November 26, 2008
Not connecting (toward a second draft)
Thanks so very much, everyone, for all the comments and discussion, after my post about ways that classical music doesn't connect with the world we live in. So many of you added so many good points. Together, we're going to make a really strong list, stronger than I would have come up with on my own.So here's a step toward doing that. I've started with my original post, and followed that with the points you've added, plus doubts you've raised about my points and others. I've added a few comments, but the important stuff here is what all of you wrote.
Next step -- to refine this wonderful stew, to pare it down to the most important points, and find the best way to phrase each one. Anyone want to take a shot? There's a lot to work with. When we're done, I'll make a final list, subject to comments from all of you (of course), and post it in the "Resources" section of the blog on the right. I'll also put it in my book, with thanks and credit to all of you.
Though I think there's at least one more poiint to be added -- something about the way classical music is played, a kind of detachment, a subtext that says "This is classical music," a restrained, scholarly approach to performance which comes from a belief that structure is a supremely important thing about classical music, and then dampens the contrasts between one moment and another that would allow the structure to be heard. A lack of "grain of the voice" (to use Roland Barthes' expression), no swing in the rhythm.
Here we go:
1. Most of the music at classical concerts comes from the past. So we're rarely engaged with contemporary life. (Is this one reason the people who go to these concerts like them?)
2. Formal dress looks archaic, and out of touch.
3. The musicians don't talk to the audience. In our culture today, people expect musicians to talk.
4. Musicians subordinate their own personalities. They play the music the way they've been taught to. They don't take much initiative, don't make their concerts personal statements, don't play the music their own way.
5. Even when new music is played, much of it doesn't sound like the world around us. The sounds of popular music aren't much heard, though they were in past centuries.
6. More general statement of point five: There's rarely even a hint of current popular culture at classical concerts. That's not true of other forms of art -- novels, poetry, visual art, dance, theater.
7. The audience is old.
***
I think your #4 point is the main problem. If musicians play music they believe in, play it sincerely, all other sticking points just naturally fall away. But if not, well, we get 2% 'niche' market share.
***
Hey there. I don't think point 7 belongs on your list, because it is a direct result of points 1 through 6; because of points 1 through 6, the audience is old.
Or, the classical music you outline in points 1 through 6 does actually connect to an older audience's version of "larger culture". My larger culture is different than someone of a different age or geography's larger culture, so what or whose version of larger culture should classical music seek to connect with?
[Maybe I could refine the age point this way. Classical music reflects only one kind of culture, one demographic, in an age where we're multicultural. And multisubcultural. If classical music was, as it claims to be, a really comprehensive musical art, able to speak for our entire culture, then it would reflect many subcultures, as our entire culture does. And beyond that, many people the same age as the classical audience have a wider culture that doesn't include classical music. So even given the age, and not making an issue of it, by itself, there's a big part of culture missing. ]***
I think classical musicians not talking to the audience is one of the bigger points in the list, and one of the biggest problems in current classical concerts. In my experience, audiences love feeling connected to the performer. They respect his/her skills and dedication and musicality so they want to feel like they know the person, like they can go grab a beer with the person after wards. Talking is the quickest and easiest way to connect people, so to me it doesn't make sense not to talk with the audience and let them feel like they are taking part in the musical experience rather than just watching it.
It's like us classical musicians are deliberately withholding information from the audience so they have no idea what we are really doing up on stage. I personally ALWAYS talk at my shows and I can feel it makes a huge difference; if anything just to break the ice a little.
In classical music it is especially important for a true audience-performer connection because of your other point, the music is VERY OLD, it is already more difficult to relate to. So if we don't relate to them on a lingual level, the music by itself is probably not going to take them there either.
***
Stuffy concert hall atmosphere. In clubs (where increasingly classical music no longer fears to tread). you can drink a beer, talk between songs.
***
Audiences are required to sit quietly and pay attention instead of having the option to sit and pay attention or to chat or drink or dance or whatever else they want to do.
***
The temple-like edifices in which orchestral music is typically performed lock out passersby and seek to cocoon their attendees.
[Christopher Small wrote a vivid chapter about this in his book Musicking. I often assign it in my Juilliard course on the future of classical music.]***
The problem with classical music ticket sales is NOT (for the most part anyway) the fault of the music. It is the fault of the performer for not adapting to modern culture and presenting the music in a way in which the average modern audience member can understand and relate.
***
No visual impact. I know this is true of most concert performances, but even at a rock show with no projections or dance, the bands can be fun to watch. we live in an increasingly visual age.
***
[This came via email, from my friend and fellow blogger Terry Teachout]
One other item that occurred to me: most classical concerts are untheatrical.
It's one of the things that strikes me most forcibly, since most pop-music events have long been highly theatricalized--by contrast, classical music often seems downright anti-theatrical.
***
Any kind of physical response to the music is discouraged for both performers and audiences.
***
Audiences, especially subscription audiences, are expected to substitute the Music Director's taste for their own.
***
Many rock clubs I go to don't have chairs, so you have to stand up for the entire show. At the concert hall, you have no choice but to sit down, often for hours on end with no respite whatsoever. That's another huge, glaring example of how classical music differs from the larger culture: seating.
***
And how removed really is auditorium seating from the larger culture? No one's about to suggest that we should all stand up at the movies?
***
Programs are rarely animated by a discernible idea that would allow one to have a conversation about the idea's aptness or lack thereof.
[So true. Often there isn't any animating idea. It's Thursday, so we're playing a subscription concert, and we've filled up the time with these pieces, one of which is the only concerto the soloist tonight is willing to play.]***
Advertisements for wealth-management firms whose services are inaccessible to the vast majority of human beings due to lack o' cash dominate major-orchestra programs.
***
Classical music appears to be the music of the upper class but we live in a middle class world. Many classical music organizations actively cultivate and promote that attitude.
***
Classical music concerts are monocultural, i.e., European. They are the whitest events I regularly attend.
***
When new music is played, it is treated as the red-headed stepchild, rather than as a special treat for the audience, which gets to experience something novel. I have never understood this.
[The mainstream audiences mostly hate it, so from another point of view it's amazing that new music gets played at all at mainstream concerts. But nothing is done to engage/involve/interest the audence, or even to challenge their brains and imagination.]***
The large share of contemporary classical music that employs atonality and highly variant rhythms through out the music confuses even seasoned pros upon first hearing. Most musicians need at least three hearings to really get into the piece and start to understand the structure and meaning, if there is a meaning. If musicians have difficulty on the first pass, how is an average audience member going to be able to relate to it?
***
Many pieces, especially new ones, are treated like music that is good for you rather than music that you will naturally like.
***
Classical music is, to my knowledge, the only musical genre in which many of its devotees demand fealty to it above all others. None of my fellow hip-hop fans ever badgers me about how useless classical music is...
***
Classical music claims not just to be better than other genres (most genres think they're better) but that it's in a superior class all by itself.
***
The term "serious music."
***
Using the education system as a tool for the indoctrination of new audiences also cultivates the attitude that classical music is good for you.
"Education" style concerts in which pieces are presented and then analyzed for the audience cultivates the attitude that classical music is something you have to _understand_ rather than something you can enjoy.
***
Program notes like this one.
***
Another one I thought of builds on the point made earlier about the languages used in classical programs, and that's the weird metadata so fetishistically cultivated for classical works. Newbies to the concert experience don't know what "BWV," "K.", "D.", "Hob.", "WoO," "Op.", et al. mean. I'm still not sure why Hoboken catalogue numbers even exist for Haydn's works, and I love Haydn's music to death. (But that's the point - I love the music.)
I'm trying to think of another artistic field in which you see that level of incomprehensible-without-decoding information presented as high-level text attached to each and every work, but I cannot. Maybe I'm missing something here.
***
Another audience connection problem is that especially with the canon of classical symphonies that are being played all the time, all the titles are in Italian or German! What kind of average American knows enough Italian or German to be able to understand the titles of the different movements of a piece? Isn't a title pretty important to the piece?
***
The classical music industry has built a wall of separation between itself and film score, even though film score is the area of classical music with the strongest connection to the mainstream. The occasional performances of film scores by orchestras are treated as novelties, and film composers who get played regularly as "serious" composers (Takemitsu, for instance) are treated like they've transcended the presumed banality of film score.
***
The standard media narrative reinforces all of these attitudes and beliefs.
Originally from Sandow, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Not connecting (toward a second draft)
Thanks so very much, everyone, for all the comments and discussion, after my post about ways that classical music doesn't connect with the world we live in. So many of you added so many good points. Together, we're going to make a really strong list, stronger than I would have come up with on my own.So here's a step toward doing that. I've started with my original post, and followed that with the points you've added, plus doubts you've raised about my points and others. I've added a few comments, but the important stuff here is what all of you wrote.
Next step -- to refine this wonderful stew, to pare it down to the most important points, and find the best way to phrase each one. Anyone want to take a shot? There's a lot to work with. When we're done, I'll make a final list, subject to comments from all of you (of course), and post it in the "Resources" section of the blog on the right. I'll also put it in my book, with thanks and credit to all of you.
Though I think there's at least one more poiint to be added -- something about the way classical music is played, a kind of detachment, a subtext that says "This is classical music," a restrained, scholarly approach to performance which comes from a belief that structure is a supremely important thing about classical music, and then dampens the contrasts between one moment and another that would allow the structure to be heard. A lack of "grain of the voice" (to use Roland Barthes' expression), no swing in the rhythm.
Here we go:
1. Most of the music at classical concerts comes from the past. So we're rarely engaged with contemporary life. (Is this one reason the people who go to these concerts like them?)
2. Formal dress looks archaic, and out of touch.
3. The musicians don't talk to the audience. In our culture today, people expect musicians to talk.
4. Musicians subordinate their own personalities. They play the music the way they've been taught to. They don't take much initiative, don't make their concerts personal statements, don't play the music their own way.
5. Even when new music is played, much of it doesn't sound like the world around us. The sounds of popular music aren't much heard, though they were in past centuries.
6. More general statement of point five: There's rarely even a hint of current popular culture at classical concerts. That's not true of other forms of art -- novels, poetry, visual art, dance, theater.
7. The audience is old.
***
I think your #4 point is the main problem. If musicians play music they believe in, play it sincerely, all other sticking points just naturally fall away. But if not, well, we get 2% 'niche' market share.
***
Hey there. I don't think point 7 belongs on your list, because it is a direct result of points 1 through 6; because of points 1 through 6, the audience is old.
Or, the classical music you outline in points 1 through 6 does actually connect to an older audience's version of "larger culture". My larger culture is different than someone of a different age or geography's larger culture, so what or whose version of larger culture should classical music seek to connect with?
[Maybe I could refine the age point this way. Classical music reflects only one kind of culture, one demographic, in an age where we're multicultural. And multisubcultural. If classical music was, as it claims to be, a really comprehensive musical art, able to speak for our entire culture, then it would reflect many subcultures, as our entire culture does. And beyond that, many people the same age as the classical audience have a wider culture that doesn't include classical music. So even given the age, and not making an issue of it, by itself, there's a big part of culture missing. ]***
I think classical musicians not talking to the audience is one of the bigger points in the list, and one of the biggest problems in current classical concerts. In my experience, audiences love feeling connected to the performer. They respect his/her skills and dedication and musicality so they want to feel like they know the person, like they can go grab a beer with the person after wards. Talking is the quickest and easiest way to connect people, so to me it doesn't make sense not to talk with the audience and let them feel like they are taking part in the musical experience rather than just watching it.
It's like us classical musicians are deliberately withholding information from the audience so they have no idea what we are really doing up on stage. I personally ALWAYS talk at my shows and I can feel it makes a huge difference; if anything just to break the ice a little.
In classical music it is especially important for a true audience-performer connection because of your other point, the music is VERY OLD, it is already more difficult to relate to. So if we don't relate to them on a lingual level, the music by itself is probably not going to take them there either.
***
Stuffy concert hall atmosphere. In clubs (where increasingly classical music no longer fears to tread). you can drink a beer, talk between songs.
***
Audiences are required to sit quietly and pay attention instead of having the option to sit and pay attention or to chat or drink or dance or whatever else they want to do.
***
The temple-like edifices in which orchestral music is typically performed lock out passersby and seek to cocoon their attendees.
[Christopher Small wrote a vivid chapter about this in his book Musicking. I often assign it in my Juilliard course on the future of classical music.]***
The formal, museum-cum-ersatz-religious-experience concert which became codified after WWII. There's no fun in this, no spontaneity, no interactivity, and no connection to the contemporary world.
***
The problem with classical music ticket sales is NOT (for the most part anyway) the fault of the music. It is the fault of the performer for not adapting to modern culture and presenting the music in a way in which the average modern audience member can understand and relate.
***
No visual impact. I know this is true of most concert performances, but even at a rock show with no projections or dance, the bands can be fun to watch. we live in an increasingly visual age.
***
[This came via email, from my friend and fellow blogger Terry Teachout]
One other item that occurred to me: most classical concerts are untheatrical.
It's one of the things that strikes me most forcibly, since most pop-music events have long been highly theatricalized--by contrast, classical music often seems downright anti-theatrical.
***
Any kind of physical response to the music is discouraged for both performers and audiences.
***
Audiences, especially subscription audiences, are expected to substitute the Music Director's taste for their own.
***
Many rock clubs I go to don't have chairs, so you have to stand up for the entire show. At the concert hall, you have no choice but to sit down, often for hours on end with no respite whatsoever. That's another huge, glaring example of how classical music differs from the larger culture: seating.
***
And how removed really is auditorium seating from the larger culture? No one's about to suggest that we should all stand up at the movies?
***
Programs are rarely animated by a discernible idea that would allow one to have a conversation about the idea's aptness or lack thereof.
[So true. Often there isn't any animating idea. It's Thursday, so we're playing a subscription concert, and we've filled up the time with these pieces, one of which is the only concerto the soloist tonight is willing to play.]***
Advertisements for wealth-management firms whose services are inaccessible to the vast majority of human beings due to lack o' cash dominate major-orchestra programs.
***
Classical music appears to be the music of the upper class but we live in a middle class world. Many classical music organizations actively cultivate and promote that attitude.
***
Classical music concerts are monocultural, i.e., European. They are the whitest events I regularly attend.
***
When new music is played, it is treated as the red-headed stepchild, rather than as a special treat for the audience, which gets to experience something novel. I have never understood this.
[The mainstream audiences mostly hate it, so from another point of view it's amazing that new music gets played at all at mainstream concerts. But nothing is done to engage/involve/interest the audence, or even to challenge their brains and imagination.]***
The large share of contemporary classical music that employs atonality and highly variant rhythms through out the music confuses even seasoned pros upon first hearing. Most musicians need at least three hearings to really get into the piece and start to understand the structure and meaning, if there is a meaning. If musicians have difficulty on the first pass, how is an average audience member going to be able to relate to it?
***
Many pieces, especially new ones, are treated like music that is good for you rather than music that you will naturally like.
***
Classical music is, to my knowledge, the only musical genre in which many of its devotees demand fealty to it above all others. None of my fellow hip-hop fans ever badgers me about how useless classical music is...
***
Classical music claims not just to be better than other genres (most genres think they're better) but that it's in a superior class all by itself.
***
The term "serious music."
***
Using the education system as a tool for the indoctrination of new audiences also cultivates the attitude that classical music is good for you.
"Education" style concerts in which pieces are presented and then analyzed for the audience cultivates the attitude that classical music is something you have to _understand_ rather than something you can enjoy.
***
Program notes like this one.
***
Another one I thought of builds on the point made earlier about the languages used in classical programs, and that's the weird metadata so fetishistically cultivated for classical works. Newbies to the concert experience don't know what "BWV," "K.", "D.", "Hob.", "WoO," "Op.", et al. mean. I'm still not sure why Hoboken catalogue numbers even exist for Haydn's works, and I love Haydn's music to death. (But that's the point - I love the music.)
I'm trying to think of another artistic field in which you see that level of incomprehensible-without-decoding information presented as high-level text attached to each and every work, but I cannot. Maybe I'm missing something here.
***
Another audience connection problem is that especially with the canon of classical symphonies that are being played all the time, all the titles are in Italian or German! What kind of average American knows enough Italian or German to be able to understand the titles of the different movements of a piece? Isn't a title pretty important to the piece?
***
The classical music industry has built a wall of separation between itself and film score, even though film score is the area of classical music with the strongest connection to the mainstream. The occasional performances of film scores by orchestras are treated as novelties, and film composers who get played regularly as "serious" composers (Takemitsu, for instance) are treated like they've transcended the presumed banality of film score.
***
The standard media narrative reinforces all of these attitudes and beliefs.
Originally from Sandow, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Arts & Leisure Calendar - West Haven News
Arts & Leisure Calendar West Haven News, CT - 3; Elliott Carter's Statement - Remembering Aaron (from Four Lauds); and Schumann's Sonata for Violin and Piano in D minor. The concert is part of the ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Parkway regional calendar - Wicked Local West Roxbury
Parkway regional calendar Wicked Local West Roxbury, MA - CHIARA STRING QUARTET CELEBRATES ELLIOTT CARTER’S 100TH BIRTHDAY – performance of String Quartet No. 4, on Thursday, Dec. 4 at 8 pm, at Houghton Library ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Ballet! Comedy! Gluttony! - Free Times
 | Ballet! Comedy! Gluttony! Free Times, SC - Bush is the featured performer at tonight’s Southern Exposure New Music Series, where he’ll be performing works by Philip Glass, John Zorn, Olivier Messiaen ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Marin Chamber Players present a jewel from the thorns of a ... - Pacifica Tribune
Marin Chamber Players present a jewel from the thorns of a ... Pacifica Tribune, CA - Recently she performed with Elliott Carter's Cello Concerto with the Berkeley Symphony. Classical pianist Marilyn Thompson has previously wowed audiences at ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Holiday happenings at NCSA, and 'Cadence' goes to Miami - Yes! Weekly
Holiday happenings at NCSA, and 'Cadence' goes to Miami Yes! Weekly, NC - 6 at 7:30 pm, there’s the Woodwind Faculty Chamber Music concert at Watson Chamber Music Hall, featuring the combined talents of Tadeu Coelho (flute), ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:12 PM | Comments (0)
Cirque De La Season - Cleveland Free Times
 | Cirque De La Season Cleveland Free Times, OH - The program begins with a dose of high culture via composers Frédéric Chopin, Stanislaw Moniuszko, Henryk Wieniawski and Witold Lutoslawski, while the ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:12 PM | Comments (0)
Written word is music to their ears - The Australian
 | Written word is music to their ears The Australian, Australia - "You can't write a massive form, so you have to take your inspiration from Weber, say, or from a Boulez miniature," he says. The results of the commissions ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:12 PM | Comments (0)
Paul Mitchinson - London Review of Books (subscription)
Paul Mitchinson London Review of Books (subscription), UK - Pierre Boulez took his final bow in the opera pit last summer at the Aix-en-Provence festival. Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the production was the ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:12 PM | Comments (0)
Temporary Notes (11)
Tempo, tempo! Let me admit that I've been casual about tempo markings; in part this is because I want to have the latitude necessary to make a piece work under different performance conditions — different room acoustics and physical placements of players, different instruments (individual instruments often "speak" and resonate very differently), and, of course, different players — as well as to allow for the precise tempo and variations in tempo to remain, to some extent, an element within the interpretive domain. And I'll further admit that my tempo markings have often been either completely intuitive (just keep adjusting that metronome until it sounds right) or completely pragmatic (i.e. setting a common pulse to a nice round number so that complicated rhythms are easier for players to rehearse), and sometimes they have been ambiguous or downright vague, particularly when I use words rather than a numerical indication. I could probably get along reasonable well with this casualness, but in a performing environment with so many competing traditions and influences, it's definitely helpful to be clear about things whenever flexibility, ambiguity, or vagueness is not intended. (Also, as someone who does, for better or worse, think a lot about music, it's somewhat careless not to think through something as basic as tempo).
There is some very useful material online about tempo. For more contemporary concerns, I recommend this webpage by composer John Greschak. For an exhaustive treatment of a historical repertoire, I recommend this webpage on the time signature and tempo markings in Mozart.
