looking for a home for its collection of some 27,000 CDs. Once I solve the storage problem, I am willing to be considered as a possible adoptive father.
Originally from ionarts, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:39 PM
The death of death, pt. 25
Last February, DC public-radio station WETA dropped its classical programming in favor of an all-talk format. Since then, the Washington Post reports, ratings have fallen and public support has stagnated. Oops. Perhaps the station manager read one "death of classical music" story too many. Via Artsjournal.
Originally posted by Alex Ross from Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
Doctor Subatomic.
I rarely get down to the Knitting Factory these days -- a strange and slightly sad condition, given that the scene that developed around this club in the '80s was my foremost incentive to move to New York in the first place. (By the time I got here in 1993, said scene had already begun to move elsewhere.) For a while, the cause of my absence was the psychic debris that lingered long after my six wonderful, tumultuous months of employment there in 1997 -- a monumental case of "Be careful what you wish for." Still, in its post-Michael Dorf era, the club simply doesn't present very much that interests me greatly.
That baggage out of the way, tonight definitely proved an exception -- and how odd that it should have been under the auspices of a presentation by Yale University's School of Music. For many, the Knitting Factory still evokes a cache of downtown hipness, judging by the comments of acting dean Thomas Duffy in his introductory remarks. Yale, Duffy went on to remind us, once maintained a strong presence in New York City through its Spectrum Concerts series; tonight's event was the beginning of a similar push, and four further events were said to be forthcoming.
The main event this evening was the New York premiere of Feynman, a one-character opera by composer Jack Vees and librettist Paul Schick. Rather than a dramatized elaboration of historical events a la Doctor Atomic, Vees and Schick offered a stylized gloss on aspects of the renowned physicist's life and work -- his work at Los Alamos, where the quirky upstart was apparently the only scientist brazen enough to view the Trinity blast with his naked eyes; his passionate love for his wife, Arline; his well-known passion for drumming; his fascination with Tuva, a tiny Asian country near Mongolia whose oddly shaped postage stamps he'd collected as a child; his decisive role in the investigation of the Challenger disaster.
In a brief but lucid program note, Libby Van Cleve notes that Feynman's "lifelong interest in quantum mechanics led to a belief that on a sub-atomic level, there was a non-linear aspect to time... Feynman postulated that an electron would investigate all possible paths, and that all of these alternate paths are integrated as the actual path taken." Accordingly, Schick's libretto moves backward to events that occured during the physicist's birth year, as well as forward to his death. (Feynman may well be the only operatic hero who dies twice in a single evening.) Rather than dealing in the expected sort of linear character development, then, Feynman offers a chronologically leapfrogging composite portrait of its protagonist's interests, without dwelling much on character development per se.
Baritone Michael Cavalieri gave a winning performance, speaking and singing lines from scientific treatises and a love letter to Feyman's wife, ticking off historical events, wandering the tiny stage and scrawling theorems and doodles on the floor. He was more than accompanied by the Yale-trained quartet So Percussion, who manned a phalanx of keyboards and drums as well as guitar, bass, dulcimer and laptop. Reichian patterns on marimba and vibraphone collided with stuttering drum patterns reminiscent of Captain Beefheart and David von Tieghem in Vees's richly colorful and animated score; the voices of news readers and Tuvan throat singers fluttered through the ether.
Whether speaking or singing, Cavalieri was aggressively amplified; only once during the piece did the words he was delivering -- all of them memorized -- become indistinct. (That suggests an improvement over an earlier performance in Norfolk, Virginia, reviewed by Jim Oestreich in The New York Times.) I mentioned that Cavalieri was "more than accompanied" by So Percussion because in addition to their musical chores, the four players were called upon to act in multiple scenes, miming lines spoken by Cavalieri or scribbling scientific formulae on the walls. Victoria Vaughan's Real Time Opera staged the piece amidst translucent screens, evocative lighting and both prerecorded and live video projections, making far better use of the Knitting Factory's meager stage than I would have imagined possible.
Stylistically, Feynman was not the operatic mode of either John Adams or Tobias Picker, but rather a form of music theater more closely allied to the work of Mikel Rouse, Heiner Goebbels or, particularly given the single-vocalist format, the collaborations of Paul Dresher and Rinde Eckert. It was rich, engrossing stuff, and ideal fodder for the Lincoln Center Festival or BAM's Harvey Theater. (Hint, hint.)
On the first half of the program -- yes, that's how short Feynman was -- So Percussion gave expert performances of Reich's Music for Pieces of Wood, a hypnotic study in shifting perceptions of pulse, and Iannis Xenakis's Ohko, a tribalistic treatise in the plethora of timbres afforded by three humble djembes. Vees himself followed with Surf Music Again, in which the composer elicited resonant tones from an electric bass guitar bowed, struck with a rubber mallet and stroked with a glass ashtray, and further treated by a delay pedal. The physical mechanics might have been Adrian Belew gone academic, but the resulting oceanic wash of rippling radiance reminded me more of Steve Roach's space music, or a slightly more austere take on Robert Fripp's recent electronic soundscapes. Having not heard Vees's similarly constituted CRI recording in some time, I wondered if the pervasive melancholy of tonight's performance was intrinsic to the composition, or whether it might have been colored by the recent, premature passing of composer Stephen Lucky Mosko, to whom it was dedicated tonight.
Saturday night also kept me busy, to the extent that I wasn't able to report with my usual dogged punctuality, since I crawled home some time after 3 AM. The evening presented both bold challenges to orthodoxy and assured performances of timeless classics -- and how peculiar that the former happened at the 92nd Street Y, the latter at the Continental on St. Mark's Place.
At the Y, contemporary-classical sextet eighth blackbird celebrated its tenth anniversary. The group came together at Oberlin a decade ago, and we have been the beneficiaries of this chance meeting ever since. A program titled "lucid, inescapable rhythms" included one world premiere -- Gordon Fitzell's Lucid -- and two local premieres -- Ashley Fure's Inescapable (in Broken Form) and Marcus Maroney's Rhythms. The first of these played to the sextet's strengths in keen improvisation, eliciting the textural mystique of Crumb and the sonic grandeur of Varèse, as well as an order to freely quote from earlier eighth blackbird premieres. (It was the valiant Frank J. Oteri of NewMusicBox who identified a naggingly familar riff played by pianist Lisa Kaplan as Michael Torke's The Yellow Pages, the piece that drew this group together in the first place.) Fure offered a fully assured music of sensation rather than rhetoric or narrative; violent pulsations ceded to a singular tone, then reversed course. Maroney's playful piece pitted chattering snare-drums patterns against melodic quintuplets.
The concert opened with Derek Bermel's Tied Shifts, an animated piece influenced by the composer's encounter with the dauntingly polymetric music native to Bulgaria. The most immediately winning Bermel score I've encountered, this was further enhanced by the group's choreography, which provided through intelligently manuvered confluences and departures in stage positioning far more insight into the music's architecture than did the composer's detailed note.
eighth blackbird's stage choreography may well turn out to be the group's most revolutionary innovation: Both Frederic Rzewski's peppy Les Moutons de Panurge and Fred Lerdahl's sumptuous Fantasy Etudes benefitted from the players moving about on stage -- drawing attention to the score's direction of solo and ensemble play, and thus enhancing comprehension rather than inhibiting it. While I won't suggest that every chamber group should be dancing its programs, it definitely works for this one. Of the remaining pieces, Thierry de May's Musique de Tables -- a work scored for three amplified tabletops pounded, scuffed and swished upon -- was a playful bit of Blue Man Group-style physical theater; Jennifer Higdon's Zango Bandango was, as the group had requested, a snappy bottle rocket of a finale. The pacing of the set list, I'll add, was as entirely right as the well-oiled machinery of a big-league rock concert.
Altogether more shambolic in pacing and presentation was the late-night set presented by legendary Los Angeles punk band the Germs at the Continental -- but that's probably the only thing this show had in common with the group's late-'70s heyday. Given that all manner of statistically impossible reunions have taken place lately -- not just Cream and Dinosaur Jr., where all the key players are still with us, but also Queen and the New York Dolls, where the same certainly can't be said -- this long-delayed New York debut can't be considered unthinkable.
Implausible, more likely, since to most fans, the Germs can't be imagined without singer Darby Crash, one of American rock's more fabled casualties. A precocious, deeply troubled frontman, Crash always promised to die young, then actually followed through with a heroin overdose at age 22. We Got the Neutron Bomb, an excellent book by Marc Spitz and Brendan Mullen that provides a Studs Terkel-styled oral history of the L.A. punk scene, provides firsthand testimony of the band's brief, livid and lurid existence; Crash, a stylishly rendered mini-comic writer/artist Craig Bostick based on a conversation between the singer and Jane Wiedlin of the Go-Go's (whose lead singer, '80s pop queen Belinda Carlisle, was briefly the Germs' original drummer), seems to suggest that the singer's demons might well have been sparked in some part by his inability to deal with homosexuality -- a claim confirmed by some and disregarded by others in the Spitz/Mullen volume.
