"However, what is the meaning of structural thinking? It is a process of applying a framework to an unstructured problem. That is, a process of projecting a plan of coordinates that maps the whole picture in order to understand it [. . .]. There is no problem at all in describing music spatially, since we have been doing this with considerable success for hundreds of years. However, problems arise when we fail to distinguish our structural thinking — which is a process of mapping the thing — and the thing itself. Tricked in this way, we may easily confound the structure of something with the manner we structure things."
Indioney Carneiro Rodrigues - "The Rhythmic Idea and The Musical Representation of Time"
Texts
Streaming
September 4, 2022
Peter Nelson-King: Sunday Afternoon Music
Ludomir Rozycki - 5 Preludes, Op. 2
extensive pieces
toward the larger end for Chopin-type preludes
much larger than any of Scriabin's
trying to make sense of Debussy
but remaining on its surface
essentially proto lounge-piano
Leander Schlegel - 2 pieces from In's Album, Op. 30
not a music for a large audience
they used to call this salon music
floats on its chords
Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco - "Mi-La"
Edward Elgar - Skizze
both of above:
from the large body of music
that filled Europe
that forms the background
for what more modernist folks were
playing with
as though beguiled by the lushness of 7ths and 9ths
thought with the feel of them
M. Camargo Guarnieri - Ficaras Sosinha
had clearly considered Bartok
Ernst Toch - Kleinstadtbilder, Op. 49
these remind me of Lockrem Johnson or Kodály
evocative and witty
Aaron Copland - Sunday Afternoon Music
J. S. Bach arr. Harold Bauer - Die seele ruht in Jesu handen
interesting
one needs to play the ornaments that stem from Bach
not how Bach would have interpreted them then
but as Harold Bauer
would have
this has become a different era's music
almost like
those jazzed up arrangements of classical hit tunes
Nikolay Kapustin - Sonatina, Op. 100
post-Tatum fun and games
September 3, 2022
Wolsey's Wilde, Fvb. 157 - William Byrd - Claudio Columbo [from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book]
a well ordered wild
in quiet weather
Sonata in B minor, Kk. 197 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Balder
descent with stops and updrafts
what drama is there
is in our
investment
in following its path
down
it truly arrives
at its final cadence
Sonata in A minor, D. 537 - Franz Schubert - Paul Badura-Skoda
the portions are ample and varied
any key involves its relation to
several others
occasionally ties its fingers in knots
last notes
of cadences are optional here
elision is common practice
this is
no straightforward descent
it includes dark and unfinished digressions
threads are lost to sight
pulls itself ashore
distinct
flavors of affect rupture
phrase to phrase
so that
the
endings of movements
are less arrived at
than come upon
accidentally
Sonata in G minor, Op. 3 - Ludwig Schuncke - Tatiana Larianova
carried away inwards
we find a fugue to wrestle
it doesn't go down
easily
and utters a dire curse
figurations don't shout about how
fabulous they are
phrase length clever
Judgement - Rev. Sister Mary Nelson [from Goodbye, Babylon]
sermon in verse
with refrain
to make sure you get the message
Utah Trail - Wright and McNew [from Evans 78s]
some of the band are nearly not there
faded into the vinyl surface
some of the plucks
have increased in proximity
I Can't Believe That You're In Love With Me - Billie Holiday [from Lady Day, The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia]
did the songs go on longer
when they were playing for dances
sample sized
Who's To Blame - T. Texas Tyler [from Allen Lowe's That Devilin' Tune]
seems hokey
until the guitar does its solo
c'mon porky
Deep Elem Blues - Jerry Lee Lewis - [from Rare and Rockin']
it bounces along infectiously
the words are just to give him something
to sing on
Romain - Bill Evans and Jim Hall [from Undercurrent]
the voice leading
each voice traces its own melodic path
when Bill
takes a solo
they
the voices
all inhabit his melody
or
relax into the left hand
this music has been to Europe
or there
has been here
What's Going On - Marvin Gaye [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]
like a secret message
passed within a crowded party
or
a
thought about public and private personae projections
an issue with pop
songs
they don't know what to do with themselves
once they exist
as such
OK here I am
now what
God Knows I'm Good - David Bowie [from Space Oddity]
trying art-folk-pop on for size
social commentary
through weakly
poeticized narrative
strung along
in a jangle guitar verse chorus
thingy
Julie with - Brian Eno [from Before and After Science]
the text slows to a crawl
dreamily perfumed
now we'll listen from
beneath the beat
stasis
and pre-echo of The Ship
a
still point
in the inevitable drift
downward
into the
entropics
The New World - The Knitters [from Poor Little Critter On The Road]
a danceable rhythm
with words attached
the hook is so you remember
the name of the song
the rest is flavoring
Welcome To The Occupation - REM [from Document]
the possibilities of complex rhythms certainly exist
but they are
hidden or obscured
by the industrial uniformity of execution
Kiko and the Lavender Moon - Los Lobos [from Kiko]
nightclub arrangement with horns and squeezebox
scuttlebutt about a
dancer
