Category Archives: Curiosities

by | August 14, 2015 · 6:00 am

Steve Martin, banjo ace

 

Steve Martin’s love of the banjo dawned when he first heard Earl Scruggs on a record in 1962, when he was was 17 years old and living in the no-bluegrass-zone of Orange County, California.

Though the actor and comedian was drawn to the instrument’s high lonesome sound, it served as a prop in his early comedy routines. His influences included John McEuen (later a founding member of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band), Doug Dillard of the Dillards, and David Lindley (banjo player for the Mad Mountain Ramblers, an acoustic ensemble that Martin heard during a stint at Disneyland).

This according to “Banjo: Obsession is a great substitute for talent” by Mr. Martin, an article included in The Oxford American book of great music writing (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas, 2008, pp. 402–406).

Today is Martin’s 70th birthday! Above, Steve Martin, 2017-08-11 is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Below, performing in 2018.

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by | July 16, 2015 · 6:00 am

Dumbo and psychedelia

 

Some commentators have suggested that the films of Walt Disney led to the emergence of the youth counterculture in the 1960s.

The Disney film Dumbo (1941), particularly the sequence in which Dumbo the baby elephant mistakenly drinks alcohol, has a psychedelic dream, and learns to fly, is a case in point. The song Pink elephants on parade can be interpreted as an unleashing of Dumbo’s creative potential.

This according to “Disney psychedelisch: Musik und Rausch im Zeichentrickfilm” by Gregor Herzfeld (Acta musicologica LXXXVI/1 [2014] pp. 125–146). Below, Dumbo’s dream.

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by | June 9, 2015 · 6:00 am

Carl Nielsen, band musician

Carl_Nielsen_ca_1880

From 1 November 1879 to 31 December 1883 the teen-aged Carl Nielsen was employed as a bugler and trombonist in Odense, with the 16th battalion and the 5th regiment, respectively.

In the long run his modest position in the military could not satisfy him, so he traveled to København to continue his musical training at the conservatory. However, in many ways his time as a military bandsman in Odense was a particularly good basis upon which to build his future.

This according to “Spillemand Carl August Nielsen” by Ida-Marie Vorre (Fynske Minder 2008, pp. 49–63).

Today is Nielsen’s 150th birthday! Above, a photograph from ca. 1880; below, Helios, op. 17, a work in which the orchestra’s brass section figures prominently.

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by | May 28, 2015 · 6:00 am

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, visual artist

Fischer-Dieskau self portrait 1985

When Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau was a little boy he was, as he described himself, “shy, clumsy, obedient, and uninterested in sport.”

He started piano lessons when he was nine, and these led indirectly to his second great artistic pursuit, drawing and painting. It took many years for him to try his hand at oils, but by the 1970s his two homes were filled with many testimonies to his skill. “It helps to release the tensions and strains of my profession,” he told an interviewer.

This according to Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, mastersinger by Kenneth Whitton (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1981, pp. 16–17).

Today would have been Fischer-Dieskau’s 90th birthday! Above, a self-portrait from 1985; below, a brief film presenting several of his portraits.

BONUS: Fischer-Dieskau’s much-celebrated recording of Schubert’s Die Winterreise with Gerald Moore, from 1962.

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by | May 6, 2015 · 6:00 am

From oilcans to old-time

Wayne's Body Shop

For more than 40 years—ever since Wayne Willis discovered that he could play the guitar and wanted some people to play with—Wayne’s Body Shop in Portsmouth, Virginia, has hosted a regular jam session.

Just about everyone who can play old-time, country, bluegrass, or gospel music in southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina has jammed at Wayne’s. The first rule is that there is no hierarchy and no noninclusion; everyone gets a chance to participate.

This according to “Saturday night at Wayne’s Body Shop in Portsmouth, Virginia” by Dan Margolies (The old-time herald IX/3 [Spring 2004] pp.14–18).

Above and below, Saturday night at Wayne’s.

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by | April 2, 2015 · 6:00 am

Crunching ballads

punch cards

In the 1940s Bertrand Harris Bronson became one of the first scholars to use computers for musicological analysis.

For one of his projects he encoded melodic characteristics of hundreds of tunes collected for the traditional ballad Barbara Allen on punch cards, so a computer could ferret out similarities. His project resulted in four groups of tunes, members of which came from both sides of the Atlantic with varying frequency.

This according to “All this for a song?” an essay by Bronson reprinted in his collection The ballad as song (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969, pp. 224–242).

Above, an illustration from the article (click to enlarge); below, the classic recording of the song by Jean Ritchie, a singer Bronson deeply admired.