The Germs' reputation rests upon a precarious balance of an Iggy Pop-inspired penchant for confrontational and violently chaotic live shows, the messianic Crash's deeply cultish following, and a single LP, 1979's Joan Jett-produced GI, which provides evidence that what was once a snotty joke had become an accomplished band, with a singer who provided unusually insightful and reflective lyrics. Currently available in its entirety as part of the Slash/Rhino compilation, MIA: The Complete Anthology, the album is one of the essential documents of L.A. hardcore.
That Crash should provide fodder for a biopic in the making is no surprise; far stranger is the notion that guitarist Pat Smear (who went on to play with Nirvana and Foo Fighters), bassist Lorna Doom (who quit the music business altogether) and drummer Don Bolles (who subsequently played in '90s trash-rock group Celebrity Skin) decided to reunite for a clutch of live dates -- with Shane West, the actor portraying Crash in said film, What We Do Is Secret, as their frontman.
The midnight show at the Continental, the band's second set of the evening, suggested that this was finally a chance for Smear, Doom and Bolles to finally realize the professional dreams they'd dared to wish for after GI was recorded. West looked and sounded like Crash; what's more, he gamefully flung himself into the audience, and shared a series of microphones with fans who crashed the stage. (Final body count: three dead mikes, with a fourth in questionable shape.)
I can't imagine that Smear and Doom ever smiled so much in the Germs's supposed heyday as they did Saturday night at the Continental, a tiny punk club similar to CBGB but far less scuzzy. Those two, along with the gaunt, wacky Bolles, served up a meaty, propulsive set with their animated yet professional virtual Darby. The hedonistic amateurism that once fuelled the band was in short supply even in a set as haltingly delivered and technically buggered as this one occasionally was. (Opening band the Magik Markers delivered that quality in spades; their performance was a noisy, virtually inchoate mix of threat and exorcism.)
On the other hand, the power of the Germs songbook -- previously overshadowed by Crash's antics -- was finally and unquestionably revealed, and the furiously moshing, stage-diving and microphone-stealing audience ate it up. A rumored tour in 2006 seems virtually inevitable; if you view punk solely as a lifestyle, or a means for confrontation and transgression, you'll probably want to steer clear. But if you've happened to notice that despite the chaos, debris and casualties -- R.I.P. Darby Crash -- punk bands have also penned a bounty of worthwhile, often brilliant songs, this show definitely scratches that itch.
The Germs set list, to the best of my ability to reconstruct it: Forming / My Tunnel / Communist Eyes / Circle One / Lexicon Devil / No God / What We Do Is Secret / Manimal / Caught in My Eye / Media Blitz / Sex Boy / Land of Treason / Dragon Lady / Richie Dagger's Crime / Let's Pretend / Strange Notes / We Must Bleed / Shut Down (Annihilation Man).
Playlist:
Germs - MIA: The Complete Anthology (Slash/Rhino)
X - Los Angeles (Slash/Rhino)
Really Red - Teaching You the Fear (Empty)
Butthole Surfers - Butthole Surfers + PCPPEP (Latino Bugger Veil)
Minutemen - Double Nickels on the Dime (SST)
Black Flag - Everything Went Black (SST)
Francesco Maria Veracini - Violin Sonatas - John Holloway, Jaap ter Linden, Lars Ulrik Mortensen (ECM)
Morton Feldman - Patterns on a Chromatic Field - Charles Curtis, Aleck Karis (Tzadik)
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
You Are (Variations) (2004). Steve Reich /2005 best of cds/
2005 aworks (composers/improvisors) CD filter /more to follow.../
Susie Ibarra (who also mentions music by Tania Leon, Samuel Barber, A&M etc.)
Jim Farber (box sets; Miles not yet available)
Amazon Top 25 Classical Editor's Picks 
Alex Ross (nothing on his main CD list but relevant mentions including Adamo, Mostel, Muhly, Giacchino, and Karchin)
Jerry Bowles
(and also Julius Eastman's Unjust Malaise).
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
Memories (1897). Charles Ives
Primi Divi on the recent Gerald Finley recital:
...but Mr Finley’s selection included a number of the more accessible songs, “Memories”, for example, perfectly captured the excitement and anticipation of waiting for an opera to begin: a feeling likely to be well-known to Mr Finley’s fans (this song, incidentally, was one of Mr Finley’s encores in his last recital)...
The fun part of the song:
We're sitting in the opera house, the opera house, the opera house
We're waiting for the curtain to arise with wonders for our eyes
And the adagio part, which makes this song so bipolar:
It is tattered, it is torn
it shows signs of being worn
It's the tune my Uncle hummed from early morn
The song was first performed in 1949.
By the way, I finally bought a copy of 114 Songs by Charles Ives (they were out of the Stravinsky Refresher Score for the Overly Modern). If I'm exiled to the proverbial desert island, I'll be ready....
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
Deciding How Long a Piece Should Be
Kyle Gann has a question for this august group: I've got a student who frets that none of her pieces end up longer than 3 minutes. She's not wild about my advice: I tell her that one of the first decisions I make about any piece is the approximate lengthOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21/Composers Forum, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
It's Beginning to Sound a Lot Like Christmas
Sick of "Hark, the Harelipped Angel Sings?" (That's how we sang it in my grade school.) "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" make you want to hurl? Be of good cheer, my friends. There's lot of wonderful choral music out there to please the sophisticated palettOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
Happy Birthday to Elliott Carter
Today is Elliott Carter's 97th birthday. Alan Theisen has a tribute...Everette Minchew reveals what he learned from Tori Amos...Meant to mention this earlier but Marc Geelhoed has his top 10 (11, actually) CDs of the 2005 up. I forgot the Pauline ViardOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 12, 2005 at 01:38 PM
December 11, 2005
In praise of Howard Hanson
Back in August I asked the question Whatever happened to Howard Hanson? (portrait right)Well, the answer is his music continues to find persuasive advocates, and a new recording has just been awarded a coveted Gramophone magazine Editor's Choice award. The acclaimed recording is by the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra conducted by Erich Kunzel, and it is on Telarc.
In my original article I enthused about the classic Chuck Gerhardt LP of the work, and the reviewer shares my enthusiasm. Here is a quote from the Gramophone review:
'I first discovered Howard Hanson's Second Symphony as a teenager from an old RCA LP conducted by Charles Gerhardt. It's lushly composed with an abundance of melody and some very ear-catching orchestral colour. Here's a new recording that does the music proud - Telarc's expertise in Cincinnati's Music Hall really pays dividends, especially with the SACD version.'
Picture credit - lovely portrait of Howard Hanson linked from Marcofreddi.org
Image owners - if you do not want your picture used in this article please contact me and it will be removed. If bandwidth is a problem with your permission I will host your image.
Report broken links, missing images, and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to My first classical record
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:18 PM
Happy Birthday, Chronometros
Originally from listen., ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:18 PM
French, Finnish, Modern!
Some classical music lovers run for the hills at the mention of Boulez, Berio, Saariaho, and Dutilleux – others run to the Maison Française’s Contemporary Music Festival instead, to treat themselves to a refreshing dose of 20th- and 21st-century modern and modernist music. There is of course limited use in trying to convince (much less convert) members of the former section of (or to) the latter’s delights, but for those who “do” this kind of music, the French cultural programs under the auspices of Washington’s one-man modern music vanguard, French Cultural Attaché Roland Celette, are an oasis in this musically arch-conservative town.Converts would have had a difficult time finding space in the auditorium last Friday, anyway; full of dedicated ears that weathered the snow as it was. In a program of French and Finnish works (for cello, clarinet, and the combination thereof), the distinguished cellist Alexis Descharmes and his equally talented, experienced, and enthusiastic clarinetist partner Nicholas Baldeyrou treated to works of the Argentine Daniel A. d’Adamo, the Franco-Swiss Michaël Jarrell, and Finn Magnus Lindberg in addition to the aforementioned composers. With half the composers under 50 and five out of six alive (Berio’s creative energy was somewhat dampened by his demise in 2003) it was a great and educational example of a particular brand of music with a pulse™.
Katja Saariaho’s Spins and Spells for cello was first to go and sounded like creaking pipes in an old apartment building during winter. Or, as the modern music maven in me would want to exclaim, it explored in fascinating intricacy the resonant and textural properties of the cello (scordatura – custom tuned – no less!) while spreading a holistic sound-cloth, tightly woven of metal strands over the audiences’ audile receptors. Take your pick.
