Saturday, May 31, 2014

Playlist

Tonight
 
May 31, 2014 - 8:30 PM
Your Mother Should Know - Highdive, Seattle
with Ancient Warlocks, Tom Price Desert Classic, On the Ground, and Ian Grunfeld
 
Recorded
 
May 26, 2014
Orpheus - Stravinsky - Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Stravinsky
 
Dense lines richly wrought.
 
Fireworks - Claude Boling, Roy Eldridge [from Allen Lowe's That Devilin' Tune]
Narrative Introducing 'You Ain't Nothing But A Hound Dog' - Elvis Presley [from The First Live Recordings]
My True Story - The Jive Five [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]
 
Refers and comments, but never tells. Names names, but takes them back.
 
Hungry - Paul Revere and the Raiders - [from The Legend of Paul Revere]
 
Our local chameleon band of yore in Rolling Stone mode.
 
Way Back Home - Junior Walker and the All Stars [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]
 
May 27, 2014
Standing Waves 76 - Stuart Dempster - Stuart Dempster
 
The recording is a frame within which we hear a dialogue - between a human and a chamber space - that projects an image of a breathing building. In breath: singing || In song: voice || in voice: human || the image of the human building breathing is a frame within which we hear voice emerging.
 
The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel - Grandmaster Flash [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]
 
Design strategy: construct a fort of a default rhythm gesture position from which extrusions interrupt slantwise in multiple layers of overlain interruptions. As though ready to burst, but held tight.
 
Greenwood 1986 (k wore that
shirt today in the garden)
Mistrial - Lou Reed
 
Karen and I spent part of the money we got as wedding presents on a bunch of CDs (the newest thing!) to play on the CD player we got as another wedding gift. This was among them. The song writing is clever and flawless. The performances are top-notch. The engineering is superb. The album, alas, is a bore.
 
May 29, 2014
Too Shy (single version) - Moe Tucker [from I Feel So Far Away - Moe Tucker Anthology 1974 - 1998]
Bounce - Renee Coulombe [from Open Space 12]
 
Envelope (big to little to big) (thickly dense to thinner to thickly dense) as idea. What's in the bag, in its interactions with what else is in the bag, is not as crucial as the shape into which those interactions bloat the bag.
 
Nineteen American Waysides - Doug Haire
 
surreal closeness temporal and spatial
radio space radio time
stuck in the ditches of wherever
ghosts follow cars
layers peel away leaving layers emerging dripping down
geologic trace gradual or torn
night crickets and frogs
left when vision ends
this roar we forever make
or distill
and our creature fellows
a book of poems, hymns
but not of the globe
 
Turncoat - Old Haunts [from The Funhouse Comp Thing]
The Way It Was - J. K. Randall [from Milton Babbitt: A Composers' Memorial]
J. K. R.
 
This past week saw the passing from this life of J. K. Randall, who was among the world's most generous creative spirits and occupies a major place in the virtual symposium of my elder colleagues. I had the great good fortune, in the company of a small contingent from Bard, to have spent several hours in improvisation and conversation with him in September of 1983. Among the fruits of that weekend was a taped improvisation - Labor Day (distributed as part of InterPlay) - that is a tour-de-force of comedic timing. To this day I don't know how the rest of us kept a straight face as Jim waxed passionate about baseball "Stats!" Just before pushing the record button he turned to us and asked "Noise reduction? Who wants noise reduction?"
 
For me as a composer, his music is a touchstone of just how far out there out there extends, of just how far in in is, and of just how far down down drops away below us. For me as a pianist it has only been in the last few years that I have overcome trepidation and begun to sneak up (by way of the Troubador Songs and Greek Nickels 1 and 2) on an attempt at ". . . . . such words as it were vain to close . . . . .", his 1977 elegy in unisons and octaves.
 
He had a way with the completely ordinary that stuns. The Way It Was is a midi composition, and there is nothing particularly fancy about the samples he uses nor any subtlety about the way he blats them out into the room. They are just exactly the most utilitarian out-of-the-box placeholder-most of sounds one could ask for, unmolested (a JKR word) by reverb, naked to the precise rhythmic relation they bear to their others. They burn.
 
