I wrote this for the “What is Happening…”  zine, which was released in September to accompany the first Big Whup Industries Compilation. American Gil & the Major Dudes’ song “Lunchtime Riverside (Tucson Version, with John Thill and Golden Boots)” is featured on that CD.

For more about the band, see their myspace.

—–

American Gil and the Major Dudes just announced their breakup, a development that has made writing this much harder than I originally anticipated. It’s one thing to write a nice article on one of the best bands in town. It’s quite another thing, however, to write that band’s obituary. And it’s awfully sad. Amongst my friends, the reaction to the news has been universal dismay. People really care about American Gil and the Major Dudes.

When I watched American Gil and the Major Dudes for the first time, I saw people that I already loved and respected doing impressive things that I hadn’t seen them do before. Lou – who masters poise and melancholy in his main act Voice on Tape – was a punk monster on bass! Sam, who I’d previously only known as a keyboardist, likewise floored me: “this guy can play guitar, too? And he’s that good?” I didn’t know the other two guys in the band very well back then, but I was similarly impressed with their skills: Sean can make his drums roll like the ocean, and Brizzah’s keyboard pop counterpoints in songs like “Lunchtime Riverside (Riverside Version)” sparkle and leap out of the song in such a crisp and compelling manner. These are genuinely talented musicians.

Oh man and they rock so hard! Because everyone is so good, they can be afford to be trashy and dissonant and nasty. They can do all that and stay palatable, which is difficult. Whenever I’ve seen them, it’s just seemed like so much fun. It would be so rad to be a part of this band!

And I haven’t even begun to talk about American Gil. He’s this big dude (and I think that with his name he kind of has to be) who barks and yelps and hollers in this voice that reminds me of… maybe Bikini Kill-era Kathleen Hanna, but less young and more of a dude? It’s hard to say. It’s pretty hard to describe his saxophone playing, too –it’s not like Clarence Clemons. Maybe Clarence Clemons in a meat grinder? Or Arnold Schoenberg conducting a heard of elephants? I’ll just say it’s avant-garde. Avant-garde and totally wicked!

The whole sonic world they’ve come up with together is so cool.  The sound quality makes me think it came out of a studio, but in my head I picture the recording session for the  “Tucson Version” of “Lunchtime Riverside” happening right underneath a giant saguaro cactus in the middle of the afternoon. It just sounds like that. Another song, “the High Seas Rhythm Poem,” takes me to a completely different landscape – although it’s far more otherworldly than the ocean suggested by the title. Over a relentless mechanical beat, Gil mumbles about being sick, sniffles, and wheezes in a way that sounds like it came right out of Snoop Dogg and Pharrell’s “Drop it Like it’s Hot” (the mouth-pops and finger snaps that come in later in the song make me think that was intentional, but I could be over-analyzing). Later he tells us, in his best drunken southerner voice, that he’s “Captain of the ship… plotting a course, plotting a course.”  Honestly, it’s disturbing – yet somehow actually groovy. It’s ultimately very entertaining.

American Gil and the Major Dudes is certainly a product of its surroundings. Each of the group members hails from the Inland Empire, and that has marked their music. The lyrical substance of “Lunchtime Riverside,” for example, is precisely what one would imagine it to be – options for lunch in a pretty uninspiring desert suburb: Taco Bell and Farmer Boys. The Inland Empire is present in their sound, too. They remind me, a bit, of the two musicians who originally put Rancho Cucamonga on the map: Frank Zappa and Captain Beefheart. And there are analogues, too, between the band’s sound and what’s going on with their contemporaries in the region: Sam’s guitar line in “Quadro Booty,” for example, would go great in a song by Upland heartthrobs Abe Vigoda.

But that’s not to say that they sound like anyone else. They don’t. That’s why it’s such a drag that they’re leaving us.

Normally obituaries tell the “cause of death,” but I’m not close enough to the situation to know anything about that. I am glad to report, however, that there is surviving kin. Every one of these major dudes is part of at least one other musical project, and each of them is worth investigating.

Above photo from Gil’s Myspace, taken by Wild Don Lewis.

This week I look back at my favourite classical music recordings issued between 2000-2009.   Though I have listened to hundreds of recordings, it goes without saying that there is a lot of music, much of it no doubt excellent, that I have not heard.

I have decided to structure this post according to genre.  For each genre I have selected two outstanding recordings, with a third “runner-up” sometimes slipped in.  The exception to this rule is the choral music category; my initial short list had about twenty-five recordings on it, and it was too cruel to cut that down to just two, or even three.  I compensate for this surplus by omitting an opera category altogether.

I have also included links to more thorough reviews and to streaming samples of the music when it was possible to do so.

Without further ado:

Choral

I have chosen six discs of choral music, plus a few runners-up.   They are arranged in rough chronological order.

Paolo da Firenze: Narcisso Speculando (Mala Punica, Pedro Memelsdorff) [2002; Harmonia Mundi]: This is music of the medieval avant-garde. Paolo da Firenze, who died in 1425, belonged to the ars subtilior school of late medieval composition.  The music is incredibly intricate, and must be exceptionally difficult to sing, but it is also marvelous to hear — in that respect, the medieval avant-garde consistently bested the modern.  The ensemble Mala Punica specializes in this music, and their awe-inspiring performances must be heard to be believed.  This is one of the most ear-opening recordings I’ve ever heard.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

I don’t know why this video is nine minutes long; the piece ends at 3:43.

Richafort: Requiem (Huelgas Ensemble, Paul van Nevel) [2000; Harmonia Mundi]: For sheer ravishing beauty, this is my choral music pick of the decade.  Richafort (c.1480-c.1550) is a mostly forgotten composer, but on the evidence here that forgetfulness is unjust.  His Requiem, which may have been written to commemorate the death of Josquin Desprez, is a thing of glories, with wave after wave of beautiful music spilling over the listener.  Just when you think it can’t possibly get any lovelier, it does.  The disc is filled out by a selection of motets, including a gorgeous Salve regina for five voices, and even a drinking song (rendered, it must be said, a little stiffly).  The singing of the Huelgas Ensemble, which is always excellent, is here focused and luminous to an uncommon degree.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

Here is the Introit of the Requiem:

In Paradisum (Hilliard Ensemble) [2000; ECM New Series]: The Hilliard Ensemble sing the Gregorian setting of the Requiem Mass and interpose motets by two of the grand masters of Renaissance polyphony: Victoria and Palestrina.  As is fitting, the music is dark-toned and somber.  The singing is as good as singing gets in this vale of tears: concentrated, responsive, inward-looking, and incredibly beautiful.  The richness of the sound is astonishing.  Part of the credit obviously goes to the four voices of the Hilliard Ensemble, and part to ECM’s superb engineers, but thanks must also be rendered to the walls and vaults of St. Gerold monastery in Austria, where the recording was made. (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

Bach: Missae Breves (Pygmalion) [2008; Alpha]: Before hearing this recording I had not known of the group Pygmalion, and I expect they are new to most listeners too.  I still don’t know anything about them — except that they sing Bach to perfection.  This disc includes two of Bach’s short Masses, BWV 234 and 235.  (A Missa Brevis includes only the Kyrie and Gloria.) This music has never sounded better.  The voices are confident, clear, and precise, with none of the raggedness or wooliness that sometimes plagues choirs who try to sing Bach.  The instrumental accompaniment is lively and vivid.  This is simply terrific music-making. (Reviews: AllMusic) (Listen to samples)

Bach: St. John Passion (Philippe Herreweghe, Collegium Vocale Gent, soloists) [2001; Harmonia Mundi]: Bach’s St. John Passion is not as well-known as his St. Matthew Passion, and with some justification, for it is not as ambitious as its more famous companion.  Its comparative modesty in scale makes it a tighter and more dramatic account of the Passion story, and I find that attractive.  This performance from Bach-specialist Herreweghe, with a starry cast of soloists and his usual crack choir Collegium Vocale Gent, is uniformly excellent.  This music was a great discovery for me this decade.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday) (Listen to samples)

Here is the final section of the work, Christe, du Lamm Gottes (an adaptation of the Agnus Dei):

Grechaninov: Passion Week (Charles Bruffy, Phoenix Bach Choir, Kansas City Chorale) [2007; Chandos]: The prospect of hearing Russian sacred music sung by a choir from the American Midwest does not immediately inspire confidence, but this disc upset my expectations.  The music, written in 1911, is inspired by the Holy Week services of the Orthodox Church.  The texts are in Old Slavonic, and the music communes with the long history of Russian Orthodox music.  It bears an obvious similarity to Rachmaninov’s Vespers, and, to my surprise, it does not suffer greatly in the comparison.  It is extremely well sung — all praise to the basses! — and the recording, though perhaps a bit boxy, still allows us to hear the music clearly.  I was very pleasantly surprised by this recording. (Reviews: AllMusic) (Listen to samples)

Here is the section of the work titled “The Wise Thief”.  (Sorry about the flowers.)

Runners-up:

• La Bele Marie (Anonymous 4) [2002; Harmonia Mundi]: This is a collection of Marian songs from thirteenth-century France.  Some are in Latin, some in French.  As befits their subject, they are bright, lovely, and mostly joyful.  The four women of Anonymous 4 sing with their customary blend and luminosity.  A very heart-warming record.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday ) (Listen to samples)
• A Scottish Lady Mass (Red Byrd) [2005; Hyperion]: This disc contains thirteenth-century music from St. Andrews, Scotland.  It includes polyphonic music (for two parts) that is not known elsewhere, and there are some real curiosities, including troped versions of the Kyrie and Gloria, as well as some unique sequences.  The record’s cover, which shows an old church at night across a foggy moor, perfectly captures the feel of this music.  The voices of Red Byrd are manly and resonant, creating a warm sonic blanket to wrap oneself in. This is my kind of singing. (Reviews: ClassicsToday) (Listen to samples) (Listen to a troped Kyrie: Rex, virginum amator)
• Dufay: Quadrivium (Cantica Symphonia) [2005; Glossa]: Guillaume Dufay is my favourite medieval composer, and this collection of sacred motets serves his music very well.  Cantica Symphonia make the interesting decision to bring instruments, as well as voices, into the music, and although this necessarily involves some improvisation and guess-work, it sounds great.  The singing — just one voice to a part — is confident and idiomatic, and the music is dazzling.  (Reviews: AllMusic) (Listen to samples) (Listen to Anima mea liquefacta est)
• Heavenly Harmonies (Stile Antico) [2008; Harmonia Mundi]: This disc is a superb collection of Elizabethan sacred music by William Byrd and Thomas Tallis, illustrating the parting of the ways between Catholic music (intricate polyphony, in Latin) and Protestant music (simple and strophic, in English).  As I have said before, the singing of Stile Antico is amazingly good.  (my Music Note) (Reviews: ClassicsToday, AllMusic) (Listen to samples)
• Elgar: The Dream of Gerontius (Sir Mark Elder, Hallé Orchestra and Chorus, soloists) [2008; Hallé]: Elgar’s setting of John Henry Cardinal Newman’s poem about death and the afterlife has not really attracted me in the past.  I had heard a few recordings, but I found them stodgy and sluggish.  When this disc from the Hallé Orchestra began earning accolades in the British press, I thought it might be another case of patriotic fervour overwhelming sound judgment, but I decided to give it a try anyway.  I am glad that I did.  The sound is much clearer, with far better articulation from the choir than on previous recordings, and the soloists are tremendous.  There’s a real sense of occasion too.  (Reviews: AllMusic)   Here is the section “Praise to the Holiest”:

Solo Voice

Victoria: Et Iesum (Carlos Mena, Juan Carlos Rivera) [2004; Harmonia Mundi]: We naturally associate Victoria with the high Renaissance style of polyphony, of which he was a master.  Himself a priest, his music was intended to serve the sacred liturgy.  Yet, as this intriguing recording informs us, some of his music was adapted for performance on a more modest and intimate scale.  In such cases, one of the polyphonic vocal lines was given to a solo voice, and the other musical lines were put into the instrumental accompaniment.  The result is something like a madrigal or song, but with a sacred text.  The comparative simplicity of the music allows us to relish the beauty of the exposed vocal melody without interference.  Carlos Mena, my favourite counter-tenor (and yours?), has marvelous breath-control in the sometimes very long vocal lines, and his voice has a creamy richness that is very satisfying.  Counter-tenor singing has come a long way in the last few generations of singers, and Mena has it all.  He is tastefully accompanied by Juan Carlos Rivera on the lute and vihuela.  This is a very special recording. (Reviews: ClassicsToday, AllMusic)

Here is Carlos Mena singing Victoria’s adaptation of Salve regina.  If you enjoy this, consider clicking through to YouTube; the same person who posted this song has also posted several other tracks from this disc.

