Showing posts with label James Joyce. Show all posts
Showing posts with label James Joyce. Show all posts

Saturday, July 22, 2023

Playlist

Seaside, Oregon
Preface

"'Now,' said Jack Hopkins, 'just to set us going again, Bob, I don't mind singing a song.' And Hopkins, incited thereto by tumultuous applause, plunged himself at once into 'The King, God bless him,' which he sang as loud as he could, to a novel air, compounded of the 'Bay of Biscay' and 'A Frog he would.' The chorus was the essence of the song; and as each gentleman sang it to the tune he knew best, the effect was very striking indeed."

Charles Dickens - from "the Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club"

Texts

Live

July 15, 2023

Finnegan's Wake, Chapter 7 - James Joyce
Neal Kosály-Meyer
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

two-fifths of two buttocks

when the angel of death kicks the bucket of life
all were wrong

the breeze blows the skirts of the table

he went without saying
some thousand rains ago
till he stank out of sight
but
would anyone short of a madhouse believe it

stamping room only
the bats in his belfry

how unwhisperably so

unused mill and stumbling stones
writing the mystery of his self in furniture
you ask in Sam Hill how

till I give you you're talking to
upon defenseless paper

snifter of carrion
premature gravedigger
to find out how his innards work

a thousand thumbs a year
it does marvels for your gripings

do you hear what I'm saying Hamlet

he lifts the lifewand
and the dumb speak

Seaside, Oregon
Recorded

July 15, 2023

Waltz in G-flat Major, Op. 70 #1 - Frédéric Chopin - Garrick Ohlsson

lightly flirty
soulful sentimental
back to lightly flirty

Tema con variazioni, Op. 81 #1 - Felix Mendelssohn - The Emerson String Quartet

tactical deployment
of offset voice leading
toward the final
of each 

heightened tension
released by recourse
to a single line
to figure us back to earth
carefully
a Mendelssohnian tic

Song 10 - Charles Ives - Kia Sams, Russ Warner

a fragment song

Got No Blues - Louis Armstrong's Hot Five [from Hot Fives and Sevens]

general parade
specialty acts
exit parade

Sloe Gin Fizz - Erroll Garner [from Erroll Garner on Dial]

registral separation
with functional differentiation

Don't You Know - Ray Charles [from Ray Charles]

text is a pleading come-on

It Might As Well Be Spring - Bill Evans Trio [from Moon Beams]

each chord is a new place to arrive at
the melody moves from pointed harmonic pull
to floating free

Seaside, Oregon
July 16, 2023

Astronomy Domine - Pink Floyd [from The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn {digital}]

there are sounds in this
that aren't in the version included in "A Nice Pair"
which I had always thought 
was just this album
and the next
as a two-disc set
but this is a different version of the song entirely
(and sounds fab)

Heaven Belongs To You - Nina Simone [from Fodder On My Wings]

so
what is it
that
I wanted to be annoyed at this album
I got over it
praise the lord

"Soft Awakens My Heart" from Samson and Delilah - Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns [from 100 Greatest Classics]

the orchestra reminds you
of what she just sang
to mark the joints

the plot does not move along in this
nothing moves at all

our animation
has been suspended
for the time being

Real Man - Bruce Springsteen [from Human Touch]

regarding insecurity
shout it out

Afraid - David Bowie [from Heathen]

late date psychedelia

Seaside, Oregon
Unfamiliar - Curtains For You [from Heaven's Waiting]

the arrangement has a string band twang to it
nicely done guys

A Pretty Short Ride - Freddie & The Screamers [from I Aint' Crazy]

when dive bars
were a place for guys to go
to complain to guys
about their women
which complaints
became an art form

Surfin' the Web - Porn Bloopers [from Blooper Reel]

punk at its best
is clear as day
no fuss
simple
but not

Aorta - Re:Naissance Opera [from Music from The Apocrypha Chronicles - Mycologue Imprints]

a tone mood
late stage impressionism
New Age Messianic spiritualism

Seaside, Oregon
July 17, 2023

East St. Louis Toodle-Oo - Duke Ellington [from The Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz]

the heavy mass casts a pall
when visible

Body and Soul - Sarah Vaughan [from Swingin' Easy]

big old yawn to bring in the up-tempo with a small ensemble she draws us into every twist she puts the tune to

I'm Alright - Bob Dylan [from A Tree with Roots]

partial

Twine - Elaine Barkin, Benjamin Boretz [from Inter/Play]

noir confab
in a staircase

a tree
through a basement window 

when not occluded
by traffic 

dream state
fractured horizontally 

train whistle
through the partials 

comic
continental siren 

start over noir
slowly this time 

the tree
remains 

portal
to bliss state

the impossible experience
of suspended animation 

falls
through the jazz registers 

modulating
all the way 

al
niente 

joint solo
reconnoitering 

Seaside, Oregon
a new room
has been discovered 

serious siren
down here 

means
business 

hiding
engines 

down there
in the low tones 

big chorale tune
in block chords 

extending
past the horizon

back
to bliss state 

bitter
sweet 

back
up through the jazz chord registers 

down
the slope on the other side 

to the carnival

The Dante Quartet - Stan Brakhage

hand painted frames
6 years in the making
rhythms of rhythms

Little Seed - Woody Guthrie and Family [from Woody's 20 Grow Big Songs]

gardening lesson

Clown - Mariah Carey [from Charmbracelet]

lots of
I shoulda never
the vicissitudes of fame
a composition of overlain voices 

in bad taste
but who's caring?