Playing from six different positions and with his X-ray vision coming in handy in the specially darkened auditorium, Nicholas Baldeyrou’s presentation of Boulez’s Domaines explored overtones and sympathetic vibrations of low, long held notes cut into with shrieks, silence, and ambient sound. I suppose I prefer the version for clarinet and small ensemble, but for the solo version it would have been difficult to get someone better adept at making it work than the Ensemble InterContemporain-schooled Baldeyrou. Mr. d’Amato’s Breath for bass clarinet and cello (the former looks like a saxophone top and bottom glued onto a fat clarinet on growth hormones that sits in the middle) was, comparatively, melodious. Well, not really – but working with both – the instruments’ tone and the sound of their percussive mechanics made for much interesting material. In preparation for another Saariaho piece – Oi Kuu for clarinet and cello – there was a telling and amusing moment when the person setting the stage was temporarily confused whether he planted the score upside down on the music stand or not. Of course critics would leap at the occasion to point out that for the bit of difficulties that had temporarily beset that chap, the audience would have had greater difficulties, still, in noticing the difference at all, had Oi Kuu been played backwards and inverted. At francophile and modernism-embracing Ionarts, of course, we would never be so snarky. L. Berio, Sequenze |
Henri Dutilleux, the old man of French modernism – a Parisian Elliot Carter of sorts – was represented with Trois strophes sur le nom de Sacher for cello which is based on the 1937 (?) Sache[r] motif (presumably E-flat - A - C - B – E) and honors the man that commissioned a slew of the most important orchestral works of the early and mid-20th century. Not coincidentally, it includes a Bartók quote from one of the works thus paid for with the money Sacher married into. Trois strophes offered more maturity than d’Adamo and Saariaho’s works and less agenda than Boulez. It was easily the most easily enjoyable work of the evening’s bill and in my opinion the only masterpiece. Its characteristic vigorous pizzicato in particular made for much pleasure.
Pitch manipulating and more overtones make Jarell’s Aus Beben educational and interesting in equal measure while offering enough music in between to make listening to the thing worth the curious audience member’s time. Since Magnus Lindberg’s Steamboat Bill, Jr. and Buster Keaton’s film that lend its name to this 1990 work “have similar durational properties” (not to be mistaken for “are the same length”!), it was shown alongside the famous storm scene from that movie. Buster Keaton’s comic genius could make any music listenable. His (literally, in one instance) neck-breaking stunts and jokes are much more timeless than Charlie Chaplin’s, and if the music was not as wild as the storm that drags Keaton on a tree through town, it came pretty close. It ended the concert with wild applause and marked a great success for the very curious ears in this town.
Originally from ionarts, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:17 PM
The bells
The carillon across the street was chiming loudy this morning with festive holiday cheer, but something wasn't quite right. My first thought was, "Man, that's a bad carillon player." But as I listened, I noticed the real problem--the bells were out of tune. One in particular. Kind of an important one too. The major thirds were minor and "Silent Night" took on a more ominous and sinister tone.
Originally posted by Brian Sacawa from Brian Sacawa: Sounds Like Now, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:17 PM
Who's Afraid of Stefan Wolpe?
I'm engaged in a constant CD exchange program with one of my professors, Dr. Joseph Brumbeloe. We are two of the most notorious new music rabble-rousers here at USM and we amuse ourselves with swapping discs of contemporary music. The other day, I came inOriginally posted by Alan Theisen from Alan Theisen, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:16 PM
Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday, Elliott Carter! The big man turns 97 today. I'll be celebrating by listening to the excellent new recording of his Violin Concerto, Four Lauds for solo violin, and the orchestral Holiday Overture. I recommend the disc for any music lovOriginally posted by Alan Theisen from Alan Theisen, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:16 PM
digital audio
Originally from david's waste of bandwidth..., ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 06:16 PM
And Now…The Jazz Grammies
Again, the Grammies are meaningless in the overall scheme, but it is nice when they acknowledge some genuinely hard working, small-time artists making great music. Here’s a rundown of notable jazz nominees.
Best Contemporary Jazz Album
(For albums containing 51% or more playing time of INSTRUMENTAL tracks.)* Keystone
Dave Douglas
[Greenleaf Music]Best Jazz Instrumental Solo
(For an instrumental jazz solo performance. Two equal performers on one recording may be eligible as one entry. If the soloist listed appears on a recording billed to another artist, the latter’s name is in parenthesis for identification. Singles or Tracks only.)* ‘Round Midnight
Alan Broadbent, soloist
Track from: ‘Round Midnight
[Artistry Music]* Away
Ravi Coltrane, soloist
Track from: In Flux
[Savoy Jazz]* The Source
Herbie Hancock, soloist
Track from: Flow (Terence Blanchard)
[Blue Note Records]* A Love Supreme - Acknowledgement
Branford Marsalis, soloist
Track from: Coltrane’s A Love Supreme Live In Amsterdam
[Marsalis Music]* Why Was I Born?
Sonny Rollins, soloist
Track from: Without A Song - The 9/11 Concert
[Milestone]Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album
(For large jazz ensembles, including big band sounds. Albums must contain 51% or more INSTRUMENTAL tracks.)* Overtime
Dave Holland Big Band
[Sunnyside/Dare2]* A Blessing
John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble
[OmniTone]* I Am Three
Mingus Big Band, Orchestra & Dynasty
[Sunnyside/Sue Mingus Music]
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
New Releases from ReR
The latest from ReR:
Martusciello, Elio: Unoccupied areas
Skeleton Crew: Learn To Talk and Country of Blinds (Double CD)
Tickmayer, Stevan Kovacs: Repetetive Selective Removal of One Protecting Group
Vogt, Michael: Argonautika
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
Review: John Zorn / Masad String Trio ¦ Azazel, Book of Angels Volume 2
One of the many new Masada releases is reviewed.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
Magma News: Lots of Releases in 2006?
I can’t verify anything in the information below, but it should rather promising, no?
2006 will be a great year for Magma fanatics:
- A Magma tribute album is being recorded for release in spring 2006. It will feature many artist playing various covers of Vander compositions, including some former band members (like Klaus Blasquiz, Jannick Top and Didier Lockwood), and also guest artists like Nebelnest, Troll and Tatsuya Yoshida. The Japanese drummer will play a fifteen-song Magma Medley, Ruins-style (if you see what I mean!)!
- During a concert in november, Stella Vander announced the release of the four Retropektiw shows that took place at Le Triton in June, in their integrality. The four discs will be released one at a time, during the span of 2006. A boxset will also be released at the end of the year for those who didn’t buy the discs individually. Apparently the audio and video quality will be excellent except for some lighting problems in disc 1.
Disc 1 (with special guest Klaus Blasquiz)
Malaria
Aurae
Iss Lansei Doia
Stoah
Kobaia
Sowiloi KMX
Theusz HamtaahkDisc 2 (with special guest Jannick Top)
Wurdah Itah
Mekanik Destruktiw Kommandoh
Bass Solo
De FuturaDisc 3 (with special guest Benoit Widemann)
Kohntarkosz
Lihns
Emehnteht-Re (excerpt)
Nono
The Last Seven MinutesDisc 4
Zess
The Night We Died
Otis
KA- Finally, Vander hasn’t finished writing Emehnteht-Re yet. But who knows, a late 2006 release is not out of question!
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
Coming Up at the Tonic
New York’s Tonic has a number of promsing shows throughout this month, including:
Mon, Dec 12
8pm Peter Evans, Mary Halvorson, Moppa Elliott & Kevin Shea plus Steven Bernstein’s Millennial Territory OrchestraThu, Dec 15
8pm Ben Perowsky & Sylvie Courvoisier
10pm John Zorn, Arto Lindsay & Anton FierTue, Dec 20
8pm & 10pm Mark Dresser & Roswell Rudd Duo plus Mark Dresser and FriendsWed, Dec 21
8pm Okkyung Lee with Sylvie Courvoisier, John Hollenbeck & Anthony BurrWed, Dec 28
8pm Sonny SImmons, Bern Nix, Daniel Carter, Adam Lane, Andrew Barker, Mike Fortune & Jeffrey Hayden Shurdut
8:30pm Pure Fire in the ))sub((tonic loungeThu, Dec 29
8pm Anthony Coleman
10pm Uri Caine with Ben Perowsky and special guestsSat, Dec 31
7pm Hemophiliac: John Zorn, Mike Patton & Ikue Mori plus John Zorn’s Electric Masada
10pm Electric Masada with special guest vocalist Mike Patton
1am Special New Year’s Eve Set: Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog
9pm Shades of Brown: Sight & Sound in the ))sub((tonic loungeSun, Jan 01
10pm Painkiller vs. Method of Defiance
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
The Unanswered Question (1908). Charles Ives /clarity/
Andrew Woodrow on Ives' The Unanswered Question:
The Unanswered Question (the Ives they played) is written for a string orchestra, a trumpet, and a few woodwinds. The strings repeat the same thing over and over again (and the thing they repeat reminded me of Barber's Adagio), and the trumpet and woodwinds interject interrogative phrases here and there. It's clear. And beautiful.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
You've Changed (1942). Bill Carey and Carl Fischer /the week/
The week's listening:
- Can't Get Enough
- You've Changed. Dexter Gordon. Still stunned by this track even if in fact people don't change.