Strauss: Lieder (Soile Isokoski, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Marek Janowski) [2002; Ondine]: Finnish soprano Soile Isokoski turns in an unforgettable performance of Strauss’ great Vier Letzte Lieder (Four Last Songs).  She has a full-bodied, very expressive voice, and it suits these opulent late flowerings of Strauss’ muse perfectly.  Competition in this repertoire is stiff, but Isokoski has displaced Elisabeth Schwarzkopf as my favourite.  The disc is filled out by a selection of Strauss’ other songs.  They are not among Strauss’ greatest inspirations, but they are still beautifully sung. (Reviews: ClassicsToday) (Listen to samples)

In this live performance (not taken from the recording), Isokoski sings “Fruhling”, the first of the Four Last Songs:

Solo Instrument

Messiaen: Complete Organ Works (Olivier Latry) [2002; DG]: As I think I have said before, to a first approximation there has been only one composer for the organ, and that was J.S. Bach.  But if we broaden our vision just a little, Olivier Messiaen comes into view.  His music is nothing like Bach’s, of course, but in its own way it is perfect music for the instrument: immense, deep, ecstatic, glorious, and overwhelming.  It is a major body of work.  Olivier Latry plays the mighty organ of Notre Dame de Paris, where he is house organist, and the DG engineers have caught the sonics in spectacular fashion.  This set is a cornerstone for my collection of twentieth-century music. (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

Bach: Goldberg Variations (Murray Perahia) [2000; Sony]: Starting in the 1990s Murray Perahia began at last to record the music of Bach.  He started with the English Suites, and has since moved through the keyboard concertos, the Partitas, and, in 2000, he made this excellent recording of the Goldberg Variations.  It is a superb, finely calibrated performance that positively dances, and it has become my favourite recording of this inexhaustible music.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

Here is Perahia playing the opening Aria and the first three variations:

Chamber

Shostakovich: Complete String Quartets (Emerson String Quartet) [2000; DG]: One of the two or three greatest concert-going experiences of my life was hearing the Emerson String Quartet play Shostakovich’s devastating final quartet, No.15.  It left me reeling and exhausted, but deeply grateful.  Afterward I bought this complete cycle of Shostakovich’s quartets, on five well-filled CDs.  It is an incredibly rich collection.  Some consider his string quartets to be his greatest music, and I am among them.  I have since heard a few other cycles of these quartets, including the famous recordings by the Borodin Quartet.  I love them too, but they do not include the last two quartets, and the Emersons have the edge on precision and sound quality.  This is another cornerstone of my music collection. (Reviews: AllMusic)

Here is a short video I have posted before of the Emersons playing the third movement of String Quartet No.3.  Not one of my very favourite movements, but the only one I can find on YouTube:

Weinberg: Cello Sonatas (Alexander Chaushian, Yevgeny Sudbin) [2007; BIS]: Mieczysław Weinberg is not a well-known composer.  I had never heard of him until I heard this recording, and, now that I have heard this recording, I cannot understand why he is unknown.  His music is fantastic.  Weinberg (also sometimes called Vainberg, or Vaynberg) was born in Poland in 1919 and lived most of his life under the Soviets.  He was a close friend of Shostakovich — the two would play their new compositions to one another.  His music is in many ways quite similar to Shostakovich’s, and that is a very, very good thing!  It is tough and lyrical, full of interesting ideas and genuine feeling, and it sounds urgent and important.  These cello sonatas — two for cello and piano and one for solo cello — are almost unbelievably beautiful.  When I first heard this record I was struck speechless by it, and I hung on every note until it was over.  I have since heard several other recordings of Weinberg’s music, and I have not been disappointed.  He is a major discovery for me. (Reviews: AllMusic)  (Listen to samples)

Here is the first movement of his Cello Sonata No.2, Op.63.  I hope somebody likes this as much as I do.

Runner-up: Pärt: Alina [2000; ECM New Series]: ECM Records are known for their innovative and unusual programming, but, even so, it took a certain audacity to put this disc out.  It includes just two compositions: Für Alina for piano and Spiegel im Spiegel for piano and violin (or cello), together amounting to about 20 minutes of music.  Both pieces are devotedly minimalist, with very sparsely notated scores and absence of dramatic effects.  An uncharitable listener might say that “nothing happens” in either of them.  ECM, in their wisdom, interleaved on the disc two versions of the first piece with three versions of the second!  And, strangely enough, it works.  The record, by the very simplicity of the music, asks the listener to really pay attention to each note.  Close listening becomes a kind of meditative experience.  It’s a rather special disc. (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

Gus van Sant’s 2002 film Gerry used Speigel im Spiegel during the opening scene.  This five-minute clip includes roughly half of the piece.  The visual is perfect for this music.  (Incidentally, in the early days of our courtship I took my wife to see Gerry.  I am lucky that she was willing to see me again.)

Concerto and Orchestral

Schoenberg & Sibelius: Violin Concertos (Hilary Hahn, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Esa-Pekka Salonen)  [2008; DG]: I confess with some shame that I had ignored Hilary Hahn’s recordings in the past.  I assumed that her success had more to do with her youthful attractiveness than the quality of her playing.  (Yes, sex sells even in the beleaguered marketing departments of classical music labels.)  After hearing this recording I am happy to say that this assumption was totally false: her playing stands firmly on its own merits.  She has chosen to couple the violin concerti of Sibelius and Schoenberg, which is a bit like having a meal of truffles and tacks.  To her great credit, she actually manages to find music in Schoenberg’s concerto.  She gives shape to the almost unremittingly angular musical line, and her tone is steely and firm, as though she’s taken this anarchic music in hand and shown it who is master. She makes as good a case for it as is likely to be made.  But it is in the Sibelius concerto that she really shines.  I’ve heard three or four other recordings of this wonderful concerto, but none has gripped me as hers has.  Her playing is precise, with no wavering or wooliness in her violin’s tone, and she really gets inside the music, allowing it to speak for itself.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday, AllMusic)

Here she is playing the final movement of the Sibelius concerto:

Messiaen: Des Canyons aux Étoiles… (Myung-Whun Chung, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio-France, soloists) [2003; DG]: This massive orchestral composition was written to celebrate the bicentenary of the United States, and it was inspired by Messiaen’s visit to Utah’s Bryce Canyon.  It celebrates in sound the canyon’s rocks, cliffs, and — of course, since this is Messiaen — its birds.   Scored for a large orchestra with piano, horn, xylorimba, and glockenspiel soloists, it is a colourful and essentially joyful composition, both weird and wonderful, and animated by Messiaen’s Catholic nature-mysticism.  The recording is sonically spectacular.  (Reviews: ClassicsToday)

Symphonic

The length of these symphonies prevents my linking to whole movements.  I hope the samples will give some idea of what is in store.

Bruckner: Symphony No.9 (Günter Wand, Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SWR) [2006; Profil]: This is a live recording made in 1979, but this 2006 disc was (I believe) its first commercial appearance, so it qualifies for inclusion on this list.  Günter Wand apparently said of this performance that it was “one of the most memorable of [his] life”, and I believe it.  It is tremendously beautiful music that seeks, as Bruckner said, to make the transcendent perceptible, and Wand leads his orchestra about as far in that direction as it is possible to go.  When called for, they play with thunderous power, and at other times with the most delicate sensitivity.  The sound is excellent.  (Reviews:  AllMusic) (Listen to samples)

Vaughan Williams: Symphony No.2 “London” (Richard Hickox, London Symphony Orchestra) [2001; Chandos]: This splendid recording of the “London” symphony was named Record of the Year by Gramophone Magazine in 2001, and it was a richly deserved accolade.  It is a wonderful symphony, and it has never sounded better.  The music glows on this recording.  It is a great interpretation too, with drama and presence.  (Listen to samples)

***

I have not seen any “Best of Decade” lists from major critics, but a number of “Best of 2009″ lists have appeared:

• Alex Ross at The New Yorker
• ClassicsToday critics’ picks
• MusicWeb International critics’ picks
• Amazon critics’ picks

11/28/09 - at the Guggenheim, NY City

In one of many letters shared between himself and painter Vasily Kandinsky, modernist composer Arnold Schoenberg summarized their mutual artistic pursuit: ”in what you call the ‘unlogical’ and I call the ‘elimination of the conscious will in art.’ ”

The conviction that drove Schoenberg was also described as dissonance, or, in Kandinsky’s case – “absolute” pictures, which actively made no discernible relation to the visible world.

Whatever the word choice, there can be no doubt that the source of their inspiration was nonetheless the same bottomless wellspring.

Arnold Schoenberg was a musician who painted. Vasily Kandinsky was a painter who occasionally composed. They admired each other’s art. And both men wrote treatises in their respective disciplines that inextricably locked their steps to propel them forward in defining art and artistic theory in the modern era.

These are artists whose sonic and visual worlds were realized through the dissolution and recreation of established convention and form. It’s music, but Schoenberg’s vision assures it’s not harmonically or logically progressive in any traditionally formal manner. Similarly, in Kandinsky’s paintings, the subject matter and object relationships aren’t congruent with reality (or each other), and his progressively hyper-saturated palette defies any natural reference points.

This not to say the resulting works aren’t orderly – quite the opposite, in fact, I actually find sometimes the beauty of their expression lies in their structure. Like the architecture of a bridge or the external stone buttresses of a Gothic church, the construct of function becomes an inseparable aspect of the overall aesthetic.

This isn’t the breakdown of order; it’s the creation of a new one.

Here’s what I’m talking about: listen to Schoenberg’s iconic Pierrot Lunaire (1912):

- and, from the same year, look at Kandinsky’s The Garden of Love (Improvisation Number 27) :

The Garden of Love (Improvisation #27), 1912

(This is powerful stuff. And, a century later, the debate continues…check out the running conversation of comments beneath the YouTube video!)

The Guggenheim Museum in New York City is currently hosting an unfathomably comprehensive collection of Kandinsky’s paintings. It opened on September 18th. After two months of antsy anticipation I made the visit this past weekend. — YOW!

Frank Lloyd Wright's stunning atrium at the Guggenheim

I can’t think of a better way for the Museum to celebrate its 50th anniversary. This exhibit gets the very core of the Museum’s original founding mission and focus: starting in the 1920s, on the recommendation of painter (and future Museum Director) Hilla Rebay, Solomon Guggenheim began collecting the paintings of Kandinsky and other abstract artists. By the late ’30s Guggenheim was regularly entertaining showings at his apartment, and over the next two decades the Guggenheim Foundation took shape. The Museum opened in October of 1959.

Many of the works in the current show belong to the Museum’s permanent collection, they’re a conglomoration of the works originally collected by Guggenheim himself and those given to the institution by Hilla Rebay’s estate after she passed away in 1967. Rebay’s contributions are considerable, in fact they comprise the majority of the watercolor, acrylic and gouache works in the separate “Kandinsky on Paper” room. These were among my favorite works.

The things I liked about this exhibit are numerous. The complementary (with the admission price) audio tour was rich, fascinating, and clearly a work of great labor, and deep personal interest and investment. The contextual dimension it added to the visual experience was invaluable. When Kandinsky’s interaction with Schoenberg is explored, for example, the audio tour offered insightful commentary and carefully curated music examples to underscore the significance of this relationship and make it real for the listener.

I also loved the intuitive utilization of the building’s interior spiral ramp, to offer a chronological pathway along which Kandinsky’s life unfolds in art and mini-timelines. By the time I reached the top I had spent over two hours making my way there, and Kandinsky’s final (Parisian) works were a stark, sweet reward for the journey.

The Guggenheim’s Kandinsky retrospective is simply a knockout achievement. It will be there through January 13th, 2010. Get there if you possibly can – spend the day, take the audio tour, and at the end you will know you’ve been somewhere much bigger and more meaningful than a mere Museum. This exhibit will transport you.

Tip: if you go, print up this coupon and bring it with you for $2 off  each admission, good for up to 6 adults. And don’t turn down that free audio tour!

By David Amos

SAN DIEGO—One of the big challenges in the artistic administration of an orchestra, opera company, or chamber music series is making the right choices of what music to present. Many factors come into play. With less classical music education in our schools and less exposure at home, we have the obvious recipe of shrinking and graying audiences for the present and future. Just look around you!