July 18, 2023

Banned Rehearsal 727 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Neal Kosály-Meyer [October 22, 2007]

a plod
but forthright
intent on the steady going
persistence may be less a virtue
than a defeat or abdication of imagination
regimented image of time's passing
suppresses the possibility of eruption
fitting for industrialized humans
each in our perpetually renewed cage
an opacity
the moment it ceases
the sky opens
and fresh breezes cleanse
any event able now to create its own unindexed time

Seaside, Oregon
Rome - Bruce Hamilton, Paul Hertz, Benjamin Smith, Glenn Weyant, Peter Thörn [from Mash Hits Volume 1]

we are close to the machinery
keep your fingers close to your body
do not cross the yellow line while machinery is powered up
wear protective gear at all times

Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge 170916 B - Keith Eisenbrey [September 16, 2017]

early in the morning and chilly
we took a walk hoping for bird sounds
we get our footsteps and an occasional bxzxzz
presumably originating in the recording device
some distant tweeters
a duck was quacking
and there were a few chirps and calls
an airplane passes over

Fruits Of My Labor - Denise Glover [from Dreams Of The Butterfly]

garden love song memory

Gene Norman and Miles Davis (live) - Miles Davis, Gene Norman [from 'Round About Midnight]

just the introduction
Gene has a practiced broadcast voice
Miles has his

Save Me - Aretha Franklin [from I Never Loved A Man The Way I Love You]

mixed with the band right up front
gives it a quasi-live vibe
more like a demo than a finished or polished product

Seaside, Oregon
The Girl Is Mine - Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney [from Thriller]

so whose is she?
Michael's?
Paul's?
her own?

Move The Crowd - Eric B. & Rakim [from Paid in Full]

post-song dance track

Old Lady Gone - Mike, Peggy, and Penny Seeger [from Animal Folk Songs For Children]

one of Ruth's piano arrangements
enjoying saying
goose goose goose goose goose goose goose

You Light Up My Life - Whitney Houston [from Just Whitney]

she likes to ornament the last syllable's note with fancy trills and turns
break into the blue sky for feel good pay-off
modified last high vowel
you light up my löööööf

Seaside, Oregon
July 19, 2023

Gradus 128 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [October 29, 2007]

again with the Lids film inclusion
I had forgotten that we tried it more than once

the pauses dawn upon the earmind
only after a certain time
what's happening in the silence
prior to earmind's realization of the pause? 

playing an instrument
is a neurological action
motor
sensory
cognitive
mnemonic
linguistic
conceptual
willful
imaginative
each of which
can be quasi-subject
to discipline of suppression or stimulation
(independently?)
(but memory operates without our input
(we have some degree of control over it
but it happens regardless))
much of practice as such
is a process of disciplining the motoric
to be in the control of the other faculties
to varying degrees

Army of Me - Christina Aguilera [from Lotus]

power anthem
power up

Sticky Note - Mud on My Bra [from Demo #2 (Manger Studio Mixes)]

personal
honest
not clever or coy
a perfect hit

Infrathin Condition 14 - Doug Haire [from Infrathin Conditions]

we are at an uncertain remove
from the source of the signal
propagated through a membrane
horizontally
as it stretches
across a broad landscape
we
however
are deep underground

Seaside, Oregon
July 20, 2023

Shipoopi - Meredith Wilson [from The Music Man]

comic dance number

On The South Side of Chicago - Morgana King [from Gemini Changes]

the place where action first got its start
show-off high note to nail the end

Faith Medley - Total Experience Gospel Choir [from Bits and Pieces]

call and response
gospel singing
is in the model of participatory preaching
that is
one has not been preached to
unless one responds
a tradition
in which preaching
isn't discourse as such
but conversation

Seaside, Oregon
The Disappointed - XTC [from Fossil Fuel]

going for that Beach Boys
sun-washed
salt-sprayed
sound
in a got dumped bummer mood

Crow and Snail - Vi Hilbert [from When The Humans Thought They Were People]

statements made twice and three times
slightly different ways
slug became smashed 

{NB
The late Vi Hilbert was a valuable resource - the last fully fluent heritage speaker for the Lushootseed language, the language in which she tells much of this story and the language that was spoken here where I sit before Europeans arrived. It is what language sounded like here in the before times.}

Something For Audrey - The Hope [from In The Deep]

for dancing in the living room

Two Knives - Byron Au Yong [from Yiju]

in a whispered echo chamber

Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge 170916 A - Keith Eisenbrey [September 16, 2017]

little chirps like juncos gleaning
an avian Geiger counter rhythm
a work song
a duck quacks
from right near distance
to left nearer nearness

Divagating - Amy Denio [from Chapel Sessions]

playing idly
with great care and attention
dig deep and discover

Seaside, Oregon
July 21, 2023

Toccata in C Major, Op. 7 - Robert Schumann - Eric Le Sage

plentiful stock of second winds
long sprint

Variations de Concert pour le Pianoforte, Op. 8 - Clara Schumann - Susanne Grützmann

dramatic gesture before the theme proper
which appears with comments in the margins
spacious
entering through the same knothole
but into different spaces