Greschak's page forced me to go back and read Mälzel's "Notice on the Metronome". Beyond the mechanical interest of the device, the main interest for me is in his scaling of tempi, and, as a composer, this is a very useful place to begin thinking about tempo, regardless of the precise (or imprecise) relationship of his ideas and gadget to historical practice. Mälzel basically envisioned four basic tempos, each measured by a different basic unit or pulse: for Adagio, the eighth note, Andante, the quarter, Allegro, the half, and Presto, the whole. Within a basic tempo, the pulse may vary a bit up and down, with Mälzel describing 80 per minute as "moderate", meaning a typical or middling rate for the tempo in question. (The number 80 seems to be taken from Quantz who identified it with the human heartbeat. "Moderate" is a really problematic word: it can mean middling, or can indicate a slowing down (or retreat from an extreme position), in the sense of moderation; a good word to avoid in scores, Ithinks). From this moderate value, one can interpolate the assais and moltos that vary down or up from the middling, and, also, interpolate tempi like Allegretto or Larghetto which fall about midway between the basic tempi. What I draw most usefully from Mälzel is making the basic counting unit clear in the score, i.e. eighth = 80. The words have their archaic and exotic charm, and if you are making a stylistic reference to historical repertoire, then go ahead and leave the words in, but not without the numerical markings. The interpretation of these words has changed and will change over time, but my physicist friends assure me that we're unlikely to experience a change in values for a minute anytime soon. In my case, I'll try to drop using words for the tempo, but this will not stop me from using words to indicate other expressive suggestions.
Now about the scaling of tempi. Metronomes are still made set to Mälzel's original scale, which approximates, in whole numbers, a 16-step scale between 40 and 80: 40, 42, 44, 46, 48, 50, 52, 54, 56, 58, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72, 76, 80. Digital devices now widely available offer more precision than this, but these tempi are still likely to have been internalized by practicing musicians. (Somewhat akin to perfect pitch, many musicians are able to memorize tempi, and some even execute the most complicated emsemble rhythms by drawing on their reserves of such internalized tempi. What a piece of work!) As Greschek points out, Cowell and Stockhausen each proposed tempo scales based on 12 divisions of a tempo "octave", in Cowell's case, just intonation-based "scales" dividing the tempi spaces 60-120 and 48-96, and in Stockhausen's case, an approximation of an equal tempered division between 60 and 120. Stockhausen used these tempo markings throughout his work rather consistently. Being personally unattached to the number 12, I can probably get along just fine with the conventional 16 values, but if I had to take 12, I would go with 60, 64, 68, 72, 76, 80, 84, 90, 96, 100, 106, 112, which uses only three speeds not found on the tradional metronome (64, 68, 90), one of which (90) is easy to accurately perform in proportion to the basic value of 60.
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Warsaw Philharmonic ends US tour - Thenews.pl
Warsaw Philharmonic ends US tour Thenews.pl, Poland - 1); the ‘Hurra Polka’ from Lutoslawski’s Little Suite; and an ebullient rendition of The Stars and Stripes Forever — intended, Mr. Wit said from the stage, ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 02:11 PM | Comments (0)
Dusted Reviews
- Image via Wikipedia
From Dusted:
Artist: Memorize the Sky
Album: In Former Times
Label: Clean Feed
Review date: Nov. 26, 2008Artist: Fennesz
Album: Black Sea
Label: Touch
Review date: Nov. 21, 2008Artist: Joe Morris & Barre Phillips
Album: Elm City Duets 2006
Label: Clean Feed
Review date: Nov. 21, 2008
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Originally posted by admin from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Sonomu Reviews
From Sonomu:
Rapoon, Alien Glyph Morphology (Caciocavallo)
Rapoon is an alchemist, turning base metal into gold. Listen closely, and you will detect, at the very bottom of music, an array of rusted junk strewn willy-nilly on the ground, serving no purpose. Rapoon beats on it, bows it, treats its sounds in sonic alchemical baths, and utterly transforms it… [read]
Posted by Stephen Fruitman at 07:34, 26 Nov 2008Marc Namblard, Chants of Frozen Lakes (Kalerne)
I recall these sounds; I have heard them on isolated frozen lake in Northern Ontario. There are among the most remarkable to be heard when nature is at its quietest. One “service” provided by field recordists is the revelation of unheard-of and unheard sounds. Some of their sources can astonish… [read]
Posted by Stephen Fruitman at 07:25, 26 Nov 2008
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Originally posted by admin from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Monologue of a Lunatic
Vocalypse Productions production of Monologue of a Lunatic presents three of Canada’s finest contemporary musicians in an evening of rare and unusual music for soprano, alto flute and harpsichord from around the world. Janice Jackson has sung contemporary music the world over. "Her performances bring out the beauty of contemporary vocal repertoire." (Music Weekly, Beijing). Michelle Cheramy teaches at Memorial University in Newfoundland. Her playing is described as a “fine blend of artistry and bravura” (Edmonton Journal). Simon Docking is the artistic director of Halifax’s Kumquat Series and is well known for his stunning musicianship and extraordinarily vivid interpretations of contemporary music.On the program are two world premieres by Canadian composers, one by Jérôme Blais of Halifax, and another by Alice Ping Yee Ho of Toronto. Jerome’s work is a heartbreaking arrangement of a Yiddish folk song, with words written by a young poet after watching the shooting of 4000 Jewish men, women, and children in the Lithuanian village of Ponar. Alice’s piece sets the powerful poetry of Nova Scotian Carole Langille to music.
Other works on the program include compositions from Holland, Greece, and Australia with texts from France, Norway, and Holland. Haunting melodies, tragic themes, terrible beauty, ethereal fantasy, and enduring mystery – this is a concert that will excite and transport the listener to worlds beyond the imagination.
Originally from Latest Events - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 12:50 PM | Comments (0)
So In The Process Of Composition, How Much Does Technique Play A Part?/Do Composers, In 2008, Need Technique {2}
Do Composers Follow A 'Process'?Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 12:48 PM | Comments (0)
Thollem McDonas at Portland Eye and Ear Control: 12/5-12/12
- Image by CDrewing via Flickr
Portland Eye and Ear Control is featuring a week of McDonas as well as a performance by our own Scott Brazieal.
12/5-12: Thollem McDonas
Thollem McDonas
pianist/composer/improviser etc.Pacific Northwest Tour Portland dates
Dec. 5th at Enterbeing 1603 NE Alberta st
Thollem Mcdonas Piano
with an ensemble featuring a score by Scott Stobbe for violin, 2 saxophones, guitar, percussion and piano.Dec. 6th at Worksound 820 SE Alder St.
with Derek Johnson-solo cello with slide projector
plus And, a Portland based band Featuring Scott Brazieal-piano Drew Adams-Guitar/vocals Kelvin Pittman-Saxophone, Drums.Dec. 10th at Sound Roots School of Modern Music 412 NE Beech St.
Thollem McDonas-Solo PianoDec. 11th at the Artistery 4315 SE Division 7$ 7pm
Thollem McDonas-solo piano
plus Kimya Dawson, L’Orchidee D’Hawai,
and Angelo SpencerDec. 12th At the Boxlift Building 333 NE Handcock St. (free with donations for Thollem)
Featuring music for and with grand piano music by Thollem McDonas, Bonnie Miksch, Branic Howard and others…..All shows except Dec. 11th, 8pm
5$ donation with no one turned away
His music is diverse, with each album and every concert exploring a variety of approaches and paths, resulting in dramatically different outcomes.
Thollem is a recent recipient of a Meet The Composer grant. He was commissioned by The Limon Dance Company for a large-scale piece in commemoration of their 50th year anniversary. Last Autumn he spent 15 weeks playing 65 concerts circumnavigating the U.S. This September he has been invited to perform the late works of Claude Debussy on the piano on which they were written, as well as his own comprovisations with Stefano Scodanibbio. This will be the first album (They’re Seen From Other Places) ever recorded on Debussy’s piano.
Thollem has performed in theaters, art galleries, universities, elementary schools, concert halls, jazz clubs, rock clubs, festivals, warehouses, house concerts, streets, forests, riots and on television and radio. He has performed piano concertos with symphonies, played in West African drumming troupes, Javanese gamelan ensembles, an afro-punk band, with hundreds of free improv groups, and as an accompanist and a composer for opera and modern dance. His music appeals to a wide variety of audiences because of these rich and wildly disparate experiences. Currently Thollem Primarily plays his own comprovisations he calls Eccentriclect Music, for people and everyone else.
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Originally posted by admin from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Contrasts, Eruptions and Clouds of Sound - New York Times
Contrasts, Eruptions and Clouds of Sound New York Times, United States - But it was the spirit of Elliott Carter (who turns 100 next month) that ran through the program presented by the New York New Music Ensemble at Merkin ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 08:15 AM | Comments (0)
a Minimalist Life - LA Weekly
a Minimalist Life LA Weekly, CA - ... learning, moving on to music jobs at summer camps, eventually to Harvard. There his life is bracketed by the Beatles, LSD and Pierre Boulez. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
Koras and chorales - Mail & Guardian Online
Koras and chorales Mail & Guardian Online, South Africa - ... music, has by now investigated every melodic and harmonic possibility, from the well-tempered clavier of Bach to the total serialism of Boulez. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
Paul McCartney's Latest Collaboration - Wall Street Journal
Paul McCartney's Latest Collaboration Wall Street Journal - You might call The Fireman's earlier music a rhythmic distant cousin to the kind of pre-Minimalism of John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen that was said to ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
Inside San Pietro
As you know, I am in Rome at the moment, as a member of the Choir of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. When we sang for Mass at St. Peter’s on Sunday and again when we went there for a rehearsal last night, we have been allowed to enter the church not through the main security gate but, by special permission, through a side entrance. Not wanting even to appear toOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 05:10 AM | Comments (0)
Wednesday, Dec. 3 - Advocate Weekly
Wednesday, Dec. 3 Advocate Weekly, MA - Williams College, Department of Music presents "A Messiaen Matrix," the final concert in a semester-long celebration of the 100th anniversary of the birth ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 02:12 AM | Comments (0)
I'll state my case, of which I'm certain
Reviewing the Borromeo Quartet.Boston Globe, Novermber 27, 2008.
No, I'm not sure why it's dated the 27th. But it's up on the Web, so here it is.
Originally from Soho the Dog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 26, 2008 at 02:11 AM | Comments (0)
November 25, 2008
Music Review | New York New Music Ensemble - New York Times
Music Review | New York New Music Ensemble New York Times, United States - But it was the spirit of Elliott Carter (who turns 100 next month) that ran through the program presented by the New York New Music Ensemble at Merkin ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Rufus Wainwright Sings Le Spectre de la Rose at the 2008 Verbier Festival
Words completely fail me regarding this attempt by Rufus Wainwright to sing Berlioz's Le Spectre de la Rose at the 2008 Verbier Festival. Kudos to Hélène Grimaud for(Via Roger Bourland)
com/~a/TheCollaborativePianoBlog?a=qRHtwx">
Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Review: Skellig, The Sage Gateshead - Journal Live
Review: Skellig, The Sage Gateshead Journal Live, UK - And it was made in Gateshead – music courtesy of Tod Machover, an American, and a libretto by the man himself, Northumberland’s David Almond, ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
From Björk to Miles in Cologne - Jazz.com
 | From Björk to Miles in Cologne Jazz.com, TX - The line-up presented a fascinating combination of instruments, with Markus Stockhausen on trumpet (and yes, the son of you know who), Arkady Shilkloper on ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
Skelling at The Sage, Gateshead; Pelléas et Mélisande at Sadler's ... - Telegraph.co.uk
Skelling at The Sage, Gateshead; Pelléas et Mélisande at Sadler's ... Telegraph.co.uk, United Kingdom - Although he has dauntingly served as professor at Boulez's research centre IRCAM and won fame as a pioneer of electronic synthesizing, the American composer ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
Mítica pieza de los Beatles sí existe - BBC Mundo
 | Mítica pieza de los Beatles sí existe BBC Mundo, UK - He says he was inspired by the avant-garde composers John Cage and Karl Stockhausen. Some of the Beatles other sonic innovations are already world famous ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
Collaborative Piano Studies at Bowling Green State University
The College of Music at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio offers a Master of Music degree in Music Performance with a specialization in Collaborative Piano. For the fall of 2009, a graduate assistantship in Studio Piano/Piano Accompanying will be offered. Those interested in receiving more information about this program can contact Bowling Green for complete program requirements and curriculum.Complete list of Degree Programs in Collaborative Piano
Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
3 Post-Doctoral Collaborative Piano Positions Offered at Indiana University
Although there is no shortage of master's and doctoral programs offered in collaborative piano (perhaps too many according to some), I haven't seen many post-doctoral positions around so far. All that is about to change: yesterday Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music posted three positions for Post-Doctoral Resident Scholars in Collaborative Piano, with one each in the string department, voice department, and woodwind deparment. Featuring two-year appointments and pay in the $40,000-50,000 range, these might be excellent alternatives for recent doctoral graduates just out of school and not yet in the running for the handful of North American tenure-track positions offered annually.Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
Linkin' Portrait
Odd, pointless, and completely random: it seems that someone in the state of Nebraska's Office of the Chief Information Officer doesn't like Aaron Copland. Or, more likely, Aaron Copland was in the wrong place at the wrong time on a February night in 2007. According to WikiScanner, a slew of vandalism to Copland's Wikipedia article originated from an IP address in said office. Most of the edits are along the lines of changing Copland's name to "Cheesehead," and asserting that his parents owned a booger shop. One prank is unexpectedly poetic, though, changing
He was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship in 1925to:
He was eaten by a Guggenheim fellowship in 1925Many an artist has been similarly consumed by high expectations.
Originally from Soho the Dog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:12 PM | Comments (0)
Edge of an Era
We're in the habit of thinking of history in terms of large events and clearly defined eras. Things were so, then this happened and then everything changed. The present economic crisis provides a useful, if unfortunate, opportunity to revise this habit. We are told that we are in the middle of a crisis, but for most of us, the depth of the situation still hasn't really set in. Family at home in the US is still planning turkey dinners and doing their holiday shopping. Word has gotten 'round that someone we know has lost a job or a house, but such news comes slowly, in bits and pieces, not all at once. Here in Germany, most people are enjoying a welcome dip in fuel prices — useful with a cold winter coming —, the mortgage crisis has largely been a foreign affair (okay, a few banks are going down due to US engagements, but Germany has always had a weird relationship to its banks and there's always been suspicion about American financial innovation, not altogether unlike that for American musical innovation, so there's more than a touch of "good riddance" about), and the declines in exports which will have to come have not yet registered. All the warning signs and signals have been around for a long time, and while there were voices predicting the coming doom, hindsight is perfect vision and accompanied by memories erased of those prophets who can only be enjoying their 20,000-point Dow and the McCain victory in an alternative universe.Which is just to get 'round to the observation that other, similar events, arrived in a similar, slinking way*: the Great Depression didn't hit in the moment of the crash of '29, it came in fits and starts, and people were well into very bad times before the severity and potential duration of the event was even somewhat clear (prosperity, you know, just being around the corner). Likewise in music history, folks didn't wake up one morning in 1750 and decide, all together & spontaneously, that they were fed up being baroque and that it was time to get down and get classical. How about the "rock'n'roll" era? Mine was one of those lower-middle-class households which turned on the B&W Zenith to watch the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. But the interest was novelty (the noise, the haircuts, the suits w/o collars), not the music. After the "event", my father put on an LP of the Cal Tjader Latin Jazz Concert or Jackie Gleason's Velvet Brass to hear some "real music". Nope, even with significantly large and influential works & deeds & events, these were — and are — processes with long, slow burns. The polyphony of styles and methods and materials and ideas that characterizes contemporary composition and music distribution and reception basically eliminates the possibility of a sudden of overwhelming change. Sure, there are single works that have tremendous impact, and single composers who seem larger-than-life, but look closely, and in every case, I'm sure that you'll find that the impact is gradually, not sudden. I think it took a quarter-century for In C to register, for example, a work of decisive and international impact on two generations of composers, but the wake of In C was initially very slow, of low amplitude and more than a little ambiguous. Was it about tonality? Texture? Improvisation? Loops and phases? Nowadays, we hear In C through the perspective of its wake, and from the perspective of "minimalism" (a term unused at the time of its composition), and the immediate ancestors of In C are all but forgotten. I know several people who heard the first performance of In C. All of them agree that something fundamentally changed with that experience, but what changed immediately was the individual sense of the nature, extent, and limits of their own music-making, not the change in the nature, extent, and limits of music-making in general that we recognize today. In music, this change comes without an edge, individual listener by individual listener, not in grand and universal events dividing the moment decisively from everything that came before it.
_____
* I think I have to add this: as a child, maybe five or six years old, I had a recurring nightmare, from which I would wake in tears and cold sweats of terror. It involved a slinky, or something like a slinky, a wire coil that would keep moving forward, step-by-step, increasing in size, volume, and ever-so-slowly in tempo, until the movement, which had begun as that of a modest toy had become menacingly loud, gigantic, and insistent.
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Jacquelyn Familant and Hugh Sung Perform Rachmaninoff
Here's a recent video of soprano Jacquelyn Familant and pianist Hugh Sung performing two Rachmaninoff songs this last July in Ocean Park, New Jersey. Farewell page-turning woes--be sure to check out the tablet PC that Hugh is playing from...com/~a/TheCollaborativePianoBlog?a=n20n8k">
Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:12 PM | Comments (0)
All About Jazz Reviews
- Cover of Time and Time Again
From All About Jazz:
25-Nov-08 Michael Marcus
Lotus Symphony (Not Two Records)
Reviewed by Jerry D’Souza24-Nov-08 Paul Motian
Time and Time Again (ECM Records)
Reviewed by Nenad Georgievski24-Nov-08 Cooper-Moore
The Cedar Box Recordings (AUM Fidelity Records)
Reviewed by Mark Corroto
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Originally posted by admin from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Masses by Pergolesi and Scarlatti
Pergolesi, Missa Romana / Scarlatti, Messa per il santissimo natale, Concerto Italiano, R. Alessandrini (released on October 28, 2008) Naïve OP 30461It seemed appropriate to review this new release from an Ionarts favorite ensemble, Concerto Italiano, while here in Rome. It brings together two lesser-known Mass settings made for churches here in the Eternal City. Alessandro Scarlatti called hisOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Paul McCartney: Why I experiment - guardian.co.uk
 | Paul McCartney: Why I experiment guardian.co.uk, UK - I was into Stockhausen and stuff. So I had more of an opportunity but I don't think that made me more experimental than John. I just possibly did a bit more ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:33 PM | Comments (0)
They say he wandered very far
Reviewing the Boston Philharmonic.Boston Globe, November 25, 2008.
Originally from Soho the Dog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:33 PM | Comments (0)
New Paris Transatlantic
- Image via Wikipedia
Another Paris Transatlantic is out.
HALLOWEEN 2008: Interview with AARON DILLOWAY ; Editorial ; In Concert: AMPLIFY 2008: light ; On Another Timbre: Davis, Milton & Saade / Algora, Rombola, Zach / Hugh Davies / Bohman, Wastell, Patterson, Davies ; On Drag City: Jim O’Rourke / Osorezan / The Red Krayola / David Grubbs ; Smiling Through MyTeeth ; On DVD: Olivia Block, Sandra Gibson, Luis Recoder / Lee Hangjun & Hong Chulki ; (POST-?)ROCK: Hair Police / Lars Hollmer / Nine Rain / Irmin Schmidt & Kumo / Scorces / Mark Stewart / Walter & Sabrina ; JAZZ & IMPROV: Angeli, Rothenberg & Parker / Ab Baars & Ken Vandermark / Bik Bent Braam / Bishop, Eisenstadt & Roebke / Lucio Capece & Sergio Merce / Davies, Lacey & McNulty / Arek Gulbenkoglu & Adam Süssmann / Greg Kelley / Byard Lancaster / Thomas Lehn & Marcus Schmickler / Denman Maroney / Chris McGregor’s Brotherhood of Breath / Michael Moore / Evan Parker / Schlippenbach Trio / SLW / Fred Van Hove / Zingaro, De Joode & Regef ; CONTEMPORARY: Bernard Bonnier / Michael Byron / Luc Ferrari / Gordon Mumma / Eliane Radigue ; ELECTRONICA: Cristal / John Levack Drever / Peter Rehberg / Zilverhill
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)
PLUNDERPHONIA By Chris Cutler
Cutler updates his theories on compostion.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)
London Jazz Festival Review
A few words about the London Jazz Festival:
The booker at Dalston’s doughty Vortex club introduces the opening night of London Jazz Festival-sponsored events defensively: “It’s business as usual here at the Vortex.” The club crowns the bend in an underground river of London jazz venues that once surfaced in the back room of the Red Rose, in Finsbury Park, but now wends from pub cellars in Stoke Newington down to the self-consciously cutting-edge space of Dalston Junction’s Cafe Oto, nurturing jazz’s experimental wing all year long. Tonight, this tiny glass attic is packed with discerning twentysomethings and radical pensioners for a trio that seems hand-picked to appease them, representing a Venn diagram of distinct but overlapping schools.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)
Corey Dargel, NOW Ensemble bring together classical and rock
- Image by Getty Images via Daylife
Dargel’s style is reviewed.