The paying public will attend concerts for two basic reasons: If it likes the music being played, or if there is a superstar performer in the roster. The great, legendary impresario Sol Hurok used to say, “If the people do not want to go to a concert, there is nothing that you can do to stop them!”

So, how do you reach a sensible balance between creating new audiences, keeping the serious listeners you already have, and at the same time not compromise tradition, artistic values, beauty, and the commitment to the continuation of the art form? Not an easy task, but there are some points to keep in mind.

Do you stubbornly program traditional music only, present it the old fashioned way, and expect to keep the orchestral concert and chamber recital alive? Or, do you cater totally to the popular tastes to attract the marginal concertgoer by scheduling a heavy dose of the 1912 Overture, Bolero, and other easy to hear, but overdone classics? The less playful is our choice of music, the more it is labeled heavy or dull; adventurous programming runs the danger of being called superficial, esoteric, and even silly.

Where is the balance?

Most young people are well informed of pop music and culture, but have never been exposed (let’s say “correctly exposed”) to our beloved classical music. Many have never been to a concert, and are uncomfortable with the traditional attire and concert etiquette. This, sadly, also applies to most of the adult population, more and more every year.

My wife and I are trying to do our part, and I humbly invite you to do something similar: In 2008, we took our seven year old grandson to a concert of the Seattle Symphony, at Benaroya Hall, conducted by Gerard Schwarz. The music way by no means lightweight: Mahler’s Symphony No. 8, “Symphony of A Thousand”. His first live orchestral experience was a symphony orchestra, chorus, children’s chorus, expanded brass section, and soloists, all in a package of 80 uninterrupted minutes, together with 2400 other adults. He survived it just fine, enjoyed the concert, and a year and a half later, we fondly still talk about it with him. We have subsequently taken him to other similar concerts.

This may be an exception, but how can we provide the younger generations a favorable introduction and exposure, and not scare them away with what they would, not surprisingly, regard as a stiff, dull, somber, and expensive exercise? The music itself is not attraction enough when so many other elements of the traditional concert experience are so foreign. We also have to cope with the vast competition from other forms of entertainment, sports, active and passive, the wonderful outdoors, and other activities.

To my opinion, we have to make the concert experience more accessible and attractive, not by pandering to popularity and selling out what in snooty circles is called “bad taste”, but by being more flexible and pliant in the concert procedure and choice of music. Keep in mind that our society rewards and even demands mediocrity. Serious art simply does not sell well, and we have to solve our puzzle within these limitations.

At the same time, we can not ignore that musical organizations have a budget, heavy expenses, and to survive, can not consistently lose money. No rational manager or board would allow the financial demise of its organization, considering all the options available. Add to this the world’s present financial crunch, where all arts organizations have been severely affected.

What to do?

Mix it up. Program serious music in the same evening with tasteful, but lighter fare. Look at the old programs from the beginning of the Twentieth Century when there was a nice blend of tradition, beauty, fun, newness, and excitement. (It is not good programming to have two Bruckner symphonies in the same evening!).

Promote the organization in non-traditional venues. If you wish to attract new subscribers, do not preach to the choir, look outside the usual forms of publicity. Others are doing it, and succeeding in reaching a wider audience of potential concertgoers. Creative thinking is not forbidden.

Relax the traditional concert attire requirements. It is already happening. Also, musicians on stage do not have to be in tails and long gowns all the time, looking like something out of a museum. Brahms sounds just as well if played in blue jeans, although I am not exactly suggesting this. People in the audience can dress tastefully, but not ostentatiously. Avoid the unnecessary fashion show to impress others. What matters in the music, the experience of the moment. Do you wear a coat and tie to listen to a piano concerto in your stereo at home? I don’t think so.

Verbal explanations from the stage before the music is played, either by the conductor or a more eloquent someone else, is not insulting anyone’s intelligence. It is not hokey and improper. We, the more enlightened ones have to be more flexible and understanding if the art form is to be rescued. Besides, you will never know when you learn something new. In general, it helps many people appreciate and enjoy the music, and encourages them to come back. It also relaxes the stuffiness of the air, which many of us don’t even notice. Regular concertgoers are so used to the ritual, that they are not aware how intimidating all of this can be to the uninitiated.

Choose exciting, vibrant music. Bring it to life through well prepared performances. Avoid the stale, academic detached presentations that do nothing to promote our cause.  The conductor and musicians have to be aware more than ever that they are communicating something special to the audience in the hall. When energy flows both ways, (and this happens some of the time), it is a wonderful memory for everyone involved.

Arnold Schoenberg said, “Play the classics as if they are new music, and play new music as if they are already classics”.

Pablo Casals said that we, the musicians have to “make divine things human, and human things divine”.

If more of these ideas are practiced, the word will get around.

*
Amos is the conductor of the Tifereth Israel Community Orchestra and has been a guest conductor with orchestras around the world.

My review of last month’s Radius concert at the Purcell Room has just been accepted for publication in Musical Opinion. It won’t be out until the January issue,  but I wanted to pick up some overspill here.

Firstly, John Reid’s playing of Berg’s opus 1 Piano Sonata was stunning. I ran out of space in my short review to really expand on why I thought it was so good, but the main thing I got was a sense of Berg’s full spectrum tonal palette, and his skill in slipping from one of its regions to another. Reid gave the music quite a lot of space, so it was possible to follow the intricate voice-leading and thus follow the logic of Berg’s tonal-atonal transitions. The final pages were breathtaking.

More generally, I thought this was the best-programmed Radius gig I’ve seen. I love the Boulez, Cage, Vivier and Xenakis rarities that have been a feature of their Wigmore Hall concerts, but I’m always a little anxious that the concert doesn’t always hang together as a whole. In this instance, however, Tim Benjamin’s Mrs Lazarus was well complemented by the Berg and Schoenberg’s First Chamber Symphony.

Should programming matter that much? I’m beginning to notice it when it does. Or perhaps it’s not programming so much as setting. What does bother me is when the memory of one work, still being processed and pieced together, is wiped over by beginning of the next piece. When the second piece perfectly complements the first, this is less of a problem, but that’s a difficult match to pull off. Better, perhaps, is to set each piece in enough space so that those memories can be processed before one’s attention is back in demand. It’s not just a question of silence either side of a piece, although that helps a lot. It’s also something to do with the environment in which the music is being heard, the priorities of the audience (listening to, or being seen), the building, and so on. The Wigmore Hall, more than some venues, conditions a certain kind of listening: the seats are quite low in relation to the stage, and aren’t raked,; the acoustic is sound-studio flawless; the architecture and decor all point towards a certain style, set of values and historical moment. It’s a bit like being inside a Muse’s womb: there’s no real life in there, and what is in there has been genetically pre-programmed.

On the other hand, I invariably enjoy concerts in churches more. They’re cold, the seats are hard and creaky, you can hear the street outside and the lighting is uneven. Not womb-like, they’re more like a translucent box in which art and real life (two sides of the same coin after all) can interpenetrate. And church architecture – particularly of the Hawksmoor/neo-classical variety that you get all over central London – is more of a blank slate. Yes, it expresses a number of things like power, majesty, and a certain moral code. But those things are generalised enough to applicable in new historical contexts. The architecture of the Wigmore (and I’m sorry for picking on it like this) speaks more specifically and is more historically reified.

Funny, hip advocates for classical music complain that concert halls are too much like churches, and here I am saying that they don’t go far enough.

The four-hand piano reduction of part of the first of the Five Pieces for Orchestra, by Arnold Schoenberg.

This year marks another centenary besides that of Vagn Holmboe: the writing of the Five Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 16, of Arnold Schoenberg.

Saturday night I went to a concert by the local Lynn Philharmonia, the music conservatory orchestra at Lynn University, and did a review for ArtsPaper. The group opened its season with the Schoenberg in the 1949 reduction, but it still made a strong impact – particularly on the audience.

It’s been a long time since I’ve heard so much grousing in the lobby and the seats around me; perhaps that’s to be expected, but it bears noting that this music was written in 1909 and has been regularly available in recordings and performances for decades. But the average concertgoer can’t stand it, apparently, and this brings back the old argument of whether atonality ever will be accepted as a listening experience — with the important exception of as background music for movies and television, usually of the thriller variety.

The Five Pieces lasts about 15 minutes, or thereabouts, and I’ve spent the last couple days looking at the score, admiring its craftsmanship and subtlety. It must have taken enormous courage to write music like this in 1909. Only Charles Ives was doing the same sort of thing, and his music is less abstract; almost everything the American composer wrote has a program. There were other experimenters out there: 1909 was the year Strauss’ Elektra premiered, Stravinsky’s Firebird took shape, and Scriabin finished Poem of Fire (Fifth Symphony).

But those, too, are either theater or programmatic pieces, and while Schoenberg appended titles to each of the Five Pieces, this music is more about musical experimentation than it is evoking any particular mood or event. The third piece is about changing instrumentation to make an essentially static music move, and the other movements have themes that are taken through their paces, albeit in a very compressed, not particularly linear way.( I’m not trying to do hardcore analysis here, just noting some obvious things about the music.)

For the listener, it’s hard to hear these transformations, and the music can sound undifferentiated and formless. And while chords like those are perfectly acceptable, indeed expected, as the serial killer lifts his knife above his head while his victim screams in terror, concertgoers don’t want to hear them as pure music. I’m not saying anything here that hasn’t been said in one way or another for many years, but what struck me about the Schoenberg was that it’s 100 years old and the verdict is still: No, thanks.

Der Meister at work.

I think it’s likely that atonal music only will ever be accepted by a mass audience as background music, and that so much of it is so indistinguishable from other pieces of its ilk that most of it is dead as soon as it’s written, at least in a sense accepted by audiences at large. Schoenberg himself went in a slightly  more conservative direction himself after this, if not to tonality; his Violin Concerto, which  I wrote about earlier, is a great piece whose difficult tonal language is ameliorated by its clear narrative structure: this is a piece that is going somewhere, and it’s exciting to follow it.

The music that manages to stand the test of time has a clear personality, whether attractive or not. You can hear someone trying to say something , and you want to stick around for the conversation. It may be that the very nature of atonal music makes it too difficult to let a personality come through, even in the case of someone like Schoenberg.

I don’t really know. All  I can say is that I was struck at how visceral the reaction was to this piece Saturday night, a piece that predates the major wars of the 20^th century, and which has long been established as a major canonical work.  True, South Florida audiences tend to be conservative, but  they also tend to be well-educated, so they should have known what was coming. And I think they did, which made their  grumpiness about it even more notable.

I guess Schoenberg still has to win his fight for acceptance, but it seems to me that for the most part, he probably never will.

Verdi, Villa-Lobos e, agora, uma obra de Arnold Schöenberg. É com o drama Erwartung que a Fundação Clóvis Salgado encerra a Temporada de Óperas 2009. A peça será apresentada no Grande Teatro do Palácio das Artes nos dias 18, 20, 22 e 24 de outubro, com a Orquestra Filarmônica de Minas Gerais. No papel central da trama, a diva Eliane Coelho, soprano carioca que vive na Europa.

As récitas serão realizadas às 19h, no domingo (18), e 20h30, terça, quinta e sábado. Os ingressos já estão à venda na bilheteria do teatro a R$50,00, R$40,00 e R$30,00, com meia entrada, conforme a lei.

Além de Gilberto Gavronski, que assina a direção, outros artistas de renome nacional e internacional se reuniram para levar aos palcos mais um grande espetáculo da música erudita: os cenários são da artista plástica Adriana Varejão, imagens do videomaker Éder Santos, poesias de Guilherme Mansur e Ivo Barreto, declamadas por Antônio Grassi, iluminação de Telma Fernandes e figurinos de Ronaldo Fraga. Na direção musical e regência, o maestro Abel Rocha.

Esta é a primeira apresentação de Erwartung em Belo Horizonte e a segunda na América do Sul. Apesar de já montada no exterior, no Brasil a ópera foi encenada somente em 2005, no Rio de Janeiro. Para Abel Rocha, este ineditismo é um grande diferencial das montagens do Palácio das Artes: “Isso é uma coisa muito legal de Belo Horizonte, se propor a desafios”, comenta o maestro, que desde julho está debruçado sobre as partituras do compositor austríaco.

Erwartung

O “monodrama” do vienense Arnold Schönberg é uma obra para soprano e orquestra, com um ato e quatro cenas. A história de sua criação é no mínimo curiosa: em 1909, Schöenberg conheceu Marie Pappenheim, uma estudante de Medicina com aspirações literárias, e a desafiou a escrever um libreto de ópera para ele. Três semanas depois, Marie entregaria a história ao músico. A estreia do espetáculo deu-se em 1924, em Praga.

