by | November 12, 2012 · 1:00 am

Gramophone ethics

With outward horror, but with secret envy, let us contemplate a man who is wealthy, unambitious, and unencumbered. After breakfast he lights a cigar, sinks into an armchair, and rings for the butler to set the gramophone going.

While one’s imagination may boggle at the thought, let us free ourselves from such trammels of convention that would confine the gramophone to the first half hour of after-dinner plethora. There is music to be had for all times and seasons.

Further, a convincing argument cannot be made against listening to the gramophone alone: If one may read a book without company, how can enjoying music in solitude be indecent?

This according to “Times and seasons” by Orlo Williams (Gramophone June 1923, pp. 38–39), an article reprinted in Music, sound, and technology in America: A documentary history of early phonograph, cinema, and radio (Durham: Duke University Press, 2012). Below, a gramophone record issued a few months after the article appeared.

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by | November 9, 2012 · 1:00 am

The symphonic repertoire

Indiana University Press launched the series The symphonic repertoire in 2002, with volume 2. Subsequently production was stalled following the death of the founder of the series, A. Peter Brown; it was revived in 2012.

For Volume 1, The Eighteenth-Century Symphony, 22 of Brown’s former students and colleagues collaborated to complete the work that he began on this critical period of development in symphonic history. The book follows Brown’s outline, is organized by country, and focuses on major composers.

Contributors address issues of historiography, the status of research, and questions of attribution and stylistic traits, and provide background material on the musical context of composition and early performances. The volume features a CD of recordings from the Bloomington Early Music Festival Orchestra, highlighting the largely unavailable repertoire discussed in the book.

Below, the Amadeus Orchestra performs a symphony by the little-known Czech composer Johann Baptist Vanhal (1739–1813).

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by | November 7, 2012 · 1:00 am

Subversive belly dancing

The role of the belly dancer at elite weddings in Cairo illuminates Egyptian attitudes toward sexuality.

The dancer plays on ambiguous evaluations, using the wit associated with baladī-class women to subvert patriarchal constructions of sexuality. Song lyrics, dance forms, and musical styles are all important aspects of raqṣ baladī.

Using wit, gestures, and the raqṣ baladī genre of dance and music, the performer Fifi Abdou entertains through an elaborate joke form in which she deconstructs and reconstructs sexualized assumptions about Egyptian dance and herself as a sexualized dancer.

This according to “‘Oh boy, you salt of the earth’: Outwitting patriarchy in raqs baladi” by Cassandra Lorius (Popular music XV/3 [October 1996] pp. 285–298). Above and below, historic performances by Ms. Abdou.

More articles about belly dance are here.

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by | November 5, 2012 · 1:00 am

Violins and fungi

In the late 17th and early 18th century the great violin maker Antonio Stradivari used a special wood that had grown in the cold period between 1645 and 1715. In the long winters and the cool summers, the wood grew especially slowly and evenly, creating low density and a high modulus of elasticity. Until now, modern violin makers could only dream of wood with such tonal qualities.

Similar wood can now be made available for violin making. The fungus species Physisporinus vitreus and Xylaria longipes can decay Norway spruce and sycamore—two important kinds of wood used for violin making—to such an extent that their tonal quality is improved. Unlike other fungus species, they gradually degrade the cell walls, inducing thinning; but even in the late stages of decomposition a stiff scaffold structure remains through which the sound waves can still travel directly.

The implementation of such biotechnological methods for treating soundboard wood could make it possible one day for violinists to afford instruments with the sound quality of a Stradivari.

This according to “Production of superior wood for violins by use of wood decay fungi” by Francis W.M.R. Schwarze, et al. (Journal of the Violin Society of America XXII/1 [2009] pp. 116-124). Above, a Stradivarius at the Palacio Real de Madrid. Below, a brief documentary on the process described by Schwarze.

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by | November 2, 2012 · 1:00 am

Bach-Repertorium

In 2012 Carus-Verlag launched the series Bach-Repertorium to make available for study and performance the compositions of all members of the widespread Bach family of musicians from the 17th into the 19th century.

For the first time, as a result of systematic research covering all musical and archive sources, all compositions attributed to members of the Bach family will be categorized according to the same criteria. In addition to details of scoring, succession of movements, and history of the works and sources, information is given concerning editions, authentication, and the most important literary references.

In the case of vocal works the origins of the texts, editions of the librettos, and the chorale melodies used are verified. Also covered are arrangements of works by other composers, editions with which the composer was involved, and—as far as it can be reconstructed—his music library.

An appendix includes arrangements by others, and spurious works are also described. The accompanying music examples document in short score the beginning of each movement and the structurally important sections of the compositions, providing for an initial insight into the works. The use of the volumes is facilitated by numerous indices.