In a movement often called “indie classical,” young university-trained composers are using pop and rock instruments, electronics and chord structures at a level never seen before. Influenced by minimalists such as Steve Reich and Philip Glass, and liberated by composers such as Christopher Rouse, John Zorn and David Lang who use elements of rock in their works, these young composers are changing the sound of chamber music — and its audience.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)
Download of the week: Gérard Grisey: Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil
Another Grisey selection, but I’m not going to apologise for that. Regular readers will know that Quatre chants is a piece with which I am very much enamoured.
Get it at inconstant sol.
And if you like this I recommend heading to the Festival Hall this Sunday, 6pm, where the Philharmonia will be playing Quatre chants for free.
Originally from The Rambler, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)
Spectral World Musics
I'm reading a newly published book 'Spectral World Musics' - the proceedings of the Istanbul Spectral Music Conference in 2003. It looks great: it deals with the idea of spectralism and timbre from a very broad perspective, completely unrestricted to western art music, and raises all kinds of aesthetic and philosophical questions - and of course also questions of the psychology of perception. This looks like one of the most stimulating books on contemporary music I've come across, if only because it relativises it within the cultural spectrum of all the world's musics. New Music communities are sometimes rather fashion-bound, and I wonder if this publication will trigger a rediscovery and a re-appraisal of spectral approaches as having a fundamental importance for new music.Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:31 PM | Comments (0)
A Strange Hangover
Last night I had a few drinks while listening to Last FM. I started with Feldman, switched to Mozart, skipped over to Stravinsky, backed up to Chopin, forwarded to Satie, crossed the street to Debussy, and dropped in on Nancarrow. It was quite pleasant and I made sure to educate my wife (in one ear and out the other) on each composer. However, I woke up with an awful headache and after four extra-strength tylenols I believe its finally starting to wear off.So my question is, was it the alcohol (didn't have much...), one of the composers listed, or my wife which gave me the horrible headache?
Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
Composer Portraits from Life Magazine
Composer Portraits from Life MagazineNow that Google's been scanning Life, all of the historical photographs are searchable...
Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
New Electronic Piece - Celestograph II
I've got a new electronic piece up.http://www.harrington.lunarpages.com/mp3/celestographs/Jeff-Harrington_Celestograph_II.mp3
I used my Yamaha TG77 for the source material and then post-processed it in Csound. It's an almost orchestral electronic composition, again, using the Wendy Carlos harmonic tuning. The sounds sound a bit like Vangelis' soundtrack to Blade Runner - although the overall effect is more like Feldman's Coptic Light. I think you'll be able to hear the influences. Basically it's a big chaconne. The other piece I've completed in this cycle is available here.
Celestographs
The title comes from a photographic series by August Strindberg in which he made photographs directly exposed to the night sky, without a lens. He believed the lens warped the direct expression of the stars.
Here's an article about his work - The Celestographs of August Strindberg
Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
a terminology question regarding Slonimsky
hey guys, i'm writing a post for another forum on 13-tone equal temperament and i've managed to draw a fog on something i used to know: what was the term Slonimsky used as a generalization for "white key music"? FWiW, this all regards a very simple diatonic-like piece i just put up for 13TET ukulele here:http://zebox.com/daniel_anthony_stearns/
Ben and Louisa
(1st piece, top of page
Okay ,please let me know if you know, and TiA
daniel
Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
TrianguliZona - Flossy
The six tracks on Flossy may best be called jazz fusion in the style of Miles Davis and Bill Laswell. However there are plenty of influences from minimalism and ambient of a dark and swampy nature. The Croation ensemble TrianguliZona piles on enough grooves and tones to mellow out the most tense urban warrior. Guitar and electronic artist Ivan Kapec, trumpeter Andrej Jakuš and percussionist Janko Novoselić deftly map out a soundscape of dense sounds and pleasing grooves. Video artist Vladimir Končar is also mentioned as a member of the collective but I’m not quite sure how that plays out on an audio CD. Regardless, this is an exciting album and worth the listen.
The albums is available as separate tracks from the Testtube netlabel in 320kbps MP3.
Originally posted by Marvin from Free Albums Galore, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
Immersions - Water Music and Other Improvisations
Immersions is more of a name for a performance than an artist or group. Emile Tobenfeld is a video artist who uses multiple DVD players to create improvisatory works. For this performance entitled Immersions: Water Muisc and Other Improvisations, he enlisted the help of his friends, some from bands like Birdsongs of the Mesozoic and The Lothars, to create a free-flowing meditative work. It was performed on July 18, 2008 and is now part of Artsomerville’s prestigious collection of live performances which you can find on Artsomervilles’ page of podcasts or from the Internet Archive. There are two tracks with each being over 30 minutes. The first one is titled simply Other Improvisations and is a pleasantly lazy mix of flute, dulcimer and synthesizers. It is a meandering piece that sends you off daydreaming. The second track, in keeping with the concert’s theme of “The Secret Knowledge of Water” is titled “Water Music” and it is a stunner . It’s starts out somewhat abstract with what may be field recording samples and is then mixed with acoustic drones from the performers. The volume builds up and threatens to overwhelm. However the performance alway comes back to a meditative center making it a lesson in balancing calm and tension. The work then moves into more melodic arenas but always cautions the listener to be prepared for the unfamiliar. This is an excellent improvisatory work. The visual portion of the performance may be missing but it is still a feast for the ears.
The album is available in VBR MP3 from Jamendo, Artsomerville’s web site, or through The Internet Archive from the link below.
Originally posted by Marvin from Free Albums Galore, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
Reveries and Rhapsodies From the Dark Side - New York Times
 | Reveries and Rhapsodies From the Dark Side New York Times, United States - Night Fantasies, a four-concert series by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center over the weekend, featured nocturnally inspired music from the 19th ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
The Reigning Diva of the Violin Embraces Contemporary Music - Wall Street Journal
The Reigning Diva of the Violin Embraces Contemporary Music Wall Street Journal - ... contemporary music. During the past two decades, Ms. Mutter, 45, has given premieres of works written for her by Sebastian Currier, Henri Dutilleux, ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
The Perfect Match Screens Tomorrow Night at the Gladstone Hotel
For those of you who missed the short operatic film The Perfect Match at Opera To Go 2008 earlier this year, there will be a screening tomorrow night at the Gladstone Hotel. Krista Dalby and Anthony Young's The Perfect Match features the voices of tenor Keith Klassen and baritone Peter MacGillivray with a chamber orchestra (I'm on piano) in a heart-warming story of two sock puppets in love. Here's more information from the Tapestry press release earlier today:Night at the Indies:And you can check out opening night of next year's installment of Opera To Go at the Harbourfront Centre's Enwave Theatre on March 27, 2009.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008, 8:00pm
The Gladstone Hotel – Melody Bar, 1214 Queen Street West
The Night at the Indies collective presents their 2nd anniversary celebration at the Gladstone Hotel's Melody Bar. The event will feature a screening of four Bravo!FACT-funded shorts: The Girlfriend Interviews, The Perfect Match, Sissy Boy Slap Party, and Auto Erotica.
For more information, please visit www.nightattheindies.com.
Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
Roy Campbell’s Akhenaten Ensemble at the Stone November 25th
From Improvised Communications:
On Tuesday, November 25th at 10:00 p.m., trumpeter/composer Roy Campbell will perform music from his March 2008 release, Akhenaten Suite (Arts for Art/Aum Fidelity), at The Stone in New York. His Akhenaten Ensemble will feature Billy Bang (violin), Bryan Carrott (vibes), William Parker (bass) and Zen Matsuura (drums).
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 05:10 AM | Comments (0)
Dudamania: The Very Young & New Philharmonic Conductor - LAist
Dudamania: The Very Young & New Philharmonic Conductor LAist, CA - The announcement of Gustavo Dudamel's appointment as the next music director of the LA Phil has created a phenomenon here and abroad, with comparisons to ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:12 AM | Comments (0)
Isaac Shepard's Before Dawn is the Soundtrack of Music Catch
Other classical music blogs might have more inbound links and traffic, but the Collaborative Piano Blog without doubt has the most awesome and committed readers, capable of the most amazing feats of detective work...Thanks to Trevor Hewer (who coincidentally lives only a few blocks from me in Oakville), I got a huge heads-up on the identity of the mystery music (featured in a previous posting) from the addictive music game Music Catch. The music for the game is called Before Dawn and is written by Isaac Shepard, who also created the game itself. Here is the game, playable here on the site for those with Flash:
If you liked the music, you can also download and print Before Dawn for free, and here is the embedded score:
Isaac Shepard - Before Dawn
The music looks like it is at approximately the Grade 8 or 9 RCM level--the trickiest places are on the second page with the 16th-note passages and changes of tempo. Isaac Shepard's blog also links to a number of Before Dawn YouTube videos.
So relax and see if you can beat my current high score of 3,030,439, and then go spend a very pleasant hour or so learning the piece.
Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:12 AM | Comments (0)
RIP, James Feldman
Dr. Feldman was the intellectual nerve center of BW for many years, in addition to being one of its most outrageously funny professors. He had a genuine mania that could be lightning in a bottle, yielding some of the best lectures I've ever heard. He taught me two years of theory, one year of form, an introductory course on composition, a comparative literature class, and he was my thesis advisor. After four years of study with Dr. Feldman, I still felt like there was more to learn from him, and one of the great pleasures of my undergraduate years were the bull sessions with him in his office, which was always overflowing with books and hilarious non-sequiturs.
One of the most memorable demonstrations he ever gave of the power of harmony was when he was discussing the Neopolitan chord, of all things. He had demonstrated Chopin's use of it in his B-minor Prelude (below), taking care to point out that not only does Chopin use the bII but that he also throws off the pulse with a hemiola. The cumulative effect of the harmonic/rhythmic shift is a sort of a lift that he compared to a chapel which he used to frequent. He spoke of how he would often simply enter the chapel and stand at the back and no matter how heavy his mood, the calm of its atmosphere would lift his spirit. Sometimes, the lift would be gone as soon as he stepped back outside, but the chapel always remained a quiet and steady solace, a sanctuary of unbroken peace. To him, the three bars of C Major in this prelude were like that chapel.
After a painful battle with Lou Gehrig's disease, Dr. Feldman deserves his solace again. May the angels lead you, James:
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:11 AM | Comments (0)
SF Contemporary Music Players
December 7th, 8th
(copied from their website)
Pierre Boulez: Le Marteau sans maître
Contemporary Insights: Music and Conversation
Sunday, December 7 at 4:30 pm
Presidio Interfaith Chapel
130 Fisher Loop, San Francisco
Join Music Director David Milnes and the ensemble, along with guest mezzo-soprano Janna Baty, for an in-depth performance and discussion of this groundbreaking work at the beautiful Presidio Interfaith Chapel.
———————————————–
Furious Craft
Music of Boulez, Francesconi, Saariaho, and Zhou
Monday, December 8 at 8 pm
Pre-concert talk at 7:15 pm
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Forum
701 Mission St., San Francisco
Four works of intensity and craftsmanship warm this winter concert, including Pierre Boulez’s Le Marteau sans maître, a U.S. premiere by Luca Francesconi, and two cello solos played by Stephen Harrison and Leighton Fong.
Originally posted by Dave from ear bastard, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 25, 2008 at 02:10 AM | Comments (0)
November 24, 2008
Over (and under) the top - The Phoenix
 | Over (and under) the top The Phoenix, MA - At the Longy School, where some eight decades ago Elliott Carter studied music, the Pacifica Quartet, just baptized Musical America's Ensemble of the Year, ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Music Review | Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center - New York Times
| Music Review | Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center New York Times, United States - Night Fantasies, a four-concert series by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center over the weekend, featured nocturnally inspired music from the 19th ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
NYC Opera Presents 'ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA' 1/15 - Broadway World
 | NYC Opera Presents 'ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA' 1/15 Broadway World, NY - City Opera Music Director George Manahan will conduct. The company's celebration of Samuel Barber's upcoming centennial will also include a Symposium on ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Contemporary Music Festival, Huddersfield - Times Online
Contemporary Music Festival, Huddersfield Times Online, UK - Think of Stockhausen in 1968, Steve Reich in 1971, Arvo Pärt in 1980 or John Tavener just about any time in the past 30 years, and you'll have some idea of ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Erhard Grosskopf, "Quintett uber den Herbstanfang"
-- Liner Notes --
Up to now, Erhard Grosskopf has had a fundamentally different career as compared to many of his contemporaries. He has never taken on a firm position, e. g. as a teacher of composition, in order to earn his living. Instead, he has held minor positions in several areas, allowing himself a maximum amount of time for composition.Erhard Grosskopf was born in 1934 in Berlin, where his father was a physician. In the turmoil of the war the family was driven to Hannover, where the boy took his "Abitur" diploma in 1954. He did not turn to music immediately, instead studying medicine and philosophy. From 1957-9 he received instruction at the Berlin Church Music School in Spandau. Immediately thereafter, he enrolled in the composition programme at the Berlin Musikhochschule, where he studied with Ernst Pepping, Boris Blacher, Heinz-Friedrich Harting and Josef Rufer. In 1964 he began a two-year term as lecturer in theory and musicianship at the City Conservatory in Berlin. During this period, he was awarded the Rome Prize and made his first long visit to Italy. Here he composed, among other works, a violin concerto ("Sonata concertante 2.) which was premiered in 1969 by Christiane Edinger and the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Bruno Maderna. In 1970 he was one of several composers invited to present a work, his "Dialectics" for tape and instruments, in the spherical auditorium of the German pavillion at the World Fair in Osaka. In the same year he received a commission from the Berlin Festival; the resulting work, "Hormusik" (Listening Music), was given its premiere the following year by the cellist Eberhard Finke and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Michael Gielen. This led to engagements for several months in the Electronic Music Studio at the University of Utrecht. There he wrote "Prozess der Veranderung" (Process of Change), which in 1972 received a second prize in the "Prix Itallia".
"Change" was also a hallmark of this juncture in Grosskopf's life. As early as 1971 he co-founded the "Musik-Projekte Berlin" with other composers and music devotees. This has enabled him since 1978 to present full concert series in conjunction with other institutions and organisations under the name "Insel-Musik" (Island Music). The founding of this group was the result of Grosskopfs withdrawal from the "Gruppe Neue Musik Berlin" with which he had been associated from its inception in 1965 and where he had first come to public notice. Further changes emerged in his style of composition as he suddenly and unexpectedly turned, with his friend Cornelius Cardew, to Chinese music of the revolutionary sort, hoping thereby to find an escape from the ivory tower of the avant-garde and its social irrelevance. This experiment was doomed to failure. Grosskopf spent the next few years delivering broadcasts, lectures and courses on how to use the synthesizer. This period lasted until 1977 when, for a second time, he was awarded a fellowship at the Villa Massimo in Rome and in several senses found his footing once again. Since 1978, in his concert series "Insel-Musik", he has attracted attention beyond the confines of Berlin by frequently presenting works which thwart the commercial music establishment.
Grosskopf was again in Italy for several months in 1982, this time at the invitation of the Berlin Academy of Arts; he also taught at the International New Music Courses in Darmstadt where, among other things, he explained his orchestral pieces "Quintett uber den Herbstanfang" which had just been given its first performance as part of the Berlin concert series "Musik der Gegenwart" organized jointly by Sender Freies Berlin and the Westdeutscher Rundfunk.
Quintett uber den Herbstanfang (Quintet for the Beginning of Autumn)
Erhard Grosskopf's works fall into several distinct periods. Until the late 60s he took his forms largely from outdated models such as the sonata form; then he turned to electronic devices and spatial sound. Later, after trying process-like music, he developed his own technique, "looping technique", which in recent years he has expanded to a new level of complexity. As far as his harmony is concerned, he began accordingly with an atonal 12-note technique with modal centres, at times extended to include auarter-tones. Electronic devices enabled him to expand his range still further, and latterly his looping technique has led to extended tona-atonal tensions, conflicting tona1,ities and overtone fields.
The somewhat unusual title of his "Quintett uber den Herbstanfang" for orchestra refers to the period of its composition (autumn 1981 of January 1982) and to the five layers on which its structure is based. These layers are not fully discernible to the listener: instead, the piece takes the form of a "Klangkomposition" involving the elaboration, clearly perceptible modification and finally the replacement of individual sounds. Even the form, with its three-part structure, is disguised, the two final sections merging just at the point where, "compressed like a scream", the composition reaches its climax. Ultimately, the piece takes on a large-scale ABA form.
In working out this piece, Grosskopf made use of his looping technique. He defines this technique as follows: "The term 'loop' implies the repetition of musical phrases of various lengths, where 'musical phrase' is to be understood in a very broad sense, in an extreme case consisting of a single sound. When different loops of various lengths are superimposed the result is a constant alternation of durations and sound combinations. In principle, this technique is related to the canonic games devised by the Netherlands polyphonists, but it is also characterized by more vivid elements of periodic repetition. A great many principles akin to simple looping technique can be found in American Minimal Music as well as its forerunners in Africa and Asia and its offshoots in Europe and Japan. The range of variation extends from phase displacement of identical material as used by Steve Reich and single pitches as found in Morton Feldman up to any density of event desired, depending on the number of loops involved and their harmonic and rhythmic structure."
Grosskopf has never applied this technique in unadulterated form. For example, he began to extend the points of coincidence in the periodic structure, i. e. those points where the various durations reach a common multiple. In "Quintett" this is apparent in the very first section, where one lengthy passage is divided by abrupt chords, automatically but unintentionally recalling Japanese music. Likewise unintentionally, these echoes of Far-Eastern music are matched by a sort of Oriental sense of time as expressed above all in the working out of individual sound passages and in the insistent impact of extreme, isolated sound events.
This piece is based on five compositional levels which serve as vehicles for the harmonies, proportions and dynamics. None of these levels is assigned exclusively to a single group of instruments; instead, their sound unfolds in a process of continual change. Among these levels are five tri-partite series of proportions based on the numbers 3, 4 and 5. These proportions, which are extended on a small scale by means of additions, generate the temporal structure of the entire composition. This structure is linked to changes in harmony and volume which make the proportions audible in the individual layers. Moreover, the instrumental groupings change at the "paints of coincidence", thus drawing timbre into the compositional process. Here the individual chords are not composed in their own right but result from the looping technique.
As Grosskopf remarked: "Looking at the temporal structure alone in the work we might get the impression that the music is constructed. However, the series of proportions are the result of a study of the underlying emotional idea of the piece. In a manner of speaking, they function as the building material for the temporal edifice in which this emotional idea can come to fruition. In order for it to do so, the composer must not view the structure he discovers or invents as an automatic recipe; instead, with alertness and sensitivity, he should follow the course of the compositional process he has set in motion, directing events with his own decisions and, wherever feasible, by his spontaneous intervention. It is my belief that a continuous, vital confrontation between emotionality and constructivity is a prerequisite (though not of course a guarantee) for the success of a piece of music. I dedicated 'Quintett iiber den Herbstanfang' to the memory of Cornelius Cardew: the news of his sudden death in London reached me while I was completing the work. Towards the end the three percussionists play a passage marked 'with unflinching tenderness'; at first they are inaudible until, gradually, the rest of the orchestra becomes so quiet that only tenderness remains, strong and forthright." -- Peter Bockelmann (Translation: J. Bradford Robinson)
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
Know your Co-conspirators: Jennifer Wharton
Your featured co-conspirator today is bass trombonist Jennifer Wharton. Jennifer has a diverse list of credits in both the classical and commercial realms on bass trombone and tuba. Her Broadway experience includes Curtains, Mary Poppins, Gypsy, Young Frankenstein, Wicked, The Lion King and The Phantom of the Opera. Jennifer has performed and/or recorded with ensembles such as the NYC Trombone Trio, DIVA Jazz Orchestra, the Ayn Inserto Jazz Orchestra , the Jeff Fairbanks Jazz Orchestra and the Disneyland College Band and has worked with popular artists Natalie Cole, Bernadette Peters, The Temptations, and Ann Hampton Callaway. Her playing inspired Dave Eshelman's Wharton Concerto, premiered by Jennifer and the Los Medanos College Jazz Ensemble in 1998. Jennifer holds a performance degree from the New England Conservatory of Music and is training for her fourth Half Ironman Triathlon.
I actually didn't meet Jennifer when she was in Boston -- she started at NEC just after I skipped town. But she goes way back with Brookmeyer protégé Ayn Inserto — they are both originally California girls, and Jennifer played a stint in Ayn's tremendous Boston orchestra before moving on to New York.