O enredo descreve o tormento pelo qual passa uma mulher que se vê abandonada pelo amante e, dividida entre a paixão e a raiva, vaga em uma floresta na esperança de encontrar o seu amor. Durante cinqüenta minutos, a confusão entre o real e o imaginário, os medos, as perdas e os temores do ser humano entram em cena.

A música é marcada pelo rigor acadêmico de sua construção e pelos reflexos do Expressionismo, que muito influenciou Schöenberg. Neste campo, assim como nas outras formas de manifestação (pintura, teatro etc), o movimento pregava que a arte deveria ser a expressão de sentimentos e emoções, o que fica evidente em Erwartung.

A criação

Para dar vida ao espetáculo, Gilberto Gavronski optou por trabalhar com artistas contemporâneos, e propôs um desafio de releitura do poema lírico de Pappenheim e da música de Schöenberg a toda a equipe. Para compor esta atmosfera, o cenário, que promete ser uma grande surpresa, as projeções, as poesias e os figurinos desempenham papel fundamental.

Serviço:

Evento: Temporada de Óperas 2009 – Erwartung, de Schöenberg
Data / Horário: 18.10 – 19h / 20, 22 e 24.10 – 20h30
Local: Grande Teatro do Palácio das Artes (avenida Afonso Pena, 1537, Centro)
Valor: Platéia I: R$ 50,00 / Platéia II: RS 40,00 / Platéia Superior: R$ 30,00 – (meia entrada conforme a lei)
Classificação etária: 10 anos
Informações: (31) 3236-7400

Go If

Agon is probably one of the quintessential Balanchine pieces in every balletomane’s punch card. You should go if you love Balanchine, abstract, short and/or neo-classical ballets. Or try it for the landmark score: this is where Stravinsky began exploring his twelve-tone technique (more on this below).

Skip If

You are a strictly 19th century classical ballet fan and all of the above makes you cringe, especially the thought of music without an overall melodic theme (as you often exit the theatre whistling to Swan Lake!).

Dream Cast

NYCB (particularly if Wendy Whelan dances the pas de deux), after all, they are the Balanchine company per excellence.

Background and Structure

Balanchine and Stravinsky. Source: Oberon's Grove. Copyright belongs to its corresponding owners.

Around 1948 Balanchine’s benefactor Lincoln Kirstein had an idea for a ballet which would form a “greek trilogy” together with that choreographer’s earlier collaborations with Stravinsky: Apollo and Orpheus. The concept was discussed at the time but a couple of years would pass before concrete plans were drawn and a structure agreed. Stravinsky started composing for the new ballet in 1953. He came up with the title Agon, the greek word for contest but also a  reference to the various 17th century French court dances he had studied from Lauze’s Apologie de la Danse (1623) and this set the frame for Balanchine’s choreography.

Agon marked the third and last time Stravinsky would specifically compose music for a Balanchine ballet (though the choreographer continued to use other Stravinsky music in  later works). On the other hand it was the first time where Stravinsky applied to his work 12-tone serialism techniques, which he had just started experimenting with.

Stravinsky’s previous compositions had been structured in diatonic scale, in other words, they had been based on major and minor scales (click links for audio examples), which give a strong feeling of a tonal center, the major keys a bright sound and the minor keys a moodier sound. One can build a diatonic scale by playing the white keys on a piano keyboard within an octave, in the sequence -Do-Re-Mi-Fa-Sol-La-Ti-Do – (see figure) 

Octave on a Piano. Image: Guido Tattoni © Source: Smack my pitch up

Between two half steps or semitones (Mi-Fa and Ti-Do – or in the picture Si-Do) there are either two whole steps or tones (Do-Re-Mi) or three whole steps (Fa-Sol-La-Ti), giving the diatonic scale its rich tonality and clear sounds.

There are however, other types of scales. Chromatic scales for instance are sequences of tones (whole steps) preceeded by semitones (half steps). One can build a chromatic scale by playing a sequence of black and white keys in order, without leaving any out. The result is uniform and different to the major scale above where tones and semitones are arranged in a particular way. A chromatic scale has 12 tones (NB: there are 12 tones or notes in an octave. Just count the number of keys in the figure above: Do, Do Sharp, Re, Re Sharp, Mi, Fa, Fa sharp, Sol, Sol sharp, La, La sharp, Ti).

The twelve-tone technique of serialism arranges notes from a chromatic scale so that in an octave none of its 12 notes prevail over another, each note appearing just once before a new series begins. This method was developed by Arnold Schoenberg in the early twenties and later developed by his disciples Alban Berg and Anton von Webern. The resulting music is often referred to as atonal and cerebral.

Even though Agon starts with a diatonic, non-serial structure, Stravinsky combined parts that had a tonal centre (think of the violin solo in the coda of the first pas de trois) with serialist parts (the flute, mandolins & harps in the Galliard). In order to concentrate on other works and further his experience with serialism Stravinsky shelved Agon for a couple of years and then returned to create the central – very serialist – part of the work (the first coda and the bransles, ie. the moves from side to side), following Schoenberg and Webern’s ideas. 

Besides the new composition techniques, Stravinsky also used specific instruments to identify the dancers in the ballet – brass for men and woodwind for women – as well as traditional French court dance references: the bransles (couples dancing in circle, side to side), galliards (an athletic dance with plenty of jumps),  sarabande and pas de deux/quatre.

NYCB in Agon. Photo: Elliott Franks © Source: The Telegraph

Balanchine built his choreography in response to Stravinsky’s score. Taking into account the serial 12-note concept he  conceived a ballet with 12 dancers (4 men and 8 women) and 12 movements (4 sections of 3 dances each). The ballet starts with the four male dancers facing the back of the stage and the dances develop as follows:

Pas de Quatre – the men
Double Pas de Quatre – the women
Triple Pas de Quatre – the ensemble

Prelude – 1 man, 2 women
Saraband-step – 1 man
Galliard – 2 women
Coda – 1 man, 2 women

Interlude – 2 men, 1 woman
Bransles:
Simple – 2 men
Gay - 1 woman
Double – 2 men, 1 woman

Interlude – 1 man, 1 woman
Pas de Deux – 1 man, 1 woman*
Four Pas de Deux – the men and 4 women
Four Pas de Trois – the ensemble
Coda – the ensemble

NYCB in Agon. Photo: Tristram Kenton © Source: The Guardian

The *pas de deux is one of Agon’s most unique features. The music sounds disjointed, with few instruments being used at a time, but it is still possible to identify the basic components: an adagio, two variations and a coda with the key difference of a role reversal for the dancers, the woman seeming to lead the male into assorted extreme poses rather than the opposite. There are several famous images such as the one where the ballerina wraps around her partner with her leg in attitude, or her 180º arabesque whilst the male dancer is lying on the floor.

PNB's Olivier Weavers and Louise Nadeau in Agon. Photo: Angela Sterling / PNB © Source: ArtsPlace

When the score calls for serial 12-note themes, dancers respond with isolated movements and hints of the courtly dances on which they are based (the men bowing to the women). If the music presents a canon of two trumpets, the dancers perform in canon (ie. successively) to match the trumpets in the music. In the final section, as the score goes back to opening motifs, the dancers resume the same opening image of four male dancers facing the back of the stage.

Stravinsky finished the score in the spring of 1957 and Agon premiered on December 1, 1957, as part of a triple bill featuring Apollo and Orpheus. It was an easy winner with the audience, since it depicted classical ballet in a different and novel way, showing conflict and resolution between various forms of dance, movement and shape.

Videos

Sorry no YouTube videos! But there are certain DVDs and VHS* tapes (if you are able to view these) featuring glimpses of Agon.

• Balanchine (1984) [link]
• The Balanchine Celebration, Part Two* [link]
• Bringing Balanchine Back [link]
• Dancing for Mr. B: Six Balanchine Ballerinas [link]
• Peter Martins: Dancer* [link]

Music

Agon had its first concert performance in June 1957 in Los Angeles. It is still often performed on its own and much valued as a piece which combines both serial and non-serial elements. At an average length of 25 min, it can be easily uploaded to your favourite mp3 player. It can be downloaded from iTunes [link] or streamed via Spotify [link].

Mini-Biography

Choreography: George Balanchine
Music: Igor Stravinsky
Original Cast: Todd Bolender, Barbara Milberg, Barbara Walczak, Roy Tobias, Jonathan Watts, Melissa Hayden, Diana Adams and Arthur Mitchell.
Premiere: December 1, 1957, NYCB. City Center of Music and Drama, New York.

Sources and Further Information

1. Agon in Context by Richard Jones. Ballet.co Magazine, April 2004. [link]
2. Wikipedia Entry for Agon (ballet) [link]
3. NYCB Agon Repertory Notes [link]
4. 50 Years Ago, Modernism Was Given a Name: Agon by Alastair Macaulay. November 2007, NY Times [link]
5. The Bransles of Stravinsky’s Agon: A Transition to Serial Composition by Bonnie S. Jacobi. [link]

Aho: Symphony No.1; Hiljaisuus; Violin Concerto
Manfred Grasbeck, violin
Lahti Symphony Orchestra
Osmo Vänskä
(BIS)

Berg: Wozzeck
Fischer-Dieskau, Lear, Stolze
Chor und Orchester der Deutschen Oper, Berlin
Karl Böhm
(DGG)

Remembrance, Music of Schoenberg, Bernstein, Bloch and Zeisl
Sharon Bezaly, flute
Vadim Gluzman, violin
São Paolo Symphony Choir and Orchestra
John Neschling
(BIS)

Schoenberg: Gurrelieder
Andersen, Isokoski, Groop
Philharmonia Voices
City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
Esa-Pekka Salonen
(Signum Classics)

 
Great Big Sea: Play
(WEA Canada)

One of my favorite tributes to the Second Viennese school:

Closing with one of my favorite Alexander von Zemlinsky works:

(photo by Lisa Kirchner)

Nice remembrance of Leon Kirchner today on WBUR’s Here and Now. He passed away yesterday at 90. A student of Arnold Schoenberg and Ernest Bloch, his own teaching is remembered for its ability to reveal music from the inside by bringing live performances and music analysis together in the classroom. John Adams and Jonathan Kramer were part of Kirchner’s famously innovative Music 180 classes at Harvard.

When you’re ready to do some listening, maybe consider starting with some of my favorites: the piano pieces. Interludes, sonatas, the duos with violin, or the great Five Pieces from 1987. Whatever your pleasure, listen knowing that you’re hearing a singularly visionary voice in contemporary classical music.

(See another article here.)

Ne scrie din nou Tamas. Baterist. Grimus.

O scurtă notiţă citind articolul “Zoom. ECOU. Grodek” din 11 septembrie AICI.

…

Se bucură de existenţa unor mari rebeli celebri care au studiat la conservator: Stockhausen, Webern, Stravinski şi care au produs o muzică total aberantă. Uneori te miri la ceea ce a putut să facă spiritul uman! Este sigur că există un superfin strat de 2% care caută altceva şi aşteaptă ca acest altceva să apară.

…

Carl Maria von Weber era un compozitor german din epoca de romantism şi compunea cu multă melodie. Compozitorul la care te referi este probabil Anton Webern, cu “n” la sfârşit (Austriac la origine), care urmează paşii lui Arnold Schoenberg.

…

Dacă suntem la muzica pentru “nebuni” să nu uităm nici de John Cage. Muzica avangardistă / serialistă este un fenomen extraordinar, o revoluţie foarte interesantă şi importantă în muzica “serioasă“. Este şi destul de apropiată de zilele noastre (Karlheinz Stockhausen a murit la sfârşitul anului 2007).

Sunt de acord că astăzi sunt probabil numai 2% din public cei care apreciază sau îi fascinează acest gen muzical, însă la începutul secolului 20 audienţa era compusă din oameni diferiţi, mulţi aristocraţi, care aveau studii mai profunde muzicale. Şi nu este vorba numai de nivelul de educaţie!

…

Gandeşte-te.

• Barok. melodii uşoare, clavecin.
• Clasicism. se măreşte gama sonoră, durata, pianoforte.
• Romantism. multă tensiune, pasiune, disonanţă, extreme.

Toate deveneau mai complexe, mai “avangardiste”, mai disonante, mai inventive. Era un learning curve. Nimeni nu-ţi poate cere după ce te dai jos din taxiul în care asculţi Lady Gaga şi Hi-Q să te adaptezi pe loc pentru un concert Stockhausen.