Moonlight In Vermont - Billie Holiday [from Songs for Distingué Lovers]

her side instrumentalists
fill out the song's corners
and breathing places

In Session at The Tintinabulary

July 16, 2023

Old Hundred - Keith Eisenbrey

Upon closer inspection of the 19th Century shape-note notation from which I transcribed this version of the tune I realized that it uses a non-standard key signature. Instead of having the lines and spaces representing letter-name notes (EGBDF: Every Good Boy Does Fine or Every Generalization Begets Damnable Falsehoods) they represent un-registered solfeggio (where "C" would be is "Do" regardless of the key). The key, or transposition, is indicated on the lowest space of the staff with words, exempli gratia: "Key of A". My first arrangement missed this trick and I wrote it in C. Once I realized my error I transposed it down a third into A.

Brewer - Keith Eisenbrey

This week's shape-note tune arrangement. I could find no solid citation of where the tune arose. A later book says "English" and has a somewhat more elaborate version of the tune. It does not appear in any hymn-book in my collection that was printed later than the late 19th Century (at least that I was able to find).

July 17, 2023

Banned Rehearsal 1080 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Anna K, Neal Kosály-Meyer

July 18, 2023

2-Part Invention in C Major - Gavin Borchert

July 19, 2023

2-Part Invention in C Major - Gavin Borchert

July 20, 2023

2-Part Invention in C Major - Gavin Borchert

July 21, 2023

2-Part Invention in C Major - Gavin Borchert

There are quite a few C Major inventions in this collection and each of the above is a unique piece. There may even be one or two more.

Postscripts

Skaldmud's Doodle Gallery

listening journal doodles from 2000




Saturday, November 13, 2021

Playlist

Preface

"Art, as practiced, is a zero-sum game. Your towering mastery is my cowering inferiority (or I guess vice versa). Expression is not necessarily even a game at all, and conceivably accommodates infinite varieties of interest outside of any defining issue of hierarchization. ("Great Expressor": sounds silly, right?) So maybe Art and Expression are two separate issues which merge in Works of Art; or just different ways of looking at (or listening to the whistle of) the blackbird."

- Benjamin Boretz - "3: (A Train of Thoughts)"  from "inside in . . . / . . . outside out" Open Space Publications, 2020

Texts

From Recent Arrivals

November 6, 2021

Upshift - Tom Swafford [from Bound to Go Away]

motor phrase
inflates in new ways
at new moments

I Listened to the Wind Again - Jürg Frey - Hélène Fauchère, Soprano; Carol Robinson, Clarinet; Nathalie Chabot, Violin; Agnès Vesterman, Cello; Garth Knox, Viola; Sylvain Lemêtre, Percussion

in the time of a heavy oscillation
each tone complex is a leaning
counterbalanced
a word is sung from nowhere
and another
a clarinet
on the counterbalance group
and a drumhead emerges
recognized
I imagine a violin also
cello perhaps
viola
my best guess
voice
violin
cello
clarinet(s)
and percussion
a bass drum
and vibraphone
the bass drum is making something in the room vibrate
back to hearing a viola timbre

its center of gravity
midbody
describes a solemn orbit

Sketch for Reconstruction - JJJJJerome Ellis [from The Clearing]

a box made of pulses
here are some things in the box
now those things out of the box
now in another box
now in both boxes

November 12, 2021

El Beso del Final - Christina Aguilera [from Mi Reflejo]

vocal, improv type:
like a sax player, hyper ornate.
Latinate sound to the band.
something about a last kiss?
my Spanish is woefully and shamefully nonexistent

Recorded

November 6, 2021

Ragtime Annie - Eck Robertson [from Allen Lowe's Turn Me Loose White Man]

not far off in procedure
from Tom Swafford's Upshift above
fiddle fun
on a motor pulse phrase

Finnegans Wake, Chapter 6 (continued) - James Joyce - Neal Kosály-Meyer [November 21, 2020]

so so my precious dear
streaming faces
so long as the locksmith laughs
eleven no blank ye
to put it all the more plummily
borrow the question
hopelessly vitiated
temporarily wrapped in obscenity
take your tongue out of your inkpot
don't I love thee
unfallable encyclical
gather behind the satraps
newhere so airly
wait a momentum
my good enemy

November 7, 2021

After You've Gone, Take 1 - Art Tatum [from Classic Early Solos]

the song
as such
is mostly intact
though
it occasionally rushes
through the boring bits
or
takes a powder
for a bar or two

Rodeo (Four Dance Episodes) - Aaron Copland - Seattle Symphony, Gerard Schwarz

of course
this
is
the West of the movies
a complete fantasy 

essentially undemanding
just sophisticated enough sounding
to pass as high brow
(the very definition of middle brow?)
flattering to our image of ourselves
mass market propaganda
pretty pictures
heroic nice guys

Milk Cow Blues - Rose Maddox and Brothers [from Allen Lowe's Turn Me Loose White Man]

the problem is
that Copland
apparently
didn't have a clue
just how oddball
the music of rural America
was
or realized
that
that kind of weird
wouldn't sell to a dance audience