In a bigband, bass trombone does more to influence the overall sound than any other horn save lead trumpet. And it requires a delicate balance -- you want power and depth and resonance, but without the blattiness that usually comes with. You need someone with great agility and time and an unshakeable hookup with the bass player. Jennifer's been bringing all that since she first started playing with us in April of this year, and I'm delighted to have her on this recording.
As part of our fundraising efforts for our upcoming recording, Infernal Machines, we are offering you the opportunity to sponsor a Secret Society musician. Click here if you would like to sponsor Jennifer's appearance on our debut album.
PREVIOUSLY...
Mike Holober
Ingrid Jensen
Josh Sinton
Mike Fahie
Sam Sadigurksy
Sebastian Noelle
Nadje Noordhuis
Ryan Keberle
Erica vonKleist
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Darcy James Argue's Secret Society is a sponsored project of Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. Contributions in behalf of Darcy James Argue's Secret Society may be made payable to Fractured Atlas and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.
Originally from Darcy James Argue's Secret Society, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
Refrigerator car
I don’t get to spend as much time in train stations as I like—ah, the romance of travel—but last week I had occasion to pass through South Station, the main commuter-rail/Amtrak hub in Boston. And there’s an odd bit of sound design that’s been built into the place.
If you’re reasonably old, you remember the kinds of schedule boards they used to have in train stations, the ones where locations and numbers are printed on tiles that spin around whenever the sign is updated. They’re like giant versions of pre-LED digital alarm clocks. (The technical name for them is a “split-flap” display.) South Station still has a couple of those boards, but they’re not in use, having been replaced by a giant digital LED board.
But this is what’s weird—there’s a speaker mounted near the board, and every time it (silently) updates, the speaker pipes in the clacking sound of the rotating tiles on an old-fashioned board. (It turns out the Globe reported on this feature back in 2006—as far as I know, it's still unique.) If you grew up with the old boards, you hear the sound, you look up to see what’s changed. But we’re now into generations that will be mystified as to why board updates are announced with this strange rattle of percussion. (There weren't that many of the old generations, actually—split-flap signs didn't become common until the 1950s.)
There is, I imagine, an entire category of sounds like this, technically obsolete but still hanging on (for another example, I can set my mobile phone ringtone to a recording of an old-time telephone bell). I wonder if these sounds will become the aural equivalent of particularly obscure sayings or turns of phrase, where the colloquial meaning still remains widely intelligible even as the literal meaning becomes increasingly baffling.
Originally from Soho the Dog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:11 PM | Comments (0)
Secret Society @ Jazz Gallery, 12-13 Dec.
Sebastian Noelle, guitar
Mike Holober, piano & keyboards
Matt Clohesy, contrabass & electric bass
Jon Wikan, drums & percussion
Originally from Darcy James Argue's Secret Society, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:11 PM | Comments (0)
Secret Society @ Jazz Gallery, 12-13 Dec.
Darcy James Argue'sSECRET SOCIETYat theJAZZ GALLERYFriday 12 December & Saturday 13 December, 2008two sets each night9:00 PM & 10:30 PMTickets: Dec 12 • Dec 13Part of the Jazz Gallery's Large Ensemble Seriesnew musicmore info...Originally from Darcy James Argue's Secret Society, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:11 PM | Comments (0)
My (radio) guest tonight -- Alex Ross
Monday 24 November 2008 -- 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. CST
Originally posted by Andrew Patner from Andrew Patner: The View from Here, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:10 PM | Comments (0)
The Continuing Saga of the Beatles’ White Album - Dissident Voice
The Continuing Saga of the Beatles’ White Album Dissident Voice, CA - The music ranged from British dance hall ditties to folk tinged ballads with some serious hard rock in between. Then there was the John Cage/Stockhausen ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 05:15 PM | Comments (0)
Ionarts at Large: Palazzo Barberini
On Sunday afternoon in Rome, a few of us spent the early evening in the Palazzo Barberini, the extensive villa near the Quirinale that the Barberini family purchased in 1625. A series of celebrated architects – Maderno, Bernini, Borromini – expanded and renovated the building, which now houses the Galleria nazionale d’arte antica. The art is displayed on the piano nobile, a floor of grand roomsOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Nook
From Brooklyn, Nook is an experimental rock / jazz outfit with a few cool tracks on myspace.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Photo By: Talaya Centeno - Women's Wear Daily
Photo By: Talaya Centeno Women's Wear Daily - But composer Elliott Carter plans to work faster than ever. “Composing is the thing I enjoy most,” says the legend, who has had a major impact on modern ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 01:23 PM | Comments (0)
Audience fails to hit high notes - Brantford Expositor
Audience fails to hit high notes Brantford Expositor, Canada - Yamagami opened her program with a work for unaccompanied cello by Gyorgy Ligeti written around 1950. The first impression of this music is that it is going ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 01:23 PM | Comments (0)
Spatialization, the final frontier
- Image via Wikipedia
A modern classical performance at MSU is reviewed:
John Cage, the Zen master of chance music, would have enjoyed the coincidence that happened in East Lansing Thursday night. In a town where avant-garde and new music fans go begging for months without input, two cool things were going on at exactly the same moment.
At Michigan State University’s music building, a modern ensemble called Musique 21 was playing a full slate of new and adventurous music from students and teachers. Across Grand River Avenue, at Scene Metrospace, Nathaniel Bartlett, the master marimba manipulator from Madison, Wis., came to town to do his latest ear-stretching dance with mallets, wood and electrons.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 01:22 PM | Comments (0)
Umbrella Music Through December 10
- Image via Wikipedia
From Chicago’s Umbrella Music:
Wednesday, 26 November 2008
The Hideout
10:00PM | Fred Lonberg-Holm’s Lightbox Orchestra
Fred Lonberg-Holm - conductor
James Falzone - clarinet
Jeff Kimmel - bass clarinet
Jason Stein - bass clarinet
Josh Berman - cornet
Jaimie Branch - trumpet
Paul Giallorenzo - keyboards
Kent Kessler - double bass
Matt Lux - electric bass
Frank Rosaly - drums
Charles Rumback - drums
two sets
$7 cover
PLUS | DJ Sets: Matt Lux spins Several Faces of the SaxophoneSunday, 30 November 2008
The Hungry Brain
10:00PM | Rumback/Beach/Lonberg-Holm
Fred Lonberg-Holm - cello
Tyler Beach - guitar
Charles Rumback - drums
two setsWednesday, 3 December 2008
The Hideout
10:00PM | Rempis/Kessler
Dave Rempis - saxophones
Kent Kessler - bass
11:00PM | Adasiewicz/Abrams/Herndon
Jason Adasiewicz - vibes
Josh Abrams - bass
John Herndon - drums
$6 cover
PLUS | DJ Sets: Peter Margasak spins BalkanizationThursday, 4 December 2008
Elastic
10:00PM | Tim Daisy Ensemble
Tomeka Reid - cello
Erica Dicker - violin
Jeff Kimmel - bass clarinet
Tim Daisy - marimba, percussion
11:00PM | .blink
Greg Ward - alto saxophone
Dave Miller - guitar
Jeff Greene - bass
Quin Kirchner - drumsSunday, 7 December 2008
The Hungry Brain
10:00PM | Jackson/Stein/Labycz/Kimmel
Keefe Jackson - reeds
Jason Stein - bass clarinet
Jeff Kimmel - bass clarinet
Brian Labycz - electronics
two setsWednesday, 10 December 2008
The Hideout
10:00PM | Rammel/Lonberg-Holm/Mallozzi/Zerang
Hal Rammel - invented instruments
Fred Lonberg-Holm - cello
Lou Mallozzi - turntables, samples
Michael Zerang - percussion
two sets
$6 cover
PLUS | DJ Sets: Cocanig vs. Jablonski: The Classic Rock Off
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 01:22 PM | Comments (0)
Kahil El’Zabar in Chicago
Passed on to us from Delmark Records:
Kahil El’Zabar’s internationally acclaimed
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble
Feat: Ernest Khabeer Dawkins & Corey Wilkes
Monday, Dec. 1, 2008, 6:30PM
Alliance Francaise, 54 W. Chicago Ave.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 01:22 PM | Comments (0)
Spellbound Halloween 08 hr 1
Spellbound Halloween 08 hr 1
Spellbound Halloween 08 hr 1 - Purple Note Radio Network - Spellbound, music for theremin
From Podcast: Spellbound, a brief program of music for theremin.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Spellbound 10/26/2008 hr 1
Spellbound 10/26/2008 hr 1
Spellbound 10/26/2008 hr 1 - Purple Note Radio Network - Spellbound, music for theremin
From Podcast: Spellbound, a brief program of music for theremin.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Spellbound Halloween 08 hr 2
Spellbound Halloween 08 hr 2
Spellbound Halloween 08 hr 2 - Purple Note Radio Network - Spellbound, music for theremin
From Podcast: Spellbound, a brief program of music for theremin.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Spellbound 10/26/2008 hr 2
Spellbound 10/26/2008 hr 2
Spellbound 10/26/2008 hr 2 - Purple Note Radio Network - Spellbound, music for theremin
From Podcast: Spellbound, a brief program of music for theremin.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Spellbound 11/16/2008 hr 1
Spellbound 11/16/2008 hr 1
Spellbound 11/16/2008 hr 1 - Purple Note Radio Network - Spellbound, music for theremin
From Podcast: Spellbound, a brief program of music for theremin.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Spellbound 11/16/2008 hr 2
Spellbound 11/16/2008 hr 2
Spellbound 11/16/2008 hr 2 - Purple Note Radio Network - Spellbound, music for theremin
From Podcast: Spellbound, a brief program of music for theremin.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
That shock
Ockeghem is astonishing. First, for the constant invention of his tunes. Ockeghem makes all the familiar moves, locally, but assembles the moves into long and unpredictable continuities (someone, certainly, is at this moment writing a dissertation on the Fractal Complexity of Ockeghem's Melodic Lines). Second, for shocking moments — like that above — is which the diversity of lines in the ensemble converge — here going absolutely in your face with a cross-relation f#-f'-natural, enjoying a direct move from one extreme to the other of his tonal resources* — into something approaching, when not actually, epiphanic.
_____
*Come to think of it, a lot of modern music gets by with the shock value of shifts no greater than O.'s here, from a b minor triad to a d minor triad. Heck, that's just about enough harmonic material for a very satisfying evening at the Mabou Mines. (Yes, Virginia, O. didn't think of it in those terms, but have you any doubt that he heard it?).
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Organist's performance fills its space - The Brown Daily Herald
Organist's performance fills its space The Brown Daily Herald, RI - The concert featured five works of Oliver Messiaen, a noted 20th century composer, and was jointly sponsored by the Department of Music and the Office of ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Comments (0)
Jan Johansson: From Small Acorns... - All About Jazz
 | Jan Johansson: From Small Acorns... All About Jazz, PA - "At that time Jan was listening to the European avant garde, to people like Ligeti and Stockhausen and so on but he was open to a lot of different music; ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Comments (0)
New on Drip Audio
- Image by slowmotionlandscape via Flickr
From Drip Audio:
Jim McAuley’s ‘The Ultimate Frog’ is a DOUBLE album made up of duets with the likes of Leroy Jenkins, Nels Cline and others The Ultimate Frog is available for purchase now only at this website. Buy it here
New Code is the 4th release from the estimable group of musicians that is The Peggy Lee Band. New Code is available for purchase now only at this website. Buy it here Both albums will be officially released in stores Canada on Dec 2nd Both albums will be available digitally very soon
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 08:11 AM | Comments (0)
MUSIC: Keef - Macleans.ca
MUSIC: Keef Macleans.ca, Canada - For driving, that’s good, but for music, I’m not sure.” Not that he operated on instinct alone. There’s an intriguing thread in the article about Jarrett ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 05:15 AM | Comments (0)
NonPop Show 056
NonPop Show 056
Program Notes:(running time - approx. 33 min.)1. “Kboco” 10:04by Robert MoranMantraInnova2. “Double Portrait” 16:09by David BordenLive Performance on November 15, 2008Andy Lee and S. Andrew Granade, piano3. “Sanctus - An Entr’acte” 6:20by Harry PartchDelusion of the FuryInnova
From Podcast: NonPop.
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
Jeff Harrington - Celestograph II
Jeff Harrington - Celestograph II
Electronic piece built using my TG77 and Csound. From the upcoming album, Celestographs. More info at http://jeffharrington.org
Originally posted by jeff from cacophonous.org, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 24, 2008 at 02:11 AM | Comments (0)
November 23, 2008
Review - Thallein Ensemble at Adrian Boult Hall, Birmingham - Birmingham Post
Review - Thallein Ensemble at Adrian Boult Hall, Birmingham Birmingham Post, UK - Though two of Pierre Boulez’ Improvisations sur Mallarme were announced, we were in fact given only the first – but we did hear it twice. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, at the CBSO Centre - Birmingham Post
Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, at the CBSO Centre Birmingham Post, UK - Ligeti’s Piano Concerto, however, was so full of multi-cultural influences (and bits of Bartok and Messiaen) it became quite exhausting, especially in the ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, at the CBSO Centre - Birmingham Post
Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, at the CBSO Centre Birmingham Post, UK - Ligeti’s Piano Concerto, however, was so full of multi-cultural influences (and bits of Bartok and Messiaen) it became quite exhausting, especially in the ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:12 PM | Comments (0)
Even Slower Slow Up & Down
Listen here:
Subscribe here: 
This is a work in progress...
This one takes the minute and stretches it out 3 times longer. Same notes and everything, just a change to the T0 table in Csound, and a few adjustments to the envelopes and volumes. I think I could keep this up for a while
Originally from Podcast Bumper Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
Even Slower Slow Up & Down
Listen here:Subscribe here:
This is a work in progress...
This one takes the minute and stretches it out 3 times longer. Same notes and everything, just a change to the T0 table in Csound, and a few adjustments to the envelopes and volumes. I think I could keep this up for a while
Originally from Podcast Bumper Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
New Sax and Piano Piece and New Electronic Piece
I've finished my first microtonal piece using conventional instruments! It's for soprano sax and piano and was commissioned by the brilliant young saxophonist, Brian Kauth. The piano part plays no microtones, but I was astonished to hear it seem to, because of the way the sax's quartertones resonate with the chords. It's called Dans le Délire de l'Inutile; the title is from a poem by the French surrealist poet Robert Desnos.
Dans le Délire de l'Inutile for Soprano Sax and Piano
I'll have draft scores up shortly once I get back some breathing phrases from Brian. If you really want to see it, drop me a line.
And today, I've finished my second in the series of Celestographs, Celestograph II. It's an almost orchestral electronic composition, again, using the Wendy Carlos harmonic tuning. I used Csound for post-processing and shaping of the final version and my Yamaha TG77 for the dry recording. The sounds were inspired by Vangelis' soundtrack to Blade Runner - I think you'll be able to hear the influences.
Birgit Schwab has helped me revise L'Ecume des Temps for Guitar and Violin, to make it much more playable. (It was practically impossible before.) I've dedicated the piece to her and wish to thank her immensely for her efforts in learning the guitar part and in her editorial suggestions!
L'Ecume des Temps - Guitar Part
L'Ecume des Temps - Violin Part
L'Ecume des Temps - Score
Original MP3 - Synthesized Realization
Originally from The Music of Jeff Harrington, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:10 PM | Comments (0)
Who'd have thought it?
If Sapir & Whorf had been Inuit or Yup'ik or Aleut, how much time would have been wasted talking about all those English words for snow (i.a. Artificial snow (aka Grits), Blizzard, Blowing snow, Chopped powder, Columns, Corn, Cornice, Crud, Crust, Dendrites, Depth hoar, Finger drift, Firn, Flurry, Freezing rain, Graupel (aka Snow pellets), Ground blizzard, Hail, Hailstorm, Heavy crud, Ice, Lake effect snow, Needles, Packed powder, Packing snow, Penitentes, Pillow drift, Powder, Rain & snow mixed (aka Sleet, Ice pellets), Rimed snow, Slush, Snirt, Snow squall, Snow storm, Snowdrift, Snowflake, Soft hail, Surface hoar, Watermelon snow, Wind slab)?
It's snowing here. Back in my electronic music days, I was obsessed for a time with trying to get sounds out of snowflakes, not the sounds they make when they hit surfaces in aggregate form, but the individual sounds of each vibrating crystal. Many years later, this became a serious interest of scientists and mathematicians, and the sounds of ringing snowflakes are now available, amplified and transposed downward into audible range. I find these sounds beautiful but somewhat disappointing because they are essentially static, musically-speaking. They are divorced of the narrative thread into which snowflakes enter our lives. Just think of that first line of Frank O'Hara's Wind (To Morton Feldman), the text Feldman used in his Three Voices: "Who'd have thought that snow falls..."
Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:10 PM | Comments (0)
Scars from Home
One thing I like enormously about traveling is having little scars and wounds that exist on both sides of the surreal thing that is an overnight flight. I cut my finger making dinner in New York last week, and feeling the cut helped me focus when I woke up at 6:00 in the morning in Iceland. It was so windy at the airport that I physically couldn’t leave the terminal to get to my rental car until it calmed down. Then, when I did, I had to walk against the wind for ten minutes while banked snow whirled around: Very Dramatic Hertz Rental Situation.
There is totally economic drama here:
I got sent this very pleasant and soothing track by a band called Kyte:
Kyte Boundaries from a self-titled album
Who are put out by a label called Erased Tapes who seem to be Consistently Excellent.
It’s almost time to start thinking about Christmas Music! I have been listening obsessively to Benjamin Britten’s arrangement of the traditional carol “The Holly and the Ivy”. Now, this is a very well-known tune and there are a bunch of very famous arrangements of it, but for some reason this Britten really hits the spot for me. When you get a really plummy recording from England, too, they really lean in on the last word of the chorus, that being, “choir,” and somehow compress it into a one-syllable loaf. I just adore the pagan universe described in these lyrics:
The holly bears a berry
As red as any blood
And Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ
To do poor sinners good
O the rising of the sun
And the running of the deer
The playing of the merry organ
Sweet singing of the choir
This particular recording has the MOST PINCHED AND DELIGHTFUL KUMAMOTO OYSTER of a countertenor solo in the third verse, too. Check it out.
The Holly and the Ivy (Traditional, arr. Britten)
King’s College Choir, Cambridge
Curiously, I can’t seem to find a source for Britten’s lyrics. The third verse (the one the kumamoto countertenor sings) seems to go on about Tree and Setting Sinners Free and such. I love these tight little protopagan rhyme schemes! Another good example of that is one of these Rhyming Numerologygasms, called “Joys Seven.”
Joys Seven (arr. Cleobury)
Nine Lessons and Carols from King’s College, Cambridge
This arrangement is perfectly English: efficient and sentimental without being too outrageous. There is, however, a completely over-the-top descant at the end that performs a little trick. The organ rises up the scale, and the trebles sing aah aah aah on the top four notes of an Ab-major scale. Then, when they repeat it immediately afterwards, the G is flatted, followed by the F, and then a G-natural: it’s very subtle, but it lines up perfectly with the text below “…to see her own son Jesus Christ to wear the crown…” — what you expect is, of course, the crown of thorns, but the word that you get is “heav’n” (to rhyme with Seven). That little turn in the trebles is precisely the Tart Joy of Christmas: you have to make sure that you advance the clock to Good Friday, looming just a few months later. See:
There are several little galling moments, specifically in the sixth cycle, at the words:
The next good joy our Mary had,
It was the joy of six;
To see her own son Jesus Christ
Upon the Crucifix.
Upon the crucifix, good man: And blessed may he be,
Both Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
To all eternity.
Mmm. This is one of my favorite lyrics EVER, because a little digging reveals some alternate words. Check out the first verse the way it’s sung these days:
The first good joy our Mary had,
It was the joy of one:
To see the blessed Jesus Christ
When he was first her son.
When he was first her son, good man…
and now an alternate:
The first good joy our Mary had,
It was the joy of one;
To see her own Son Jesus
To suck at her breast bone;
To suck at her breast bone,
Good man, and blessed may he be…
Ooh, see, isn’t that so much better? Then, dig deeper:
þe forte joye wt out in good fay,
was upon halewÿ þursda,
he stey to hevene in ryche aray,
wt fadr and sone and holy gost.þe fyfte joye wt outÿ dene,
in hevene he crownyd his modr clene,
þt was wol wil þe eyr a sene,
wt fadr and sone and holy gost.