…

Personal. nu era şi nu va fi genul meu preferat, însă l-am ascultat, l-am cântat şi în cele mai multe cazuri şi dacă nu era fain, era cel puţin interesant. Şi apropo, a zice nu la muzica contemporană e cam echivalent a zice nu la trupele indie (ex. Yeah Yeah Yeahs) în muzica “uşoară”.

…

Mă bucur că am auzit despre muzica avangardistă la CZB!

Tamas. Baterist. Grimus

Couple of interesting stories on NPR’s Weekend Edition today:

Bach and Schoenberg: If you’ve spent any time listening to the Well-Tempered Klavier it may not come as a surprise to you to discover that Bach’s endless imagination and inventiveness may have ventured into tone row territory a couple of centuries before Arnold Schoenberg went there officially, with the Second Viennese school. New research, here’s the article.

and,…

From the Top, NPR’s weekly radio showcase for young musicians, is celebrating its 10th anniversary this week!

I read in the New York Times today that Joe Maneri, an experimental musician, died on Monday at the age of 82. Though I only met Joe a few times, he taught me a wonderful, enduring life lesson.

In 1979, at 24 years of age, I decided to retire for the first time. I had been working 20 hour days at A and R Recording Studios  since I was 16. I was finishing up a year-long stint working on the film, “All That Jazz.” As anybody who has worked with director/choreographer Bob Fosse would tell you, after one of his projects you needed an extended break. Besides, I wanted to take some time to “woodshed.” That is a phrase musicians use that means to return to learning. I had never studied theory in depth, and as I wanted to be a producer, I thought it best if I got my chops together. I asked Emile Charlap, a lovely man who was the premier contractor in those days – he knew everybody in town – if he could recommend a teacher. He turned me on to this cat, Alan Grigg.

Grigg was a devotee of the Arnold Schoenberg school of harmony. Though Schoenberg was notorious for having destroyed western music through his innovations in atonality and the invention of 12-tone music, he was profoundly grounded in conventional harmony. Not only was he the world’s greatest modern composer but he was also a genius theoretician and teacher. Grigg was a direct descendent of the Schoenberg didactic line. Schoenberg taught Berg, Berg taught Schmidt, Schmidt taught Maneri, and Maneri taught Grigg. Grigg taught me technique, but he told me that fundamentally the Schoenberg tradition was about love. I didn’t quite get it. When I looked at the severe pictures of that fin de siècle Viennese composer and followed his strict rules of chord progression, love was not the first word to come to mind.

When I told Grigg that I wanted to get out of town and leave the biz to study, he recommended that I visit his teacher, Joe Maneri, in Boston. I called up Joe and he generously invited me to come and sit in a class of his. He was teaching at the New England Conservatory of Music. I took the bus up to Boston. In spite of the fact that I had supped with Mick Jagger and assisted Dylan when he recorded “Blood on the Tracks,” I felt somewhat intimidated walking through the Beaux Arts hallways of the Music Conservatory. Here were the hallowed halls of serious music! And I was going to get to hang out with Maneri, who had virtually hung with the genius, Schoenberg! I walked into his class and took a seat in the back. I looked at my watch. He was late.

Finally, Maneri, this short round guy with a classic Sicilian vibe, plunges into the room. Before he’s even inside, he dives into his spiel. His voice sounds like someone chewing rocks. I sit up attentively waiting to hear what he has to say about the secrets of remote modulations. Instead, he says,

“Every one of you in this class is here because you think you’re going to get into the Boston Symphony. Well, let me tell you something. Not one of you is going to make it. And that’s not what it’s about anyway. Me, I play nursing homes. One day I’m playing this nursing home and I walk up to this guy sitting in a chair, and I realize he’s deaf. Now I’m a musician. What can I do for a deaf guy? So I look up to God and pray. And I get it. I take my clarinet out of my case, that’s what I’m playing, the clarinet, and I put it together and I wet the reed, and I look into this guy’s eyes, and I open my heart, and I start to blow. And I look in the guy’s eyes and suddenly tears start to flow. He’s crying.”

Maneri stops talking for the first time since he walked in the room.

He looks at us, points, and says, “Now that is what it is all about.”

The bell rings, and the theory class is over.

Years later, back in New York, I was producing an act that featured three girl singers, all under the age of 12. Early on in the project, I got them a gig in Atlantic City that turned out to be less than what was promised. It ended up that they would be playing for no money for a small audience of mostly handicapped kids. Backstage, before we went on, I could see their disappointment at the unglamorous nature of what they were about to do. I didn’t know what to do. I looked up at the sky, and prayed. And then I remembered the love thing. We stood in a circle and I told them the story of Joe Maneri and the deaf guy. They looked at me with understanding and nodded their heads and smiled. One of those little divas said, “Let’s go, girls!” And they ran out on stage and sang their asses off.

Now that is what it’s all about.            Thanks, Joe.

Et av de flotteste fotografiene jeg vet om er dette, av Holland House Library i London etter et bombeangrep i september 1940.

Bildet viser en slags tid som er frosset fast, slik alle fotografier jo i en viss forstand gjør. Men samtidig er det noe annet i bildet. De tre mennene blandt alle bøkene i bygningen som nå ikke er lengre, ser knapt ut som om de har market at taket er borte. De ser på bøkene, vendt bort fra ødeleggelsene. De er midt i en ruin, men merker den knapt. Men for oss som ser bildet er det ruinen og ødeleggelsen som åpenbarer seg først. Men deretter, så å si umiddelbart, er bildet for meg også et bilde av historien. Dette er historien – om enn ikke med stor H – fastholdt i et øyeblikk. Det kan minne om hvordan Walter Benjamin beskriver “farens øyeblikk,” også selv om faren her tilsynelatede er over. Den fare bombeangrepet innebar er i hvert fall borte, men muligens er det en anne fare, en mer subtil versjon, som finnes her. Bøkene, kulturen, den såkalte sivilisasjonen står muligens i fare. Historien selv, som en slags nedskrevet erindring, der fortiden holdes fast i bokstavene og bøkene er på en måte truet. Bildet viser til lesningen og til fortiden, samtidig som historien holdes fast. Det er ikke for intet at bildet også pryder forsiden av Eduardo Cadavas bok Words of Ligth: Theses on the Photography of History (1997).

Men overskiften min spiller også på et annet verk som innskriver en historie og en fortid, Arnold Schoenbergs Moderner Psalm fra 1950. Det er et av Schoenbergs ufullførte verker, skrevet for talestemme, blandet kor og orkester, og til Schoenbergs egen tekst. I teksten (som kan ses her i original og med tysk oversettelse – og der verket også spilles) står det: “Trotzdem bete ich (…) O du mein Gott, deinen Gnade hat uns das Gebet gelassen, als eine Verbindung, eine beseligende Vermindung mit Dir.” Her er bønnen en slags forbindelse mellom mennsket og G-d, en slags privilegert kommunikasjonskanal, et medium mellom to størrelser av kvalitativt ulik karakter. (Det er vanskelig for meg å ikke se Moderner Psalm i relasjon til Schoenbergs Moses und Aron, et annet av hans ufullførte verk, og et annet der kommunikasjonen mellom mennesket og G-d er en viktig dimensjon – og, som faste lesere vil vite, det verk som er emnet for min doktorgradsavhandling, se også her, her, her og her).

Jeg vil nødig gjøre en altfor direkte forbindelse mellom fotografiet og bønnen, eller lesningen/bøkene og bønnen. Samtidig er det noen åpenbare likheter her. Både tekstene – i biblioteket – og fotografiet åpner også forbindelser, forbindelser mellom fortiden og nåtiden, en form kommunikasjon på tvers av tid og rom. Slik sett er det en allegorisk dimensjon i fotografiet, slik det i følge Benjamin også er det i ruinen. Allegorien er i tankenes rike, hva ruinen er i tingenes rike, som Benjamin skriver i Ursprung des deutschen Trauerspiels (fra 1928).

Sorry I haven’t posted in a while–I’ve been incredibly busy with work, etc.  Now that things have calmed down a bit, eartotheground will be back up to speed.  Anyway:

As you may or may not know (I certainly didn’t know the specifics until I read this article), yesterday was the 50th birthday of Miles Davis’ landmark album Kind of Blue. That’s cool enough in itself, but what’s even cooler is how Slate’s Fred Kaplan breaks down the nitty gritty of Davis’ innovative music theory.

Most music in what music scholars call the “common practice” period of European classical music is based on the notion of triadic chords: you’ve heard of a “C major chord” or an “a minor chord,” etc.  Triads in what we call “root position” have their main, or tonic, note on the bottom (i.e. as the lowest note) and then build two more harmonizing notes on top to create the familiar sound.  Plenty of other musical systems rely on this foundational principle of harmony, such as blues, many kinds of folk music and much of the pop we listen to today.  (One of the key harmonic differences among these musics is how the chords are patterned: Muddy Waters’ blues progressions are, for example, different from the progressions you’ll hear in a Mozart sonata, though many of the same kinds of chords may be used.)

Conventional harmony also relies on the notion of a key or tonic: a primary pitch and associated harmony (in D major, for example, this pitch would be D; in e minor, it’s e, and so forth, generally speaking) around which every other pitch and harmony is organized hierarchically.

Jazz was based on this general theory for a long, long time, until Davis came and blew (I’m resisting making a pun) the whole system out of the water on Kind of Blue.  In fact, chord progressions were (and often still are) perhaps more fundamental to jazz than to many other kinds of music due to jazz’s improvisational nature.  Musicians knew what chords were coming next and improvised on them; without mutual agreement on chords, it was impossible for the complex interplay of voices that is jazz to occur.

But in the 1950s, Davis was looking for the next new thing and lighted on his friend George Russell’s theory of modes, an entirely new way of thinking about the relationships and hierarchies among the 12 pitches available within the Western musical system:

Russell threw the compass out the window.  You could play all the notes of a scale, which is to say any and all notes.  ”It is for the musician to sing his own song really,” Russell wrote, “without having to meet the deadline of a particular chord.”  In other words, he continued, “you are free to do anything” (the italics were his), “as long as you know where home is”–as long as you know where you’re going to wind up.

One night in 1958, Russell sat down with Davis at a piano and laid out his theory’s possibilities–how to link chords, scales, and melodies in almost unlimited combinations.  Miles realized this was a way out of bebop’s cul-de-sac.  ”Man,” he told Russell, “if Bird [Charlie Parker] was alive, this would kill him.”

Out of this new freedom was born Kind of Blue and an entirely new jazz landscape.  There are a few links in the article which are worth listening to, but better yet, pick up the album for yourself if you don’t already own it.

Also, read this quote.  I hope I’m not the only one who sees (infinitely more exciting and enjoyable-to-listen-to) echoes of Schoenberg and the Second Viennese School in this approach:

“When you go this way,” [Davis] said, “you can go on forever.  You don’t have to worry about changes, and you can do more with time.  It becomes a challenge to see how melodically inventive you are….I think a movement in jazz is beginning, away from the conventional string of chords and a return to emphasis on melodic rather than harmonic variations.  There will be fewer chords but infinite possibilities as to what to do with them.”

Drei Klavierstucke, op. 11-I. A classic.

[waxy]

An individual singing style often involves a singer’s imitation—for better or worse—of a popular artist’s tone quality. It sometimes calls for a sudden break in the voice, plaintive bleating, or wild screeching: all these effects, however, are purely ephemeral and continually change with their originators.

These devices by which some singers develop a vivid, individual, and compelling style are quite familiar to us from the music all around us. They may bring to mind specific artists who have used them successfully. These will doubtless be performers of great (and perhaps somewhat uninhibited) expressivity. Some readers will think of certain now-venerable jazz singers, others of soul, folk, or rock singers whose vigorous expressive devices fit such norms of what we might call mal canto. What the quoted remark of course will not describe at all well is the goals and achievements of our best “classical” or operatic singers. Their more or less bel canto interpretation of the standard repertory of the past has become a sort of international standard. It is widely considered to have the only valid claim on the serious attention of people of elevated musical culture.

The quotation, which deserves to be read with great attention, is from Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s musical dictionary of 1768. (The philosopher’s untranslatable expression here rendered as “particular style of singing” is gout de chant.) The passage refers to the best usage of Rousseau’s day. The musical events that involved such singing were naturally rather different from the specific decorum of modern “classical” occasions both in aesthetic posture and in the whole atmosphere that surrounded them. (If they weren’t considerably more highly-charged before the singing began, they certainly must have become so in the course of the breaks, bleats and screeches.) Rousseau’s description was originally applied to repertory that is now generally referred to as “early music,” which a curious chronological reflex in us will, if we are not careful, associate with the prim and the restrained—even despite the most feverish exertions of such as Peter Schaffer’s Amadeus to disillusion us.