- Double Music. John Cage and Lou Harrison. Ethos, Meadows, and UMass/Lowell recordings.
- Copland, Harris. Lara Downes on piano. Not too crazy about her Flash-based website, though.
- Return Of The Repressed. John Fahey.
- About Right
- Circle in the Round. Miles Davis. The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings. I'm playing through the 6-CD set from the library but may reach saturation since I have also checked out the four-CD Jack Johnson set.
- Tropical Hot Dog Night. Captain Beefheart. Memorable if a bit creepy.
- Got Too Much
- The Firebird. Igor Stravinsky. Gerard Schwarz. Sorry. Joshua Kosman does give Oedipus Rex and The Nightingale a good review.
- Faster. Ekkehard Ehlers. His Albert Ayler is cool, albeit way, way abstract.
- Sonate No. 3. Alban Berg. Alain Neveaux. I thought I might like this but not yet.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
A Hand of Bridge (1959). Samuel Barber
I used to have a soccer blog but it was tedious for me let alone any readers. In any case, for the next six months, I may show surprising interest in music from Italy, the Czech Republic and Ghana. Related, the News Blog has the best prediction so far for next year's soccer World Cup in Germany:
But a win in Germany would likely bring back the Cup to the UK, if the English fans don't refight WWII in the process.
So, I'll be seeking out Italian-American, Czech-American, and Ghanian-American composers. Only Gian Carlo Menotti and his Pulitzer-winning The Counsel comes to mind but I'll keep working on it.
Reading Menotti's bio, I see that he "wrote the libretti to Samuel Barber's operas Vanessa and A Hand of Bridge." I'm not familiar with the latter but the Wikipedia description intrigues:
A Hand of Bridge, a nine minute opera composed by Samuel Barber with libretto by Gian-Carlo Menotti, is one of the shortest operas that is regularly performed. It consists of two couples playing a hand of bridge. During the opera each character has a short arietta in which they express their internal monologue. The soprano laments not loving her now dying mother while she was still well. The contralto recalls a hat she saw in a shop window erlier in the day. The tenor recalls an ex-lover and wonders where she is now. Finally, the baritone fantasizes about what he would do if he were as rich as his boss "Mr. Pritchett."
Uh oh, I identify with several of those characters...
A quick search points out Tomas Svoboda and I suppose Dvorák has relevance here. Amazon, via this interesting list of African American composers, also turns up a CD I want.
Originally posted by Robert Gable from aworks :: "new" american classical music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
In the Bleak, Mid-Winter
Elodie Lauten has a neat interview with Czech composer, conductor and flutist Petr Kotik who has a concert coming up on December 20. Kotik is also the founder of the S.E.M. Ensemble. Anybody know what the "S.E.M." denotes? I don't but then I don't knowOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
Donald Martino, 1931-2005
Donald Martino has died at the age of 74. What few of his works I know, particularly his most famous piece, Notturno, should be enough to give the lie to the idea that composers in the academy, even those involved with dodecaphony, are incapable of writOriginally posted by Evan Johnson from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 05:57 PM
Cac.ophono.us - Building A New Music Announcement Aggregator
OK, the Cac.ophono.us site is up and I've wired up the del.icio.us feed to one of the columns. This is not even a pre-alpha site yet. Initial ideas are in the previous article, A Proposal for Announcing New Music Recordings on the Net. At the moment, I'm still experimenting with how to auto-generate blog entries from the del.icio.us mp3_classical_contemporary RSS feed. Once that's done and I settle on a look, this should get rolling. Current plans are: 1. Auto-generate blog entries from new items in the del.icio.us RSS feed. 2. Auto-modify a playlist at Webjay.org which can also serve as a podcast for people that just want to subscribe and watch the new MP3's just drop in. 3. More as I remember/think them up and digest your comments. What I could really use a hand in is how to make it so that when we do start promoting the service (especially the use of del.icio.us tags) it gets some traction. Am I forgetting anything that would make it more compelling as a new music announcement service? Is requiring a del.icio.us account going to stymie this service? I can certainly use the post to generate new tagged entries, by way of the Cac.ophono.us site or an email list, but I'm afraid that's just inviting spam. Also, there's a real advantage in slowly identifying composers who use the list through their announcements. Del.icio.us allows for subscription to a tag by tagger and that could pave the way for a privileging that could be helpful in maintaing this micro-community service. I'm thinking of ways to invite the electronic music community, also. That's a can of worm for sure, since every kid with a computer now is a composer. Requiring a del.icio.us account identifier might be key here in keeping the list maintainable and interesting. I'm leaving comments open here and in the announcement below for the moment, until it gets googled and blog-spammed. Please help me out with your thoughts and ideas. If you're reading this through the New Music ReBlog site, please comment at beepSNORT.Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 11, 2005 at 03:02 PM
December 10, 2005
At a Loss for Compositional Ideas?
Nick Didkovsky on the JMSL list reminds us all of Webhamster Henry's Top 10 Imaginary Recordings of 2005. a brilliant spoof/sendup/ideafarm of conceptual possibilities in sonic design. My favorite... Return To Sender (Mail Ops, 2005) Experimental sound artist Holga Becker modded up her Mp3 recorder to run extra slowly, stuck it in a package and mailed it to her self. Hear the sounds of travel, other packages (what's that ticking noise?), sorting machines, mutterings of the postal employees and lots of bumps....Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 04:20 PM
A Proposal for Announcing New Music Recordings on the Net
I've got an idea, and I'm working on an implementation, of a generalized way to announce new MP3's on the net. Been thinking for a while, about what a loss of community, the demise of MP3.com was. We've experienced a diaspora of sorts, spread out all over from Ampcast to Download.com. We no longer have any site that welcomes comments or even just pointers to new recordings. And it's not just the community that's been lost, its the mechanism for attracting the release of new net-distributed recordings. So, a modest proposal is in order. I'm setting up a new site, which is now up and empty, called Cacophonus. I don't intend to re-create Sequenza21 or even the MP3.com Classical Forum. It's main purpose will be to aggregate new music announcements and at some point, possibly critiques and commentaries in an informal way. But the first step, that we can all begin doing, so that we can find each other's new recordings is to use del.icio.us to tag URL's for deep-linked (or not so deep-linked) MP3's. You'll need to set up a del.icio.us account which takes approximately 2 seconds. I propose 2 tags for our community, but can envisage a few more: mp3_classical mp3_classical_contemporary Whenever a new work is tagged in this fashion, it'll show up for anybody who has subscribed to mp3_classical_contemporary tag in their inbox. You 'post' your MP3 URL and tag it with one of those tags. I'd suggest we begin using it for new works and not for our entire catalogs. Users that want to see these new works can subscribe to these tags in their inbox. Example: del.icio.us mp3_classical_contemporary Now when, somebody posts a new MP3 URL in this manner, I will see it in my inbox, because I have subscribed to that tag. Notice there is an RSS feed to that page. You can subscribe to that almost as a podcast and that'll play into some of my plans on how to aggregate these announcements and at some point create a comments system.Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 04:20 PM
William Bolcom Ties with 50 Cent
On December 8th, the Recording Academy announced its nominees for the 48th GRAMMY Awards ceremony. Topping the list -- and proving that miracles can happen -- were Mariah Carey, John Legend, and Kayne West with eight nominations apiece. Next in the hierarchy came nominees with six nods each. That list included 50 Cent, Beyoncé Knowles, The Black Eyed Peas, Stevie Wonder, and William Bolcom.
The lauded Bolcom recording - his huge 1982 settting of William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience for a dozen soloists, multiple choruses, and orchestra with added brass, percussion, and electronic instruments - was released on the Naxos label, and features the performing ensembles of the University of Michigan (where Bolcom is on faculty) with Leonard Slatkin conducting. The recording was mentioned in the following categories: Best Engineered, Producer of the Year, Best Classical Album, Best Choral Performance, Best Classical Vocal Performance, and Best Classical Contemporary Composition.A review of the full nominee list reveals other interesting tidbits. Of particular note, in the classical album, opera, choral, and orchestral categories combined, the only American ensemble to receive a nomination -- other than the UM School of Music for the Bolcom -- was the Boston Early Music Festival, which was given a best opera recording nod for its production of Conradi’s Ariadne .