Now we’re talking! Mm, crownyd his modr clene. I wonder if this is an error (Queene is prolly what is meant, here) or if really we’re talking about “clene” in its Middle English use as a noun, meaning, “(a) Guiltless or excellent person; also, purity; (b) = clene Lenten; (c) clear path,” in which case, she, as a Pure Virgin or whatever, can properly join the “sene,” (here, from the root that brings us Synod - sort of a holy gathering) of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Inneresting.
Two final things. I got a comment in my Comment Space saying, “your meat talk is relentless. i find it a bit dull,” to which I respond, “Sorry! I am just a big flessh enthusiast.” Second thing: anybody who wants to witness a particularly ugly argument online about the staging of Opera should check out this website. It’s interesting and nasty: the basic premise here is that Patrice Chéreau directed a production of Wagner’s Ring Cycle a couple years ago that got stuck on DVD and is a kind of mainstream example of a wacky production (the whole thing is set in, like, the industrial revolution). Now, I am somebody who thinks that operas (especially great ones) can bear the weight of totally crazy productions with, you know, elephants and gas masks and gender reversals and piles of syringes or whatever. But I don’t really “care” in that same way that a lot of people do. And some people hate the whole idea of applying a production to an opera (rather than letting the production come from within, if that makes any sense). Anyway, read that nasty argument and feel glad that you don’t have to fight with these people.
Originally posted by Nico from Nico Muhly, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Slow up & down
Listen here:Subscribe here:
This is a work in progress...
After a long hiatus, I've been able to crank out 60 seconds of music. This one takes a chord of the overtone series 4:5:6:7:9:11 and slides it up and down to the same notes. 4 goes to 9 or 7, 7 goes to 4 or 6. Each note glides to it's nearest overtone, up or down. There's a finger piano arpeggio that just moves up and down a 53-TET interval while playing on the 4:5:6:7:9:11 notes. They start in synch, drift out and back twice in a minute. Scored for finger piano, tuba, trombone, flute, french horn in Csound.
Originally from Podcast Bumper Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:11 PM | Comments (0)
Baltimore's RedRoom
I finally had a chance to check out the very cool local hangout: RedRoom at Normal's Books and Music. I picked a good night too. Tim Kaizer of Make Magazine fame was there with his handmade electronic instruments.usic concert... one where there something to watch other than speakers. Tim's performance is part musical, part sculptural, and part conceptual. He will swirl tubes, twiddle knobs, wave his hands, and move his light wand to control the electronic noises.
Like any good Maker, Tim is proud and excited to explain each of his creations in detail after the performance. When I took a closer look at his toys, I was able to admire the incredible detail. I noticed that he even made a yellowed-with-age instruction manual for one of his stranger creations, encased in an oak box.
The trip was a lot of fun. Definitely a cool hangout for anyone in the Baltimore area!
Dolf Kamper
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 05:11 PM | Comments (0)
Review: John Kelly at the Pack Horse, 21st November, 2008
Sometimes the best gigs are the ones you fall over in the dark, unexpected treats... I struggled out Friday night down to the Pack Horse because I had agreed to do the door for Mr Marmion – was feeling tired and a bit rough but did not want to let him down so duly reported for duty. After last weekend's concentrated blast of jazz- from fire musics and back via various ambles into the Asian sub continent – plus the great Roma buskers I heard - somehow folk music was not high on the acoustic agenda. So: it is good to have one's expectations wrenched sideways... To be fair, John Kelly had come with high recommendations from sources I respect, but my mood was not ready for the usual sad wander through the Arc of Loss that I perceive much contemporary English folk music to describe. In the event – the Harmonium Hero conquered all, despatching my misgivings immediately... Possessed of a light, lithe voice, more vocal technique than the average folkie but used expressively, for the benefit of the song, he accompanies on harmonium, backed up with cittern (I think) and guitar. All of which he plays masterfully. This is a man who has thought about his chosen music deep and long I suspect – there is a steely intellectual base to his performance, evidenced in the instrumental backings, (and discretely hidden under a quiet, dryly humourous demeanour) that lets his wonderful voice ride freely over. Use of the harmonium especially means he can match breath to air, as it were, in an organic flow, swaying and bending with the words. This gives the sea songs the movement of waves almost, the long ballads he likes, room for the narrative to flow. His playing on the stringed instruments was equally fluent, displaying technique enough to bend the songs into his use and avoiding the lockstep of orthodox folk clawhammer on his fingerstyle excursions. The material: intriguing... A couple of songs I did not know plus those I know well but haven't heard for a while, 'Polly on the shore,' ' Leazy Lindsay' (he bravely used the 'Lord Ronald McDonald' version and no one tittered!) 'Lakes of Pontchartrain,' 'Lord Gregory.' A nice surprise - 'Captain Kidd,' underpinned by fast, flatpicked cittern which echoed the first time I ever heard it, on a record of the late, wonderful Alex Campbell's back in the early sixties. (Which I found recently on the internet, a warm reminder of a great guy – 'Hell, yeah.'). John has been around, as they say, starting out back in Liverpool way back and retiring from the scene for a few years. Yet in his recent return he displays freshness of vision, rather than retreads of past glories. A rare talent – to be uncompromising musically yet be also accessible. Summed up, perhaps, by his encore: not a belter but a thoughtful meditation on 'The Plains of Waterloo.' A downbeat move – which gripped throughout. A special night... maybe there is something to this folk music lark after all... John gave a performance of grace and subtle power...
A final thought. Mr Marmion told me over lemonade on Saturday afternoon that John had been travelling around the country doing spots in the local clubs in the old pre-internet/MySpace fashion of building a base of support – and had been camping in a van during this endeavour. Which in the weather we are experiencing at the moment shows some steel and dedication. Harmoniums were instruments that were exported to the colonies and beyond in the nineteenth century, because they were not too adversely affected by the climate and were reasonably portable. Missionaries especially would have used them. Fancifully, I see John Kelly as a kind of poetic musical missionary, the long beard giving images of Walt Whitman and the Old Testament in equal measure, taking his music to the heathen. (Walt's beard 'full of butterflies' perhaps, after Lorca... Leviticus 19:27 'Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard.'). He converted me back, that's for sure...
Originally from wordsandmusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Free Jazz Blog Reviews
- Image via Wikipedia
From Free Jazz:
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Taylor Ho Bynum - Asphalt Flowers, Forking Paths (HatHut, 2008) ****½Friday, November 21, 2008
Ab Baars Trio & Ken Vandermark - Goofy June Bug (WIG, 2008) ***½Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Sean Conly - Re-Action (Clean Feed, 2008) ****Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Townhouse Orchestra - Belleville (Clean Feed, 2008 ) ****Monday, November 17, 2008
The Peggy Lee Band - New Code (Drip Audio, 2008) ****
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
DMG Newsletter November 21st, 2008
- Image via Wikipedia
From DMG:
John Brackett’s book on John Zorn! David Byrne/Brian Eno together again! Zorn Film 22! J Spaceman/Matt Shipp! Charles Gayle 3 live 2007! Tamura/Fujii duet and Satoko Fuji NY Orchestra! Gebhard Ullman’s Basement Research! A new Umezu Kiki Band CD! Herb Robertson MacroQuarktet!
Wu Fei! Peggy Lee! McCauley/Cline/Jenkins! John Esposito! John Escreet! Drumbo! Kaufmann/Dresser Eisenstadt! Christian Fennesz! Dave Fox/Bruce Eisenbeil! Hector Zazou! Xenakis! Chrome! Glass! Cage! Tyranny! …. Super-Rare vinyl Rarities! …and much more!
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
AMN Picks of the Week
Here is where I post, at a frequency of about once a week, a list of the new music that has caught my attention that week. All of the releases listed below I’ve heard for the first time this week and come recommended.
Alex Maguire Sextet - Brewed in Belgium (2008, jazz)
Paul Lansky - Alphabet Book (2002, modern classical / acousmatic)
Francois Carrier - Kala (2008, free jazz)
Charles Dodge - Any Resemblance is Purely Coincidental (1994, modern classical / acousmatic)
Kalte - The Lanthanide Series (2008, electronic)
Harris Eisenstadt - Guewel (2008, free jazz)
Daniel Levin - Fuhuffah (2008, free jazz)
Jeff Gauthier / Goatette - House of Return (2008, avant-jazz)
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
ArtSlant at Oresman Gallery
Not music, but our own Lyn Horton will be displaying her at and giving a talk at Oresman Gallery:
Smith College Department of Art
Hillyer Hall, Brown Fine Arts Center
Northampton, MA 01063
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)
Life and loves of a maestro - Boston Globe
 | Life and loves of a maestro Boston Globe, United States - It's very special for the Boston Symphony to play Olivier Messiaen, it is the 100th anniversary of his birth. Because I only conduct opera now I don't have ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
Fabled experimental Beatles track could be released: McCartney - Macau Daily Times
Fabled experimental Beatles track could be released: McCartney Macau Daily Times, Macau - "Carnival Of Light" was recorded for an electronic music festival in 1967 -- between takes of "Penny Lane", one of the band's most famous songs -- but was ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
Moon June Records to Release Archival Soft Machine
- Image by svennevenn via Flickr
From Moon June Records:
This CD documents an often overlooked phase in the long and complex history of Soft Machine - Australian drummer Phil Howard’s five-month interim behind the drum stool between Robert Wyatt’s departure and his eventual long-term replacement John Marshall. It did last long enough to record half of the studio album “Fifth” (1972) and a couple of BBC radio sessions, but until now no official document of that line-up in its preferred environment - the stage. Howard was brought into Soft Machine by saxophonist Elton Dean, both being members of Elton’s side project Just Us, and under their combined influence the band became freer and wilder than ever before (or after) in its existence, pushing longtime leaders Mike Ratledge and Hugh Hopper into unchartered areas of electric madness. Before long they’d decided this wasn’t the way to go, but meanwhile the line-up had antagonised audiences throughout extensive tours of the UK and Europe. This CD documents the German leg of the tour and, as veteran music journalist Steve Lake notes in his detailed liner notes, is a revelation - a glimpse of a highly exciting alternative route Soft Machine decided not to explore further.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
Dessay and Kaufmann Among 2008 Charles Cros Award Winners - PlaybillArts
 | Dessay and Kaufmann Among 2008 Charles Cros Award Winners PlaybillArts, NY - By Frank Cadenhead Soprano Natalie Dessay, tenor Jonas Kaufmann and conductors Pierre Boulez and William Christie were among those honored by the Academy ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Comments (0)
Media buzz accompanies pianist to Xavier for Dec. 7 concert - Cincinnati.com
 | Media buzz accompanies pianist to Xavier for Dec. 7 concert Cincinnati.com, OH - Also on the program are a sonata by Ludwig van Beethoven and Gyorgy Ligeti’s Musica Ricercata. Lee moved to the United States at the age of 9 and graduated ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Comments (0)
Classical music - Los Angeles Times
Classical music Los Angeles Times, CA - Los Angeles Philharmonic Gustavo Dudamel conducts the orchestra in Ligeti's "Atmosphères," Strauss' "Four Last Songs" and Beethoven's Symphony No. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Comments (0)
Seiji Ozawa on what he misses most about Boston and what's next ... - Boston Globe
| Seiji Ozawa on what he misses most about Boston and what's next ... Boston Globe, United States - By Joan Anderman This week Boston Symphony Orchestra music director laureate Seiji Ozawa returns to the podium at Symphony Hall for the first time since ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Comments (0)
Avant Garde Project 127: Ramon Zupko
From Avant Garde Project:
The Avant Garde Project is a series of 20th-century classical, experimental, and electroacoustic torrents digitized from LPs whose music has in most cases never been released on CD, and so is effectively inaccessible to the vast majority of music listeners today. This is wild stuff, so check it out if you’ve never heard this sort of music before. The analog rig used to extract the sound from the grooves is near state-of-the-art, producing almost none of the tracking distortion or surface noise normally associated with LPs.
AGP1-122 are now available for direct download in the archive at www.avantgardeproject.org
AGP123-126 and other recent AGP installments are also available at http://thepiratebay.org/user/loudav
AGP NEWS: Next week’s installment may be a day late. Or not. Stay tuned.
=======================================
AGP127 features works by the American composer Ramon Zupko, who was born in Pittsburgh and taught at Western Michigan University, whose studio for electronic and computer music he founded and directed. He is now professor emeritus. I know his music exclusively from releases on CRI records. Although he won numerous awards and commissions, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1981, to my knowledge, none of his works are still in print either on CRI or on other labels. This may be in part because he was not part of any of the easily definable movements of 20th century music.
I very much enjoyed listening to these works while transcribing them–in particular the first, for string quartet. The harmonies are all over the map, yet to my ear everything he does sounds fundamentally right. It reminds me of Bartok’s string quartets in places, but it is by no means derivative. The recording by William Allgood is rich and detailed. The other works are for brass quintet, piano duet, and piano.
Two more works by Zupko will be included in next week’s collection of electroacoustic compositions. The torrent includes a PDF file with scans of the liner notes from the two LPs transcribed for this installment.
01 - Noosphere [22:26]
02 - Masques [13:04]
03 - Nocturnes 1-3 [8:16]
04 - Nocturnes 4-6 [9:49]
05 - Fluxus II [13:56]Equipment used for A/D conversion: Lyra Helikon phono cartridge, Linn LP12/Lingo turntable, Linn Ittok tonearm, Audioquest LeoPard tonearm cable, PS Audio PS2 preamplifier, Kimber PBJ interconnect, M-Audio Audiophile USB A/D converter.
NOTE: To the best of my knowledge, these recordings are currently out of print. If you know otherwise, please let me know ASAP, as I do not wish any artists to be deprived of the royalties that they so richly deserve.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:10 AM | Comments (0)
Brevamente In Breve
Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to good things in Blogville and Beyond.The historically informed performance practice movement has received another imprimatur of its official success, being transformed from an edgy movement that was (and in some quarters still is) vilified by listeners and traditional musicians alike into something as mainstream and accepted as possible. WilliamOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 08:10 AM | Comments (0)
A Whirlwind Named Barenboim - New York Times
A Whirlwind Named Barenboim New York Times, United States - Asked recently whether, like so much of Mr. Carter’s work, this one was difficult to learn, the sort of music most pianists want months to prepare, ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
The Fireman: Electric Arguments - the Sunday Times review - Times Online
The Fireman: Electric Arguments - the Sunday Times review Times Online, UK - ... not Revolution 9 — was far more experimental and important than anything by Stockhausen or Varèse. The forms of music the Beatles developed didn’t exist ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:12 AM | Comments (0)
The hottest downloads: Brighton Port Authority, Feist, Low, Take That - Times Online
The hottest downloads: Brighton Port Authority, Feist, Low, Take That Times Online, UK - Their third, 1973’s Last, scarifies crackling Stockhausen fizz and synthesizer soundscapes with crispy funk bass, tribal beats and the often almost banal ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 23, 2008 at 02:12 AM | Comments (0)
November 22, 2008
Good times
The in-laws just left to go back to Ohio. This was fun.
WF
Originally posted by Wes from Walk In Brain, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 07:56 PM | Comments (0)
Appellate Brief
- Image via Wikipedia
Attached (below this paragraph) is a copy of the appellate brief I wrote for Moot Court / Appellate Advocacy this semester.
The topic was a First Amendment challenge by the fringe religion Summum against the city of Pleasant Grove, Utah. Pleasant Grove had allowed the Fraternal Order of Eagles to erect a permanent Ten Commandments monument in a public park. Summum requested similar permission to erect a permanent monument to their Seven Aphorisms in the park. The city denied, the request, Summum filed suit, and hilarity ensued.
Summum lost at trial, won on appeal to the 10th Circuit, and recently both sides argued in front of the Supreme Court.
This case is relatively easy to decide on its face. The Court is almost certainly going to rule in favor of the city. However, will the Court clarify the interaction between government speech and public / nonpublic forum doctrines that makes this case so interesting?
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- Another religious monument case for the Supreme Court - this time it’s the Seven Aphorisms of Summum.
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Originally posted by Mike from Turtles all the way down, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 07:55 PM | Comments (0)
Impressions of the Bruckner Symphony No. 4 - Doug Bauman
The second movement of the Bruckner was my favorite. You hear the raw power of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra strings, each member acting in unison, pushing the romantic uplifting theme, reverberating deep into my body and soul. In person it...Originally posted by Doug Bauman from Outside Perspective, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 07:55 PM | Comments (0)
Dr Atomic at the Met
Bruce Hodges on John Adams Dr Atomic at the Met which will be seen in London at the ENO next year:
"Somewhere in this well-intentioned study of the nail-biting hours leading to the test of the first atomic bomb, there is a transcendent experience that this production did not quite reveal. And as a fan of John Adams, I was curious enough that I saw it not once, but twice"........" "The basic premise is meritorious and worth exploring: getting inside the head of J. Robert Oppenheimer and his colleagues in Los Alamos, New Mexico in June of 1945, during those uncomfortable final hours before the bomb test. ...."
"But the libretto, flickering with possibilities, ultimately kept me at a safe distance. At least as seen here, the opera seems largely about "the banality of waiting around." I empathize, but as a listener I don't feel the need to travel the same journey. And some scenes seemed hungry for a director's ability to clarify and amplify—to help focus our attention on what in this story is important. Often large groups of people are milling about, working on something related to the impending test, but it is never clear why, or why we should care."
"Given the number of times Doctor Atomic has been produced already, goodwill is clearly on the creators' side. Much of the set, by Julian Crouch (whose work was also seen in last season's Satyagraha) is enticing to look at, such as two massive blocks of cubicles—three rows of seven on each side—in which singers can pose, sometimes in gripping images: in the second half, a row of bodies appear flung to the walls, stuck upside down or at strange angles. White shades, when drawn, allow animation to be projected: maps of Japan, equations on a blackboard, and the endless, relentless rain."
For the whole piece and production pix see:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/SandH/2008/Jul-Dec08/atomic2110.htm
Originally from CLASSICAL- ICONOCLAST, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 07:54 PM | Comments (0)
Delayed entry
Though it’s certainly been sad to see a lot less hardly any classical music coverage in the new (and definitely not improved) streamlined Sun, one of the consequences has been that their music critic, Tim Smith, now has his very own space in the blogosphere. While we sometimes miss the feel of our fair city’s paper in our hands while absorbing a review of last night’s concert, Tim’s writing on Clef Notes (I’ll wager the name wasn’t his choice) more than makes up for that. As a Baltimore resident for nearly six years, I’ve come to know Tim’s work and—now, I’m being ultra-presumptive here—based on his blogging style, which is packed with personality, feel like he was maybe edited to death by the Sun. Translation: I like his writing on the blog. Though Tim’s already had his coming out in the blogosphere (geez, 140 comments!?), SLN thought it was time to send out some full-blown blog love. We hope to see Clef Notes gracing many more blogrolls in the future.
Originally posted by brian from brian sacawa | sounds like now, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 07:54 PM | Comments (0)
Musique Machine Reviews
From Musique Machine:
Christina Carter - Orignal Darkness
Original Darkness ten songs are acrawl with a tangible feeling paranoia; 4am sweat drenched panic and claustrophobia. All to make a very human, pained and what’s life all about album that seems to hypnotise the listening into bleak stateFalkenstein - Heiliger Wald
Falkenstein make offten sombre and ancient tinged yet memorable Germanic folk, this is the southern German collectives first album and it’s wonderfully focused and rewarding bringing to mind the more sombre side Sturmpercht.
Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
All About Jazz Reviews
- Image via Wikipedia
From All About Jazz:
22-Nov-08 Shakers N’ Bakers
YFZ (Yearning For Zion) (Little (i) Music)
Reviewed by Eyal Hareuveni22-Nov-08 Globe Unity Orchestra
Globe Unity Orchestra: Globe Unity - 40 Years (Intakt Records)
Reviewed by Andrey Henkin22-Nov-08 Pete M. Wyer
Stories from the City at Night (Thirsty Ear Recordings)
Reviewed by Mark Corroto22-Nov-08 Eivind Opsvik
Eivind Opsvik: Overseas III; Koptor & This That
Reviewed by Wilbur MacKenzie22-Nov-08 Mark Dresser
Mark Dresser: The Beautiful Enabler & Point of Contact
Reviewed by Wilbur MacKenzie22-Nov-08 Paul Motian
Paul Motian: Voices and Portrait in Jazz
Reviewed by Francis Lo Kee21-Nov-08 Charles Gayle Trio
Forgiveness (Not Two Records)
Reviewed by Mark Corroto20-Nov-08 Michael Dessen Trio
Between Shadow and Space (Clean Feed Records)
Reviewed by Greg Camphire20-Nov-08 Daniel Levin Trio
Fuhuffah (Clean Feed Records)
Reviewed by Troy Collins20-Nov-08 Paul Bley Quintet
Barrage (ESP Disk)
Reviewed by Jerry D’Souza
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Hause music at Liverpool’s Cornerstone Festival
- Image via Wikipedia
Stockhausen is the part of this festival.