But, in the early twenty-first century, we here and there find people willing—or perhaps driven is not too strong a word—to try to go back to earlier musical repertories with an openness to experimentation involving even the most extreme of the old expressive ways. (Joseph Kerman has described the singing of one of the best of them as “inspired screeching.”) Insofar as they do so, they bring together crucial aesthetic ideals of the “pop” culture and of the early-music nook of the “classical” culture, which manages to be rarified and frisky at the same time—not unlike some esoteric jazz circles. (Both the jazz and early-music movements, significantly, have tended to be viewed with suspicion by the same people.)

The Rousseau excerpt provides a simple and useful first example of the sort of radical anomalies in our musical life that can be considerably and usefully cleared up by a serious view of music-as-event. Somewhat different musical bedfellows are found together through an event-directed, performance-oriented approach than through the more customary chronological or social-class segregations. These latter groupings may scrupulously play by their own historiographical rules without sufficiently taking into account the nature of the musical art itself.

The works of Rousseau are of course not unknown. But the certain testimonies that his, and vast numbers of comparably illuminating sources contain, have not been as useful as they might have been: the greater cultural world has not found them sufficiently striking without adequate reference to the larger event that music indissolubly belongs to.

And that greater world is right. We will here endeavor to look at some things, both familiar and novel, with the freshest eyes that we can possibly assume. Doing so can be an exhilarating imaginative experience. Doing so will teach us much about our musical culture. It is a prerequisite to finding what that culture itself can tell us about what we are accustomed to thinking of as wider issues.

If the styles of Rousseau’s eighteenth-century opera singers and of modern popular singing have much in common with the almost infinite quantities of vivid folk singing around the world (and, incidentally, with what is known of medieval and Renaissance singing ideals); and if they have rather less correspondence to what now comes to us—with all its considerable virtues—licensed as the preferred, correct way to sing all Western “art” music seriously and well; then when and why, we may ask, did the change occur? What other changes went with it? And, crucially: why are even earnest music-lovers so generally unaware that Rousseau’s contemporaries (who included Bach and Handel at one end, Mozart and Haydn at the other, and Gluck all the way through) were accustomed to such singing as was at least within hailing distance of his description? To establish what has happened, we need to look at radical changes in attitude to what we may call the musical occasion. And to do it, we will want to walk through some cultural history with that goal in mind.

Our earliest records of human community life include fortunate references to music. They sometimes put, in fact, drastically more emphasis on music than is considered quite the thing in our more recent enlightened societies. There has been much brave effort spent on finding a natural cause for this invariable presence of music among people. In the process, the anthropologists have been able to collect evidence showing that the ability to make music is as innate to our species as speech and that virtually all known societies share some musical practices. These common habits evidently involve, for example, the primacy of certain melodic intervals, usually producing a “pentatonic scale” that is heard all over the world, and on which China’s traditional music is as dependent as Scotland’s is. This constitutes, among other things, a modern vindication of Pythagoras. He found that these intervals are the first naturally to emerge from abstract mathematical thinking on music and also from practical experiments with a vibrating string. That humankind (who, we sometimes forget, is also a part of nature) reflects these facts in universal musical practice may be a matter of comfort to pessimists who fear that our species never does anything right.

The universals of rhythm are easily observable. All ordinary meters, whether of drum, bells, clapping, stamping, or poetry, are divisible by either two or three. In its provision of two hands for drum-beating, for example, the human frame predisposes us to duple meter, and the structure of our foot imposes a quadruple meter on the act of walking. The special appeal of things triple is deeply embedded in human history and, hence, human psychology. The fact that anatomy, philosophy, and psychology confirm each other in such considerations would have come as no surprise to our thoughtful forebears (and is the subject of writings on music and poetry from ancient times). It is we who often expect disorder in nature until the taming hand of humanity has subdued it. This expectation is the basic principle of magic and of applied science. It is philosophy and religion that look to human conformity to nature as the way around serious difficulties. Music has often shown itself capable of taking sides in such rivalry between control and co-operation.

There seems to reside in human nature a certain sameness of approach to the uses of music. Music is, for example, always and everywhere used for transcending time and space, telling stories, solemnizing pacts, dignifying words, governing dance, relieving ennui, lending rhythm to work, sending signals, recalling prior events, paying honor to other beings or ideas, making love to a prospective mate, drawing groups together, confirming separate identities, mourning, mounting protests, pacifying babies, building up courage, chasing melancholy, and giving expression to high spirits.

These—for want of a better word—uses of music do not of course preclude a decidedly non-utilitarian character in music’s effects, some of which, in their intensity, belong to it alone. Music’s ecstatic element—what may be experienced as a kind of passionate sanity—can seem to some people its main characteristic. The individual can feel the achieving of a god’s-eye-view of the universe. But never do music’s transcendent powers ever exist entirely apart from societal considerations. It is key to music’s nature that it functions socially rather than in isolation. That is, what we often call the art of music does; acoustical science of course awaits no one’s pleasure, is unresponsive to social situation. It exists even where the tree falls in the woods. This art/science duality creates a natural balance in music’s character that made it an early object of fruitful study in many cultures.

No society is heard of in which music’s rôles contradict those mentioned above. Communities may, however, specialize in certain uses of music, as do individuals. The ancient Hebrews seem to have emphasized the ceremonial and psycho-somatic purposes of music. The Greeks codified ethical and theatrical uses. Oratory is the first thing that comes to mind from the Roman extension of highly developed Greek practices. But each of these cultures also in some degree possessed all the other systems mentioned.

The Christian church, from its early days a predominantly urban and cosmopolitan society-within-societies, found itself heir to all these, even those it chose to de-emphasize, such as the theatrical. (The dramatic impulse in Christian liturgy has never stayed smothered for long at a time, however.) The nature of musical culture produced crises in the ninth century, and the activities it often accompanied were less those of peace than of the sword. The important thing for modern Westerners to remember here is that music was once something that unambiguously existed in time—not on paper, or even primarily in the memory. However lasting its effect, its existence evaporated at the moment it occurred. Musical practice found itself being altered according to places and circumstances, and the early church at Rome seems to have led the typical Romantic project of letting it adapt as men and women felt was fitting. In this—to be quite explicit—we see a tradition that has repeatedly asserted itself, combatting attempts to freeze practice in some ideal state. Already in a Carolingian movement given its marching orders by at least two rulers of the eighth century, we find an ideology tinged with the rival tendency: that of codification, uniformity, and a sort of mild, incipient conservative classicism.

By the twelfth century, the contest was over on the official level. The North and systemization had, to some extent, won; and the more Romantic tendencies became a more-or-less tolerated, but ever crucial, leavening of cultural life. Attempts to break out of this, motivated by many of the same tendencies as the rebels against the earlier Carolingian codifiers, produced the polyphony that would be intermittently controversial for at least four hundred years. In the fourteenth century, we have the first composer whom we know to have collected his works into bound manuscripts as visual objets d’art. The idea that musical works might to some extent, and however exceptionally, transcend occasion was a new and bold one and fit well with the courtly ideas of artificial and transferable amorous etiquette and ready-made feeling. This greatly accelerated a tendency that European music managed largely to keep at bay until the late nineteenth century. But the genetic strain of fixed compositional procedures had been introduced and was hardier than it might appear from the luxuriance of the more dominant improvisation-oriented musical frameworks in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. During all that time, there was a strong sense of insult involved in inserting a piece of composed music (even something so large as an opera) into one occasion when it had been tailored for another (rather as we might now be revolted by re-using for one funeral the floral tributes arranged for another funeral). It is significant that even so efficient and effective a re-user as Handel usually kept the matter decently cloaked, or at least did not parade it, and Bach could show willingness to slip previously secular material into the liturgy but showed scruples about traffic in the opposite direction. He may have considered such material consecrated by its sacred use; but nothing would have shocked, or perhaps embarrassed him, more than the uncritical reverence that sometimes motivates our collecting his merest manuscript trill (which, for all we know, is there to cover a bad note on the instrument that it was first performed on) to publish it in our editions and duly reproduce it in sound-recordings. These laudable tasks do, however, seem to meet real needs of ours that are not exclusively or inherently musical.

The predominantly improvisatory and “occasional” nature of public music-making still continued to mirror that of private playing throughout most of the nineteenth century. Even the learning of music was a social activity, and the idea of an instrumentalist spending the major part of his music-making time alone playing to himself seems to have been as foreign to Frederick the Great, and then to Mendelssohn, as it had been to Henry the Eighth and would eventually be to Bix Beiderbecke.

As eminent composers and musical thinkers emerged who were less inclined (and, not co-incidentally, less able) to perform as charismatic virtuosos, the creation of music began gradually to be seen, not as the making of sonic art in a social setting, but as the solitary graphic effusion of genius onto paper, only gradually and very ceremoniously to be birthed to a reverent public on occasions where musical midwife-priests would allow nothing else to compete (at least theoretically) with the divine musical utterance. After ages in which the performance had been seen as yielding an unrepeatable event, it was now the process of composition—rather than performance—that aimed at producing a unique masterpiece.

About this time the Paris Conservatory established a formal composition curriculum. It did not aim at equally emphasizing all kinds of composition. (The separate classes in such things as Fugue and Organ—meaning improvisation—were still high on the composer’s list of necessary pursuits.) Far the greatest concentration in the composition classes was put on the composition of operas—the least improvisatory, the most schematic, of musical forms. (Even there, the composers only very slowly and with famous difficulty were able to stamp out the improvisatory habit in the singers—though the extent to which composers like Rossini even tried to do so has been traditionally exaggerated.) So composition was increasingly concerned with large numbers of decreasingly autonomous performers at the very time that public musical life was becoming more and more centered on the performance of compositions for paying audiences.

In that same period, understandably enough, works of the past began to be seen in a different light; for the inherited (or, increasingly, rediscovered) compositions that people found they approved of must, they felt, have been created by these same hallowed, and increasingly mysterious and specialized, processes. The ranks of citizenry considered “musical” shrank more and more into a narrow caste. Amateur became almost a term of reproach.

An old composer’s accidentally remaining manuscripts are often the slender, fragmentary, relics of a career that they did not typify. But this has not prevented the erection of a preservative edifice around the works that have met with the approval of the same people who were lining themselves up as either successors or professional interpreters of these Great Composers. No matter if these Greats were primarily performers or even what we now would call, perhaps with a curl of the lip, entertainers (including thorough men of the theater), they would henceforth be known and characterized —or shunned and vilified—according to the nature of the manuscript crumbs that fell from their tables and were carried into the laboratories of analysis and dens of criticism. Berlioz, in his guise as critic, could take the Alceste operas of Lully, Handel, and Gluck and judge them as works of written-down art (to the great disadvantage of the former two) without betraying much suspicion that such works had any other layer of musical significance, procedure, means, convention, or context than he could see jotted down on paper. In this he was, as always, in the avant-garde. Music manuscripts began to join the subject matter of archeology in glass cases of museums, but—unlike these other artifacts, whose essence is much more a matter of material existence—they were more thoroughly deprived of their time and context and judged largely by current, anachronistic standards. They were labelled “primitive” in the least sympathetic sense of that word.

All of which explains why the presence of African-American music in Western society presents such an opportunity for understanding and re-orientation. Using that repertory, we can compellingly illustrate some otherwise obscured connections that our society’s music still maintains with that of all other human communities past and present.

For some time now, when people speak of “the musical world,” some of them have meant, when one thinks of it, something quite miserably small. There is none of the spaciousness there that the word world properly connotes. Nor is there anything of the sweep that a Haydn took for granted as he interacted with folk music, liturgical ceremonial, the music of ball and street, lady-like boudoir, Enlightenment masculine amateurism, antiquarian criticism, operatic exoticism, academic speculation, and whatever else he and people like him unselfconsciously knew as provinces of music. The “world” of music is too often one that has been brought to think of itself as a limiting norm. It may have been the unconscious limitation of the reader or writer of this post at its beginning. We probably think—if we think of the subject at all—that the mass of people would get into this musical world if only they could. It is thought to be small only because those outside it, sad to say, are ill-equipped, in some more-or-less undefined and indefinable way, to be participants in “real music.” Well-intentioned attempts to bring more people into the circle are regularly mooted and almost as regularly regretted as failures; but both attempt and failure would undoubtedly make almost all those we commonly call our musical forebears scratch their heads in puzzlement. In the repertories that have African-American origins, this bizarre situation in musical life is reversed.