In Session at the Tintinabulary
 
May 25, 2014
Franciscan 140525
Improvising on a nylon string guitar.
 
May 26, 2014
Porch AM 140526
I recorded 2+ hours of morning sounds from my porch, starting at about 4:20 AM.
 
Your Mother Should Know
Mike Gervais came over and recorded the horn tracks for the upcoming YMSK album.

Upcoming

June 27, 2014 - 8 PM
Banned Rehearsal Celebrates 30 Years of Noise
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Saturday, May 24, 2014

Playlist

Live

May 23, 2014
Stag
Mikey and Matty
Minus 5
Tractor Tavern, Seattle

There is a rhythm of musics as they speak through and across generations of musicians, through and across the years. There is a rhythm to a music as it ages within a musician, and as it is expressed from that musician, and as it feeds back into the webs of mutually influencing fellow musicians.  Guessed roughly, the guys in Stag are in their 40s, Mikey and Matty and their excellent crew are in their 30s, and Minus 5, are, in their own words, "now in our 50s / soon to be 60s". There are stylistic differences in what they do, but those differences aren't polemically charged. What carries a charge is the depth of the layered past as evoked. A long long chain of ringing ears.

Recorded

May 22, 2014
Remeriro de Sao Francisco - New World Chamber Ensemble, Gerard Schwarz, Robert Bonfiglio
I Shall Wear A Crown - Arizona Dranes [from Allen Lowe's Really The Blues]

A strident affirmation of faith. But, from the point of view of a downtrodden soul, it is a declaration of victory. She'll get hers, but we'll get ours.

Improvisation on "Victimae paschali" - Charles Tournemire - Douglas Cleveland [from The Grand Organ of Princeton University Chapel]

There is a rhythm of the beginnings and ends of pitch events. But this is heard behind a rhythm of the relative speakings of each pitch event - they may start at the same time, but pipes don't all speak with equal rapidity. And in turn, this is heard behind a rhythm of the speaking of the space itself - each pitch event finds itself in a unique location within the chamber, and each location within the chamber speaks at a different rate. Or: the pipe is opened and then the pipe speaks and then the sound of the pipe speaking finds its location of speaking.

Density 21.5 - Varese - Rene Le Roy

An indictment. Stops you in your tracks.

Menelik - Rex Stewart [from Allen Lowe's That Devilin' Tune]

Starts and ends in an utterly remarkable low splattery squalor of lippy trumpet. In the middle it makes like it's straight up, but it ain't. Fabulous!

In Session at the Tintinabulary

May 18, 2014
Fox Spit 140518 - Keith Eisenbrey

May 19, 2014
Banned Rehearsal 859 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal Meyer

May 22, 2014
Zoom Test 140522 - Keith Eisenbrey

Upcoming


May 31, 2014 - 8:30 PM
Your Mother Should Know - Highdive, Seattle
with Ancient Warlocks, Tom Price Desert Classic, On the Ground, and Ian Grunfeld

June 27, 2014 - 8 PM
Banned Rehearsal Celebrates 30 Years of Noise
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Sunday, May 18, 2014

Playlist

Recorded
 
May 11, 2014
Francesca da Rimini - Tchaikovsky - Concertgebouworkest Amsterdam, Bernard Haitink
 
Its gaze is steady. It looks neither to right nor left. It bears in, observes, moves on.
 
Serenade in E-flat - Strauss - Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Gerard Schwarz
Sonata in A - Franck - Zino Francescatti, Robert Casadesus
Variations on America - Ives - David Di Fiore [from The Grand Organ of the Castle Church of St. Catherine Kremnica vol. 2]
 
The declamation gleefully and completely overwhelms any sense of  continuity - the segments of theme are allowed to hang in space, brazen in glory. The next is not moved to, progressed toward, pointed at, or otherwise sullied - there it is WHAM!
 