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by | March 23, 2015 · 6:00 am

Music for abusers

Istedgade

For some decades the back entrance of the Hovedbanegård (Central Station) in København served as a shelter and meeting place for alcoholics, drug abusers, and drug dealers, because this part of the station faces Istedgade Kvarteret (Isted Street Quarter, above), a part of the city that accommodates prostitution and pornography shops and cinemas. When narcotics entered the milieu of prostitution, this part of the city also became the home of junkies and drug dealers.

After a major restoration of the station in the 1990s the management wanted to get rid of the abusers in the back entrance. So did many travelers. And as the police did not succeed, they adopted a concept that had proved its efficiency at the central station in Hamburg. By playing music from the Romantic period through a loudspeaker, they stressed the abusers so much that, after a few days of persistence, they left the entrance hall.

Most of the junkies and alcoholics are not familiar with nor attracted to classical Romanticism, and popular music has been a vital part of their lifestyle. Therefore they feel uncomfortable when smoking, fixing, or dealing accompanied by strange classical music. For the travelers, however, Romantic-era music is a preferred genre compared to, for example, medieval music, atonal music, bebop, or modern jazz, and they are not bothered by it during the half minute it takes to pass through the entrance.

This according to “Musik for misbrugere” by Olav Harsløf (Antropologi LIV [2006–2007] pp. 87–98). Below, an excerpt from Berlioz’s opium-themed Symphonie fantastique, a Romantic-era work suitable for the station’s loudspeaker.

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by | March 21, 2015 · 6:00 am

Bach or the Devil

Devil_Plays_His_Organ

During his life, Bach was primarily known as a dazzling organist with virtuoso improvising abilities. Not surprisingly, his prowess gave rise to a number of urban legends.

One such legend had him traveling incognito, dressed as a village schoolmaster, going from church to church to try out the organs—prompting one local organist to cry out, “I don’t know who’s playing, but it’s either Bach or the Devil!”

This according to “Tod und Teufel” by Frieder Reininghaus, an essay included in Bach-ABC (Sinzig: Studio-Verlag, 2007, pp. 91–93).

Today is Bach’s 330th birthday! Below, the tocatta and fugue in D minor, BWV 565, which always seems to surface around Halloween.

More posts about J.S. Bach are here.

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by | March 20, 2015 · 6:00 am

Svâtoslav Rihter’s spontaneous recitals

sviatoslav-richter-kiev-1958

In a 1997 interview, Svâtoslav Rihter spoke about his love of unscheduled performing.

“I now know from experience that things planned too far in advance always end up being aborted. Always! Either you fall ill, or you’re prevented from appearing for some other reason, whereas if you improvise—“The day after tomorrow? Of course, why not?” or, if the worst comes to the worst, “Next week?”—everything passes off smoothly. I may be on form today, but who can tell what I’ll feel like on such-and-such a date in the more-or-less distant future?”

“And so, when I arrive in a country I prefer to open a map and show my impresarios the places that have certain associations for me or that excite my curiosity and, if possible, that I’ve not yet had a chance to visit. We then set off by car, followed by the pianos, avoiding motorways like the plague. And then I may play in a theater or chapel or in a school playground at Roanne, Montluçon, or in some remote corner of Provence. All that matters is that people come not out of snobbery but to listen to the music.”

This from Sviatoslav Richter: Notebooks and conversations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001, pp. 110, 114).

Today is Rihter’s 100th birthday! Above, in Kiev in 1958; below, a 1964 performance of Prokof’ev’s second piano sonata.

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by | March 19, 2015 · 6:00 am

Ice Music

 

In 2014 the guitarist Charlie Sexton and other musicians from Austin, Texas, collaborated with Danish and Swedish musicians in the cross-cultural jam known as Ice Music in Luleå, Sweden.

The artists co-wrote and performed songs on violins, cellos, and other “icestruments” designed by the instrument maker Tim Linhart. The icestruments are played inside igloos to slow the melting process. Some must be suspended from the ceiling to avoid cracking, and all require frequent tuning, re-freezing with dry ice vapor, and spot repairs, as handling and body heat cause nearly instantaneous melting.

Linhart hopes the collaboration with the musicians from Texas will be the start of a long-term project to establish a new genre of music inspired by the elements.

This according to “For these musicians, hot licks provide cold comfort: Players in Sweden make music from ice instruments; beware of melting violins” by Anna Molin and Miguel Bustillo (The Wall Street journal CCLXV/57 [11 March 2015] pp. A1, A10); an online version of the article is here.

Below, Ice Music in Luleå.

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