Tag Archives: Performers

by | November 12, 2018 · 6:00 am

Forging and legitimizing Dutch metal

 

Dutch heavy metal came of age in 2001 with the first mainstream success of the symphonic metal band Within Temptation, whose single Ice queen reached the number two position in the national Top 40.

The woman-fronted group initiated a trend that became internationally associated with the Netherlands and Dutchness. In 2007 the German magazine Rock hard labeled the genre melodic-dark-metal with female vocals, and counted the Netherlands among the leading nations in this field. Within Temptation has received support from the Ministerie van Economische Zaken en Klimaat, which is interested in stimulating the export value and copyright revenues of Dutch artists.

The next step was formal education: Metal Factory was founded in 2013 to teach instrumental skills and the ins and outs of band organization, management, communication, and touring.

This according to “From thrash to cash: Forging and legitimizing Dutch metal” by Pauwke Berkers and Julian Schaap, an essay included in Made in the Low Countries: Studies in popular music (New York: Routledge, 2018, pp. 61–71).

Above, Within Temptation’s guitarist Ruud Jolie teaches at Metal Factory; below, the official Ice queen video.

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by | November 8, 2018 · 6:00 am

Don Byron’s intercultural eclecticism

 

The eclecticism of Don Byron and his music reflects the decentralization of music in the U.S., where there is no single musical culture but rather mini-, micro-, and subcultures that continually mutate into new idioms.

While eclectic music seems to characterize culture in the U.S. at this moment, the discussion about it reveals certain cultural biases. Byron’s works highlight the tension between assimilation and difference and dispel prevalent assumptions regarding style politics and identity politics.

This according to “Making mischief in the melting pot: The intercultural music of Don Byron” by Barbara White, an essay included in Intercultural music. III (Richmond: MRI, 2001, pp. 15–37).

Today is Byron’s 60th birthday! Below, a track from Don Byron plays the music of Mickey Katz.

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by | November 2, 2018 · 6:00 am

Bunny Berigan, Mr. Trumpet

 

The life of the jazz trumpeter Rowland Bernard “Bunny” Berigan resembles nothing less than an ancient Greek tragedy: a heroic figure who rises from obscurity to dizzying heights, touches greatness, becomes ensnared by circumstances, and comes to a disastrous early end.

Berigan was a charismatic performer. His artistry made a deep and lasting impression on everyone who heard him play, while the body of recorded work he left continues to evoke a wide range of emotions. He played a key role in a golden age of American popular music and jazz.

This according to Mr. Trumpet: The trials, tribulations, and triumph of Bunny Berigan by Michael P. Zirpolo (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2011).

Today is Berigan’s 110th birthday! Below, his classic 1937 recording of I can’t get started, which was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1975.

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by | October 18, 2018 · 6:00 am

An aperitif for Lotte Lenya

 

For the opening of a 1976 exhibit on Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the curator, Don Vlack, created an aperitif inspired by Lenya and named in her honor.

Vlack described the drink, which is made with Mandarine Napoléon liqueur and Kritter Brut sparkling wine, as “very much like the great singer in that it is slightly bittersweet, gentle but potent (even volatile), and is, in color, a light orange, the tint of her hair.”

This according to “Lenya: A moment in history (and a drink)” (Kurt Weill newsletter XXIX/2 [fall 2011] p. 9).

Today is Lenya’s 130th birthday! Above, enjoying her namesake aperitif at the opening reception; below, singing Seeräuber-Jenny, one of her signature songs.

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by | April 13, 2016 · 6:00 am

Al Green’s “Take me to the river”

Written and recorded by Al Green (guitarist Teenie Hodges gets a co-writing credit), Take me to the river straddles the line between sacred and secular—between sultry soul music and ecstatic gospel release. The sound is R&B with lashings of subtlety; it doesn’t sound like a band playing, it sounds like a lot of instruments humming.

Despite never being released as a single, Take me to the river was covered in turn by several other R&B musicians. Still, it took a band of CBGB-dwelling art school grads to fully realize the song’s potential.

Produced by Brian Eno, the Talking Heads version turns the original production inside out. In the original version, the strings, horns, organ, guitars, and Green’s wild-honey voice blend into a single swinging, winning thing, whereas the Heads/Eno version emphasizes open space and distinct sounds.

This according to “Take me to the river” by Tim De Lisle, an essay included in Lives of the great songs (London: Penguin, 1995 pp. 21–25; RILM Abstracts of Music Literature, 1995-20152).

Today is Green’s 70th birthday! Above, Green in 2010 (photo credit: Kingkingphoto&celebrity-photos.com, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0).

Below, the original recording, followed by the Talking Heads version.

BONUS: Talking Heads in Stop making sense (1984).

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by | September 20, 2015 · 6:00 am

Jelly Roll Morton and Frog-i-More

jelly roll morton

Jelly Roll Morton probably wrote Frog-i-More rag in 1908 to accompany a fellow vaudevillian known as Frog-i-More, a contortionist who performed in a frog costume, but he did not deposit the music for copyright until 1918 for fear that any form of public record was an invitation to purloin his ideas.

Morton’s piano style and musical greatness are nowhere better demonstrated. All of the most typical features are abundantly evident: his wealth of melodic invention and skill in variation; the tremendous swing; his feeling for formal design and attention to detail; his effective use of pianistic resources; the contrasts of subtle elegance with hard hitting drive; and the variety of harmony yet freedom from complication and superficial display.

This according to “Jelly Roll Morton and the Frog-i-More rag” by William Russell, an essay included in The art of jazz: Essays on the nature and development of jazz (New York: Oxford University Press, 1959, pp. 35–36).

Today is Morton’s 135th birthday! Below, a performance of the piece via mediated piano roll.

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by | September 16, 2015 · 6:00 am

B.B. King’s evolving technique

 

 

B.B. King’s guitar technique drew from many sources, both direct and indirect.

At first he functioned primarily as a vocalist, making little idiomatic use of the instrument; in subsequent recordings the influence of T-Bone Walker became quite apparent.

He also adapted embellishments used by earlier blues guitarists (Lonnie Johnson) as well as those of jazz guitarists (Charlie Christian, Django Reinhardt, Bill Jennings). King’s distinctive finger tremolo was inspired by Bukka White’s bottleneck style.

This according to “B.B. King: Analysis of the artist’s evolving guitar technique” by Jerry Richardson (American Music Research Center journal VI [1996] pp. 89–107.

Today would have been King’s 90th birthday! Above, King in the late 1980s (photo licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license); below, live in 1974.

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by | August 15, 2015 · 6:00 am

Oscar Peterson’s aesthetics

 

In an interview, Oscar Peterson discussed his aesthetics and teaching.

“I’m an admirer of the beautiful long line that starts out and then reaches a point of definition. If you reach a point of definition, it validates all the other aspects of the line.”

“One thing I try to convey to my students when I’m teaching is the relativity of notes. From a melodic standpoint there are wrong notes. But from a creative standpoint there are no wrong notes because every note can be related to a chord. Every note can be made part of your line, depending on how fast you can integrate it into your schematic arrangement.”

“It’s not a matter of technique; it’s time….You have an idea, and it’s confined to a certain period in a piece on an overlay of harmonic carpeting. You have to get from here to there in whatever time you’re allotted with whatever ideas you have.”

Quoted in “Oscar Peterson” by Leonard Lyons, an interview included in The great jazz pianists: Speaking of their lives and music (New York: Thomas Morrow, 1983, pp. 130–43).

Today would have been Peterson’s 90th birthday! Below, the pianist as jazz encyclopedia.

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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 | 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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