WHEN asked if he was familiar with Stockhausen, Sir Thomas Beecham, both conductor and musical wag, famously replied: “Yes, I trod in some this morning.”
The German avant-garde composer Karlheinz Stockhausen – who used electronic gadgetry and tapes in producing his compositions – was a controversial figure right up to the time of his death last year, aged 79.
But it is no surprise to see a concert dedicated to his music at the heart of Liverpool’s best arts festival.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Haitinks's Mahler 2 -- A conductor's late triumph with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Here is my Saturday, November 22, 2008 Chicago Sun-Times and suntimes.com review of the Thursday November 20 Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus concert with CSO principal conductor Bernard Haitink, soprano Miah Persson, and mezzo-soprano Christianne Stotijn.
A rapturous Mahler symphony, courtesy of Haitink
From Sir Georg Solti's reconsideration of Beethoven's tempos and Shostakovich's politics to Pierre Boulez's blossoming as an interpreter of classical works he had long ignored to Daniel Barenboim's unanticipated taking up of Mahler, Chicago has seen many examples of late style at the podium.
But the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's current principal conductor, Bernard Haitink, just a few months shy of his 80th birthday, seems to be outdoing them all. With each new addition to his CSO repertoire of major works by Bruckner, Mahler, and Shostakovich (and, with the Boston Symphony, J.S. Bach), it is as if we are participating in real time in the conductor's own deeply personal and scholarly reexamination of these weighty scores.
I have attended at least a dozen different presentations of Mahler's C minor Second Symphony, the so-called Resurrection, since the 1970s, and it has long been one of my favorite works in any genre. But I have never heard the piece as it sounded under Haitink on Thursday night. It was as if the players and listeners were experiencing the musical discoveries that Mahler made in this revolutionary work (composed and revised from 1888-94, and premiered in full in 1895 in Berlin) just as they were being made by the composer.
In an 80-minute-plus work whose many fans often have to fight the urge to sing along with the choral and vocal solo parts, and at least to hum along with both the massive and intimate orchestral writing, concentration in the packed hall was total. While being ever loyal -- but with the loyalty of a champion, not an acolyte -- to the score, Haitink made each choice of tempo, rhythm, volume, massing, and color seem almost shocking.
When before have the offstage brass in the huge fifth and last movement sounded both so striking and so altogether right? When did the eerie passing of solo lines come off so quietly and in such silence that you could actually hear the lips of the principal trumpet, horn, and flute leave their instruments? When was the second movement Ländler dance played so delicately that it was as if we could see couples greeting each other with a "How do you do?"
Many in attendance still had the voice and presence of the great American mezzo Lorraine Hunt Lieberson (left) in mind from the CSO's most recent performances of this symphony in March 2006. Not only was her singing of the fourth movement "Urlicht" ("Heavenly Light") in full keeping with its name, but just months after these, her final concerts anywhere, she was dead from cancer at 52.
But in the fine young Dutch mezzo Christianne Stotijn (left), like Hunt Lieberson herself a former string player, Haitink somehow has found a singer who shares his vision totally, and so we wound up listening to and thinking of Mahler, and not any particular artist, however gifted.
Duain Wolfe's chorus, all instrumental sections and soloists, there's nowhere here to start or stop. We're experiencing historic musicmaking in Chicago these days. Miss it at your peril. And don't be late.
Originally posted by Andrew Patner from Andrew Patner: The View from Here, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
They made me do it -- Some reactions to the orchestra "rankings" by The Gramophone
I really had nothing to say about the "rankings" of the world's major orchestra's by The Gramophone magazine for its December 2008 cover story. But my bosses at the Chicago Sun-Times wanted a story and so, here 'tis. From the Saturday November 22 edition.
Sweet sound of success
CSO | Respected London magazine rates Chicago Symphony No. 5 in the world and tops in the U.S
BY ANDREW PATNER
What would happen if a leading British-based music magazine ranked the world's leading orchestras and the "winning" U.S. ensemble didn't care?
That's basically what's happened when leaders of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra shrugged their collective shoulders over the London monthly The Gramophone saying that it's the top classical outfit in the United States.
(Photo: Associated Press)
1) Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Amsterdam
2) Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
3) Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
4) London Symphony Orchestra
5) Chicago Symphony Orchestra
6) Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra
7) Cleveland Orchestra
8) Los Angeles Philharmonic
9) Budapest Festival Orchestra
10) Dresden Staatskapelle
11) Boston Symphony Orchestra
12) New York Philharmonic
13) San Francisco Symphony
14) Mariinsky Theater Orchestra (tours the West as the Kirov Orchestra)
15) Russian National Orchestra
16) Leningrad Philharmonic
17) Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra
18) Metropolitan Opera Orchestra
19) Saito Kinen Orchestra (Japan)
20) Czech Philharmonic
"I think it is safe to say that we are not advocates or necessarily firm believers in lists of this sort, given the subjective nature of these types of rankings," said CSO President Deborah Rutter, using the sort of language that one usually hears from someone who's just been voted off the island, not named king of the hill.
Although such surveys are basically not much more than publicity gimmicks for the outlet conducting and trumpeting them, The Gramophone's December cover story list is a cut above many similar rankings. (I've heard all 20 international orchestras on the list perform live, as well as two other excellent and historic U.S. orchestras that are odd omissions: the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Pittsburgh Symphony.)
Coming out on top is Amsterdam's universally revered Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, a superb orchestra that was led for decades by the CSO's current principal conductor, Bernard Haitink. Not surprisingly, the top ensembles of Berlin, Vienna, and London follow. and Chicago pops up at No. 5 on the overall chart.
- Perhaps the biggest winner in the pack, though, is the Concertgebouw's music director Mariss Jansons. The Latvian-Jewish conductor has two ensembles in The Gramophone's "Top 10" -- Munich's Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra was rated No. 6 overall, just behind the CSO and just before the exceptional Cleveland Orchestra.
The high ranking for the Dresden Staatskapelle (No. 10) seems reasonable after their outstanding showing at Orchestra Hall on Sunday. The Los Angeles Philharmonic at No. 8, three places above the far superior Boston Symphony Orchestra, seems a stretch, although well-traveled Los Angeles Times critic Mark Swed was on the Gramophone jury, along with The New Yorker magazine super-critic Alex Ross. A top 10 spot for the spunky Budapest Festival Orchestra is another oddity. Former CSO music director Daniel Barenboim's Berlin Staatskapelle is nowhere to be seen.
"As everyone should know," Rutter continued in an e-mail, "on any given evening anywhere and everywhere in the world there are 'best concerts' taking place by many great orchestras. Music is always a subjective experience, and that's why there isn't and can't be a 'World Series' in our world to firmly, regularly rank orchestras.
"All that said," Rutter concluded, "in any case, it is wonderful to have international recognition of our truly superb and peerless orchestra."
Originally posted by Andrew Patner from Andrew Patner: The View from Here, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Ionarts at Large: Andiamo a Roma
The Choir of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, of which I am a member, is in Rome this week. Tomorrow, we will be singing at the Papal Mass in St. Peter's (November 23, 10:30 am), along with several Masses at other churches in Rome throughout the week. This concert tour culminates with a concert on Wednesday, part of the 7th Festival Internazionale di Musica e ArteOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Libretto Fashions
A playwright friend & I have recently being going through some libretto possibilities. There are some really interesting ideas, but I've started to worry about things being either too fashionable (which is one sort of risk) or not fashionable enough (which is another sort of risk altogether). A vampire opera, for example, immediately suggests lots of interesting musical solutions (even Marschner's empty coffin of a vampire opera has been getting revived) but it would inevitably be thrown against the whole pop culture vampire phenomena (not to mention the fact that I've already done my Edward Gorey puppet opera). A pirate opera, on the other hand, has real-world news value above and beyond any popular phenomena, but poses instead a musical issue for me, in that I'm not particularly interested in a piece without (or with few) female voices, short of imagining a Barbary — or Somalian — Coast version of a Seraglio harem, which would probably be too cheerful for the particular species of piracy encounter in these times. How about historical or political topics? A Bush in Bagdad might have been imaginable if the resident had stayed on the bottle and sometimes went to bed late and did more than squeeze German Chancellors. As it is, he so boring (see: evil half-wit, the banality of the) you simply can't imagine the guy in Sprechstimme, let alone singing. Perhaps you have to have a certain distance to pull this off, anyways. Stravinsky suggested a Maximillian and Carlotta opera, a great idea, complete with a Manet-quality execution and a very long mad scene, but, surprisingly, no one's ever made a go of it.Originally from Renewable Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Arts and entertainment calendar - Daily News Transcript
Arts and entertainment calendar Daily News Transcript, MA - BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, led by Seiji Ozawa, performs music by Messiaen and Berlioz today at 1:30 pm, and tomorrow night at 8, at Symphony Hall, Boston. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)
Modernism's Monster - Washington Post
 | Modernism's Monster Washington Post, United States - He groups the French composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier with Olivier Messiaen and Stravinsky as composers of modern music heard at the inauguration of the ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)
SCOOP PREVIEW: Honoring Elliott Carter - Women's Wear Daily
SCOOP PREVIEW: Honoring Elliott Carter Women's Wear Daily - He’s followed his vision of music regardless of where it led him. To be able to master what he does, you will expand your own technical ability in not only ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)
Glyndebourne 2009 festival programme
The 2009 Glyndebourne season productions has officially been announced. Most, but not all the below mentioned cast has been officially announced, thus some of the below casting information is inofficial, however reliable, as these things go..Tristan and Isolde - revival of the Lehnhoff production. With Anja Kampe (Isolde), Torsten Kerl (Tristan), Kristine Jepson (Brangäne). Vladimir Jurowski conducts.
Falstaff - new Richard Jones production, conducted by Vladimir Jurowski. With Christopher Purves as Falstaff, Tassis Christoyannis (Ford), Adriana Kucerova (Nanetta), Jennifer Holloway (Meg Page).
Giulio Cesare - revival of the David McVicar production, Laurence Cummings conducts. With Danielle de Niese and Sarah Connelly.
Rusalka - new production by Melly Still. Jirí Belohlávek conducts. With Ana Maria Martinez, Brandon Jovanovich and Tatiana Pavlovskaya (Foreign Princess).
The Fairy Queen - new production by Jonathan Kent. William Christie/Laurence Cummings conducts.
L´elisir d´amore - revival of the 2007 production by Annabel Arden. Maurizio Benini conducts. With Ekaterina Siurina and Peter Auty.
Originally from mostly opera..., ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:52 PM | Comments (0)
It's About Time
To be precise, two years since I’ve written here, an unfortunate confluence of perfectionism, overcommitment, medical emergency, political angst, and writer’s block. John Zorn pulled me out of the latter to write a piece for his latest issue of Arcana. Perhaps I’ll post that essay at a later date; you can check out the beautifully published volume, with writings by Chrisian Marclay, Sean Lennon, Gavin Bryars, Brad Lubman, William Parker, Wadada Leo Smith, Olga Neuwirth, Laeticia Sonami, and many others, here. Through these two years I have been sketching ideas, and hopefully some will come to fruition over the next few months. In the meantime, a reminiscences about my trip to China last year.********************************************
“Be prepared for something unforeseen to happen,” a Chinese musician-friend had cautioned me, with a smirk. And so it was with a bemused sense of trepidation that I embarked on my trip to the Beijing Modern Music Festival last May to perform my clarinet concerto Voices. I had been invited by Ye Xiao-gang, director of the festival, at the behest of my colleague Chen Yi. Prior to my departure from the U.S., in response to a frantic request from the orchestra management, I had hastily packed several items – castanets, a wa-wa mute, and a flexatone – lent to me by generous acquaintances. Several of the instruments in my score were not commonly owned, or even known, by smaller Chinese orchestras.
After ten hours spent at Newark Airport, including two flight cancellations, I finally boarded the plane and arrived in Beijing at 1AM, only to have my bankcard rudely swallowed by the local ATM. A driver arrived to transport me to Tianjin, a city located about two hours away from the capital. The midnight trip was a grey, polluted blur. My mind was enveloped in a groggy fog after two half-days of travel, and a steady stream of industrial, covered trucks – delivering goods from the ports of the China Sea to Beijing – clogged the highway, belching soot. Bland billboards loomed from the roadside and a busy whirr of construction persisted through the night.
Following a 4am check-in at the hotel, I collapsed into deep, two-hour sleep and was awoken for breakfast. Walking into the 9am rehearsal, I conjured some Zen, expecting a number of ‘issues’ to surface. “A great deal will depend on the conductor,” my friend had warned. “You’ll need someone who understands American rhythms.”
The young, energetic conductor Yang Li greeted me upon my arrival. To my surprise, he spoke English quite well. “I’m glad you are here!” he said excitedly. “We have already been rehearsing for several days!” I learned that he was the son of the famous choral conductor Yang Hongnian whose China Children’s Choir was world-renowned for their skill; training together from a tender age, the singers remained with the group throughout their teenage years, often into their twenties. Yang Li had studied conducting in Stuttgart, and German words were sprinkled throughout his animated conversation. “Do not worry if the orchestra sounds imperfect,” he assured me with a wink. “They are still getting used to your jazzy flavor. We will concentrate on your piece all day today and tomorrow.”
The first reading of my concerto was quite rough; many of the difficult wind passages seemed downright shaky, and huge swaths of the music were missing. But the string section held their own, and the principal winds attacked their parts in a determined – if occasionally stiff – manner. Yang Li spoke encouragingly to the orchestra, then turned to me and pointed at his score. “This is the hardest part,” he announced gravely. “Where you write ‘Bebop.’ They’re not getting the rhythm accurately. Go over there and play it with them.” He urged me toward the woodwind section.
All eyes were on me. I hesitated. It seemed somehow presumptuous to step into their space; as the soloist, I would be crossing an invisible boundary. Yang Li persisted, “You must show them how to play the first movement. Much better than if I do it! You are American; this is your music.” So I stepped in front of the woodwinds and executed a blindingly fast two-bar passage of 64th notes. The whole orchestra immediately burst into applause.
Please,” he entreated, ignoring the clapping. “Once more.”
“OK…” I said, moving back toward my normal spot.
“No, stay where you are,” he gestured. “In the orchestra. Play with them, in the section!”
So I stood next to the principal clarinet player and we all played together. It sounded pretty awful.
“Play it again,” Yang Li said. We did.
“Again.” We repeated it.
“Again.”
Steadily, almost imperceptibly, the two-bar phrase solidified.
“Now Derek, play it slowly, very slowly.” I did it, stressing the non-‘ghost’ notes.
He spoke to the orchestra in Mandarin. “I explain to them what you are doing. How you emphasize some notes and swallow others. Play again.” I did, exaggerating the syncopation.
He barked a command to the orchestra, then turned to me. “Now we all play in the slower tempo.” Remarkably, the entire wind section eked out a slightly clumsy but discernable swing.
“Again!” he hollered. They played.
“Now a little faster...” Yang Li was no longer conducting, but allowing me to lead from my post, standing in front of the wind section.
“Again,” he insisted, with a tiny smirk. And so it went, for at least an hour, Yang Li breaking down the movement into small phrases and imploring me to demonstrate.
During a moment of inspiration, I unearthed a potent metaphor for describing to the musicians my swooping, gliding musical rhetoric: Peking Opera. It seemed like an apt touchstone with which to cross the cultural divide; Peking Opera prominently features exaggerated vocal gestures via high soprano and falsetto singers, deliberately caricaturizing speech for dramatic purposes. Yang Li appreciated the stylistic analogy and echoed it repeatedly when explaining my piece to the orchestra; we had found our Rosetta Stone.
In this way, the musicians slowly grew comfortable with the gestural language of my work. The evolution was especially palpable during the breaks; the principal cellist winked slyly as he bowed glissandi imitating slides and groans, the first clarinet player parroted my licks, the trombonists practiced funky inflections, fall-offs, and ‘doits’, the trumpeters rehearsed syncopations and ‘ghost’ notes, and the hornists perfected their rips. During the second movement – which is based on an Irish folk song – the concertmaster riffed on a fiddle lick and the piccolo player painstakingly deconstructed the 'keening' grace notes in her solo, a low, melancholy echo of the clarinet melody. After much practice, the pianist was able to create a subtle, resonant thump with a soft mallet on the strings, and the harpist achieved a sultry portamento pedaling. I had been worried about whether the bass guitar player would possess any knowledge of slap techniques, but to my delight, he turned out to be a virtuoso; he gigged regularly in a Tianjin funk band and, though never having played electric bass with an orchestra, he quickly learned to negotiate the complex task of following a conductor while grooving with the rhythm section.
Given their lack of resources, the percussionists were particularly noteworthy in their dedication to realizing my orchestrational nuances. Lacking an extra drumhead available for puncture, they set about searching for creative solutions to simulate a ‘lion’s roar’ using timpani. Two squeaky rubber ‘Hello Kitty’ toys were ingeniously substituted for a cuica. A makeshift vibraslap was constructed for the final bars of the slow movement. The drum set player memorized a lengthy 7/8 funk groove so that he could more easily watch the conductor. And the entire section teamed up to find a tub deep enough to immerse a large gong in water, auditioning three or four containers before a vessel of appropriate size was located.
By the end of the first afternoon we had already rehearsed for double the amount of time that an equivalent new piece would have received with a Western orchestra. It was a long working day for the musicians: 9am-5pm, punctuated by a few half-hour breaks, during which they practiced, smoked, or played ping-pong. By concert time the following evening, we had clocked three days of rehearsal on my concerto alone (three other contemporary works were also featured on the program: by Ching Wen Chen, Zhang Lida, and Jing Xiang). Yang Li appeared thoughtful. "Voices will be pretty good tonight in Tianjin,” he mused, “but it will improve greatly by the time we perform in Beijing, because we will rehearse in-between the concerts too.” He smiled impishly. “They don’t do that in the West.”
What drove the relaxed, devoted, and optimistic atmosphere that permeated the rehearsal process? Part of it was Yang Li’s disarmingly casual, yet focused, manner; but the copious time allotted for the musicians to familiarize themselves with my compositional language was undoubtedly a vital factor. In the States it is rare to receive more than two or three rehearsals to hone a contemporary piece (and the scenario is often even more hectic when playing standard repertoire; I’ve performed the Mozart – and even the Copland – concerto without a full dress rehearsal). In most of Europe the situation is not much better; in England it is probably worse. By contrast, in Tianjin the generous amount of rehearsal time allowed a chamber music sensibility to prevail. Rather than relying on sight-reading chops, the players melded together into an ensemble, internalizing my musical gestures on a vastly more intimate level. I gazed with admiration at these dedicated musicians, earning less money for a week of work than most Western orchestral players make at one rehearsal.
I recall reading about the tumultuous history of Aaron Copland’s Short Symphony. Deemed unplayable – and subsequently abandoned – by Stokowski in Philadelphia and by Koussevitsky in Boston, the work had to wait for its premiere until Chavez's orchestra in Mexico City allotted ten rehearsals. It wasn’t performed in the States for another decade. Imagine the possibilities were a bold commitment undertaken today by major Western orchestras to prepare, perform, and record challenging and unorthodox new works. Yes, it would require time. And time - in the West - is often equated with money. But the rewards would be priceless, and timeless.
Originally from inspirations, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:51 PM | Comments (0)
Udderbot in NYC
I am in NYC. The two primary previously-known purposes for this trip are twofold: (1) to learn the ins and outs of robot making as an intern with the League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots (LEMUR), and (2) to assist the Garden Performance Project in its endeavor to make homegrown junkmusic.Originally from udderblag, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:51 PM | Comments (0)
It’s not mobile music, it’s just music
I happened to get an eMusic email a few days ago (announcing new releases in the alternative/punk category) and noticed a link to a special offer for AT&T Mobile subscribers
, with the promise that You could win 6 months of free AT&T mobile service
. I recently became an AT&T subscriber (when I bought an iPhone), so this sounded intriguing and I clicked on the link. It turned out to be a sweepstakes tied to a trial offer for eMusic Mobile, and isn’t even applicable to me because eMusic Mobile doesn’t work with iPhones.
But before clicking away I noticed the pricing: $7.49 per month for five tracks. Yowza, that’s almost $1.50 per track! That’s a pretty high price from a company that’s perhaps best known as a discount outlet for music. I can only conclude that this is just standard practice in the so-called mobile music
market (or, as it’s often called by cognoscenti, the OTA or over-the-air
download market). Sure enough, looking at Verizon’s V CAST Music with Rhapsody offering we see that it costs $1.99 to buy a song and have it downloaded directly to your phone, vs. $0.99 to buy it on your PC and then sync it to your phone.
