Preface
 |
| Science under Divers Forms - George Cruikshank |
from The Comic Almanack. 1st Series, 1835-1843
Texts
Live
October 17, 2026
Earshot Jazz Festival: Leanna Keith, Jun Iido
The Royal Room,
Seattle
I didn't bring my notebook, but share some thoughts below.
Absolutely beautiful show all around.
It was great to hear Leanna again.
Recorded
 |
| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 5, Meeresstille (After 2nd Version, D. 216) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
any music involves a negotiation of its immediacy
its nearness to its
audience
but
primally
to each of its individual
audients
traditional or familiar means to this end . . .
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Fugue No. 2 in G Major - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
. . . offer both an opening of an immediate conduit . . .
Not Guilty (Take 102) - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
... and a barrier to it simultaneously
such means might be
the traditions and postures of jazz
or pop
or western tonal practice
or free improvisation
- social
practices of all stripes
Thundercrack (All Night) - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
My thoughts are full of last night's Earshot Festival concert at The Royal
Room
I didn't have my notebook with me
so I'm using my current
listening
as a reverberation board
to consider the issues it
raised
the easy way to parse it
would be to position the traditional elements
as mediation or barrier
and liberation from them as the conduit
and perhaps
for this listener
it may have seemed to be
working that way
Leanna's band's free improvising
as being more
immediate
(less mediated)
than Jun Iido's band's
more
normatively structured jazz compositions
standing between me and them
but
that's not exactly true
since in both cases
there
was a give and take of immediacy
ebbs and flows
By Rail - Steve Layton [form Próxima Estación]
any performer and practice
on any instrument
has a field of
immediacy available to them
and negotiation among them
necessarily
involves movement among
or conversation among
a whole cacophony of
possible immediacies
perhaps my lingering discomfort
with
electronically produced sound
is its presumption of immediacy
its
factness
it is its sound
and not
also
the gestures of
its production . . .
Who Made the Man - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
. . . it lacks
for instance
Leanna's face
tsk-tsk-tsk-ing us
through her bass flute
or
the retrievable image thereof
or Jun Iido's pianist's limby posture
or the image of Mack Rice
singing those words
while strumming his guitar
(if that's what's
happening here)
all of which
is part of the musical experience of
live performance
even when only retrievable by imagination
while
listening to recordings . . .
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 6, Die junge Nonne (After D. 828) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
. . . all the spectacle of which
becomes a focal point
for the
audience as a mass
which might seem irrelevant
to any one audient
were it not for the fact
that the performers
are also listening
and are deeply aware
of all those listening ears
which awareness feeds back
into their performance
(not
self-consciousness
but listening-selves
conscious
of selves
listening)
from that standpoint . . .
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Fugue No. 3 in C Minor - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
... traditional or normative practices
can act
for some
as a
genuine conduit
a mitigation of mediacy just as . . .
What's the New Mary Jane - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
. . . a sui generis action can act
for some
as an obfuscation or a
barrier
and not every such act
is made in the good faith that
for instance
Leanna's licketysplit tsk-tsk-tsks so clearly were
for this listener
sometimes
(as here)
it comes across
as more like flailing
than like riding a creative thought to its
shore . . .
The Song About His Mom - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
. . . or
(as here)
when risk devolves into a self-declared
modest
violation of genre normatives
(as though rock and
roll weren't a country music)
but everyone has a mom
so it's
really nothing particularly risky
that said
this isn't a bad
performance or song for Bruce
he doesn't over-blow it
Trouble in Mind - Steve Layton [from Trouble in Mind]
of course the raw immediacy of electronically produced music
opens
possibilities that acoustic practices can't really touch
the sound we
hear
is the same as that
that the producer hears
they are
not also hearing
through their physical/gestural production of the sound
the music is a shared artifact
less of a negotiation in that sense
than a physical object or sculpture
It Don't Pay to Get Up in the Morning - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
nothing but the blues
and more blues
on the other side of sleep
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| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 7, Frühlingsglaube (After D. 686, 2nd Version) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
within any culture
there are prescribed norms
and allowable
parameters
of undiscovered potentials
(un-proscribed)
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Fugue No. 4 in A Minor - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
compact subject
Rocky Raccoon (Take 8) - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
a failed attempt to talk Minnesotan
question
were hoe-downs and
show-downs ever a Minnesotan thing?