The 48th GRAMMY Awards ceremony will be held in Los Angeles on February 8, 2006.
Originally from ionarts, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:51 PM
Criticising in Context
I've been mulling over this rather extended debate going on in el blogosphere. I was having some trouble crystalizing my thoughts on the function of musical criticism, when I found a neat & tidy(ish) interview quote that did some of the heavy lifting for me:We study the history of music as though it starts with Gregorian chant and goes to [Machaut], Monteverdi, Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Stravinsky, Schönberg, etc. But rarely do we learn when we study those things. What these people were really thinking about, aside from musical questions. We talk about them and listen to their work as though they only thought about music, and were not subject to the conditioning forces of the society in which they lived. As though that was something unimportant. Whereas, it is known in many cases that these composers were very often passionately concerned with social and political issues. Beethoven is certainly a case and point, or Chopin, or Wagner just to name a few, so it becomes a confusing question when we try to think how music, which we are accustomed to thinking of as a fundamentally abstract form of communication, how that can be a vehicle not only for feelings, but for ideas. I think that perhaps, in order to answer a question like that one has to examine not only the imminent characteristics of a piece of music, one has to imagine the piece of music as consisting not only of notes or sounds, but as a process of communication involving groups of human beings on a very basic level of course involving the collaborative activity of composers, performers, and audience, but also as a larger process of communication which involves a much larger and more general context.(Rzewski, again)
He gives the issue a slightly political bent, but I suppose that's part of his personality. Looking at it more generally, it's an issue of context. The quote could easily be rephrased to say that we commonly neglect religion, race, gender, whatever, in discussions of music. Context is the difference between a chord with an added sixth signifying kitsch or signifying prayer.
The NYT review of An American Tragedy was itself criticized for what some saw as a slew of short-sighted omissions. What I want to know is why didn't it discuss the context of the premiere more? The first paragraph:
For a company of such international standing, the Metropolitan Opera has had an inexcusably timid record of commissioning operas in recent decades. Consequently, when the Met presents a new work, the stakes are almost impossibly high.The context of the production isn't really touched on until the conclusion, when Tommasini does a simple tie-in to make the piece feel rounded out. What of the fact that the Met has commissioned so few new operas? Is the mantle of Great American Opera still worth aspiring to, or has it dwindled to a pointless pursuit in our present cultural climate? Is the choice of libretto significant in any way? What audience is the opera reaching out to? Should anyone else care?
Alternatively, you can go in the opposite direction and only discuss context. Pitchfork is an easy target, but a failing of a lot of rock criticism, particularly when you get into indie rock circles, is favoring "hot or not" "issues" over whether or not the music's any good. As usual, a median between the two extremes, "objective" and "subjective" reactions, is what should be pursued.
Returning to the Rzewski quote, his final point is worth taking note of: in the production of music, you witness an intersection of a multitude of extensive and interconnected social relationships. Jeremy Denk posted some thoughts on a review of a Richard Goode recital. The issue was that the critic was harsh on Goode, faulting him for making an unusual (perhaps daring?) performance. In playing the music, Goode was continuing a thread of relationships that began with the authorship of the music, led through all of his experiences with the piece, touched on whoever may've been involved in those experiences, and took a stop at his recital.
Rather than contemplate and consider this very extended train of thought, the critic (at least as Jeremy suggested) cut it off with a cold and slightly ambivalent response. Speaking from my experience as a performer, you know whether or not you played well on any given night. It's flattering and all to get compliments on how you did, but really, no one needs to tell you. Similarly, I'll know if I lost control in any spots. Saying that someone "[let] his passion surge ahead of his judgment" ... what does that really mean to a reader? I'm not being dense here; how much does that statement inform a reader's understanding of what went on that night?
Contextualizing the playing, though, talking about it in relation to the pianist's past performances, common practices on how the composer's music should be played, what kind of relationship the performer had with the audience... these comments can make up for not being at an event. They continue the discourse that started way back whenever the piece was written. They, to me, are the makings of good criticism.
Originally from Form/Content, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:51 PM
And . . .
. . . the nominees are . . . See Jerry Bowles' "quick and dirty" page for the classical music Grammy nominees. Hey, I played saxophone on the Bolcom album! That's me with the solo on Disc 2, track 1.
Originally posted by Brian Sacawa from Brian Sacawa: Sounds Like Now, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:51 PM
Guilty of remix?
In the US the pioneering webcaster Postclassic Radio has been found to be in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for streaming consecutive tracks (actually consecutive movements from a symphony) from the same CD.Is it right to prevent emerging technologies such as the internet and music streaming from being used for the long-established practice of remixing culture?
I recently quoted Lawrence Lessig, Stanford law professor, and originator of the Creative Commons alternative to copyright who explained: "Culture is remix. Knowledge is remix. Politics is remix. Everyone in the life of producing and creating engages in this practice of remix.Companies do it. Politicians do it ... We all do it. This is what life is in the expression of creativity. Remix is how we live."
Remixing has a pretty long history with some pretty impressive practitioners. Berio's Sinfonietta remixes Mahler. Tippett's Third Symphony remixes Beethoven. Shostakovich's Fifteenth Symphony remixes Rossini and Wagner. Stravinsky thought he was remixing Pergolesi in his ballet Pulcinella, but it turns out it was actually Dominico Gallo, and Elgar remixed himself in the sublime Music Makers. The Lutheran chorales in Bach are remixed secular songs, and many medieval composers such as Guillaume Dufay remixed popular songs of the day in their Mass settings such as the Missa L'homme armé.
Remixing has long been an established practice in rock music. George Harrison was sued for remixing when he allegedly infringed the copyright on the song He's So Fine, which was composed by Ronald Mack and performed by The Chiffons, in his composition My Sweet Lord which was released in 1970 on the album All Things Must Pass.
The court in Bright Tunes Music Corp. v. Harrisongs Music, Ltd., 420 F.Supp. 177 (1976), ruled that George Harrison had infringed upon the copyright of He's So Fine . The decision was precedent setting as the court acknowledged that Harrison may have unconsciously remixed the tune. The ruling stated: "His subconscious knew it already had worked in a song his conscious did not remember... That is, under the law, infringement of copyright, and is no less so even though subconsciously accomplished."
There are examples of remixing even holier than George Harrison's My Sweet Lord. The German scholar Karl David Ilgen put forward the view that there are nearly twenty documents that make up the biblical Book of Genesis, and that the documents were assembled by three separate groups of writers.
And of course blogging is the ultimate expression of remix. The previous paragraph was gently remixed from Peter Watson's book Ideas, A History from Fire to Freud, and the two paragraphs before that were slightly more vigorously remixed from a copyright website (nice one). And this post will be remixed at New Music reBlog, we now even have a book that remixes blog posts as hardcopy, and so on .........
On An Overgrown Path has previously been accused by internet evangelist Jeff Harrington (who remixes himself on New Music reBlog) of being on the side of the record companies. That is untrue. I try wherever possible to be on the side of the angels. For me the angels are those adding the most value to music making, and that includes composers, musicians, and some record companies who have successfully remixed themselves, such as Zig- Territoires, Alpha and MaxOpus.
Postclassic Radio says its objective is to promote "weirdly beautiful new music from composers who've left the classical world far behind." In my book that is adding value to music making. And for me, as we say here in England, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act is an ass for finding it in violation.
Check out Postclassic Radio founder and composer Kyle Gann's own blog for more on this story,and thanks to that other excellent webcaster Classical Junk for the heads-up on this story.
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If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Music-like-water
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
Five Movements for String Quartet
From 1909, these pieces are the first to directly employ the signature Webernian sparseness. "The Master of Pianissimo" is clearly present here, and the brevity of the third movement is a fantastic indication of the things to come (all the way up to echo's Microscores Project):I. Heftig bewegt—etwas ruhiger
II. Sehr langsam
III. Sehr bewegt
IV. Sehr langsam
V. In zarter Bewegung
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
Two Down, One to Go
Like an old flame, Alban Berg's Lyric Suite has aged well indeed, 80 years old this year. The Arditti Quartet shows us the New in this most romantically inclined of the Second Viennese Three.