Those who have lately been in the habit of reading and writing books on musical thought—if indeed the two groups are not one and the same—may need to think particularly hard to see the extent of the reversal. There is a tendency for all serious discussion of music to be about a certain kind of music, and that of the most numerically minuscule constituency. There is an acceptance that for a repertory to be widespread is to be other than serious and to be serious is to be limited to those like “us.” (Schoenberg bluntly tells us that music cannot be art if it is popular, or popular if it is art.) It is assuredly not the contention here that the constituency for what is most widely thought of as “art” music is either contemptible or that it must die. Nor need it be necessarily small. But it is surely socially moribund without an opening that is offered to it by both the best musicology and, quite harmoniously, by such as the African-American phenomenon abroad in the musical world—in that great, broad world peopled with the millions of the naturally musical by virtue of their humanity rather than with the few who have proclaimed themselves musical by virtue of … what?

By virtue of participation in social rituals that have very little, if anything at all, to do with musical values. If people are excluded from some classes of musical life on account of non-musical factors, then the differences in attitude and occasion characteristic of the African-American repertory not only explain its wide popular (and economic) appeal, but point to ways that the best benefits of the “high” musical culture could in future be extended through the population. When changes in the manners and rituals of “classical” musical life are proposed, many of us will revolt and say that we don’t want the repertory “cheapened” by association with other patterns; but, if we do so, let us be honest enough to admit that values other than styles of composition and quality of performance are coming into play for us—and that these values are superseding “purely musical” considerations (that very idea being an anthropo-musicological error that tries to separate the anthropo- from the musicologia). And we might at least ask the question of how much the characteristic aura of the “classical” has to do with musical content, and how much with style of presentation, including location and dress. This may explain why we have found it relatively easy to welcome less serious—even undeniably “popular”—music into our concert halls, so long as it orginates from some particularly “well-behaved” European community of the eighteenth or nineteenth century. Societies in Africa and elsewhere who lack our approach to the social distinctions also lack a separate classical music. The fewer compartments an art has been partitioned into, the more adaptable to the flow of life that art will be.

I have been listening to some early works by John Cage.  It’s fascinating to hear the roots of Cage’s later style in early 12-tone compositions such as Music for Wind Instruments (1938) and Metamorphosis (also 1938), and to compare these to the freer works that followed: First Construction (1939), Imaginary Landscape no. 1 (1939) and Bacchanale (1940), his first piece for prepared piano.

Cage said of Schoenberg, with whom he studied:

“Schoenberg was a marvelous person … He gave his students little comfort. When we followed the rules in writing counterpoint, he would say, ‘Why don’t you take a little liberty?’ And when we took liberties, he would say, ‘Don’t you know the rules?’ “

(Source: Cage’s obituary in the New York Times)

Here is an interesting video take on Bacchanale by Keith Troester, featuring a performance by pianist Stephen Drury.

Si el pop es la música del día, una banda de sonido de 09.00 a 17.00 que regula el trabajo y el consumo, entonces el Noise es su noche, poblada por las siluetas agazapadas e incipientes sombras del deseo y la desesperación alienada. En contraste con la música manufacturada bajo la vigilante mirada del pop, Noise provee una cobertura de oscuridad que alienta tanto la experimentación como los actos criminales. El Noise genera las condiciones perfectas para interrogar los métodos de control e interferir sus canales. El Noise es la fusión de la lógica. Y rechaza la noción de que todo es consensual, que la comunicación es primordial, que la música debe ser placentera. Es por eso que artistas Noise como Throbbing Gristle, Boyd “Non” Rice y Whitehouse, son asociados con  frecuencia a un imaginario de atrocidades, sexo transgresivo, poder y violencia.

Se considera ampliamente que, Luigi Russolo, fue el primer gran teórico del ruido con su manifiesto de 1913, L’arte Dei Rumori. Y, por supuesto, compositores como Arnold Schoenberg, John Cage y Karlheinz Stockhausen jugaron roles importantes en la ruptura de los sistemas armónicos clásicos. El disco de Lou Reed, Metal Machine Music, señalizo una manera de de liberarse del impasse creado por los coletazos finales del Avant-Garde de mitad del siglo 20, funcionando simultáneamente como una critica de la música y una forma para su rehabilitación.

Todo es ruido, por supuesto, todo lo que siempre se escribió en The Wire. El territorio señalado por la revista desde 1982, es uno cuyo carácter marginal significa que sólo es explorado voluntariamente por nosotros de almas intrépidas. El territorio contiene cosas que sabemos que es música, pero también sabemos que, en el fondo, todo el mundo piensa que es cualquier cosa menos eso. Es siempre sobre nosotros y ellos, ¿por qué ser tímido al respecto? Después de todo, ¿de qué otra manera podemos dar sentido a este fenómeno que llamamos Noise con N mayúscula? Si aceptamos su habitual definición como “sonido inarticulado, por lo general desagradable”, es necesario tener alguna idea de para quién es inarticulado y desagradable. Obviamente, no para  nosotros –  aquí estamos escuchándolo, leyendo sobre él, escribiendo, haciéndolo. Lo que lo hace Noise es lo que los otros piensan. O más bien, lo que pensamos que podrían pensar, si alguna vez lo escucharan. Lo que  no  hacen.

Y en ese interminable, tortuoso circuito de reflexión y especulación, se encuentra la clave de lo que es el Noise: el sonido de las ideas en conflicto. Es la notoria consola de mezcla de Toshimaru Nakamura, con ideas en lugar de cables conectados de nuevo en sí mismos, paradoja criando paradoja, la retroalimentación que produce retroalimentación. Una vez que eliminas la idea de que es sólo sobre confrontación, el Noise se vuelve mucho más confuso, y mucho más interesante. Y eso es lo que ha sucedido, sin prisa pero sin pausa, desde 1982, poco a poco se orientó hacia una comunidad de oyentes empáticos, en lugar de alienar al público como si se tratara del enemigo.

En 1982, la experimentación con el ruido en estado puro, se suponía que era la preocupación la mayoría de los primeros grupos industriales, pero los más visibles de estos (Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, SPK) se habían disuelto o embarcado en un proceso de templado de sus tendencias sonoras más extremas. El Noise estaba en retirada en otras partes del globo, también. La No-Wave de Nueva York había alcanzado su zenit y estaba decayendo. Tal vez lo que ocurrió fue que, una vez que las tácticas de confrontación fallaron – ¿Quién podía pensar que sus loops “parcialmente sumergidos” darían lugar a la revolución armada? – Sólo había dos opciones disponibles. Se podía tomar la ruta “conformarse a deformar”, depurando la música de sus elementos más difíciles u ocultarlos detrás de seductores ritmos de máquina, o continuar como antes, cultivando un selecto público quienes se regodean en la extremidad sónica, como insignia de pertenencia a una élite ilustrada. Fueron los Mencheviques contra los bolcheviques de nuevo, sin el beneficio de 1917, para definir quién había tenido razón todo el  tiempo.

Norma de esta última tendencia eran Boyd “Non” Rice no y William Bennett Whitehouse; los soldados de a pie donde las legiones de home recordists de todo el mundo (como los británicos The New Blockaders, los californianos The Haters, y el japones Merzbow), que comercializan y casetes establecieron sellos especializados. El Noise de estos artistas, inicialmente encadenado a sus preocupaciones conceptuales, comenzó a agitarse hasta conseguir una identidad propia. El Noise ha sido principalmente metafórico, la representación sonora de la ruptura los tabúes sexuales, sociales y políticos, una banda de sonido con los temas como la violencia y la abyección explorados en vivo. Cuando estos aspectos temáticos comenzaron a decaer – debido a su dilución y asimilación en la creciente y burguesa escena  “Industrial Dance/Electronic Body Music” y de allí aún más en el mainstream – el ruido tomo el centro de atención. Liberado de contexto, sonaba mucho más ruidoso. El artista Noise japonés Hijokaidan y artistas como Incapacitants cambiado el uso del Noise como banda sonora del fetichismo a ser fetichistas del ruido en sí, regodeandose en su densidad, borrando la distinción entre la resistencia y el placer.

Tal vez el Noise necesitaba retirarse sobre sí mismo y reunir sus recursos para el próximo gran impulso hacia el reconocimiento de masas. Mientras la década de los ‘80 colapsaba en los ‘90, hubo ciertamente más músicas que exploraban los efectos de la sobrecarga sónica extrema. La banda de Kevin Martin, God, por ejemplo, tomaba de la improvisación (el bajista free John Edwards y el saxofonista Tim Hodgkinson estaban involucrados, así como John Zorn), el metal y el hiphop, Metal y hiphop, distendiendo y distorsionando los límites de la viabilidad. Aphex Twin trataba el techno de la misma manera, cuando no estaba produciendo piezas electrónicas que simulaban un ataque de asma, como en “Ventolin”, pinchaba con papel de lija en lugar de vinilos.

Lo que ha impulsado el aumento del Noise desde mediados de los años 90 a su situación actual como género en sí mismo – por más cuestionable que pueda ser – más que nada tiene que ver con la influencia de las distintas cepas de guitarra de rock. Por cada 99 niños indie que entendieron el zumbido del tema de My Bloody Valentine “You Made Me Realise” como un simple gesto de rebeldía- uno lo consideraba un manifiesto. Sonic Youth transformo a una mini-legión de jóvenes punk en terroristas del ruido por su unión de las técnicas de “reinvención de la guitarra” de Glenn Branca con el Hardcore (y más tarde con el Grunge). Los cada vez más lamentables intentos del rock corporativo por representarse de alguna manera a sí mismo como peligroso y contracultural, ha causado la creación y el protagonismo de grupos como Wolf Eyes y Prurient.

Las raíces de la actual escena Noise pueden, por supuesto, rastrearse mucho más lejos, incluso más allá de principios del siglo 20, cuando las hipótesis sobre la naturaleza de la música eran desafiadas por Luigi Russolo, en manifiesto fechado en 1913, “L’arte dei Rumori”. Puede que no sea demasiado imaginativo vincular la práctica actual con los orígenes de la creación musical. Los sobretonos producidos por un bronce, o la abrasión de la crin contra el catgut, dan forma a la nota “pura”, transformándola en algo único para el instrumento que se está tocando. Las propiedades características de estos instrumentos son provistas por el incuantificable, inefable ruido producido por ejecutarlos. En su ensayo “Rough Music, Futurism, and Postpunk Industrial Noise Bands” Mary Russo y Daniel Warner afirman, “En gran medida, los convenios de una cultura musical, son una serie de negociaciones aurales, entre la señal sonora y el ruido.”

Estalla la armonía y estallara la estructura social, dice un dictado Noise. Opuesto al control, el Noise siempre contiene las semillas de su propia destrucción. Desde la postura paramilitar de Throbbing Gristle al pastiche totalitario de Laibach, el Noise aparentemente abraza distintas nociones de disciplina, regimentación y control, con el propósito de entenderlas mejor para poder socavarlas. Si le Noise aparentemente alienta un apetito por la destrucción, es solo por el deseo de liberar el reprimido apetito de reconstrucción.

Muchos artistas contemporáneos usaron el Noise como una base funcional, desde el Free Jazz al sonido conceptual de The Sonic Arts Union y las filosas improvisaciones de AMM y MEV. También a infectado y rejuvenecido completamente al rock, gracias a artistas como Mars, John Zorn, Fushitsusha y Sonic Youth, quienes ayudaron a exponer al Noise a la luz. Pero esto es sobre esos artistas que desviaron las convenciones del género en su aceptación absoluta del Noise.