(good reason to cut the opening
chatter)
Hold On I'm Comin' - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
with Sam someone
a soul singer
Midnight Waves - Steve Layton & Sound-In [from The Summer Sessions 2018]
undulations in a field
occasional impacts
generate fresh
undulations
Don't Let the Love Light Leave - Carla Thomas [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
personal plea
cleaves tightly to the words of its conceit
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 8, Gretchen am Spinnrade (After D. 118) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
finding stimulus in worldly images
as echoes of inner turmoils
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Fugue No. 5 in C-Sharp Minor - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
a subject of six notes in three stations
I Will (Take 1) - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
the kinds of mathematics available to a music
depend on the degrees of
integration
persisting among that music's lexicon and syntax
When Something Is Wrong With My Baby - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
extended vamp for a heart to heart confession
Rejuvenator - Steve Layton [from The Month of Endings]
after eight iterations
if a new thing had not entered on the fifth
iteration
we expect it on the ninth
and thereafter
in like
multiples
the normative regime of square folds
I've Got No Time to Lose - Deanie Parker [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
slow dance
twelve eight time
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 9, Ständchen von Shakespeare (After D. 889) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
why listen to a transcription
when the actual song is available?
a
unified conception
personal/cultural appropriation of the whole of
things
into an individual
(the Romantic Heroic)
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Fugue No. 6 in F-Sharp Minor - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
studies in the secrets of the old practice
Step Inside Love/Los Paranoias - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
dinking around
nothing sticks
Hey Bo Diddley/I Thank You - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
so much vamp
so little song
The Green Curtain - Steve Layton [from Virtual Composition]
blocks of orchestral sound
splotches of color
a numb stillness
A Woman's Love - Carla Thomas [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
an explanation
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| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 10, Rastlose Liebe (After D. 138a) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
Liszt's championship of musics not his own
even if under the banner
of Liszt-branded transcription
is a feature of the Romantic-Hero
complex
raising the standard
of the intellectual commoner's
individual creative spirit
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Canon No. 7 in F Minor - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
contrapuntal forms are a tool of intellectual continuity
Glass Onion (Outtake) - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
a lively and arrogant mind
dealing with an unprecedented situation
Soul Man - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
the popularity of music that fills stadiums
is as much about
stadium-sized crowd communality
as it is about the content of the
focusing device in play
rock&roll
pro-wrestling,
whatever
social belonging on an industrial scale
{Sam
Moore?}
In the world to come I will love the flowers and I will love the moon - Steve Layton [from Próxima Estación]
the social need to belong
in a community of any given size
is
common
but no particular one size
is a comfortable fit for every
individual
hence the need for niches
study of large phenomenon
(such as rock&roll)
can inform
concerning a plurality of sorts
but study of the niches can inform
concerning the microbes of a culture
where it shares sides of a
membrane
with individuals' intervals
643-5789 (Soulsville USA) - Eddie Floyd [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
one eight hundred
12 Lieder von Franz Schubert, S. 558: No. 11, Der Wanderer (After D. 489, 3rd Version) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
some musics narrowcast to individual audients
the community of an
audience disappears
in the privacy of this communique
no stadiumite could hear those pianissimo trills
and remain in the
stadium community
8 Fugen und Kanons, Anh:F19: Canon No. 8 in A-Flat Major - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
hiding in plain site
I'm So Tired (Take 3, 6 and 9 Remix) The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
differently paced vocal production
than the released version
Just Another Road (Shine Silently) - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
a new singer
a stage
starts lightly
nice voice
singing
not shouting over a mass of sound
sells his song
and
miracle
of miracles
you can hear what the guitar is doing
Speed - Steve Layton [from Trouble In Mind]
in a postulated set of three items:
performer
audient
audience
any item among them
might find musical means to
vanish any one of the others
(but not both simultaneously?)
does
this music seek
somehow
to vanish the performer?
lifting the
Wizard of Oz curtain
behind which lurks the composer?
or
might we ask how the music generates the items
in the postulated
set of three items
what do we mean by organized
when we say
that music is organized sound?
Linda Sue Dixon - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
I'm wondering now
whether many of these demos
were recorded in the
same room
and that
over time
one could get a pretty good
idea
of the acoustic shape of that room
just through the
recordings
 |
| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
some music inspires awe
some music is awe inspired
awe inspired
inspires awe
awe expired expires awe
ah!
rest in song's cradle
Canon in A Major for Piano (Completed by J. Draheim) - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
complete with a little canonic cadenza
Why Don't We Do It In The Road (Take 4) - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
a mimic/clown
inventing a voice
for a ditty
Because The Night Belongs to Lovers - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
I hope you'll recognize . .