2. andante amoroso
3. allegro misterioso
4. adagio appassionato
5. presto delirando
6. largo desolato
- this completes an ANABlog tagteam
of the
Second Viennese School
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
Eugene Chadbourne Show Previewed
A preview of an upcoming Chadbourne performance is available.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
Clarinetist David Krakauer finds in hip-hop klezmer a funk that fits
An article describes how Krakauer, the guy behind Klemzer Madness, found a young hip-hop artist to work with.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
DMG Newsletter
Hey, it’s another DMG Newsletter, this one including lots of Zorn info.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
Bar Kokhba Sextet Reviewed
Yet another f the Zorn birthday releases is reviewed.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
Obituary: Stephen "Lucky" Mosko
Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
The Friday Informer: Getting Inside Their Hearts, Heads, and...Houses
Dan Visconti and Daniel Bernard Roumain let us into their studios, Jason Freeman gets into our iTunes, and more...Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:50 PM
So's Your Grammy
The Grammy nominations came out yesterday and, no surprise, our friends at Naxos got more of them in the classical category than any other label--15 in all. Mark Berry has a report on The Naxos Blog. The nominees for classical contemporary compositionOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:49 PM
Philadelphia Sounds: Network for New Music and Leon Fleisher
Philadelphia’s Network for New Music program Music from the Hands and Heart featured the hands of guest pianist Leon Fleisher, and (mostly) new music. Let’s begin by conceding that Fleisher certainly can play. After 40 years of playing only pieces for theOriginally posted by Deborah Kravetz from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:49 PM
"An American Tragedy" at the Met
Whatever one makes of Tobias Picker’s “An American Tragedy,” it’s a relief to see the Met once again bringing to life new work by a real live American composer. That said, Picker’s latest neither affords this critic the opportunity to write a rant or aOriginally posted by David Salvage from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:49 PM
Guilty of remix?
The pioneering webcaster Postclassic Radio, run by composer Kyle Gann, has been found to be in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for streaming consecutive tracks (actually consecutive movements from a symphony) from the same CD. On An OveOriginally posted by Pliable from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 10, 2005 at 12:49 PM
December 09, 2005
Music in a moment
When I welcomed the new Naxos blog a month ago I had some concerns that it would turn out to be a smooth corporate PR machine for their new releases. Well, so far it has turned out to be ..... er ..... a smooth corporate PR machine for their new releases.By contrast another new blogger on Sequenza21 is in the running for my best new blog of 2005 award. Blockdogred's Indie Beat meets the three tests for a great blog - personal, passionate and unpredictable. It is also refreshingly free of the tiresome uptown/midtown/downtown patois that makes some of the other discussions on Sequenza21 difficult to relate to if, like both Benjamin Britten and me, you live on the wrong east coast.
Another new blogger over at Sequenza21 is Jack Reilly. He first found out what a blog is when I blogged him a while back in Journey with Jack Reilly. Now the 73 year young jazzer is blogging like a veteran. He is a great all round musician, and he has something to say. Read him.
Finally Music in a moment is yet another interesting new blog. John Clare's introductory manifesto is a bit top heavy- 'Don't listen to live, live to listen. Broaden you musical horizon and be opened to a lifetime in a measure. Music is powerful. It is special. I sincerely believe that you can "live" in a moment of music'. But once you're through the treacle the the blog starts very promisingly with features (and audio files) on Andrzej Panufnik and Walter Mays among others. Check it out.
Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
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If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to A quiet celebration with friends
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:54 PM
Just lie back on the cushion...
"I put to you that the United States is without doubt the greatest show on the road. Brutal, indifferent, scornful and ruthless it may be but it is also very clever. As a salesman it is out on its own and its most saleable commodity is self love. It's a winner. Listen to all American presidents on television say the words, 'the American people', as in the sentence, 'I say to the American people it is time to pray and to defend the rights of the American people and I ask the American people to trust their president in the action he is about to take on behalf of the American people.'It's a scintillating stratagem. Language is actually employed to keep thought at bay. The words 'the American people' provide a truly voluptuous cushion of reassurance. You don't need to think. Just lie back on the cushion. The cushion may be suffocating your intelligence and your critical faculties but it's very comfortable. This does not apply of course to the 40 million people living below the poverty line and the 2 million men and women imprisoned in the vast gulag of prisons, which extends across the US."
The Nobel Prize citation says of Harold Pinter: "who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression's closed rooms"
Now read all Pinter's Nobel lecture exclusively on the Guardian web site
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If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to 'Tis the gift to be free
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:54 PM
Original Position.
I think i was 8 years old, maybe 7- not sure, placing the date around 1993/94 (be warned: dates fascinate me). I played all those annoying children’s things, those stupid children’s music books with things like mary had a... ba ba black sheep, and dumb little cartoons to go along with the sheet music.
I have never been a person who enjoys being patronized, and i distinctly remember hating those children-music books because i felt they suggested that i was an idiot, they were pandering to adult assumptions of what children enjoy with banal cartoons and happy smiling 8th notes. (i may not have know how to express this hostility at the time, but i know i felt it) So i made little progress for a few years. I also had difficulty sight-reading, i hated it. But this changed with my exposure to Bach.
Bach! i was probably 10 or so when my teacher presented me with a minuet in G (after going past the advanced children’s books). I was thrilled, i knew the music! i liked it too! how different. I ate it up and in two weeks time i was on to a new Bach piece, a prelude. From there i progressed to another prelude, and another. Then i remember my teacher presented me with something novel and different all together- an arrangement of Sakura, cherry blossoms, that famous Japanese tune. I loved it! I wished for more music with an eastern sound, so my teacher presented me with "Chinese lanterns", which became a favorite in that period of my life. A little later i played my first Chopin prelude (e minor, which, i must say, i played with a lot of emotion for an 11 year old) (circa 1997) i was filled with enthusiasm. That music was dark, somber, melancholy, like nothing i had ever played, and certainly nothing like the always-cheerful Bach and Mozart pieces i knew up to that point. I fell in love with Chopin immediately.
Then more Chopin preludes (the easy ones, of course). I impressed my friends by playing with such drama and i loved the attention. I continued to play this and that for awhile... some Bartok, some more Bach, even a few Beethoven bagatelles. Anyway, after this i remember stuff more clearly, and here i am now- still playing...
People often ask me how long i've been playing and usually i just respond with "im not sure". 12 years almost? Thats what i think, could be wrong though.
Hope i didnt bored everyone to tears, just a little bit of dull personal history thats good for me to remember. I suppose that would make this a rather selfish post. .. eh.
Originally from Music in a Suburban Scene, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:53 PM
Mauricio Kagel's Music for Renaissance Instrument...
Mauricio Kagel's Music for Renaissance Instruments (1965/66)
I'm begging some group to take this on - or if you know some period instrument ensemble that have programmed this work on an upcoming concert, please drop me a line !
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:48 PM
Schoenberg Meets Denza
If Schoenberg took the time to arrange "Funiculì Funiculà", it's rather a shame he couldn't have held on long enough for us to hear what he would have done with Britney Spears.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:48 PM
Experimental Music Workshop presents...
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:48 PM
Popism
The official news release for the Grammy Awards nominations makes no mention of classical music or jazz.
Originally posted by Alex Ross from Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:48 PM
New on pfMENTUM
pfMENTUM has a pair of new releases.