I guess the underlying rationale is that users are willing to pay extra for the convenience of downloading directly to their phones, just as they’re willing to pay extra for the convenience of buying a song already ready for use as a ringtone, as opposed to making their own ringtones from an MP3. I can understand this model for ringtones (where I think convenience is worth paying for), but frankly the traditional OTA business model is a business model that is rapidly becoming obsolete.
When I use my iPhone, there’s no real difference in what I can do over the AT&T 3G network vs. a WiFi network; I’m just using the Internet and the web. Well, there is at least one difference: When I’m on WiFi I can buy music through the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store, but there is no corresponding iTunes 3G Music Store
I can use when I’m using the AT&T cellular network. This, of course, is a crock—there’s no technical reason why Apple can’t offer the iTunes Store over the AT&T network, it’s just a restriction imposed on Apple by AT&T, either due to existing OTA-related contracts or to protect the OTA business model generally.
The only reason an absurdity like this can continue is because the iPhone is a proprietary device, and Apple and AT&T can use that proprietary nature to enforce arbitrary restrictions on customers’ use of the iPhone. However over time as more open devices like Android become more popular, and Internet access from mobile phones becomes more like Internet access from PCs, that situation will likely change, if not for Apple then for others. For example, one can imagine a Songbird-like (or perhaps even Songbird-derived) open media player and library manager on a mobile phone, through which one could download and play MP3 tracks purchased through the standard eMusic web site.
To paraphrase a blog post by Jay Sullivan of Mozilla, users don’t want the mobile Web
, they want the real Web on mobile devices. Similarly users of mobile phones and related devices can look forward to someday moving from mobile music
to just plain music, and from eMusic Mobile to the same old eMusic we know and love.
Originally posted by hecker from Swindleeeee!!!!!, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:50 PM | Comments (0)
Liveblogging! Commentary for “ITDE” 11/22/08
I decided to start tonight's broadcast with some older material, and figure out what direction the show might take from there. The last-minute choice was Peter Wright, from the lovely three-disc set "Pariahs Sing On," from Last Visible Dog. Seems like that label dropped me from their promo list some ...Originally from Startling Moniker, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:50 PM | Comments (0)
A Priceless and Yet Truly Terrible Review of an NNM Member and Friends
You guys have got to check this out. Admittedly, it's a small town CT paper, but it is truly priceless in what it says about the critical arts today. The crass judgementalism, the inability to even feign an exploratory methodology, and the childish venting about the 'state' of the arts when backed by a cretinous philosophical outlook.The Art of Noise
Favorite phrases from this gushing of hyper-critical excrement include:
What I got was three artists so overloaded on theory that they were unable to cooperate, choosing instead to masturbate all over their audience.
This one might actually be a good title for something:
The purposelessness was deafening.
Meanwhile, percussionist Bill Solomon tinkered with a table full of objects — some were musical instruments, and some were anything but.
Good pic of our Bill Solomon tho!
Congratulations!
Originally from Discussion Forum - NetNewMusic, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:49 PM | Comments (0)
composer journeys from Denmark for a premiere - Honolulu Star-Bulletin
composer journeys from Denmark for a premiere Honolulu Star-Bulletin, HI - ... he remembered his meeting in Copenhagen some 20 years ago with -- and playing the music of -- Denmark's leading contemporary classical composer, ... |
Originally from "contemporary classical" | "avant garde" music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:49 PM | Comments (0)
Hause music at Liverpool's Cornerstone Festival - Liverpool Echo
Hause music at Liverpool's Cornerstone Festival Liverpool Echo, UK - The German avant-garde composer Karlheinz Stockhausen – who used electronic gadgetry and tapes in producing his compositions – was a controversial figure ... |
Originally from "contemporary classical" | "avant garde" music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:49 PM | Comments (0)
The Triumph of Music: Composers, Musicians and Their Audiences ... - Times Online
 Times Online | The Triumph of Music: Composers, Musicians and Their Audiences ... Times Online, UK - He more or less ignores contemporary classical music, whose story has been told so well by Alex Ross in The Rest is Noise. Whereas his narrative of ... |
Originally from "contemporary classical" | "avant garde" music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:49 PM | Comments (0)
Music Review | New York Philharmonic - New York Times
 New York Times | Music Review | New York Philharmonic New York Times, United States - The Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki, who turns 75 on Sunday, has explored a range of idioms, from avant-garde to neo-Romantic, during his career, ... |
Originally from "contemporary classical" | "avant garde" music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 12:48 PM | Comments (0)
Review: Lukas Ligeti at the Steve Allen Theater - calendarlive.com
Review: Lukas Ligeti at the Steve Allen Theater calendarlive.com, CA - By MARK SWED, Music Critic On my way to the Steve Allen Theater in Hollywood Thursday night for a rare local appearance by Lukas Ligeti, I stopped by Amoeba ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
ASO conductor-pianist Brown delivers in dual roles - The Birmingham News - al.com
ASO conductor-pianist Brown delivers in dual roles The Birmingham News - al.com, AL - Topping Music Director Justin Brown's wish list for the Alabama Symphony is a larger permanent orchestra. A nearly full house at the Alys Stephens Center ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
Derek Berwin/Fox Photos--Getty Images - New York Times
Derek Berwin/Fox Photos--Getty Images New York Times, United States - Asked recently whether, like so much of Mr. Carter’s work, this one was difficult to learn, the sort of music most pianists want months to prepare, ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:14 AM | Comments (0)
Interfaith Calendar - Indianapolis Star
Interfaith Calendar Indianapolis Star, United States - The choirs of Christ Church and the University of Indianapolis and organist David Sinden also perform music of Messiaen and contemporaries. Free. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:14 AM | Comments (0)
A Ritual Revisited Yet Again - New York Times
A Ritual Revisited Yet Again New York Times, United States - And perhaps, also, the endeavor starts with a step, one that fits so perfectly with this music that it offers a way through the score — or at least a way in ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:14 AM | Comments (0)
Brown conducts, solos with Alabama Symphony with aerobic intensity - The Birmingham News - al.com
 | Brown conducts, solos with Alabama Symphony with aerobic intensity The Birmingham News - al.com, AL - Topping Music Director Justin Brown's wish list for the Alabama Symphony is a larger permanent orchestra. A nearly full house at the Alys Stephens Center ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:14 AM | Comments (0)
YFZ (Yearning For Zion) - All About Jazz
YFZ (Yearning For Zion) All About Jazz, PA - "The Roar of G_D," turns Gyorgy Ligeti's well-known "Hungarian Rock" upside down, with a new arrangement shifting through a nervous, punk drumming ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:14 AM | Comments (0)
The Squid’s Ear Reviews
- Image via Wikipedia
From The Squid:
Morton Feldman - Turfan Fragments
(Dog w/a Bone)
- Brian OlewnickHenri Pousseur - Electronic Experimental and Microtonal 1953-1999
(Sub Rosa)
- Brian OlewnickChristian Wolff - Early Piano Pieces
(Hat[now]ART)
- Brian OlewnickRobert Haigh - Written On Water
(Crouton)
- Darren BergsteinJacob Wick / Andrew Greenwald - 37:55
(Creative Sources)
- Jeph JermanFAB Trio - A Night In Paris
(Marge)
- Jeph JermanMemorize The Sky - In Former Times
(Clean Feed)
- Jeph JermanBoxhead Ensemble - Dutch Harbor
(Atavistic)
- Max SchaferChristina Carter - Original Darkness
(Kranky)
- Max Schaefer
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:11 AM | Comments (0)
The night France tuned in to clank and clatter
- Image by pablosanz via Flickr
Sixty years of electroacoustic music are profiled.
This concert de bruits was a red-letter day in the annals of modern music. It was the moment when musique concrète - made from sounds recorded out in the world, rather than musical notes - came out from the laboratory and into public view. The man behind it was a quiet, intense telecommunications engineer turned composer named Pierre Schaeffer. For months he had been working in the radio station’s studio, shaping the sounds he had recorded into a musical form.
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 08:11 AM | Comments (0)
5 Musical Quizzes for Both Beginners and Pros
Here are some clever quiz games that are equally useful either as educational tools or as conversation pieces at parties:Originally from The Collaborative Piano Blog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
Ring Festival L.A. - Wrong Festival L.A.
Over the centuries people have come to Southern California from all over the world. They bring their art and religion and they build monuments to their own cultural heritage. In Southern California these monuments mix in unexpected ways.I photographed an example of cultural heritages mixing: two architecturally antagonistic church steeples. They're one block apart and were built one year apart.(1) The congregations, although close physically, are heirs to very different cultures and mythologies. Their histories stretch back, along very different paths, to different parts of Europe. Neither church, neither congregation, neither religion, neither style of architecture is representative of Southern California by itself - but the area is richer for having both. And lots of others too.
Music can be a religion, it has a heritage and it has monuments. People often attend concerts to connect with their music history - like another Mozart symphony or another Rolling Stones tour. And just like the diversity of churches and religions, there are many different types of music in Southern California - hugely different heritages in close proximity.
One kind of music is opera. For many decades Los Angeles civic leaders dreamed of their own opera company and eventually they got it. Then they wanted their own Ring Cycle - as if that were some sort of validation. Their theory seems to be that Los Angeles Opera wouldn't be considered a "real" opera company without a Ring cycle, and without a "real" opera company Los Angeles wouldn't be a real place.
WAGNER'S RING
Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung is one of the biggest musical monuments imaginable - nineteen operas, each over two full days in length. (Hyperbole!) The plot screams about lust, murder, incest and revenge - but all in a good way. (Sarcasm!) "Love" and "Redemption" and "Heroism" and "Magic Fire" and "Helmets of Invisibility" and "Women Warriors on Flying Horses with Longer-Than-They-Are-Wide Swords" make it no weirder than Star Wars.
Some people keep coming back to these operas again and again. Those people are called Ringnuts (although I think it'd be cool to call them "Wagnerds"). Read my favorite Ring synopsis here. (Better yet, go find a recording of it.)
Richard Wagner was quite the egomaniac, a short, offensive scumbag who hated Jews and loved adultery - all in a good way as well. (More Sarcasm!) And of course Wagner's most famous fan was named Adolf. He used Wagner's music as inspiration to become the most evil person in history. Unfortunately the music world has largely forgiven Wagner for the horror of Hitler's ways. (2)
I'm not a believer in any religion, most particularly not that of Wagnerism. Others can believe whatever they want and attend whichever ceremonies make them feel good. I don't have to pay any attention. The L.A. Opera production of The Ring is easy to ignore.
RING FESTIVAL L.A.
Recently the L.A. Opera announced that they would produce a Los Angeles-wide ARTS FESTIVAL to accompany the performances of their Ring cycle. Here's a press release announcing the participation of 50 local cultural and education organizations. You have to go here for the whole list.
In the press release Placido Domingo modestly tells us:
Ring Festival LA will be a defining moment in the cultural history of Los Angeles,This one-ring circus will start in April 2010. The final program won't be announced until January 2010 - 14 months from now.
WHY A RING FESTIVAL?
Civic boosterism is a good answer: dollars and profit. As Eli Broad, the rich local patron who has given Six Million Dollars towards the opera productions themselves, said:
Ring Festival LA will bring worldwide attention to our city and attract an increasing number of visitors.In other words: more tickets sold, more hotel rooms filled.
Less credibly, Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky is quoted as saying:
Ring Festival LA will highlight the wealth of arts and culture that is unique to our town.Someone should mention to him that Wagner operas are never going to be unique to Los Angeles. We will not become Bayreuth on the Pacific. Someone should also mention that Los Angeles has a history of arts festivals - a history which reflects conflict between elitism and populism.
A SHORT HISTORY OF ARTS FESTIVALS IN LOS ANGELES
Although from 1947 through 1966 there was the Los Angeles Music Festival created by composer Franz Waxman, apparently the first attempt at a city-wide multi-discipline arts festival was the Olympic Arts Festval in 1984.
Here's a bit of Olympic Arts Festival hype (from here)
[T]he 1984 Olympic Arts Festival threatens to become one of the wonders of the contemporary world. These projects are Los Angeles theatre, Korean dance, California sculpture, performers from the People’s Republic of China, and above all, “freeway murals”.A second festival, the Los Angeles Festival, was produced 3 years later under the same director, Robert J. Fitzpatrick, using Olympic profits. Here's a 1985 New York Times article about that.
The programming of the first two festivals was still hugely Eurocentric in spite of the hype. Some local creativity and non-European artists were included. The freeway murals have not survived several generations of taggers. Art is ephemeral.
For a while Los Angeles expected to have a regular city-wide arts festival every three years. There was a change of festival leadership. Here's a 1987 New York Times announcement about the change.
The new director Peter Sellars had a different philosophy about the purposes of and communities served by a giant arts festival. Here's an article about the difficulties the changed festival encountered. (Here's another.)
The last Los Angeles Festival in 1993 suffered from the lack of large corporate donations. Although Peter's philosophy was both positive and praiseworthy, it didn't really fulfill the desires of the arts community. I guess they were mostly interested in European arts and so the L.A. Festivals died on a petard of multi-culturalism. No one, to my knowlege, talked about another festival again until now.
SO WHAT'S MY COMPLAINT?
I am bothered that Ring Festival LA will be promoted as a centerpiece of our entire local arts community - a keystone to all things expressive in Los Angeles.
While it might be nice for some people who live here, this festival, as it was announced, will be far from representative of the arts community as a whole. In fact it is elitist in the extreme. As such it could well do our arts community - especially our creative music community - a grand disservice.
I'm assuming that the plethora of arts organizations taking part in Ring Festival L.A. will program events related to the Ring or to Wagner. This would be a a way of attracting the Ringnuts who are expected to infest L.A. during the festival.
Go here to read about the events announced so far - everything seems to be Wagner related. except for one "little" Stockhausen piece. (Sarcasm!) Stockhausen fits in because he was German and he had an ego even bigger than Wagners.
There's this gem (yep, more sarcasm):
LA's ground-breaking daKAH Hip Hop Orchestra, led by Geoff "Double G" Gallegos, premieres a new work inspired by the revolutionary spirit of Wagner.There are many "to be announced" festival events on their list. They might eventually include all sorts of things in the festival - Latin jazz, oriental dancers, gospel choirs, klezmer bands, etc. - events with significance to large segments of the other 97.6% of the city who couldn't care less about Wagner. Not holding my breath. (3)
WHAT WOULD I SUGGEST INSTEAD?
The Los Angeles Opera should have their Ring festival. My fears could be allayed. Here are some suggestions. Only the first one is simple.
1) Change the name of the festival to "Ring Festival L.A. Opera" or "L.A. Opera Ring Festival"? Just don't claim to represent the entire Los Angeles arts community.
2) L.A. Opera also has a project called Recovered Voices which presents operas suppressed by the Nazis. Mix the Recovered Voices operas into the festival. In my best of all possible worlds you would only be able to attend a Ring opera if you had previously attended a Recovered Voices opera.
.
3) A big Ring Cycle production might someday appear on DVD. Before that let the masses listen in and watch for free. Broadcast all 4 operas live on radio and/or television. The opening of Disney Hall had live broadcasts. Share the operas.
4) A Los Angeles Ring should not further expunge the black marks on Wagner's personal rap sheet. The man should be viewed as reprehensible and his personal opinions and behavior are still highly relevant if his music is to get so much attention. Expand the educational seminar entitled "Richard Wagner and the Jews: The Use of Wagner by the Nazis." Los Angeles has the second biggest Jewish population on the planet and this subject should not be swept under the rug. One seminar in front of a few hundred people without extensive media would be an insult.
5) Be realistic about the debt which the Los Angeles film music community still owes to Wagner. Big ticket film scores draw their lifeblood from Wagner's leitmotivic composition methods. This is discussed interestingly here by John Mauceri. He's talking about emigre composers, but the practice persists. L.A.Opera has not had terribly good luck commissioning works from film composers - but that doesn't mean they should stop trying. Maybe they'll come up with something better than the Ring.
6) Hold a fringe festival at the same time as the Ring Festival. This is not something the L.A.Opera should do on its own. Instead the opera should give other organizations money to create an anti-establishment, anti-authoritarian, anti-totalitarian festival showcasing local creativity. Let those Ringnuts see that Los Angeles arts have gone beyond Wagner and movie soundtracks.
THE WRONG FESTIVAL LOS ANGELES
In my best of all possible worlds I've picked a name for this fringe festival - The Wrong Festival. The Wrong Festival is the Right thing to do. Like a clapper hitting opposite sides of a bell - we can hear "ringgg" and then "wronggg". Ringgg. Wronggg. Two sides of the same sound. An aural pun.
Like the two churches at the start of this essay, the Ring Festival and the Wrong Festival can coexist. They can occupy adjacent space at the same time and still validly and vividly represent entirely different artistic traditions.
A Los Angeles Festival should show the world that the people here respect one another through their art and music. It should show how Los Angeles residents hail from a huge number of backgrounds. We should celebrate our diversity in festival. We should not trumpet elitism.
FOOTNOTES
(1) The picture of two church spires on North Lake Avenue will be familiar to residents of Pasadena and Altadena. On the right is St. Elizabeth's Catholic Church (in Altadena) and on the left Westminster Presbyterian Church (in Pasadena). The one on the left is actually much taller; it's visible for miles. One is Gothic Revival, built in 1925, designed by Marston, Van Peet & Marbury. The other, in Mediteranean Spanish style, was built in 1926 and designed by Wallace Neff.
(2) Jews included. I believe that the contemporary pardon of Richard Wagner represents the loss an important lesson from the history of National Socialism. Namely, that the arts can be use for bad purposes. My parents taught me to avoid Wagner, not by telling me 'Avoid Wagner', but by simply avoiding Wagner themselves. All the while they were teaching me to appreciate other music instead.
In our current politics, the lessons of political appeasement before World War II are repeated endlessly as an excuse for our wars. Now and again society should remind itself about the powerful dangers of all encompassing arts. These days the danger isn't from opera - more likely that television or movies or country music or books could get everyone's brains into lockstep as we make yet another foolish national mistake.
(3) 97.6% - calculated like this: 4 complete performances of the Ring, NINETEEN operas per performance, all 3200 seats in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion sold out for every performance, no person ever attends more than once. Total attendance - 243,200 people or 2.33 percent of the total estimated population of Los Angeles County as of Jan. 1, 2008 - 10,363,850. More realistically, if they only performed 4 of the 19 operas the percentage drops to just under one half of one percent. And divide that figure by four if everyone attends a complete cycle. On anyone's l scale an event accessible by barely one tenth of one percent of the population qualifies as elitist.
More links:
- See more photos from LA Opera's Ring here.
- Pictures of Valkyries come from here and here and here and here
and here. - The blond woman in black is Katharina Wagner great-granddaughter of Richard Wagner and current co-director of Bayreuth.
- Robert J. Fitzpatrick describes the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival here.
- Nibelung Real Estate is here.
- Hitler and Wagner sites here and here and here. (The last one has a complete Bayreuth Ring Cycle mp3 recording to download.)
Just for the fun of it, here's some video of Hitler visiting Beyreuth.
Rants You Might Not Enjoy Either:
- Wagner and Schubert Have Intercourse
- Mingus Epitaph (in which George Bush plays a guitar)
- Los Angeles - New Music Backwater
- In Which Wealth Has It's Privileges (about the Ojai Festival and the riot at Attica)
- Charles Mingus
- Frank Zappa's Jukebox
- Old School (a visit to my alma mater, the Herb Alpert School of Music)
- Paradise, Pomp and Puppets - Performing Zappa's Orchestra Music
- Less Than The Paper It Isn't Written On
- Kraft's Encounters
- Everybody Loves Beethoven (Probably)
- The Rest Is Noise
- The Docker Award For Mainstream Avant Garde Music
- 30 Second Spots - Flight of the Rhino (includes my musical manifesto)
- The Second Second Story Series - Concert Four (Terry Riley's In C)
- Me and Mahler, Me and Iowa
Wrong Tags: L.A. Opera. . . Richard Wagner. . . Ring of the Nibelungs. . . Ring Cycle. . . Adolph Hitler. . . Valkyries. . . Los Angeles Festival. . . Ring Festival. . . Wrong Festival
Originally from Mixed Meters, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
York Holler, "Schwarze Halbinseln"
YORK HOLLERYork Holler was born on 11 November 1944 in Leverkusen. From 1963 to 1967 he studied music pedagogy at the Cologne Musikhochschule, where until 1970 he also studied composition with Bernd Alois Zimmermann and Joachim Blume, piano with Alfons Kontarsky and Else Schmitz-Gohr, and conducting with Wolfgang von der Nahmer. He also took courses in musicology and philosophy at the university. After attending Pierre Boulez's courses in analysis at the 1961 Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music, Holler was inspired to take up both the theoretical and practical sides of serial music. For his degree in music pedagogy he wrote a dissertation, "Kritische Untersuchung der seriellen Kompositionstechnik" (Critical Study of the Serial Technique of Composition, 1967), drawing on ideas from information theory and Gestalt psychology which, even today, still underly his music. He also wrote a piece for orchestra, "Topic" (1967), freely adapting serial procedures, and a "Sonate informelle for piano (1968) which was stimulated by Theodor W. Adorno's hypothetical notion of "musique informelle".