LOU REED

METAL MACHINE MUSIC (RCA CD 1975)

MMM1 – MMM2 – MMM3

“Si alguna vez ustedes pensaron que el feedback era lo mejor que le podía pasar a las guitarras”, escribía Lester Bangs en una apreciación de Metal Machine Music, publicada en 1976 en la revista Creem, “bueno, Lou acaba de deshacerse de las guitarras”. El disco solista de Lou Reed de 1975, es el álbum Noise “par excellence”. Todos las directivas del futuro Noise estaban presentes e incorrectas: la extensión artificial del medio utilizando ritmos cerrados como ciclos infinitos, la manipulación de los gritos de protesta de aparatos electrónicos y la usurpación del balance uniforme e invariable del stereo a favor de zooms telescópicos de volumen que se agitan como torres de departamentos de un oído a otro. Algunas veces Reed dijo sobre MMM, que era un álbum de generación espontánea, un sistema cerrado de feedback, al que solo puso en marcha y ocasionalmente reguló; otras veces insistió sobre el hecho que codifico el disco con citas a Mozart y Beethoven. De cualquier manera, vale la pena recordar que Reed fue uno de los primeros músicos rock en usar el ruido como un color visceral. En el segundo disco de The Velvet Underground, White Light/White Heat (1968) fue el lugar donde, por primera vez se dio fuego, a las jerarquías musicales convencionales. La canción de 17 minutos “Sister Ray” avanzaba desde un R&B monolítico de tres acordes hasta transformarse en una pelea de a cuatro, con cada uno de los músicos subiendo la apuesta del volumen hasta el punto en que toda la pieza quedaba paralizada por el feedback. Pero el momento en el que el rock realmente tomó, la atonalidad, como la base de una nueva sintaxis llegó durante el solo de Reed en “I Heard Her Call My Name” del mismo disco. Iniciado por el famoso llanto de Reed “And then My Mind Split Open”, su solo Noise, que consiguió gracias al uso de una caja de distorsión Vox sostenida manualmente, incorporando notas que sonaban como si estuvieran quebrándose bajo la presión de la distorsión, con cualquier noción de melodía, forzada a ocupar el asiento trasero, detrás de la fricción, el volumen y la distorsión. En términos Noise “I Heard Her Call My Name” fue la partición del átomo. Metal Machine Music fue la fusión resultante.

THROBBING GRISTLE

THE SECOND ANNUAL REPORT + ZYKLON B ZOMBIE/UNITED (LP INDUSTRIAL 1977 / INDUSTRIAL 7’’ 1978)

D.o.A: THE THIRD AND FINAL REPORT (LP INDUSTRIAL 1978)

20 JAZZ FUNK GREATS (LP INDUSTRIAL 1979)

Operando desde el sur de Londres entre 1978-81, Throbbing Gristle fue el primer grupo en entender por complete la habilidad del Noise para desactivar y disturbar los sistemas de control y para permitir la liberación de poderosas energías psíquicas y sexuales. En conformidad, preparaban sus shows como rallies donde una rudimentaria habilidad como músicos, sonidos de maquinaria agresivos, espejos, cintas sospechosas, luces estroboscopicas, y generadores industriales de iones, se combinaban para hacer entrar en corto la relación mono direccional tradicional de audiencia/artista. Mientras que el punk era esencialmente recuperativo, secuestrando y redimiendo cansados modelos de rock, TG trabajaba para la destrucción de la música como un precursor para la reintegración del arte y la vida. Moldeada usando como base “I Heard Her Call My Name”, de The Velvet Underground, “Zyklon B Zombie” fue el lado B del single de 1978 “United”. Forma parte también de la reedición en CD de “Second Annual Report”, hecha por el sello Mute. Nombrado como el químico que usaban los nazis en las cámaras de la muerte, el track fue deliberadamente grabado como si fuero escuchado a través de un túnel de vapores. Los vocales de P-Orridge cambian las palabras de Reed (“mind split open”) por un “and then my head split open”, seguido por el gorgoteo de un única nota de sintetizador barato.

BORBETOMAGUS

SAUTER, DIETRICH, MILLER (AGARIC CD 1982)

El trío Borbetomagus, formado por los saxofonistas Jim Sauter y Don Dietrich, junto con el guitarrista Donald Millar, son el grupo más excesivo de improvisadores libres que alguna vez haya soplado bronces. Sus presentaciones realmente físicas son rutinariamente descriptas usando términos como músculos y homoerótica subliminal. Pero claramente hay mucho más. Borbetomagus usa el ruido para despejar un espacio en tiempo real, dentro del cual la armadura de la personalidad puede disolverse como algodón de azúcar, dejándolos libres para ensamblar una significativa sintaxis de volumen, velocidad y textura. Con los micrófonos sumergidos en lo profundo de las barrigas de sus saxos,  Dietrich y Sauter – amigos desde el jardín de infantes – traban sus instrumentos como los cuernos de un lace, produciendo tempestades, formando rayos cercanos a la visión extática de música celestial de Albert Ayler. Aumentados con mangueras de goma y tubos de plástico que extienden su alcance, ambos saxos son alimentados a través de bastidores de efectos de distorsión, mientras que Millar toca su guitarra acostado de espaldas, excitándola con juguetes, radios, barras de metal y canicas.

Resumiendo un poco la cosa, un profesor decía que hoy en día hay dos tipos de compositores: los que componen sobre el papel y los que componen con el oído; los que hacen un desarrollo impresionante de su obra a base de cálculos matemáticos, proporciones, progresiones, relaciones interválicas y medidas rítmicas que responden a patrones cíclicos, a veces desarrollados en espiral, a veces ensanchándose y encogiéndose, etc. (en mi opinión, una cagada); y los que se enfrentan al proceso creativo guiándose principalmente por el oído, la experimentación, el contacto directo con los instrumentos y su sonoridad. Una de las principales diferencias es que los primeros no siempre saben cómo va a sonar su obra, ni falta que les hace. Lo principal es vender bien el producto, hablando sobre él, analizándolo, pero no necesariamente escuchándolo. No es broma. A veces se escudan en lo matemático de las composiciones de Bach. Esto también es una cagada, porque, entre otras cosas, Bach suena muy bien, y no nos importa tanto su complejidad y perfección formal, sino lo que nos provoca al escucharlo. Que juegue casi constantemente en la estructura, en la relación interválica y en el ritmo con el número catorce, que surge de adjudicar un número a las letras de su apellido, siguiendo el orden alfabético: A=1, B=2, C=3, etc. (B=2+A=1+C=3+H=8, en total 14), no nos emociona tanto como la audición de sus composiciones. No nos interesa tanto su gusto por la simbología aplicada a su obra, realmente impresionante y sorprendente, como el contacto directo con su música. Reducir su música a simples cálculos matemáticos sería, como digo, una cagada.

Este último trimestre tuvimos la suerte de recibir en el Conservatorio al compositor David del Puerto, que estuvo durante dos tardes dando unas charlas sobre música, composición, la música del siglo XX y su obra. Fue muy crítico con la situación actual de la música y especialmente con los compositores, al fallar completamente la funcionalidad de su trabajo, por ser incapaces de conectar con el público y estar siempre dependiendo de subvenciones públicas que los mantienen vivos como si de una UVI móvil se tratara, a base de respiración asistida y electroshock. Si a esto sumamos que los programadores de teatros y salas de concierto tampoco hacen mucho por variar esta situación, ofreciendo principalmente música clásica tradicional por un lado y por otro, y en una mínima medida, música contemporánea que entre en la misma línea de la subvencionada, podemos sacar la conclusión de que hay muchísima música contemporánea que no conocemos y que podría perfectamente tener aceptación por aficionados a la música, sin necesidad de ser expertos, sino simplemente oyentes que tengan ganas de experimentar con el sonido a través del oído y no del papel o la palabra.

Mi profesor llegó a comentarme que este compositor, David del Puerto, llega incluso a tener serios problemas para que su música se interprete en teatros por dejar en ridículo a los demás compositores que estén programados en el mismo día. La comparación los deja en pañales. Tiene esa clase de problemas a pesar de ser Premio Nacional de Música. Pues ésa es la situación, una auténtica cagada.

El límite de una música que de antemano establezca unas normas de organización del sonido bastante estrictas lo podemos encontrar en el sistema dodecafónico, o serialismo, creado  y desarrollado a mediados del siglo XX por Arnold Schoenberg y sus discípulos, Alban Berg y Anton Webern, la denominada Segunda Escuela de Viena. Pero el caso es que incluso Schoenberg decía que nunca se podía componer sin inspiración, a pesar de que su sistema pudiera parecer encorsetado. Sin inspiración, cualquier obra que simplemente siga unas normas al pié de la letra sería una cagada. Su sistema se resume a grosso modo en crear una serie (de ahí su nombre) que incluya los doce semitonos de la octava que no puede volver a repetirse hasta que se concluya. Se puede desarrollar en distintas voces, en distintas octavas, con distintos ritmos, etc., pero respetando siempre esta condición. Posteriormente otros autores desarrollaron el serialismo integral, aportación de Anton Webern, que no es más que una mayor complicación y sofisticación del sistema original, ampliando la aplicación de la serie a los restantes parámetros musicales, como la intensidad o la duración.

Aficionado como Bach a la simbología numérica, además de a la cábala, Webern sufrió por ser judío la represión intelectual del gobierno nazi. Otra cagada más de Adolf y sus pamplinas.

Y hablando de cagadas, y de las buenas, la del soldado (paradójicamente americano) que hacía la guardia en el toque de queda establecido en Austria al finalizar la Segunda Guerra Mundial. El bueno de Anton salió tras la cena a fumarse un cigarro al portal de su casa, para no molestar a su familia con el humo. El soldado percibió algún tipo de actitud peligrosa en el músico y simplemente le pegó un tiro. Ya se sabe que el tabaco mata. Pero yo qué sé, más bien creo que son la guerra y sus consecuencias las auténticas y mayores cagadas.

It is a perennial accusation made against worshipers that they make their gods in their own image. I’m on record below as being a big fan of Le Poisson Rouge, but in today’s New York Times we are told

So you can imagine how gratified the composer [Arnold Schoenberg] would have been to hear this fresh, keenly dramatic account of “Pierrot Lunaire” presented at an informal club for an eager and receptive audience.

Whoa there.

Schoenberg famously put on his ideal concerts for years in Vienna. These were notoriously ernst affairs. Would the man who didn’t even allow applause take to the easy-going Poisson Rouge atmosphere? I think not. Not the man who said, “If it is art, it is not popular. And if it is popular, it is not art.”

Another thing that the chief critic of the Times may be forgetting is that, if Schoenberg had had his way, said critic might not even have been allowed at the Poisson Rouge performance, since Schoenberg customarily posted a sign at the door saying, Kritikern ist der Eintritt verboten (“Critics are forbidden entry”).

Lesere av bloggen vil ha oppdaget min fascinasjon av Moses-figuren, mannen Norman J. Fedder, i artikkelen “Dramatizing the Torah: Plays about Moses,” kaller “Judaism’s ’superstar’.” Jeg skrev min doktorgradsavhandling om Arnold Schoenbergs (se Arnold Schoenberg Center) opera Moses und Aron (1930-32), og har aldri siden sluttet å arbeide med den operaen. I den forbindelse vil jeg også gjøre oppmerksom på siste webpubliserte nummer av The Opera Quarterly (Volume 23, number 4, autumn 2007), som har denne operaen som tema, og som bringer mer interessant inn i diskusjonen for min del. Jeg har vært opptatt av stemmene i denne operaen (se tidligere post om “Operatiske stemmer” der det også finnes video fra en framføring av operaen).

Et av de store temaer i operaen er det jødiske billedforbudet. Og det er noe paradoksalt over å lage en opera “om” billedforbudet, gitt at det er den musikalske sjanger som kanskje i størst grad nettopp forholder seg til bilder – og iscenesettelser. Men et desto større paradoks er det at denne operaen så har blitt filmatisert. Men i 1973 laget Jean-Marie Straub og Danièlle Huillet en filmadaptasjon. To scener finnes på YouTube. Her er først åpningen, der Moses og stemmen fra tornebusken (en multiple stemme) er i en slags dialog:

I forbindelse med Moses’ stemme se også min tidligere post “Han stammer.” Den andre scenen er dansen rundt gullkalven (se også tidligere post “Gullkalven”):

Det er et “problem” at Straub og Huillet gjør Schoenbergs uferdige opera “ferdig” og filmatiserer tredje akt også, men rent bortsett fra det, som i én forstand er en detalj, er dette riktig interessant filmatisert. Og mer tankeføde.

En av artiklene i The Opera Quarterly, Daniel Albrights “Butchering Moses,” gjorde meg også oppmerksom på en statue jeg ikke hadde hørt om før, Joseph Kiselewskis terrakottastatue av Moses fra Syracuse University:

Her har Moses horn, som han har i store deler av tradisjonen, inkludert Michelangelos statue (fra 1513-15):

Da Kiselewskis statue ble avdekket i 1965 ble det stor oppstandelse da flere mente Moses så ut som en demon (se her). Her synes altså billedforbudet å gå videre, og også å gjelde Moses selv. Som lesere nok forstår, min fascinasjon blir ikke mindre med årene.