Steuart Liebig Stigtette: Delta
Michael Vlatkovich: Across 36 Contintents
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
Notes on Classical Grammy Nominations
Ok, so the Grammies are silly, but its always nice to have a few deserving contenders:
Best Orchestral Performance
(Award to the Conductor and to the Orchestra.)* Antheil: Sym. No. 3 “American”
Hugh Wolff, conductor (Radio-Sinfonie-Orchester Frankfurt)
[CPO]* Popov: Sym. No. 1; Shostakovich: Theme & Variations
Leon Botstein, conductor (London Symphony Orchestra)
[Telarc]* Shostakovich: Sym. No. 13
Mariss Jansons, conductor (Sergei Aleksashkin; Chor Des Bayerischen Rundfunks;
Symphonieorchester Des Bayerischen Rundfunks)
[EMI Classics]Best Choral Performance
(Award to the Choral Conductor, and to the Orchestra Conductor if an Orchestra is on the recording, and to the Choral Director or Chorus Master if applicable.)* Penderecki: A Polish Requiem
Antoni Wit, conductor; Henryk Wojnarowski, chorus master (Izabela Klosinska,
Ryszard Minkiewicz, Piotr Nowacki & Jadwiga Rappé; Warsaw National Philharmonic
Choir; Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra)
[Naxos]* Schoenberg: Accentus
Laurence Equilbey, choir director (Jonathan Nott; Accentus; Ensemble
Intercontemporain)
[Naive]Best Small Ensemble Performance (with or without Conductor)
(Award to the Ensemble (and to the Conductor.))* Ancient Voices Of Children
David Colson, conductor; Tony Arnold, Courtney Hershey Bress, Kathryn Dupuy
Cooper, Mark Foster, Susan Grace, William Hill, John Kinzie, Justin Murray,
David Starobin & Dale Stuckenbruck
Track from: Complete Crumb Edition, Volume Nine
[Bridge Records, Inc.]* Boulez: Le Marteau Sans Maître, Dérive 1 & 2
Pierre Boulez, conductor; Hilary Summers; Ensemble Intercontemporain
[Deutsche Grammophon]Best Classical Contemporary Composition
(A Composer’s Award. (For a contemporary classical composition composed within the last 25 years, and released for the first time during the Eligibility Year.))* Ayre
Osvaldo Golijov (Dawn Upshaw)
Track from: Golijov: Ayre; Berio: Folk Songs
[Deutsche Grammophon]* Bolcom: Songs Of Innocence And Of Experience
William Bolcom (Leonard Slatkin)
[Naxos]* Boyer: Ellis Island: The Dream Of America
Peter Boyer (Peter Boyer)
[Naxos]* Franzetti: Corpus Evita
Carlos Franzetti (José Luis Moscovich)
[Amapola Records]* Nine Episodes For Four Players
Ned Rorem (Contrasts Quartet)
Track from: Rorem: Nine Episodes For Four Players
[Phoenix USA]
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
BLAST4TET Website
This latest version of Blast finally has a site and it contains lots of goodies.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
Grammy Nominations Announced
Can William Bolcom pull off a Nora Jones-style sweep at the the 48th annual Grammy awards?Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
Minneapolis: Build It And They Will Come
The Renegade Ensemble's enlists armature musicians into its ranks, cultivating a more community-first approach which attracts a favorable crowd to this relative newcomer to the Twin Cities music scene.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
Exposing MySpace Artist Exposure
I've recently joined MySpace after a year or two (how long has it been around?) of avoiding it cuz it looked so HotOrNotty. My page has BlueStrider and a few other 'hits' of mine and I've been wondering where the music promotion scene was going from there. I've actually met quite a few interesting composers there, FWIW, and even have the Kronos Quartet as a friend. Woo hoo! Hint to Kronos, my string quartet Anamorphosis would be a compelling addition to any of your concerts! I found an article about a band that was featured on the front page there for a week and what that meant in CD sales. They shared the feature with Madonna and 2 other big names. They got tons of downloads, friend requests and sold... well... 0 that is a big naught CD's. Overexposed is an article by Scott Andrew about this and its pretty interesting. What is exposure now? What can one reasonably hope for with online exposure? I received an email from a friend last week about some radio airplay he'd had with a few of his pieces. It seemed so old-skool I thought it was a little funny. The show probably has 200 listeners. How is that different from 200 downloads? Not sure... but there is a difference, I'm sure. People do download without listening and people do listen to the radio without listening. Does getting real world exposure, a Wire feature, or a TV spot add up to anything in the current scene when there is so much music competing for our attention? I keep telling people that we're in a new scene now, that online exposure will become more and more important. That an online buzz will be THE buzz that propells great artists to the top. We'll see I guess, it sure is taking a long time. On that note, I guess I should mention here that Stirling Newberry, composer and political blogger of fame wrote a very flattering article about yours truly recently focussing on my music and my activities in the net music world to create a classical music scene. Jeff Harrington, The Unwritten Chapter....Originally posted by jeff from beepSNORT, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
Blah, Blah, Blah
Dave Thomas has a funny post on his love-hate relationship with reeds. Lawrence Dillon has a funny story about little old ladies. I have nothing amusing to say today. Pre-Christmas blahs. Hey, I know. Let's do desert island disks. Here's my first thOriginally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
Kunning Kapitalist Kristians On the March
Here's something that got my blood boiling. The powers that be at Glimmerglass Opera asked Stephen Hartke, and librettist, Philip Littell, to take the word "whore" out of the title of their new opera for fear of offending patrons. And, they did. Thus,Originally posted by Jerry Bowles from Sequenza21, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 9, 2005 at 01:41 PM
December 08, 2005
Links for the week, Postclassic edition
The first, on Postclassic Radio's brush with the DMCA , brings up the tricky issue of how the bit of the DMCA being applied (no more than two songs from one album consecutively) legislates against broadcasting all multi-movement classical works. As John Maxwell Hobbs observes in comments to Kyle's post, a pop paradigm is being applied across the board - he asks: why not, then, manufacture classical CDs as one track per work, rather than one track per movement? This might be the easiest solution (and not a bad one), but a better one might be to write a law that can take account of all music that actually exists. The best one would be to scrap the whole thing.
The second is on Paul Griffiths' take on Messiaen's added sixth chords. Like Kyle, I never heard these as problematic - maybe slightly kitschy, but not in a bad way. The odd thing about them, and the equally frequent dominant and minor seventh chords, is that they don't sound like what they are. In context they sound exactly like another part of the great man's harmonic vocabulary (and I think this is the point Griffiths was making in the passage quoted by Gann); I was always suprised by that, even when, sat at the organ on a Sunday afternoon, I had the darned chords in my hands. Context, as so often, was everything. That and a warm and fluffy vox celeste stop.
Originally from The Rambler, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:43 PM
Making lists, checking them twice, redux
I did a quick count on the Sequenza 21 list -- I've heard 68 of the pieces listed (the Nancarrow Studies counted together as one), and surprisingly, I've heard most of them in concert, with only a handful encountered on radio, and only one or two of the pieces were heard only via recordings.Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:42 PM
Alsop advocates Arnold
This blog is a champion of the music of Malcolm Arnold. And there are few conductors around today with the media profile of Marin Alsop.
So it is really exciting to see Alsop (right) programming Arnold in a Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra concert in March 2006. The work is Arnold's sublime Guitar Concerto, the performances are on 29th March at the Lighthouse Poole, and 31st March at Exeter University, and the soloist is the talented young American guitarist Eliot Fisk. (Could there be a Naxos recording in the pipeline? - next year is the 85th anniversary of Sir Malcolm's birth and they have already recorded all his symphonies.) And more good news, Eliot Fisk has his very own excellent blog. Great to see a professional musician blogging, makes a change from mere amateurs like me.
Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dott uk
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If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Arnold's 9th - neglected 20th century masterpiece?
Originally from On An Overgrown Path, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:42 PM
To Ayre is Human
I got the school library to purchase Golijov's Ayre, and yesterday I had the chance to check it out and listen to it twice. I fall in between Alex Ross and Charles T. Downey, though much closer to Alex's opinion. I think Charles' problem (and Jens' in comments at ionarts) is that they approached the music as a classical work, an art song cycle. Ayre is a mongrel creature, a mix of pop, world music, art song, electronica, and performance art. The sixth song, "Wa Habibi," caught me off-guard the first time, with its heavy emphasis on glissanding synthesizers. But it has a unique charm, as does each song. Ayre somewhat reminds me of Bach's Magnificat. Each movement creates a specific character, with often sharp shifts from one movement to the next. Despite these radical differences, the work retains an overall cohesion. Ayre is definitely a lighter work, but I think it is a lot of fun to listen to, and recommend it to almost anyone.Originally from Musical Perceptions, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:42 PM
Charmed
I'm off to Baltimore today for a masterclass at Morgan State University on Friday and a concert at the infamous Red Room on Saturday night, featuring music by James Tenney, Michael Pisaro, Keeril Makan, Alvin Lucier, and Per Bloland. Billed as a "rare night of composed-not-improvised experimental music," the show made the CITYPAPER's Short List.
I've been looking forward to returning to Baltimore for a long time. I was a resident of Charm City from 1999-2002 and have many fond memories of my time there. I lived on the west side in a little neighborhood known as SoWeBo, which is where they film The Wire for HBO. It was a rough neighborhood, but my row house was nestled in a nice little artistic community. Gun shots were somewhat common but they never really bothered me that much--I lived on the second and third floors of the house so I wasn't really at street level. One night I woke up to six rounds fired off in quick succession. On my way to work that morning I heard on the news that there was a triple murder on the 1100 block of Hollins Street--I lived on the 1300 block. It's a nice city, really!
While it's not the size of New York, there are plenty of options, especially for the arts. Hey, it's where John Waters is from. Some of the more quirky Baltimore destinations include the American Dime Museum, where you can see the world's largest ball of twine and the American Visionary Art Museum. I could go on and on, but I'm a little tired of coding . . . and I need to pack. I will most definitely enjoy a bit of Ozzy's company, however.
Originally posted by Brian Sacawa from Brian Sacawa: Sounds Like Now, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:35 PM
The Microscore Project hits the studios today. We ...
