New site!

New blog site at http://composering.tumblr.com/ !


I hope my reader will like the improved design and commitment to fewer flash video postings!!

How a composer hears music

/best viewed full screen.

Some of my favorites...

I will go out on a limb and say that Conlon Nancarrow wrote the coolest post WWII music in existence.

Related:

Kyle Gann's Mechanical Piano Study Homage to jazz pianist Bud Powell, "Bud Ran Back Out".
And this, by an unknown Japanese musician.

I should say that any of these pieces double as alarm clock audio.

Macbeth Blues

If you haven't ever experienced Leonard Bernstein's musical pedagogy, I suggest you start here:

(Check out this link to dig deeper into Bernstein's world of Jazz (50 minute series via Youtube))

And then to his ideas about musical semantics:

Ives' "Unanswered Question", a great topic of interest to Bernstein "How should music proceed in the 20th Century?":

The Unanswered Question is an interesting piece, though I'm not sure if it will make much sense without some sort of forward. There is one here (page 268), in a Lecture/Book by the same name by Bernstein. 


Also on youtube: Bernstein on Conducting, on Beethoven, on Opera, on Musical Comedy, on Bach, on Stravinsky, on Rock, on repeat. 


Update: there is a new WSJ article on the Omnibus shows, if you'd like some context.


/ :)

BallDroppings

I think I just wrote my best piece ever. (it crashed at the end)
Still, I want my 19 minutes back, BallDroppings. (requires google chrome!)

Also, and, and, and (for fun:)

Is it Plagiarism?

Recently I stumbled upon a few mash-up videos of Led Zeppelin, a band known its eclectic blend of the Blues, Rock and Roll, quasi-mystical folk ballads, a huge heavy metal sound and plagarism of an older generation of American Blues musicians. You can probably guess which aspect of Led Zeppelin the videos highlighted. The juxtapositions seem particularly appalling: song lyrics stripped many times word for word, riffs, melodies and harmonies watered-down or expanded upon, inserted here and there at will.

For a while watching these videos I felt pretty angry at a group I have always admired for their great contributions to music. But then I started to consider the (Parisian) classical musical world of the 1920's and 30's. Poulenc, Stravinsky, Satie, Milhaud, Honegger.. All stealing from each other, and with neo-classicism, the entire history of music before them. They didn't take texts (well, aside for the assortment of sacred ones, uh oh) or lyrics, but certain musical materials are undeniably taken or traded from others. They made something new with it at each turn, each time it was re-thought for each new composition, but didn't Led Zeppelin do the same? What Led Zeppelin did with Albert King's "The Hunter" in "How many more times" is so different than the original. They gave it a new meaning, introduced it to a new crowd of people, and thus re-energized the original material. And as for Jeff Beck's guitar riff, yes it's quite similar, but it's also just a Lydian scale, which is hardly an original invention of Beck (whose music I also love). If you ask me, the Psychedelic Rock and guitar instrumentals of the 1960s use modal scales in guitar parts like Mozart uses...the alberti bass...the augmented 6th chord... the rondo form… modal mixture...

Either way, admitting that Jimmy Page outright stole material from Jeff Beck, I would still defend its use in that they were collaborative contemporaries like Poulenc and Stravinsky, and that Page gave Beck’s music new context and new meaning.

A good example of what I mean by “musical materials” being used and reused (and even including an example by Led Zeppelin, what a surprise!) is available here via the Listen To This audio guide. This particular chapter highlights a 4 (or so) note descending bass line originating before the 17th century. It can be altered in a number of ways, but the basic outline is that of “Hit the Road Jack” by Ray Charles or “Dazed and Confused” by* Led Zeppelin.

*yeah, turns out they may have stolen that entire song+

+this is looking like spy vs spy cause the guy who really wrote it**, he stole it too, from Bach.
**the jake holmes version really ain't so hot

- Listen to this on Amazon.com
- Chacona, Lamento, Walking Blues - Video by Alex Ross.
- Nytimes story on a new lawsuit against Led Zeppelin over Dazed and Confused. (features same video)