Tag Archives: Composers

by | October 1, 2015 · 6:00 am

Dukas and the uncanny

paul-dukas

In Paul Dukas’s L’apprenti sorcier, the figure of the magically animated broom becomes an agent of the uncanny, matching definitions subsequently outlined by Freud in his 1919 essay Das Unheimliche.

New attention to musical details, the composer’s unpublished notes, and the structure of Goethe’s poem Der Zauberlehrling suggests that Dukas’s work stands as a peculiar kind of fiction that points to the uncanny nature of narrative itself and the impossibility of mastery.

This according to “Silence, echo: A response to What the sorcerer said” by Carlo Caballero (19th-century music XXVIII/2 [fall 2004] pp. 160–182).

Today is Dukas’s 150th birthday! Below, the work in question.

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by | September 22, 2015 · 6:00 am

The Boydell composer compendium series

Rameau compendium

Boydell & Brewer launched The Boydell composer compendium series in 2014 with The Rameau compendium by Graham Sadler.

The series aims to present up-to-date reference works on major composers that can provide instant information and connect users with further reading. As leading authorities on the composers in question, the authors are encouraged both to present available information and, where appropriate, to introduce new facts and arguments and to illuminate the various discourses on the subject.

Each volume includes an exhaustive cross-referenced dictionary of relevant people, places, institutions, compositions, terminology, genres, and events. A comprehensive bibliography is also included, as are numerous musical examples and illustrations.

Below, John Eliot Gardiner conducts a concert of Rameau’s works.

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by | September 11, 2015 · 6:00 am

Arvo Pärt and tintinnabuli

In an interview, Arvo Pärt discussed his tintinnabuli style:

“It is a very simple, concentrated, and strict polyphonic harmonic system—although not in the classical sense. Tintinnabuli is merely a name; it is not intended to signify anything specific. And it sounds nice.”

“The most difficult thing is to find the right spirit. It all depends on that.”

This according to “A quick one while he’s away” by Ben Finane (Listen: Life with classical music IV/4 [winter 2012] p. 96).

Today is Pärt’s 80th birthday! Below, Spiegel im Spiegel, a much-celebrated example of his tintinnabuli style.

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by | August 7, 2015 · 6:00 am

Rahsaan Roland Kirk and “Rip, rig, and panic”

Roland Kirk 1966

 

Rahsaan Roland Kirk’s Rip, rig, and panic provides a rich example of irony in jazz, not least for its good-natured sendup of Edgard Varèse.

The work’s multipart form is punctuated by breaking glass, a siren, and Kirk’s multi-instrumental imitations of electronic sounds. Flanked by nonmetric improvisations, its two swing sections are counted down by Kirk on castanets.

In the album’s liner notes Kirk explained the title: “Rip means Rip Van Winkle (or Rest in Peace?). It’s the way people, even musicians are. They’re asleep. Rig means like rigor mortis. That’s where a lot of people’s minds are. When they hear me doing things they didn’t think I could do they panic in their minds.”

This according to “Doubleness and jazz improvisation: Irony, parody, and ethnomusicology” by Ingrid Monson (Critical inquiry XX/2 [winter 1994] pp. 283–313).

Today would have been Kirk’s 80th birthday! Above, performing at Ronnie Scott’s ca. 1969 or 70 (photo © Del de la Haye); below, the 1965 recording.

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by | August 3, 2015 · 6:00 am

Beethoven at the table

Beethoven’s conversation books indicate that he particularly liked pasta with parmesan cheese and salami.

He also liked veal, beef, liver, chicken, oysters, fish, spinach, fruit, cream, sugar, soup, eggs, very strong coffee and, last but not least, wine. He didn’t like pork and he was not really fond of beer.

This according to Die gute Kocherey: Aus Beethovens Speiseplänen by Martella Gutiérrez-Denhoff (Bonn: Beethoven-Haus, 1988); the book includes several recipies.

Below, a chance to enjoy Beethoven’s music with some street food.

More posts about Beethoven are here.

 

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by | July 25, 2015 · 6:00 am

Per Nørgårds skrifter online

 

Per Nørgårds skrifter online is an archive of nearly 500 writings, arranged alphabetically by article title. Full text is available for nearly 400 items. A chronological work list, 1949–2012, is included, along with a full biography of the composer.

The site is sponsored by Det Kongelige Bibliotek and edited by Ivan Hansen.