Concertina for 12 Instruments - Igor Stravinsky - London Symphony Orchestra, Michael Tilson Thomas

busy bustle
city street
at last
calmly home
comfy chair

Hoot Owl - Guy Mitchell [a Rescued Record]

they say hoot
almost as Hüt
or
to rhyme with Yew

What Time Is It - The Jive Five [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]

were the backup singers dressed like little clocks?
bedderhurryup

I Have Loved Me a Man - Morgana King [from Gemini Changes]

this could be kind of incestuously creepy
but then
proudly proclaiming
to have done
what my Mama did
a sentimental compliance with traditional roles

Starting All Over Again - Mel and Tim [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]

sets itself up
like in a musical
the song arrives within the story
the sort of personal message
formerly reserved for epistles
it reveals a realm of communication
from literature
into song

Barracuda - Heart [from Greatest Hits]

white girl
finding a way into Tina Turner
bad girl power suit

I remember hearing this song
when it came out
I was 18
and didn't get it
puzzled by it
more than anything
why is this popular?
too produced and constant
for my taste at the time

Athena - The Who [from It's Hard]

trying to write a Bob Dylan
wordy verse

November 9, 2021

Gradus 7 (San Diego Series) - Neal Kosály-Meyer - Neal Kosály-Meyer [January 17, 1987]

old stock
the tape wavers across the head
a physical-historical factoid
artifacted digitally
in an unstable
(virtual)
ear 

sample
of the path
of the virtual ear
of the signal projected
here 

we once were tape heads
with virtual
tape head ears
on them
ear L erase R ear
Virtue Al
(A Head of His Time)
heads have ears
signals have virtual ears
space left blank
on purpose
these tapes arrived here
at about the same time Ben's "One" tapes did.
Wave for the tape, Al!

Septet, but Equal - Milton Babbitt - Composers Ensemble, Paul Zukofsky

polyhedrons sliding
along crystalline-generated angles
in such guise as to speak
they have lots to say

Banned Rehearsal 455 - Isaac E, Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Anna K, Neal Kosály-Meyer [June 7, 1997]

Isaac practices his linguadentals
we honk and blat
springs are loudly shaken
the Kingsbury is forsaken
for the Mighty Wurlitzer
Isaac continues to linguadentalize
we are teetering edgeward
we stop in time for drums
and other percussions
woods metals skins
low piano note
and zither strum
at last the violin
calmly
the violin is having a chat
with the linguadentalist
dada:bowbow

{from my journal entry of January 25, 2005:

Isaac, I think, babbling, and playing piano with his dad.
The best part is the babbling.
Must be one of those
some in, some not
sessions.
A possible start, just a few minutes in:
at the slide-whistle entrance,
things begin to come off like sounds.
And we still get plenty of babble
springthing on cymbal
or perhaps just 620 septillion.
A thin tape.
must be duets, or trios.
Isaac begins}

Track 1 - The Humidiflyers [from Humidiflyers 2002 (private tape)]

The Humidiflyers
(Devin Gaylord, Ian Grunfeld, Rick Hoag, Darren Reynolds)
were the first EMP arising band
that Neal introduced Karen and me to
back when we were emerging
from the world of small children,
in the early oughts.
They were working on an EP
(Blue Ducky)
and these
I presume
were tracks and premastered takes
they shared with Neal
during that process.
They were excellent musicians all,
dripping with chemistry.
Ian, the vocalist, turned up years later
as the opener for the show
Your Mother Should Know
put on at The High Dive (in Fremont)
to benefit the Wobblies.

Consider the Birds 19 - Keith Eisenbrey [February 3, 2007]

given how sparse the individual tracks are
the crazy texture of the whole together is quite a trip
it is a track with sounds on it
is it music?
does it need to be?

Zazaru - $.99 Dreams (Matt Crane, Adam Diller, Tom Swafford) [from Brood of Bau]

such a swarm of sound
one starts to hear things
coming from behind
I can't remember exactly
where or when
we heard these guys
but it's got to be back in the blog
somewhere since this dates from 2012
my vague recollection is
a wine bar somewhere
on a bill with one of Jim Knodle's projects

Maple Leaf 170220 - Keith Eisenbrey [February 20, 2017]

recorded in our backyard one morning in February
birds traffic something tapping
(not sure what)
possibly a slow drip in a drainpipe nearby
I think I can hear me
rattling dishes
inside in the kitchen
as I unload the dishwasher
unidentified moving objects
rain?
must be,
the dripping has sped up

November 10, 2021

The King's Hunt, Fvb. 53 - Giles Farnaby - Claudio Columbo [from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book]

a firm stepped thread
for a while
followed by diverse tactics
leaves Pachelbel's too famous Canon
hopelessly mired

Lukas-Passion - Heinrich Schütz - Capella Augustana

I love how he sets the ornate title page
long recitatives 

tenor narrator baritone Jesus 

a whole and delightful tiny choral intrusion
just to set "Nie keinen" 

the choral intrusions increase in length
and frequency
in the trial portion of the narrative
as the story goes
to a more public stage
ends with narration
severe
a final chorus to match the title page 

notable: voices alone, no instruments

Die Wohltemperierte Klavier, Band I, Prelude and Fugue in F-sharp Major - Johann Sebastian Bach - Sviatoslav Richter

reach out
roll back
get a good stance
reach out
clear a space
to dance within

Sonata in D minor, Kk. 141 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

clockwork and its mechanical precision
a globalized environment
to discover the music in the machine
the soul inside reason