(it's a guitar solo
even I can
recognize that)
oh
there may be more
it's a song
with
two dudes singing to each other
about night belonging to lovers
it
certainly goes on long enough
surely it's morning soon?
made such great records
Tyrant - Steve Layton [from Virtual Composition]
operatic cue
scenes of horror and waste
translation
visual
to disembodied music
if an image
can't be demonstrated to
cohere
does it somehow
not cohere?
the how-ness of coherency
gaps in logic
artistically displayed
Told You For The Last Time - Delaney Bramlett [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
if a music doesn't take you to its planet
why is it?
country soul
dynamite cut
Die Rose, S. 556/3 (After Schubert, D. 745) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
an impersonated poem
or an empuppeted poem
unexpected passion
erupts
well then
ahem
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 1, Nicht schnell, leise vorzutragen - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
a fugue is a mode of musical mathematics
that searches out odd corners
of things
it so happens
I have started work on a piece that
for now
is opening like a fugue does
it's been awhile
Julia (Take 2) - The Beatles [from The Beatles Anthology]
working out the fingerings
Oh What Can I Do?/I'm a Trashcan/Kitty's Back In - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
that's another guitar solo
I recognize it
something about a
mustelid
same vamp to each new soloist
how demeaning
simplified structural signaling
From the Shore - Steve Layton & Sound-In [from The Summer Sessions 2018]
a nosegay of surf and reeds and rainy days
Let Me Know - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
nice guitar sound
Lob der Tränen, S. 557 (After Schubert, D. 711) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
a song breathes
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 2, Mäßig - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
marching bravely into the thickening polyphony
strands of tones
inventing stacks of tones between them
Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand - The Beatles [from Past Masters 1]
remembering their Munich
Christmas Song - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
big excitement
for the mass of little kid-ness in the hall
It's go in / quiet illuminated grass / land (Leslie Scalapino) - Steve Layton [from The Month of Endings]
life's caesuras roam the land
in vast herds
a weighty speaking
Let Me Be Yours - Joe Shamwell [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
promise of presence
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| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
Ungarische Nationalmelodien, S. 243b - Franz Liszt - Carlo Grante
first it takes an elaborate bow
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 3, Ziemlich bewegt - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
a strand of tones reveals itself
within a syntactically generated field
of strands of tones
Lady Madonna - The Beatles [from Past Masters 2]
engineered
to sound
somewhat
like separate mono speakers are
playing it
(at first)
channel separation
as an engineering goal
Merry Christmas, Baby - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
time for guys to strut for each other
to a lazy beat
Próxima Estación - Steve Layton [from Próxima Estación]
one follows the sway of a vehicle along a track
as it takes the corners
as pre-ordained
an utterly smooth ride by maglev
it
navigates for you
enjoy the experience
We Can Love - Eddie Floyd [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
that opening guitar lick
is as close to a kalimba lick
as can be
got
Russischer Galop (After Pyotr Bulakhov), S. 478 - Franz Liszt - Wenting Shi
must have been a market for national-characteristic dances
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 4, Lebhaft - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
the fugal mathematics
projects serious intent
flippancy kept away
Sie Liebt Dich - The Beatles [from Past Masters 1]
and the flip side
Jeah Jeah Jeah
I Don't Wanna Go Home - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
that's why his songs are so long
plugging the sponsors and charitable
organizations
Almost the Periphery - Steve Layton [from Virtual Composition]
a dragon breathes below
water drip drips through the lair's mountain
keep
they awaken
rather a strong piece Steve!
Without You - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
funky at its best
 |
| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
a sentimental favorite of its time
the fashionable greeting
in
card and song
always the passion
hidden within the upright heart
the oaken core
of a Romantic Hero
Excelsior!