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by | October 31, 2012 · 1:00 am

Frank Zappa and Uncle Meat

The 1969 double album Uncle Meat by Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention is a collage of rock, jazz, modernist art music, parodies of 1950s pop songs, and documentary-style spoken passages; two recurring themes and their variations unite it as a single musical statement.

Other unifying factors include the collage approach itself, which is echoed in Cal Schenkel’s cover and booklet art, the alienation aroused by the shocking elements in the musical and spoken episodes and in Schenkel’s art, and the anachronistic contrast provided by the pop song parodies.

Throughout his career Zappa successfully positioned himself as an outsider to both the rock and art music worlds, thus managing to maintain a unique place in both; Uncle Meat stands as his strongest single statement in this regard.

This according to “The Mothers of Invention and Uncle Meat: Alienation, anachronism and a double variation” by James Grier (Acta musicologica LXXIII/1 [2001] pp. 77–95). Above, Schenkel’s front cover art (worthy of today’s Halloween posting!); below, the Uncle Meat theme.

Related article: Zappa and classical music

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by | October 24, 2012 · 1:00 am

Gnawa jazz

The Gnawa ma’llem (spirit master) Abdellah El-Gourd and the African American jazz pianist Randy Weston met in El-Gourd’s native Tangier in the early 1970s; over the next 30 years their interactions transformed their lives.

They recognized a common thread in slavery, as the Gnawa were originally sub-Saharan peoples who were mainly brought to Morocco as slaves. The two men collaborated musically, and Weston’s music was deeply influenced by the experience.

For El-Gourd, the great figures in jazz—both historical and contemporary—became symbolic ancestors; their portraits hang in his home next to those of Gnawa elders. Also due to his Western encounters, El-Gourd realized the importance of documenting his local laylaẗ tradition, a project that possesses him in a way that may be compared to the spirit possession of the laylaẗ ceremony itself, and which resonates with the way that Gnawa music has possessed and is possessed by the West.

This according to “Possessing Gnawa culture: Displaying sound, creating history in an unofficial museum” by Deborah Kapchan (Music & anthropology: Journal of musical anthropology of the Mediterranean 7 [2002]). Below, a brief interview with El-Gourd.

Related articles:

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by | October 21, 2012 · 1:00 am

Solti and world peace

 

After a surprise 80th birthday party hosted by Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, Georg Solti thanked the multinational ensemble that had just performed and wondered aloud why musicians from many different countries can play together in harmony, while international diplomats cannot even agree on the crucial issue of world peace.

Inspired by this notion, his wife, Valerie Solti, hatched a plan with Leia Maria Boutros-Ghali, the wife of the then United Nations Secretary-General, to amass an orchestra comprising players from all over the world, and to have this orchestra perform for the U.N.’s 50th anniversary in 1995.

Dubbed the World Orchestra for Peace, the ensemble—79 musicians from 24 countries—debuted in Geneva in July of that year, with Solti at the podium, to great critical acclaim. The maestro did not live to preside over another of their performances, but the orchestra lives on, materializing whenever conditions permit.

This according to “The conductor with an ear for peace” by Harvey Sachs (The New York times 14 October 2012, p. AR11).

Today is Solti’s 100th birthday! Below, he conducts the World Orchestra for Peace in Rossini’s overture to Guillaume Tell.

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by | October 19, 2012 · 1:00 am

The first musical comedy

The earliest known secular stage play with music, Adam de la Halle’s Le jeu de Robin et de Marion, has been touted as the first musical comedy.

Of the two extant sources, the Paris version is by far the rowdier one—three characters that do not appear in the Aix version engage in mooning the audience, playing with sheep dung, and speaking in unimaginable metaphors worthy of Hungarians.

Common to both versions, Robin, Marion, and the seducing knight are more stock characters, but their lines are pithy and suggestive—e.g., from the scene depicted above:

Knight: You surely won’t put up a fight—you’re just a peasant, I’m a knight!

Marion: Money can’t buy love, you know.

Knight: It can buy something like it, though.

This according to “The hows and whys of Adam de la Halle’s Robin & Marion” by Lucy E. Cross (Early music America XVII/1 [Spring 2011] pp. 38–42). Below, a complete family-friendly performance of the work.

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by | October 5, 2012 · 1:00 am

Musicalia Medii Aevi

A series launched by Brepols in 2011, Musicalia Medii Aevi is a collection of international studies that welcomes writings and reflections on the most innovative aspects of medieval musicology.

As one of the essential liberal arts in the Middle Ages, music was at the center of the era’s thought and culture. That is why the collection addresses the field of music as part of a wide and varied cultural history, often in interdisciplinary terms, offering a fresh look at the role of music in medieval society. The first volume in the series is The calligraphy of medieval music by John Haines.

Related article: Codici online

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