Kurze und Leichte Klavierstücke, Andantino e grazioso in B-flat Major, Wq. 114/2 - Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach - Miklos Spanyi

folds in upon itself
turns tenderly
embraces

Sonata in F Major, Op. 10 #2 - Ludwig van Beethoven - Stephen Kovacevich

1
opens with a question
say what?
response and discussion 
follow-up question

2
worries grow
comfort is provided
doubts intrude
reassurance permeates
decision is made

3
time to play
vigorous exercise

Sonata in C Major, Op. 1 #2 - Friedrich Wilhelm Kalkbrenner - Luigi Gerosa

I read through the first movement of this just this morning
[of the day of listening]
the rest will follow Thursday and Friday
[not quite true]
trades in the sort of bald major-minor melodrama
that Schubert transfigured a few years later
so sunny
so clean
theme and variations
hence the squareness to open 

If the19th Century
is
among other things
the era of the Bourgeoisie rising
this is for their comfort
and flattery
simple and pure
not indulging in ultra-sophisticated contrapuntal
or structural games
for display only

3
proves it's only a game
repeat verbatim

Etude in C minor, Op. 10 #12 - Frédéric Chopin - Alfred Cortot [1942]

tattered standard
in battle breeze

Stumbling - Mitchell's Jazz Kings [from Allen Lowe's That Devilin' Tune]

the new dance craze
to cut loose
and keep the old Victorians away

Honey Just Allow Me One More Chance - Henry Thomas [from Allen Lowe's Really The Blues]

essentially a celebration
(in the negative)
of staying out drinking all night
for playing in 1920s dive bars?

When You Got A Good Friend (SA-2584-2) - Robert Johnson [from The Complete Recordings]

better advice given here
than above

You're Easy to Dance With - Peggy Lee [from The Complete Recordings 1941-1947]

a less than memorable song
(as a song)
played and sung well
but that lyric was a rush job

Music for Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet' - David Diamond - Seattle Symphony, Gerard Schwarz

the unfortunate part of theatrical incidental music
is that it is tied by its title and history
to an external story 

at least with Romeo and Juliet
the material is
or has become
so mythic as to nearly disappear
in a multiplicity of ramifications 

what's nice here
is that none of these little pieces
presumes to carry the whole edifice

more like a display of stage designs or costumes
from some past production or other residue 

Tran La Ezy - The Musical four Plus One [from Allen Lowe's Turn Me Loose White Man]

proto Chuck Berry with great lazy fiddle playing

Mosaics - Howard Hanson - Seattle Symphony, Gerard Schwarz

all serious like Ruggles comes on
can't hold it
quite
must have his big builds
evoking ancienthood
as a feeling
tourist antiquity
documentary ready
I suppose it fulfilled a commission

November 11, 2021

Young Rats - The Lake Washington Singers, Betty Eisenbrey, JoAnne Deacon [April 10, 1962]

barely even time for a smile

Groovin' - The Young Rascals [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]

who am I to this?
Is it addressed to a prospective mate?
It is as though I am an observer
watching this song in a movie

Do You Hear What I Hear? - The Lake Washington Singers, Betty Eisenbrey, JoAnne Deacon [December 1972]

that's me
on the snare drum
age 13

Speed of Life - David Bowie [from Low]

instrumental first track
but structured as though
there were a verse chorus and bridge
one wonders whether he liked everything about it
but the vocal 

it certainly makes plain
the by-then-pedestrian structural habits
of industrial music
this is how it goes
because this is how things always go

Intermezzo 2 - Keith Eisenbrey - Keith Eisenbrey [recorded at Bard Hall, December 17, 1982]

at issue:
how might a music put itself together logically |
(that is, plausibly)
expanding its scope
using plausible ramifications of itself
AND
with recourse
to as limited a rhetorical vocabulary
as can be mustered
so as
not to obscure
or elide
the plausibility
of its putting itself together
how
that is
to grows a radish

a list of notes
a sequence of duration types
(short/long)
flat dynamics
(but not dead dynamics) 

original title
"Feather Light Turning"
derived from AW's suggestion
"a feather turning in the light"
even then
I resisted directly descriptive titles
they say too much
allow too little 

I was also trying to understand
with my composing mind
what it might mean
to explore within an interval
to chart the innards
step by step
little if any thought was given
to how this might exist in the concert music world
and yet
I would gleefully indulge in a tonal pun (still will)
and succumbed
to what amounts
to a climacteric peroration
rhetoric is a tougher nut to eschew
than one might think

I Ain't No Joke - Eric B. & Rakim [from Paid in Full]

I am being put in my place
OK
I suppose I do no less

Banned Rehearsal 300 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer [August 16, 1992]