Below, the finale of his 8th symphony (2011).

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by | July 20, 2015 · 6:00 am

Natale Monferrato: Complete Masses

Natale Monferrato

Natale Monferrato was maestro di cappella at the Basilica Cattedrale Patriarcale Metropolitana Primaziale di San Marco Evangelista in Venice from 1676 to 1685.

An obscure figure of early Baroque history, Monferrato (who trained under Claudio Monteverdi, Giovanni Rovetta, and Francesco Cavalli, among others) was, in fact, responsible for restoring discipline and musical standards in a chapel that had long succumbed to secular decay.

The type of Mass composition most commonly sung at San Marco was the a cappella form, as distinct from the messa concertata. Musicologists have long relied on a small corpus of music—notably containing two works by Monteverdi—for appraising the a cappella style at the 17th-century chapel.

In 2014 A-R Editions issued Natale Monferrato: Complete Masses, a definitive edition of Monferrato’s Masses. This edition—a total of eight settings from the composer’s opuses 13 and 19—provides a major boost to musical scholarship by presenting the most substantial testimony to the cathedral’s daily ritual during the Baroque era.

Below, Monferrato’s setting of Alma redemptoris mater.

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by | July 1, 2015 · 6:00 am

Willie Dixon, blues innovator

 

Using conventional musical devices for blues compositions as a basis, Willie Dixon expanded the possibilities for blues songwriting by introducing elements from pop song forms, using a quatrain refrain text form with longer musical structures than a 12-bar form, and amalgamating the 12-bar/a-a-b form with the 16-bar/quatrain refrain form in different sections of a composition.

Dixon also helped artists such as Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and Koko Taylor to intensify their public images; his development of their performing personae is relevant to the tradition of the blues as a secular religion, and Dixon’s casting of them originated in traditional black badman tales circulated in the postbellum South.

This according to Willie Dixon’s work on the blues: From the early recordings through the Chess and Cobra years, 1940–1971 by Mitsutoshi Inaba, a dissertation accepted by the University of Oregon in 2005.

Today is Dixon’s 100th birthday! Below, he sings his own Back door man, first recorded by Howlin’ Wolf in 1960; the song is a classic example of Dixon’s innovations in blues song forms.

BONUS: The inimitable Howlin’ Wolf recording:

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by | June 29, 2015 · 6:00 am

Bach at the table

Bach food

The holdings of the Bachhaus in Eisenach include a polished goblet that was presented to J.S. Bach around 1735; the word VIVAT inscribed on it was meant as an invitation to enjoy a glass of wine.

Sources including letters, pay slips, stipends, and the 1750 catalog of his estate suggest that Bach’s life was sometimes cheerfully informal.  The table of this choral street-singer, organist, cantor, court musician, and municipal music director—whose salary as an employee was, throughout his life, paid not only in money but also in kind (grain, fish, beer, wine, wood)—was abundantly set for his large family and for the many welcome guests, and his comfortable standard of living was provided for on a corresponding scale.

This according to Zu Tisch bei Johann Sebastian Bach: Einnahmen und “Consumtionen” einer Musikerfamilie by Walter Salmen (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 2009).

Below, Bach’s jovial Mer hahn en neue Oberkeet (“Bauernkantate”), BWV #212, which includes the encouraging words “Wave if you’re thirsty!”

More posts about J.S. Bach are here.

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by | June 24, 2015 · 6:00 am

Terry Riley’s moonshine dervishes

 

The title of Terry Riley’s improvisation template Descending moonshine dervishes  is rooted in several sources.

“Moonshine” may be considered a triple entendre referring to the mysticism of the shining moon, the ecstasy associated with U.S. moonshine liquor, and Riley’s property on Moonshine Road in the Yuba River country of California’s Sierra foothills, which he has dubbed Shri Moonshine Ranch.

Dervishes are adherents of Sufism, and although Riley subscribes to a general spirituality rather than any formal religious orientation the Sufi tradition has clearly been important to him, as evinced by his performances in mosques and with musicians more closely involved with Sufism. Riley has also used the word dervish in reference to his Hindustani music teacher, Pran Nath.

This according to “Terry Riley in the 70s” by Mark Alburger (21st-century music XI/3 [March 2004] pp. 4–7).

Today is Riley’s 80th birthday! Below, Descending moonshine dervishes as he performed it in Berlin in 1975 (Kuckuck, 1982).

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