The Microscore Project hits the studios today. We will attempt to represent the most diverse of compositional thoughts and strains of sound in an ongoing effort to bring the circus to a town near you.A selection of pieces from our playlist slated for the sessions:
Peter Ablinger two strings and noise
James Tenney Just Another Bagatelle
Vinny Golia 2v2
Mark Menzies Huff-Hough
Pauline Oliveros in 30 seconds for violin and cello
Shane Hubert 30 seconds of Pure Evil
Philip Brownlee In vento scripta (excerpts)
Sabine Lara Vogel Wing Nr.1
Kris Tiner Beedie & Bob
Sean Clute Micro Hemisphere
Zachary Scott Tributary
David Kendall
Andre Cormier Debris (excerpts)
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:35 PM
Séanced
The New Music Séance last weekend was a tremendous success... we sold out each of the three performances. The hall proved to be quite intimate and appropriate for this type of music. And the performers were outstanding. One of our volunteers, Mike Strickland, took pictures and created a weblog about the experience. Rather than duplicate what he has already done, I've cobbled his blog entries together into a single narrative here. There are even a couple of pictures of me.
In the end, the afternoon and evening were amazing. And we owe it all to these wonderful performers, Sarah Cahill, Kate Stenberg, and Eva-Maria Zimmermann.
Hey. Let's do it again!
Originally from All I Know, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:35 PM
Time of the sines.
Cellist Charles Curtis, a longtime New York fixture and La Monte Young associate now based in San Diego, is back in town this month in a big, big way, presenting a series of concerts under the collective rubric "Waking States." So far, the residency has included a performance of Young's Just Charles and Cello in the Romantic Chord at the Mela Foundation Dream House last week (with two more performances to come on December 10 and 17), the world premiere of Éliane Radigue's Naldjorlak last Monday night at the Tenri Cultural Institute, and tonight's all-Alvin Lucier bill at the Diapason Gallery for Sound. The remaining events in the series are a concert at Tonic featuring the Piece for Cello and Saxophone by forgotten minimalist pioneer Terry Jennings on Sunday, December 11, and a performance of Morton Feldman's enigmatic Patterns in a Chromatic Field with pianist Aleck Karis at the Double Knot Rug Gallery on Wednesday, December 14. (Details regarding all of the concerts can be found here.)
I became aware of Curtis embarassingly late, via the absorbing CD of the aforementioned Feldman composition that he and Karis released on John Zorn's Tzadik label last year. More recently, Curtis and clarinetist Anthony Burr issued an utterly engrossing 2-CD set of Lucier's music on the outstanding Brooklyn-based electroacoustic music label Antiopic. That set followed hot on the heels of another rich lode of Lucier, by the Barton Workshop on New World Records -- which I have to thank Molly Sheridan of NewMusicBox for bringing to my attention, and for reviewing so admirably in TONY.
Alvin Lucier's music offers an intriguing paradox: Based on all manner of daunting scientific theorems and mathematical schemata, his pieces rightly sound like processes of nature. It's as if Wagner had scrapped the entire Ring cycle in order to more fully explore the acoustical implications inherent in the opening chord: An enveloping world of sound and event is revealed in the simplest and subtlest of gestures.
The New World set does an outstanding job of presenting Lucier's music, but the Antiopic release goes a step further, extending the gestalt to include the packaging in which the sounds are presented -- yet without stinting on first-rate annotation. (See for yourself -- the CD booklet and notes are here.) This is a first-rate model of presentation -- and how unsurprising it is that this should have come from a label at the periphery of out-rock, as opposed to avant-classical.
Perhaps ironically, Curtis didn't even touch his cello in my favorite of tonight's pieces. Instead, in the original version of Lucier's 1974 piece Still and Moving Lines of Silence in Families of Hyperbolas, he triggered sine waves from his laptop, in the process eliciting sympathetic vibrations from three snare drums positioned at varying distances in the room. The ebb and flow of the computer's simple song set the snares rustling like cicadas on a summer evening; as the wave forms slowly changed, the drums seemed to offer first a chorus, then ghostly pre-echoes, and finally scrabbly little rhythm patterns in response.
Charles Curtis, a Lucier piece dedicated to the cellist, created a complex interdependency between Curtis's instrument and the computer's slowly sweeping tones: sine waves rang; the cellist played a short figure; repeat. Across the work's duration, however, the soloist's position with regard to his accompaniment/antagonist constantly shifted. Many times, it seemed as if cello and computer were generating identical sounds, but when Curtis cut short his present aphorism, the machine was revealed to have moved somewhere else entirely. Mysterious and magical.
The final piece, Music for Cello with One or More Amplified Vases, revealed that the wiry parabolas draped behind Curtis throughout the evening were actually electrical cords, on which dangled microphones plunged into a collection of large ceramic vases. The basic premise of the piece was an exploration of the resonances created when Curtis bowed his instrument in the proximity of these vessels. If only the vases had been turned up in the mix... much of this piece came off as a soliloquy, at least from my patch of floor. (Granted, New York City is a hard place in which to play subtle music; the players contended all night long with sirens and garbage trucks on the street below.) On the occasions that a genuine balance was achieved, the results were utterly mesmerizing.
Playlist:
Felix Mendelssohn - A Midsummer Night's Dream: Overture; Lobgesang - Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra/Riccardo Chailly (Decca)
Hesperion XXI - Altre Follie 1500-1750 (Alia Vox)
Elliott Carter - Dialogues (Nicolas Hodges, London Sinfonietta/Oliver Knussen); Boston Concerto (BBC Symphony Orchestra/Knussen); Cello Concerto (Fred Sherry, BBC Symphony Orchestra/Knussen); ASKO Concerto (ASKO Ensemble/Knussen) (Bridge)
Tom Flaherty - Vorarlberg Resonance (Karl and Margaret Kohn); Timesflies (Peter Yates, Tom Flaherty); Trio for Cello and Digital Processor (Flaherty); Quartet for Viola, Cello and Digital Processor (Cynthia Fogg, Flaherty); Time to Travel (Karl and Margaret Kohn) (Bridge)
Ulver - Blood Inside (The End)
Nine Horses - Snow Borne Sorrow (Samadhi Sound)
Éliane Radigue - Adnos II and III (Table of the Elements)
Originally posted by NightAfterNight from Night After Night, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
Ennio Morricone - Crime & Dissonance Reviewed
A positive review of the new Morricone 2CD compilation is available.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
Dave Holland Solo Concert Review
A short review of the show is available.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
Live Chat with Dave Douglas
Greenleaf Music will be hosting a live chat with Douglas tonight.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
DMCA Hurts Classical Internet Radio
Kyle Gann blogs about how the DMCA laws stack the deck against meaningful classical broadcasts on the Internet.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
David Bond Free Jazz Festival in DC
The Twins Jazz & Twins Lounge is hosting the David Bond “FREE JAZZ” Festival this weekend.
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 9- THE DAVID BOND GROUP with DAVID BOND and ANDREW WHITE-Saxophone, BOB BUTTA-Piano, STEVE NOVOSEL-Bass, and NASSAR ABADEY-Drums
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 10- DAVID BOND, MARSHALL ALLEN, and ANDREW WHITE- Saxophones, BOB BUTTA-Piano, and members of the SUN RA ARKESTRA.
BUY TICKETS ONLINE
Marshall Allen is recognized all over the world as the premier avant-garde saxophonist, appearing in solo concert in London in 1995, duet with Terry Adams in 1997 in Canada, and featured in articles in “JazzTimes” (12/02), “Signal to Noise” Magazine, and innumerable other music magazines and radio and TV interviews. He is frequently called upon to give master classes, lectures, and demonstrations of Sun Ra’s musical precepts, and he Keeps himself accessible to all who have an interest in Sun Ra’s legacy. Marshall Allen plays the alto saxophone, flute, clarinet, oboe, kora, and E.V.I. (Electronic Valve Instrument).
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
An American Tragedy: Watching Opera Wearing Pop-Culture Glasses
The Met is wrapping up the first week of Tobias Picker's new opera, An American Tragedy. You may have heard about it. To be brief, the reviews in the papers and those overheard in the lobby have been decidedly mixed, rarely gushing or especially damning.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
How Sweet the Sound: Music in the Spiritual Lives of Americans
In 1957, the year Sun Ra recorded "Sun Song" and "Call for All Demons," tenor saxophonist John Coltrane underwent one of the fabled religious transformations in the history of American music.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
In Conversation with David W. Stowe
An interview with the author of How Sweet the Sound: Music in the Spiritual Lives of Americans.Originally from NewMusicBox, ReBlogged by jeff on Dec 8, 2005 at 01:32 PM
You Are (Variations) (2004). Steve Reich /2005 best of cds/
2005 aworks (composers/improvisors) CD filter /more to follow.../
Susie Ibarra (who also mentions music by Tania Leon, Samuel Barber, A&M etc.)
Jim Farber (box sets; Miles not yet available)