Neal must have been up for a visit from San Diego
I don't think they had moved back yet*
drumming thumping jingling and light hooting
some howling
takes the cassette tape a bit past its capacity
when the door opens I hear bells
when the blue light comes on
I know it's not long
red light black light
blat bursts blast blues
in memoriam John Cage
in the person of a southe'n preacher
things ain't gonna be the same
since
you gotta adjust for the time zone differences
let me start over
'tain't neether
the window is clothed
thou shalt not tape life liberty or property
without doing process
just and fair condensation
the rest escapes me
British soldiers
shall not be quartered in our homes or brothels 

*the K-Ms must have visited more often than I remember in 1992 & 1993 as they show up in the listing frequently before they moved back for good in '94

My Journal Entry of March 5, 1995
Apparition - Omega Man [from The Carlos Compilation - a Rescued Record]

beware mankind
then some yelling

November 12, 2021

Gradus 1 - Neal Kosály-Meyer - Neal Kosály-Meyer [January 21, 2002]

and so it begins in earnest
15 years after the San Diego series
strangely I don't see that I entered these in my journal
at the time for a while
not sure why not 

that lowest A-nat was not the Yamaha's strongest feature
the mic I was using was OK but not great
I did the transfers from DAT to computer soon after each session
sessions were single rungs
30 minutes
there isn't a great deal of space here
for Cagean silence
that must have arisen later
or become more pronounced
much more concerned
with the rolling thunder of the partials
(speaking of which
a crack of doom thunderclap
hit here at about 1 AM this morning)
(quite the amazing sound system ions have!)
our post-session conversation
centered on piano-technique issues
I was concerned with string breakage
which was a significant
(and expensive)
problem with that piano
hammering on a single note
with the pedal down
was a trial by worry for me

Not About You (The Lament) - The Hope [from In The Deep]

wallowing in billows of glory voice
lost in rapture

Gradus 209 - Neal Kosály-Meyer - Neal Kosály-Meyer [April 2, 2012]

10 years later
and almost 10 years ago
still going through the A-nats
different piano
different recording device
2 rungs per session
the reverberation of high piano notes is a shimmer
due to the channel configuration 
between microphones and the speakers
the high notes
are to my left
the low
to my right
this is strange to me 

leave room for John Cage 

time for thinking
in word mind
about musical structure
and identity markers
in experience
how do we learn
and signal
that a certain patch of experience
is a piece
or a piece of a piece?
we set the piece apart
we take it apart 

if not distinct from environmental sounds
per Cage
then is it
that the piece is indistinguishable
from the ongoing flow of experience
or
is it
that the ongoing flow of experience
is coopted by the piece
a segment of it
is cordoned off
involuntary servitude

Overture - Dead Bars [from Dream Gig]

If I am not mistaken, that's our boy Neal on the keys for this

In Session at the Tintinabulary

October 31, 2021

Banned Telepath 77 Toad Hall - Aaron Keyt

Aaron sent sounds just after I had put together Banned Rehearsal 1037, so I included these in Banned Rehearsal 1038

November 5, 2021

Two Part Inventions in A Major and B-flat Major - Gavin Borchert - Keith Eisenbrey

These were originally composed for piano, but they work fabulously on clavichord, with just a few adjustments to keep the notes within the 5-octave range. Enjoy!

November 8, 2021

Banned Telepath 77 Southern Fried - Steve Kennedy

Banned Telepath 77 Tintinabulary - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Anna K, Neal Kosály-Meyer

Anna and Neal reach to us by phone, talking about consciousness as they understand it

Banned Rehearsal 1038 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Anna K, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer

and we put it all together
in glorious sci fi

November 12, 2021

Two Part Invention in B-flat major - Gavin Borchert - Keith Eisenbrey

I recorded the next Invention (#5 of 19) but I haven't had a chance to edit it down and share it with Gavin yet. Next week it will be here, I hope.

Special Mention

My Dinner with Wallace

Much of my musical energy during the first year of the Pandemic went into producing this virtual recital of recent solo piano music by my long-time collaborator, Aaron Keyt, and by me. There are 9 reels total in the playlist, ranging from 10 to 20 minutes or so each, the whole stretching for just under 2 hours. I am quite pleased with the results, especially with how well I manage to illuminate the extraordinary "in-your-presence-alone" intimacy of Aaron's compositional voice.

Postscripts

::Consult the Oracle

could call a name and on a dark night when

for any one to stand out there is one

sign one drink loggers is appeased collection

Reality Check::

the bridge

densely mirrored

receding into

Saturday, January 16, 2021

Playlist

Preface

 "So the body is musicalized; but also music is corporealized - its ontology is objectified as one's own identity or as the situation obtaining between one's self and it, or its identity; such an objectification is like an extralinguistic reconfiguring of the expressive event, a turning it over in your mind and body - re-living and re-doing pieces of it - not only experiencing what you are doing, but also doing what you are experiencing."