In addition, Holler was fascinated by the potential in electronic music for generating and manipulating sound - a potential which is far from exhausted. In 1969-70 he worked with Herbert Eimert in the Electronic Studio of the Cologne Musikhochschule; and in 1971-2 he was invited by Karlheinz Stockhausen to the Electronic Music Studio of the Westdeutscher Rundfunk in Cologne. Here he created his four-channel composition "Horizont" (Horizon, 1971-2). Since 1978 he has frequently worked at IRCAM, Boulez's research centre in Paris. Since then Holler has been a freelance composer living in Cologne, where he also is a part-time staff member at the Musikhochschule, teaching analysis and music theory. He has made the fusion of instrumental and electronic sounds the hallmark of his work, as shown in pieces such as "Klanggitter" (Sound Lattice, 1975-6) for cello, piano, synthesizer and tape, "Antiphon" for string quartet and tape (1976-7), and several works uniting orchestra and tape: "Arcus" (1978), "Mythos" (1979), "Umbra" (1979-80) and "Resonance" (1981).
Schwarze Halbinseln (Black Peninsulas)
"Schwarze Halbinseln" for full orchestra, voices and electronic sounds was written in 1982 and received its premiere from the Symphony Orchestra of the Westdeutscher Rundfunk in Cologne on 27 November 1982, the conductor being Diego Masson. The title and voice parts of the work (which Holler dedicated to Stockhausen) are taken from the expressionist poet Georg Heym: the title refers to a metaphor from Heym's poem to a "metaphysical country" whose "black peninsulas reach deep into our fleeting days". As his text Holler chose Heym's poem "Die Nacht", or "The Night":
All flames died that night on the steps.Yet not until the end of the piece does the poem appear on the tape in its original, unadulterated form. Until then its speech-rhythms, expressive gestures and images infuse the music, as it were, in the background, where the text is electronically distorted and parcelled out to a solo female voice and a women's chorus. For exemple, 15 seconds after the piece has begun, the opening lines of the poem ("Alle Flammen starben in Nacht auf den Stufen . . .") are whispered by the female soloist, yet modulated to such an extent that while the articulation remains intact the individual words become unintelligible. Just like the instrumental sounds, Holler harnesses even these vocal sounds to attain a synthesis between natural and electronic sounds. For "Schwarze Halbinseln" he has created a sound repertory of nine categories, some of them further divided into subcategories: (I) electronically generated sound material (subdivided into noises, sounds, and compound sounds); (2) instrumentally generated sound material (sounds and noises); (3) instrumental sounds subjected to electronic transformation (by means of ring, filter or amplitude modulation); (4) vocal sounds; (5) vocal sounds subjected to electronic transformation; (6) mixtures of vocal and electronic sounds; (7) speech; (8) electronically transformed speech; and (9) electronic sounds modulated by speech. The tape which Holler produced at the Electronic Music Studio of the Westdeutscher Rundfunk, Cologne, from July to September 1982 contains - in addition to the electronic sounds - the parts for women's chorus and female voice as well as several instrumental sounds which would have been difficult to synthesize in comparable form.
All wreaths withered. And there below.
Lost in blood, moaned Horror. Sometimes, from afar,
Dark cries echoed as from beyond the portals of the dead.
High above, a torch leaned from the passageways,
Ran in chorus. And sank like the hair of daemons,
Red, spluttering. Yet outside, the tips of the woods
Grew in the storm and stretched their length.
And above, in clouds, with wild gibbering
Came the hoary greybeards of the storm,
And giant birds started across the sky
Like ships with damp sails hanging from the waves.
But lightning bolts, wild and blood-shot, rent
The night, lighting the bleak halls,
And there in the mirrors, garish, brandishing blackened fists,
Stood the dead.
Stay with me. Let our hearts not freeze
When the doors open softly onto the darkness
And It stands in the silence. -And Its iron breath
Congeals our blood and dessicates our souls
So that, narrow as a sigh, they rise from the deep
And flutter into the night, sinking, falling,
Brittle as leaves wafting forlornly on the ground,
Cast into the emptiness by the evil wind.
When the laughter of thunderclaps fades in the dark.
Holler's "Schwarze Halbinseln" is not only a prime example of the extreme sophistication available in the early 1980s for merging electronic, instrumental and vocal sounds; it also reveals a carefully planned compositional design and execution. The work opens with an introduction lasting almost a full quarter of the piece. This introduction, based on a 12-note row, presents the musical material of the work. The main section which then follows comprises five interlinked but musically contrasting sections, and derives from a 31-note "sound aggregate" containing all of the essential compositional features of the work as regards melody, harmony, form and rhythm (see above). -- Christoph von Blumroder (Translation: J. Bradford Robinson)
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 05:11 AM | Comments (0)
Arts and entertainment calendar - Daily News Tribune
Arts and entertainment calendar Daily News Tribune, MA - BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, led by Seiji Ozawa, performs music by Messiaen and Berlioz today at 1:30 pm, and tomorrow night at 8, at Symphony Hall, Boston. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 22, 2008 at 02:11 AM | Comments (0)
"Appartition of the Eternal Church" comes to Lawrence - Lawrentian (subscription)
"Appartition of the Eternal Church" comes to Lawrence Lawrentian (subscription), WI - Messiaen himself played on themes of torture, violence and sex in religion when he wrote "Apparition de l'Éternelle." Festa incorporated these themes into ... |
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Dance Review | 'The Rite of Spring' - New York Times
Dance Review | 'The Rite of Spring' New York Times, United States - (He used a recorded version of a Pierre Boulez rendition, unedited save for a shortening of some of the silences.) Ms. Toumpakari is a beguiling performer, ... |
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November 21, 2008
SCOOP PREVIEW: Honoring Elliott Carter SCOOP PREVIEW: Honoring ... - Women's Wear Daily
SCOOP PREVIEW: Honoring Elliott Carter SCOOP PREVIEW: Honoring ... Women's Wear Daily - He’s followed his vision of music regardless of where it led him. To be able to master what he does, you will expand your own technical ability in not only ... |
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Review: Lukas Ligeti at the Steve Allen Theater - Los Angeles Times
 | Review: Lukas Ligeti at the Steve Allen Theater Los Angeles Times, CA - By MARK SWED, Music Critic On my way to the Steve Allen Theater in Hollywood Thursday night for a rare local appearance by Lukas Ligeti, I stopped by Amoeba ... |
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Wallingford Food Bank
Seattle-based composer Christopher DeLaurenti has quietly followed up his “Favorite Intermissions: Music Before and Between Beethoven - Stravinsky” with “Wallingford Food Bank.” The album was released on the label “Public Record” and is available for free download at the link above.
Here is the description from PRs site: “Seattle phonographer and soundscape composer Christopher DeLaurenti delivers a gritty sonic document of poverty for his Public Record debut. According to the cliché, the starving artist holds a golden thread to class advancement. Does an artist persist in identifying with wealth even to the point of amnesia? This is the sound of the golden thread being cut.”
Listening to DeLaurenti’s soundscapes, from the infamous Seattle WTO riots to the RNC protest in 2004 and from the private moments captured during intermissions in concert halls across the United States to the latest release in Wallingford Food Bank is highly recommended for passionate musical explorers.
Originally from Amaranth Arthouse Music, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
Know your Co-conspirators: Mike Holober
(Photo: Lindsay Beyerstein) Your featured co-conspirator for today is pianist Mike Holober. Mike is a compositional heavyweight in his own right -- he leads the Gotham Jazz Orchestra and recently became Associate Music Director of the BMI Jazz Composers Workshop,...Originally from Darcy James Argue's Secret Society, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
Burn Down Hot Topic
Originally posted by jake from thumbuki, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:13 PM | Comments (0)
Marginalized
Here's a comment from Eric Lin, a college student, to my "Why I'm Here" post. I'm giving it a post of its own, because I think it's important:There is some overlap between the theater folks and the classical music folks at the school I currently attend, and I happen to have worked and know people in both circles.When I posted the comment, I added an anecdote of my own. I know a consultant who's worked with theater companies and orchestras. He told me once -- with real perplexity -- that if he's in a theater company's office the day after a new production premieres, everybody talks about it. Everyone debates the play, the acting, the directing, the sets, the costumes, whatever.
This season, student dramatic productions include works by Edward Albee, Arthur Miller, Sondheim, a Mac Wellman play from the mid-1990s, and The Front Page, a comedy from the 1920s. This is not including the bi-annual productions of Gilbert and Sullivan and Shakespeare. Sarah Kane's controversial Blasted and Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses from 2002 both graced the main theatrical venue...
On the other hand, what has the classical music scene done? One orchestra does a composition contest each year and another chamber strings group generally does some student work, and I'm quite grateful that these opportunities exist. But beyond this?
The pattern is quite obvious. Theater types go around talking excitedly about the crazy Sarah Kane play. Sondheim productions are events. For the actor, yes, Shakespeare is great. But I certainly don't hear many (or any) person going around talking about how Shakespeare is better than Miller or Albee. That sort of distinction just doesn't register with them. It doesn't make sense. Albee's plays are great too...but for different reasons. Further, and more importantly, the plays are mostly chosen by THE STUDENTS themselves. People actively recruit teams of production staff to put together an Albee play. And people are genuinely excited to do a play/musical because they picked it.
Classical music? The new commission for the orchestra (if there is one at all) is usually treated like its spinach. The Classical music equivalents of Albees and Kanes barely register with the performers, let alone the larger community. Why? The performers don't know about them. So how can they get excited about their music?
Whereas your average theater geek with know who Edward Albee is, chances are the violinist in the orchestra will not know who Thomas Ades or Helmut Lachenmann is. Or care.
Whereas Shakespeare and Albee are equals, Beethoven and Birtwistle are not. At least not for the practitioners. Until these attitudes change, Classical music is and will be marginalized.
But when he's in an orchestra office the day after a concert, nobody says a word. The concert just as well might not have happened.
This doesn't mean that many people, in the audience and on the orchestra's staff, might not have loved the concert. But in a very tangible way, classical concerts are non-events. If the people most directly involved can't get aroused to talk about them, why would anybody else?
Originally from Sandow, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Not connecting (first draft)
I'm making a list -- and checking it twice -- of all the ways in which classical music doesn't connect to our larger culture. This'll eventually be a detailed blog post. I'd love comments. Can anyone add to the list?1. Most of the music at classical concerts comes from the past. So we're rarely engaged with contemporary life. (Is this one reason the people who go to these concerts like them?)
2. Formal dress looks archaic, and out of touch.
3. The musicians don't talk to the audience. In our culture today, people expect musicians to talk.
4. Musicians subordinate their own personalities. They play the music the way they've been taught to. They don't take much initiative, don't make their concerts personal statements, don't play the music their own way.
5. Even when new music is played, much of it doesn't sound like the world around us. The sounds of popular music aren't much heard, though they were in past centuries.
6. More general statement of point five: There's rarely even a hint of current popular culture at classical concerts. That's not true of other forms of art -- novels, poetry, visual art, dance, theater.
7. The audience is old.
I know that many of these things are changing. Point three, for instance. So I'm talking about classical concerts in their traditional form.
And I'm not saying that any of these things are bad. If you enjoy these concerts, you enjoy them. It's just that concerts with these characteristics don't resemble other current cultural events, don't connect with our larger culture, and therefore might not attract many people, especially younger people -- no matter how fine the music is.
Originally from Sandow, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
Great bargains for Phoenix arts events - AZ Central.com
Great bargains for Phoenix arts events AZ Central.com, AZ - They also will perform more well-known sonatines by Burton and Dutilleux. The details: 2:30 pm today. ASU Katzin Concert Hall, Music Building, 50 E. Gammage ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:12 PM | Comments (0)
The Listening Habits of Superheroes:
NAME: Ozymandias (Adrian Veidt)BORN: 1939
POWERS: Super intelligence and discipline, exceptional hand-to-hand combat skills.
MEMBER: Crimebusters
APPEARS: Watchmen
From "After the Masquerade: Superstyle and the art of humanoid watching" from Nova Express, July 12, 1975
NOVA: Changing the subject entirely, do you listen to much music? I wondered what your tastes might be, as a superhero...
VEIDT: I like electronic music. That's a very superhero-ey thing to like, I suppose, isn't it? I like avant-garde music in general. Cage, Stockhausen, Penderecki, Andrew Lang, Pierre Henry. Terry Riley is very good. Oh, and I've heard some interesting new music from Jamaica...a sort of hybrid between electronic music and reggae. It's a fascinating study in the new musical forms generated when a largely pre-technological culture is given access to modern recording techniques wihtout the technological preconceptions that we've allowed to accumulate, limiting our vision. It's called dub music.
Originally from ANABlog, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:11 PM | Comments (0)
Nov 22: Glass Farm Ensemble (NY)
SHADOW COUNTERPOINT
November 22, 2008
Baryshnikov Arts Center, 37 Arts
Here is the linup for the show:
| JOHN MORTON | PARTING for music box |
| NILS VIGELAND | IVES MUSIC 1986 for violin, violoncello and piano |
| HEINZ HOLLIGER b. 1939 |
LIEDER OHNE WORTE (1985-1994) for violin and piano |
| JOHN MORTON | NEGATIVE CAPABILITIES 2008 WORLD PREMIERE for violin, piano and music box |
| CHARLES IVES 1874 - 1954 |
TRIO 1911 for violin, violoncello and piano |
Originally posted by Dave from ear bastard, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:11 PM | Comments (0)
Jazz Listings from the New York Times
- Image via Wikipedia
In the Times:
ROY CAMPBELL’S AKHENATEN ENSEMBLE (Tuesday) Drawing on the expressive and searching music from his most recent album, “Akhenaten Suite” (2008), the trumpeter Roy Campbell leads a group with Billy Bang on violin, Bryan Carrott on vibraphone, William Parker on bass and Zen Matsuura on drums. In a preceding set, at 8 p.m., Mr. Parker plays a mostly improvised solo recital. At 10 p.m., the Stone, Avenue C and Second Street, East Village, thestonenyc.com; cover, $10. (Chinen)
MARK FELDMAN AND SYLVIE COURVOISIER (Sunday) As a pianist and composer, Ms. Courvoisier pursues intricacy and rigor; Mr. Feldman, a violinist, favors plangent power. They have worked well as a duo, notably on “Malphas: Book of Angels Vol. 3” (Tzadik), a volume of John Zorn compositions. At 10 p.m., the Stone, Avenue C and Second Street, East Village, thestonenyc.com; cover, $10. (Chinen)
FIELDWORK (Monday) On its potent new album, “Door” (Pi), this trio throws down a characteristic gantlet of jagged melodies and asymmetrical forms. The heart of the group’s sound is an ever-shifting rapport between the pianist Vijay Iyer, the saxophonist Steve Lehman and the drummer Tyshawn Sorey. At 7:30 p.m. (doors open at 7), Le Poisson Rouge, 158 Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village, (212) 796-0741, lepoissonrouge.com; $15. (Chinen)
ERIK FRIEDLANDER/JOEY BARON (Wednesday) Mr. Friedlander, a cellist, and Mr. Baron, a drummer, have worked together in some irresistible downtown groups, and they share an uncompromising enthusiasm. The first set here, at 8 p.m., features Mr. Friedlander in a solo setting; the second, at 10, presents Mr. Baron the same way. At the Stone, Avenue C and Second Street, East Village, thestonenyc.com; cover, $10. (Chinen)
? ROBIN HOLCOMB (Friday and Saturday) Ms. Holcomb seeks out meditative spaces as a pianist and singer, and softens her avant-garde urges with an enveloping lyricism. On Friday she shares a bill with Flutterbox, an experimental pop duo. On Saturday she revisits “Larks They Crazy,” an off-kilter classic featuring Marty Ehrlich and Doug Wieselman on reeds, Dave Hofstra on bass and Kenny Wollesen on drums (who will all join her). Friday at 7 p.m., Joe’s Pub, at the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street, at Astor Place, East Village, (212) 539-8778, joespub.com; cover, $12, with a two-drink minimum. Saturday at 8 p.m., the Stone, Avenue C and Second Street, East Village, thestonenyc.com; cover, $10. (Chinen)
KNEEBODY WITH THEO BLECKMANN (Sunday) Blending rock, jazz and funk in a convincing amalgam, Kneebody draws on the skills of improvisers like the trumpeter Shane Endsley. Here the group has a special guest in Theo Bleckmann, a provocative and texture-minded vocalist. At 9:30 p.m., Joe’s Pub, at the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street, at Astor Place, East Village, (212) 539-8778, joespub.com; cover, $15, with a two-drink minimum. (Chinen)
DONNY MCCASLIN AND BEN MONDER (Sunday) Weighing Latin American rhythms against a rock-inspired forward thrust, the fearless tenor saxophonist Donny McCaslin and the ruminative guitarist Ben Monder team up with a strong bassist (Boris Kozlov) and a serious-minded drummer (Adam Cruz). At 10 p.m., 55 Bar, 55 Christopher Street, West Village, (212) 929-9883, 55bar.com; cover, $8. (Chinen)
? PAUL MOTIAN TRIO 2000 + 2 (Tuesday through Thursday) The masterly drummer Paul Motian introduces a new lineup for this ensemble: Masabumi Kikuchi on piano, Chris Cheek on tenor saxophone, Loren Stillman on alto saxophone and Thomas Morgan on bass. Expect a weightless and luminous sort of music, with an equal commitment to mystery and melody. (Through Nov. 30.) At 9 and 11 p.m., Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Avenue South, at 11th Street, West Village, (212) 255-4037, villagevanguard.com; cover, $20, with a $10 minimum. (Chinen)
MATTHEW SHIPP (Monday) Mr. Shipp’s pianism can be prickly but it’s rarely off-putting, because his even his free improvisations tend to follow a faintly linear path. He performs solo here, as on a thoughtful recent album called “One” (Thirsty Ear). At 8 and 10:30 p.m., Blue Note, 131 West Third Street, West Village, (212) 475-8592, bluenote.net; cover, $15 at tables, $10 at the bar, with a $5 minimum. (Chinen)
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Originally posted by Mike from Avant Music News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:10 PM | Comments (0)
'Norma' in Baltimore
Ruth Ann Swenson (Adalgisa) and Hasmik Papian (Norma) in Norma (photo courtesy of Baltimore Opera)Add to the list of opportunities to hear bel canto opera this month the fine production of Bellini's Norma at Baltimore Opera. Wednesday evening's performance confirmed what seemed evident just from looking at the cast list: the company outdid itself by assembling a fine group of singers, especiallyOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 08:10 PM | Comments (0)
Classical Month in Washington (January)
Last month | Next month Classical Month in Washington is a monthly feature. If there are concerts you would like to see included on our schedule, send your suggestions by e-mail (ionarts at gmail dot com). Happy listening! January 3, 2009 (Sat) 8 pm Salute to Vienna: New Year's Concert Kennedy Center Concert Hall January 4, 2009 (Sun) 6:30 pm National Gallery of Art String Quartet [FREE] WithOriginally from Ionarts, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 05:10 PM | Comments (0)
Hause music at Liverpool's Cornerstone Festival - Liverpool Echo
Hause music at Liverpool's Cornerstone Festival Liverpool Echo, UK - The Radio 3 discussion went some way to untangling and dismissing the widely held conception of Stockhausen’s music as electronic gimmickry. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 02:11 PM | Comments (0)
Hause music - Liverpool Echo
Hause music Liverpool Echo, UK - The Radio 3 discussion went some way to untangling and dismissing the widely held conception of Stockhausen’s music as electronic gimmickry. ... |
Originally from lutoslawski OR xenakis OR boulez OR Dutilleux OR ligeti OR "elliott carter" OR stockhausen OR "steve reich" AND music - Google News, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Nov 21, 2008 at 01:27 PM | Comments (0)
Barenboim in NY, preparing for Met debut - Gramophone
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