entertainers interscuttlebutting on stage
language differential allows a freedom with accentuation
so that
the word is heard
newly
still a bit thin
Gradus 16 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [June 4, 2002]
the sound a piano makes when activated as designed
only seems to come
from a single source location
and then spread into the room
but
the source of sound itself
is spreading into the instrument
from the get go
and propagates into the room
from all parts
of that instrument
variously
depending on which strings are struck
and with what speed and weight
and with which other strings that
might be undamped
which is largely the purpose
of a resonating
instrument
it is made
to optimize sound's ability to spread
throughout itself
and then project that sound outward
the vector
of its propagation
through the instrument
and into the room
is the subject matter of the sound
the sound's beginning
or
start point
is not yet the sound we follow
and possibly never can
be
it's very quick
the sound leaps off the hammer strike
too
quickly to catch in the act
a sound that can't be heard
but
can have been heard
Swing Song - Low Hums [from Sounds of Speakers]
waking from a deep hole
mobility untested
Ask Your Question - Your Mother Should Know [recorded live at The Comet Tavern, Seattle, July 29, 2012]
back in the wordy days
does this music support the sung text
or
fight it
does the sung delivery support the text
or erase it
Earplug Girl - Dead Bars [from Dream Gig]
making the best of a sad sitch
Piano 1 - Sascia Pellegrini [from Five Piano Fantasies]
connections possibly implied
just as plausibly entrailed
Callino casturame, Fvb. 158 - William Byrd - Claudio Columbo [from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book]
a given melody is revealed politely
Dixie Cowboy - Aulton Ray [from Allen Lowe's Turn Me Loose White Man]
not to forget
that by 1927
the days of the cowboy
as the
movies envisioned them
were largely finished
100 years ago
we already romanticized our own past
at least this guy realized it
was no picnic
beneath the stars
Milkcow's Calf Blues (DAL 403-3) - Robert Johnson [from The Complete Recordings]
the guitar comments
both on the sung vocal
and from each register
into the other
in B-flat?
The Hymn - Charlie Parker [from The Complete Savoy and Dial Master Takes]
so light
if you weigh nothin'
you can turn all the corners at once
Piano Lesson - Meredith Wilson [from The Music Man, Original Cast Recording]
right
take what you can get
Manhattan at Six - Stevie Wonder [from The Jazz Soul of Little Stevie]
fill the track with explosive bongo
Prelude in F Major - Lockrem Johnson - Keith Eisenbrey [recorded August 26, 2022]
this one is giving me troubles
this version is better than the others I
have done
but is it closer to what it wants to be
there are no
tempo or dynamic indications in the score
I like my faster tempo here at
the start
but perhaps it needs more time to breathe later
hm
Welcome to Mexico - Cheech and Chong [from Cheech and Chong]
you with the halo!
alto!
ensemble and singer facing off like fighters
admirably
this sounds
like they recorded a performance
in a room
no engineer was allowed
to juice it later
a fearsome battle
Little Red Corvette - Prince [from 1999]
layered vocals
everything else stays out of the way
presumed
social function of the sound
is the context of social dance
soundtrack to mutual
look at me
Three Sides to This Story - The Young Fresh Fellows [from Refreshments]
it all goes by so fast
onslaught
Gloria's Eyes - Bruce Springsteen [from The Human Touch]
nice pun
no effort to establish why it is what it is
within what
it is
validity assumed
since it fits in
with what is
expected
in his ubiquitous context
does the thing
then fades
away
Going Back to Cali - The Notorious B.I.G. [from Life After Death]
word shredder
technically
I suppose that concentrated listening
is a strange context
in which to understand
or take in
what this is
within the culture
in which
it arises
Praying Mantis - Box - Jarrad Powell [from Natural Selection]
this sound has pitch in great specificities
but is it made of notes
atoms of anything
trivially
of course not
but we do
accept it easily
as something
a presence
a vapor
a
region
but not a region of time
a region explorable in time
but
that persists in a time
different than the time
of
its inhabitability
like mist in a forest
or light in a marsh
slowly becoming solid
sinking in
Sputnik Love 04 Mixdown 01 Tube Mic - Keith Eisenbrey [February 20, 2007]
the glorious sound
of finding a station on a tuner dial radio
the
satellite has become all confused as to its message
Sound Check - Black Plastic Clouds [recorded live at Sound Effects Coffee Shop October 26, 2012]
Fish Distributor - Your Mother Should Know [recorded live at Victory Lounge, Seattle, April 27, 2017]
once again the story before the story
enthusiasm is wonderful
but
it can also get in the way
prolix
The Tail's Tale - Steve Layton [from Excavations]
an ornate duet or so
but who's counting
In Session at The Tintinabulary
September 7, 2022
Sinfonia 4 - Keith Eisenbrey
this has been an interesting follow-up project to my Etudes.
Inventing
ways to twist a pentachord around itself
in three strands
nested
within each other's interstices
Prelude in E-flat Major -Keith Eisenbrey
Postscripts
Skaldmud's Doodle Gallery
some listening journal doodles from 1990
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