- Benjamin Boretz "music/ /consciousness/ /gender" from "Being About Music Textworks 1960-2003 J. K. Randall Benjamin Boretz Volume 2: 1978-2003"

Texts

Streaming


January 9, 2021

Finnegans Wake, Chapter 7 - James Joyce  - Neal Kosály-Meyer

did his hair

Shem's Bodily Makeup
speech without words
the Joyce sub
marine man
fear these
talk about lowness
of
it 

it
will trickle out 

commuinicaauted 

not a bit sorry
new irish stew
becoming a novel 

communicquated 

among the pornfarts of speech
low

the obligatory
ewe of queue

lowness 

forehead as visual
stank out of sight as structural 

Persse O'Reilly
toon
Leitmotivalisticatulus
a bad fit of pajamas
these are the words we heard 

were we to memorize one wwword
we e eoooe a k (dd)

dd(ak)
d a d
k d
( ) 

in the names of the incensed privy
moose gas 

onechapteratatime
echapte
e a ch pt htcp thpc 

tits 

the age of his arteries
public impostures 

once
current
punce 

edge you
candied
fermented words
highly prosy crap in his hand
let us pry
to booth

we all take [*] 

premature gravedigger
to find out how his innards work 

Lowness (of the) Highlands 

he points the deathbone
and the quick are still 

woe woe woe
way way way 

[*misforbegotten] 

he lifts the life wand
and the dumb speak

Wayward in Limbo

With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series now moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is curating and commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of exclusive material. Many of these will be essentially “live” performances recorded at home for this occasion. Others may create a mix of pre-recorded material that has not been previously released elsewhere.

- from the Wayward Music Series website at https://www.waywardmusic.org/.

January 9, 2021

Tom Baker

Traces:Sarah – Melissa Achten, harp
Traces:Henry – Tom Baker, bowed mbira
Traces:George – Tom Baker, electric guitar
Traces:Nellie – Lily Shababi, viola; Madison LaVigne, cello

floating
amidst chatters and engines
we are inside
the outside
may not persist
if we could move
we would wander 

signal transmission released from location
the chambers are roomy but interminable
walls are made of empty space 

intermittency

January 10, 2021

Rahikka (Carson Rennekamp) & James Lee

gentle otherworld 

whole body float 

slow river wonder land 

periodic without stops
semi-stops
or any else stops 

it flows
and undulates
breathing
river music
un-flow stasis
null motion
in null space
no disturbance below the surface 

music designed for living with
like walls and ceilings and floors
and the volumes
so arising
between them

January 12, 2021

Bit Graves

built from center of a sound outward
the center is at the root
unshakable
discord's squirrels notwithstanding 

the space aliens are talking
welcome to bloop beep land 

irresistible periodicity
shop sounds
manufactory

Recorded

January 10, 2021

The Quaker's Courtship - Train Case

sense and sensibility

Love is a Landmark - Antonioni [from Lullablaze]

voice flips yodel-like into a distant part of the head
and occasionally drops into an alto warmth 

not without some technique there
no question about it
she got some pipes

Jhon Come Kisse Me Now, Fvb 10 - William Byrd - Claudio Columbo [from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book]

The written music of those days looked different than the written music of our days. I wonder if those old guys had different concepts of what music was made of, than our concepts are of what music is made of, stemming from the differently shaped symbols?

Courantes - Michael Praetorius - New London Consort, Philip Pickett [from Dances for Terpsichore]

the art of pleasure
dance
the night is long 

one for strings
one for recorders
(what's record about recorders anyway?)*
drums and brass and krummhorns

*great Wikipedia article with terms like fipple flute and jongleur.

Suite in F Major, BuxWV 239 - Dietrich Buxtehude - Stella Simone

multiple voices together
even virtual voices
create a lyric line
inexplicitly
between them
a melody of their intervals 

Fux thought
perhaps it could be explained
mechanically

Vom Himmel hoch, da komm' ich her, BWV 700 - Johann Sebastian Bach - Michel Chapuis

more than two voices
of course
means multiple inexplicit lyric lines
which being lyric lines
create 2nd order inexplicit lyric lines
between them
melodies of intervals of intervals

Lamentationes pro die Mercurii Santo 2 - Jan Dismas Zelenka

the art of making the word beautiful
aestheticizing prophecy
a risky gambit 

sensuous dissonance

3 Excerpts from Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach - Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach - Miklos Spanyi

familiar to generation after generation of piano pupils

Partita in F Major, Hob. XVIIa.2 - Franz Joseph Haydn - Christine Schornsheim, Andreas Steier

duos are clearly as much fun to play as to witness
possibly more

January 12, 2021

Symphony in F Major, K130(130) - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Academy of Ancient Music, Christopher Hogwood, Jaap Schröder

as much as it continues returning
it presses forward 
never looks back
completes the phrase
spins the tale
harmonic progression becomes a thing
with a narrative of its own

January 13, 2021


Sonatina in C Major, Op. 36 #1
- Muzio Clementi - Howard Shelley

now that's familiar! see CPEB above.
a nice clear little piece 

but
as a child
I got the impression that Clementi only wrote pieces for children
because his music never came up again 

were teaching pieces a publishing vogue?
lucrative no doubt
democratizing music
anybody can learn

Sonata in G, Oop. 31 #1 - Ludwig van Beethoven - Wilhelm Kempff

the quick-echo figure that opens
is more than just a clever flourish
it informs everything
as effective as it is obvious
even when noticed by its absence 

I tried to learn this as an undergrad at the UW
it got the better of me 

the figure continues through into the third movement
right out to the double bump end