Who Broke The Lock - Standard Quartette  [from Allen Lowe's That Devilin' Tune]
The Easy Winners - Scott Joplin - William Albright
 
 
May 12, 2014
Chamber Symphony #1 - Schoenberg - Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Zubin Mehta
 
A fever dream inside Mahler's bag of holding.
 
Polka de W.R. - Rachmaninov - Vladimir Horowitz [from Horowitz in Moscow]
Roman Sketches - Griffes - Micheal Lewin
 
In Session at the Tintinabulary
 
May 11, 2014
Crestline 140511 - Keith Eisenbrey
 
May 13, 2014
Narration from A Cat's Life - Olivia Sterne
 
May 10-15, 2014
Your Mother Should Know - Your Mother Should Know
 
Neal and Karen spent the week recording their album with Jake Thompson. The first few days were at Pouch's rehearsal space in Fre-lard, but they spent several days here at the Tintinabulary as well.
 
Upcoming
May 31, 2014 - 8:30 PM
Your Mother Should Know - Highdive, Seattle
with Ancient Warlocks, Tom price Desert Classic, On the Ground, and Ian Grunfeld
 June 27, 2014 - 8 PM
Banned Rehearsal Celebrates 30 Years of Noise
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Sunday, May 11, 2014

Playlist

Live

May 3, 2014
Les contes d'Hoffmann - Offenbach - Seattle Opera
McCaw Hall, Seattle

Nested tales in nested tales and musical numbers in musical numbers tell of people within people. It is all clever and ironic and sentimental and fun, but too slippery to care much about.

Recorded

May 4, 2014
La Damnation de Faust (parts 3 and 4) - Berlioz - Orchestra & Chorus of Rome Opera, Georges Pretre, Nicolia Gedda, Marilyn Horne, Roger Soyer, Dimiter Petkov

Mount Adams 1977
There is a moment in John Huston's film of Under The Volcano when we see Albert Finney's face pass through more expressions than frames can capture. When Berlioz really gets down to business we enter this realm. Each word, each note, is a dramatic movement. Nothing ends where it started.

May 6, 2014
Variations on an Original Theme op. 21 #1 - Brahms - Julius Katchen

Burial by contrapuntal intricacy, forth from which we emerge transfigured.

Selections from Tannhäuser - Wagner - Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Gerard Schwarz

An elaborate bait and switch routine. Surely that issue we were addressing has been resolved? But we're kidding ourselves. We've just moved on.

May 8, 2014
Symphony in C minor (#1) - Bruckner - Staatskapelle Dresden, Eugen Jochum

The matter of this symphony is its own metrical framework. Overlapping groups of squares in multiple time scales ought be rigid and stiff, but instead they build to a critical mass and curve back around. We have been seen.

In Session at the Tintinabulary

May 5, 2014
Banned Rehearsal 858 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal  Kosály-Meyer

Upcoming

May 31, 2014 - 8:30 PM
Your Mother Should Know - Highdive, Seattle
with Ancient Warlocks, Tom price Desert Classic, On the Ground, and Ian Grunfeld

 June 27, 2014 - 8 PM
Banned Rehearsal Celebrates 30 Years of Noise
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Saturday, May 3, 2014

Playlist

Live
 
May 2, 2014
Seattle Composers Salon
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle
Bill Smith, Keith Eisenbrey, John Teske, Tom Baker
 
First of all: Thank you Tom Baker for all the hard work you have done to keep this amazing project going for the last 15 years. Not only has it given me and countless others repeated opportunities to share what we have been working on with the best ears in the city, but it has been an invaluable hob-nobbery for composers and performers alike. Every time around I marvel at just how many musical planets there are to have come from. It has been a grand ride and I am honored and blest to have been a part of it.
 
And to John Teske: I am ecstatic you have accepted the curatorial position. I think you're perfect for the job. It is a beautiful thing that Tom has done here, and I look forward to many more years of fascinating evenings under your guidance.
 