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 5, Ziemlich langsam, empfindungsvoll vorzutragen - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
a lovely lonely piece
disconsolate
modest solace
The Inner Light - The Beatles [from Past Masters 2]
George here
sounds like Syd Barrett
and/or vice versa
Rise Up - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
a soulful prayer
to send us out redemptified
a working class influencer is something to be
Resistente - Steve Layton [from Trouble In Mind]
an illustration of a fantasy creature
musically animated
illustrator:
translation between mediums of imagination
verbal to
musical
or visual to musical
we are given ample opportunity
to experience its power
we create objects to make sounds
on the fly as we hear them
hear a
sound
create an object
the longer we study it
the less
familiar it seems
ends just after
it will have been going on
forever
Shouting Out Love - Veda Brown [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
girl group energy
Il m'aimait tant!, S. 533 - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
an implied balance will do
but if too many are merely implied
the
math can lead to a breakdown of reserve
the tonally distant interrupting
echo
an articulatory device
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 6, Sehr schnell - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
spider quick
Long Tall Sally - The Beatles [from Past Masters 1]
Paul does Little Richard
Peace Love and Understanding - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
we had the exhortation
now we'll get the witness
the service is
winding up to its feel good conclusion
Bruce's Tent Meeting Spectacular
Doomed to Fail - Steve Layton & Sound-In [from The Summer Sessions 2018]
objects follow the paths of their pitch strings
a box of sounds
from here and there
Take My Body - Bettye Crutcher [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
quite the offer
Petite valse favorite, S. 212 (2nd Version) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
first the magic sparkle dust
then the dance
7 Clavierstucke in Fughettenform, Op. 126: No. 7, Langsam, ausdrucksvoll - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
an unusual halt to the meter
leans on two of four
Hey Jude - The Beatles [from Past Masters 2]
brotherly advice
Santa Claus is Comin' To Town - Bruce Springsteen [from Christmas at Asbury Park]
time for the commercials for local businesses
the whole Chamber of
Commerce crowd
Ho Ho Ho Ho Ho Ho
time to go home folks
Sugar Crash - Steve Layton [from The Month of Endings]
to illustrate
is to make plain
to manifest
in one medium
an image from another
a track can appear and disappear
but transformation is trickier
I've Got A Feeling (We'll Be Seeing Each Other Again) - Homer Banks [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
a rain check
put a pin it it
 |
| Dry Falls State Park, Washington |
open with a puzzling
delay firm notification of a tonic
plenty of time for that later
the sense of a tonic
is really
a sense that all the pitches going by
are in a unified syntactic
relation to each other
functional ambiguities not up front
a
sequence
is tonality on the move
Fantasia sopra un tema di quatre suoni in E Minor (Fragment) - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
an idea left behind
Revolution - The Beatles [from Past Masters 2]
self-proclaimed radical of many minds
Why Apollinaire - Steve Layton [from Virtual Composition]
these figures don't move
they stay where they're put
if figures
don't move
can we hear motion between them
or do their
interrelations also get jammed up?
I Could Never Be Satisfied - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
a strut
Lyubila ya "Romance" de Wielhorsky, S. 577 (4th Version, Published) - Franz Liszt - Leslie Howard
in the manner of a song with a harp
Tanz for Piano in G Minor (Fragment) - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
these figures move as bodies might
I Call Your Name - The Beatles [from Past Masters 1]
not gonna mayeeayeeake it
Triunfante - Steve Layton [from Trouble In Mind]
this is the sound that constant energy makes
a gelatinous ambience
Everybody's Hustling - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
elements of the groove performed for clarity
not power
I Lombardi alla prima crociata: Salve Maria de Jérusalem, S. 431 (2nd Version) [After Verdi] - Franz Liszt - Wai Yin Wong
devotion theater
Gesänge der Frühe, Op. 133 - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
a marvel of touch and pacing
gently transparent
Get Back (with Billy Preston) - The Beatles [from Past Masters 2]
train travel groove
Doomed to Fail - Steve Layton & Sound-In [from The Summer Sessions 2018]
figures travel in lines
from low to high
and high to low
pulses of intervals
clearing a space between
Either You Love Me Or Leave Me - Homer Banks [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
ultimatum time
3 {sic} Pieces from "La muette de Portici", S. 387: No. 1, Introduction (Prière) - No. 2, Cavatine (Berceuse) [After Auber] - Franz Liszt - Wai Yin Wong
besotted with melody
Variations on a Nocturne by Chopin (Completed by J. Draheim) - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
figures move
figures hold
restless
Slow Down - The Beatles [from Past Masters 1]
a one panel sitch
Slow Heaven - Steve Layton [from The Month of Endings]
these figures take the stage
and enact a mimic dance
their motions
like in-tongues speaking
require interpretation
which can
only occur
within the language of their motions
this is quite nice
I've Never Been This Close to Jesus - Mack Rice [from Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos]
witness
Zigeuner-Polka No. 2 in E Minor (After August Conradi), S. 481 - Franz Liszt - Wenting Shi
frippery?
oui!
but astonishing frippery
Grand Sonata No. 3 in F Minor, Op. 14 (1853 Edition) - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig
one might think of an older fellow
thinking about his younger
impetuosities
seeing how the fit now
Florian generally opts for
poetry over bravura
In Session at The Tintinabulary
October 18, 2026
Oxford - Keith Eisenbrey
Ain - Keith Eisenbrey
October 19, 2026
Banned Telepath 107 Mile Square Park Grackles Geese Crows - Jennifer Chung, Aaron Keyt
Banned Telepath 107 Serrano Creek - Jennifer Chung, Aaron Keyt
Banned Telepath 107 Tintinabulary - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Neal Kosály-Meyer
Banned Rehearsal 1161 - Jennifer Chung, Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer
October 22, 2026
Detritus 2 - Keith Eisenbrey
Postscripts
Drops
Keith Eisenbrey 35
Sabbatical Improvisations 2014-2015
Another album of solo improvisations for you.
recordings of my compositions (and more!) can be found at keitheisenbrey.bandcamp.com - free to download or stream.