Sonata in F-sharp minor, Op. 61, "Elégie harmonique sur la mort de Louis Ferdinand" - Johann Ladislaus Dussek - Tuija Hakkila

he sticks with a figuration
out as far as it will take him
the appassionato strains in its harness 

keyboard as arena
of worth and prowess
a martial art

January 14, 2021

Impromptu in B-flat Major, Op. 142 #3 - Franz Schubert - Murray Perahia

balanced phrase
lyric expression
song is the model 

theme and variations
to show how expression is foreground
the theme is a carrier wave 

same dude
different mood 

anti-reductionist
(we contain multitudes)

Etude in A minor, Op. 10 #2 - Frederic Chopin - Alfred Cortot [1942]

like Queen Mab

String Quartet in A minor, Op. 41 #1 - Robert Schumann - Quatuor Via Nova

let us gather in this lonely place
to share what comfort we can 

doubling back on himself
bursting outward 

balance is
hinted at
alluded to 

counts as dire 

through figuration meter is liberated from the bar line
an invisible hand molding the tension of a poignant balance

In Session at the Tintinabulary

Assembly Rechoired 60 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey

Karen and I made some noise while engaged in an ineffective attempt to straighten things up out in the Tintinabulary

Postscripts

::Consult the Oracle

without music the only reward he
took students is he out of a sigh and
raised mine so goddamn important me old

Reality Check::

the lion in my wall
unravel
lick her side then

Saturday, December 21, 2019

Playlist

Preface

"As my explanations here are probably above your understandings, lattlebrattons, though as
augmentatively uncomparisoned as Cadwan, Cadwallon and Cadwalloner, I shall revert to a more expletive method which I frequently use when I have to sermo with muddlecrass pupils. Imagine for my purpose that you are a squad of urchins, snifflynosed, goslingnecked, clothyheaded, tangled in your lacings, tingled in your pants, etsitaraw etcicero."

James Joyce - Finnegans Wake

Texts

Live

December 14, 2019
Finnegans Wake Chapter 6
Neal Kosály-Meyer
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Neal performs this in the dark, except for some spotlights during the Mookes and the Gripes episode, for one spotlight of which I was responsible. I therefore did not take notes. However, in an accident of my system for choosing the next thing to listen to, my recording of this will come up shortly. I'll probably listen in short bits, rather than all at once. Stay tuned.

December 19, 2019
Extremity
Lu Evers
Jo Anderson, voice; Keith Eisenbrey, piano; Lu Evers, voice and clarinet

I am grateful to Lu for inviting me to join in this intriguing collaboration. I was so involved in the doing of it that I don't have much of a sense of what it is from the audience side of the stage. Lu and Jo read some texts that Lu had written. For some of the texts Lu played clarinet. For some of the texts I played piano. Lu had written scores for me to play from. For one of the texts Lu and I played together.

Recorded

December 15,1019
Leather and Lace (Alternative Version) - Stevie Nicks [from Bella Donna]

message music
tell you something

outing a conversation with a known actual person
or fantasy of a conversation with a known actual person
or providing a soundtrack for another's life moment

throwing words, nonspecific events and particularized emotion laden words
in hopes that some of a set of them will hit home

All Around the World or The Myth of the Fingerprints - Paul Simon [from Graceland]

This song is a body dancing in many frames.

Jeremiah 17:5-8 - Keith Eisenbrey - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey [from Continuity in Small Things, February 2002]

hiss noise heavy in the mix
and yet we hear the music signal as though it were pristine within it

Karen sounds great
I flubbed some notes but was otherwise right on

nice song writing, past me!

Turtle Island Waltz - Robert Tree Cody, Will Clipman [from Heart of the Wind]

Who is appropriating whom indeed?

Can appropriation by appropriate?

The whump of the drum is preceded each time by a quiet whoosh
a soft fabric sound
very like the wh of whump

Gradus 198 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [October 2011]

Among these pitches, the A-nat in the middle of the range, where we would be speaking in terms of pitch register, is easily felt to be the focus of the activity. The purpose of our hearing is, partly, in order to hear our selves.

How is one supposed to hear?
Why is one supposed, exactly, to hear?
Why not overhear what one is supposed to not hear?

piano pedal technique: as one slowly releases a reverberation the dampers won't quite each engage with absolute unanimity of time

result: the possibility of a melody of the sequence of apparent tones as they linger differentially, as they arise as others are stopped, as others are withdrawn

Swallow Your Fears - Robber's Roost [from Swallow Your Fears]



So articulate!
So fast!!
clawhammer hardcore?

DK should hide in shame

Sonata in G Major, K. 63 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

a tinkerer was Scarlatti
which is why
he is such a composer's composer

La de Guyon - Jacques DuPhly - Christophe Rousset

solo music
not intended for multitudes

much more private
for among intimates
fellow wizards

Sonata in B-flat Major, Wq 65/45 - C.P.E. Bach - Miklos Spanyi

strays into other tonal regions
as though losing itself in bookstacks

follow carefully now
you may have to find your own way out

3rd movement is more than a little tipsy
this is W.C. Fields juggling drunk
a mimicking wit
a puppeteer

In Session at the Tintinabulary

December 16,2019
Banned Rehearsal 995 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer




Postscript

saying that allow for the always living
but because of this effect it makes the 
soul live without knowing why his voice was

arranged my tapes in three neat little stacks)
carrying a sack of gold
a bird flutters through the sun