Bill Smith - Assisi - Bill Smith, Brian Cobb, Jesse Canterbury
 
I'm not sure I got the name of the piece right, but it had something to do with Assisi, so I'll go with that. A loving modern re-hearkening to the jazz & pop sounds of the late 40's and early 50's: Stan Kenton, Peggy Lee, Glen Miller, all tinged with incipient bebop. It wasn't that music dressed up, but rather a translation of those sounds into a taut and robust harmonic idiom, retaining every inch of its without which it don't mean a thing swing.
 
Keith Eisenbrey - Selections from Études d'exécution imminent
 
My notes: 150 years ago Franz Liszt composed a cycle of piano etudes that demanded of the pianist a transcendent technique. For Liszt this was a powerful and incendiary aesthetic stance. But there is a complement to transcendence that I thought might be worth pursuing. And so, as a corrective to the Études d'exécution transcendante, I have been working on a cycle of Études d'exécution imminent. I have 8 so far completed to the point of minor adjustments. Tonight I will perform #s 1, 2, and 8.
 
John Teske - Topographies - Any Ensemble
 
The title, by report, is descriptive of the composer's intent in the creation and design of the scores. I understand then that the scores are like maps of a physical space to be explored, and that the performance is a journey we take through that physical space. But, perhaps driven by the suggestion of the title, and further allowed by the textural complexity of the sounds created, the received image is not foremost a sequence of events, but something more like a map itself - the whole landscape at once, sequenced from above by our hovering, flitting attention.
 
Tom Baker - Sagamihara - Tom Baker, Corrie Befort (film)
 
I saw an earlier version of this film a year ago. It consists of a series of image groups: groundskeepers raking a dirt plane, people lofting a monumental kite, drummers with masks, a young woman lying uneasily in a meadow, people working in rice paddies. The sound component is a separate image on the same plane as the visual, not an accompaniment or comment. Or it is the young woman, or it is the meadow, or it is the kite or the sky. 
 
Recorded
 
April 27, 2014
Symphony in C K111b(96) - Mozart - Academy of Ancient Music, Jaap Schroder, Christopher Hogwood
 
This music is very proud of its own artifice. It can't help but lift its lid now and then to show us how it works.
 
Sonata in G Op. 49 #2 - Beethoven - Wilhelm Kempff
 
This music is trying ever so hard to sit still in polite company.
 
Symphony in C minor D417 - Schubert - Vienna Philharmonic, Karl Munchinger
 
It climbs flights of stairs. It always has a goal in mind, and that goal is the ever so lovingly, ever so nostalgically, deferred cadence. Once there we embark again so that we can look back while sailing on to look back further on.
 
Symphony in B-flat (String Symphony #5) - Mendelssohn - English Bach Festival Orchestra, William Boughton
Concerto in E minor - Paganini - London Philharmonic Orchestra, Charles Dutoit, Salvatore Accardo
Waltz in E-flat Op. 18 - Chopin - Peter Katin
 
A magic theater :: delight fancy free
 
Scherzo - Schumann - Peter Fankl
 
Fierce, with gritted teeth.
 
Die Loreley - Liszt - Thomas Quasthoff, Justus Zeyen
 
An opera in a song.
 
April 29, 2014
La Damnation de Faust (parts 1 and 2) - Berlioz - Orchestra & Chorus of Rome Opera, Georges Pretre, Nicolia Gedda, Marilyn Horne, Roger Soyer, Dimiter Petkov
 
In Session at the Tintinabulary
 
April 27, 2014
Coronet 140427 and 140427A - Keith Eisenbrey
Zither 140427 - Keith Eisenbrey
 
April 28, 2014
Gradus 243 - Neal Kosály-Meyer
 
An expanse. At the bounds we set markers. We launch missives over the edge. We stand firm. We turn our backs. We shout to the sky. We breathe light.
 
We feed energy into a system to keep it lit.
 
May 1, 2014
Your Mother Should Know - Karen Eisenbrey, Neal Kosály-Meyer
 
A practice session for their upcoming album.
 
Upcoming
June 27, 2014 - 8 PM
Banned Rehearsal Celebrates 30 Years of Noise
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle