All posts tagged music

Maybe I Was Asleep

Do you ever get the feeling that some things have just passed you by?  Those moments when other people are talking about things which were significant for them, and of which you have no memory at all?  Even, or perhaps especially, when they tell you that everyone was listening/doing/watching?

I’m not talking about the things which I knew were around, but which I chose to avoid, like Only Fools and Horses, or Little Britain; I mean those things which left no impression at all.

I’ve just watched the first hour (of well over two) of Spike Lee’s documentary Michael Jackson: BAD 25, a  track by track hagiography of an album released in 1987.  Every imaginable contributor has been interviewed and carefully spliced together, wither now or in archive tape, from Martin Scorsese and Quincy Jones to each of the session musicians, and current stars who were inspired by it.

Apparently, if this film is to be believed, pretty much everything about the album and associated short films (music videos by another name) was extraordinary; from its sales figures and the number of consecutive number 1 singles  to the fact that it gave Wesley Snipes his debut film role.

As the documentary progressed through the development, recording and performance of each of the tracks one by one, I was really surprised to realise that, with the exception of the title track (Bad), I would swear that I’d never heard any of them before.

How did that happen?  In 1987 I still listened to music radio and bought loads of records, although I might have been transitioning to CDs around about then.  I wouldn’t say I was a big Jackson fan, but I did feel I’d grown up with him.  At the house-warming party for my first house, built on the edge of a cemetery,  we had played Thriller on near continuous loop, with the windows open to the graves over the fence.

But the subsequent album completely passed me by; and now it’s gone, as the music was of its time, and having missed it first time round I have none of the nostalgia for it that all the contributors obviously share.

Do you remember it?

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by rowena on December 4, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on December 4, 2012

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Another Old Shirt

I’ve spent the last couple of evenings going through old photos, and loading some of them onto my laptop so that I can use them in a couple of gifts I am contemplating making for the end of the year.  While I already knew I had lots of photographs, mainly because in the recent past I’ve always seemed to be moving the albums and boxes from one place to another, actually looking through the pages brought the message home very forcefully.

Because I had a particular purpose in mind, I tried not to spend too much time letting my mind meander around in all the memories that were unearthed; all those odd little incidents, the people with whom only a few hours were spent, but who live on in the stories I’ve told of my trips, but it was hard to keep focussed.

The clothes are a talking point in themselves.  We’re all wearing the same waterproof jackets and trousers in most of the hundreds of shots of the Lake District where, for a period of about 10 years I used to spend a week walking every May with a group of friends, so I’ve no idea which year was which; and some t-shirts and dresses seem to have lasted for several years worth of warm trips in the late 1990s.

This one in particular made me laugh out loud, even when I wasn’t looking at my hair.  It was taken in 1996 near the Sun Gate above Machu Picchu where we had sought refuge from the hoards of people visiting the main site.  I’ve still got that shirt.  In fact I still wear it quite often to my drawing classes.  I knew I’d had it a long time, but I would never had said ‘at least 16 years’ if you’d asked me; but here is the proof.  I guess you could call it a good buy.

It brought this Mary Chapin Carpenter song to mind; the story of a life lived through the memory of all the places one old shirt had been, and all the things for which it had been used.

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by rowena on October 16, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on October 16, 2012

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Ian Bostridge Masterclass st LSO St Luke’s

Continuing with my occasional project to try new things in London, I’ve been to a Masterclass on Mahler songs, conducted by the tenor Ian Bostridge, run for the benefit of students at the Guildhall School, but which was open to the public.  It took place in St Luke’s, an 18th century Hawkesmoor designed church building which now houses the LSO’s educational programmes.

I’d never seen a real masterclass before; I’ve seen them portrayed in dramas on television, and in plays, where the point of the class is usually to show some power play or Machiavellian shenanigans on the part of the teacher.

This was quite the opposite.  The manner in which  Ian Bostridge conducted the session was all about the musical interpretation, and not at all about him.  He didn’t show off, didn’t show the students how it should really be done, instead he coached them in their own efforts, talking about the score and the clues and instructions left there by the composer; although in those occasional little moments when he did hum a phrase to illustrate a point, there was a hint of what a mellifluous, easy, rich voice he has.

It’s fascinating watching artists talk about the techniques they use to achieve the effects for which they’re striving, even if it’s not an art form with which I’m familiar.  So I learnt a great deal listening to their talk of intensity without increased volume, of accentuating the consonants when singing pianissimo, and using long fluid vowels for louder passages, of debating the difference between piano and pianissimo, when to take a breath, and when to smooth a phrase.

But not only did Bostridge coach each of the four singers in their singing, he talked about where they might look, and what they might be thinking about during a long introduction, to get both themselves and the audience ready for the words that are to come; and he also gave notes to the accompanist on improvements they might make.

I’d never really thought about the partnership between soloist and accompanist before, other than to think that the pianist is the solid one in the background, supporting the singer, the one taking all the risks.  But during the masterclass, as well the Q &A at the end, it became clear that it is much more of an equal partnership, that both must have an understanding of the repertoire and be working together in the service of their joint interpretation.

When I heard the class would take place in a former church, it reminded me of the Anglican church in Moscow, which had been used for many years as the recording studio for Melodia Records.  When the Queen visited Russia in the early 1990′s the Kremlin had promised to return the building to the control of the Anglican Church, but this process was far from complete when I lived in the city, and while the outside of the church looked like a substantial Victorian church which might have been found in any worthy northern English town, its interior was that of a rather elderly and uncared for studio.

St Luke’s is the polar opposite; on the outside it is elegant and plain, with a towering narrow spire, while on the inside it is a wide open space, sound proofed in clear glass, and supported by massive circular girders.  The air conditioning is vigorous and the extensive underground facilities include a café, which on a Monday morning was the meeting place of a dozen mothers with children and buggies, which were neatly lined up against the wall.

So, another success…..

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by rowena on October 9, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on October 9, 2012

http://rowenadunn.wordpress.com/2012/10/09/ian-bostridge-masterclass-st-lso-st-lukes/

Berlioz Requiem – St Paul’s Cathedral

Shame-faced confession #643: I’ve never been inside St Paul’s cathedral.

I’ve walked around it, I’ve looked up at it, admired it from across the river, given tourists directions to it, and frequently used the Tube station that bears its name; once, feeling particularly dejected, and looking for a place to sit and collect my thoughts in the days before there was a franchise coffee shop on every street corner,  I even got as far as the door, only to find they were just closing up.  But I’d never crossed the threshold, until this week.

I went to a concert arranged under the auspices of the City of London Festival, of Berlioz’s Requiem, played by the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and the London Philharmonic Choir , under the direction of Sir Colin Davies.  We were told to be there on time, as it was being broadcast live on BBC Radio 3, here, an instruction that, inevitably, profoundly irritated me.  I’m happy to be there on time out of respect for the orchestra and choristers, and for my fellow members of the audience, but no, not for the convenience of the Beeb’s schedulers.

I’d never heard this Requiem before, and you already know that I’m not that well educated musically, and the lasting impression left with me from this experience was the sheer amount of noise human voices can make when joined together and singing at full gusto.  The acoustics of the cathedral meant that by the time the sound reached me in the middle of the nave it had already swirled around the pillars and up and down in the dome, and had acquired a fuzzy edge and a little tail end echo.  I couldn’t distinguish any individual words, but simply let the rich sound engulf me.

One the things I usually enjoy about a concert is watching the musicians at their task; the intensity of their faces, the sweep of their arms and fingers, their concentration, but this time they were all a little too far away for that, so I was left with the cathedral, the enormous pillars and the elaborate lights to study, and to surrender to the sounds of the concert, and especially the fantastic deep and sonorous tone of the bass sections of the choirs.

Some of the notes were ghostly and strange because of the building.  During the segment on which Barry Banks the tenor was singing alone, there was a single timpani beat, accompanied by what to me sounded like a human voice ‘ssssshhhhhh’; S, my much more knowledgeable friend, told me that it was cymbals.  The explanation was at the same time both satisfying in that it answered my question, but also disappointing as it  removed a little bit of mystery.

It was an extraordinary experience to feel the whole space of the cathedral filled with sound and to see every seat in the audience filled.

I’ll have to go back another day to see the cathedral in another guise.

5 Comments
by rowena on June 29, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on June 29, 2012

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RIP – Robin Gibb

I wouldn’t say that I was particularly a fan of the BeeGees, and I didn’t feel any immediate sense of shock when I heard of Robin Gibb’s death at the end of last month, but the press coverage of his funeral has made me feel sad.

The sight of Barry, the sole survivor of the four Gibb brothers, leaving the church was very poignant.  Being the eldest of four, he might reasonably have expected not to be the one left on his own; how bereft he must feel.  And how awful for their mother to have outlived three of her four sons.

There was a period in the mid to late 1970s when the music of the BeeGees dominated; the songs from Saturday Night Fever were the unavoidable sound track to my teenage years.  I only got around to buying any of their albums in the late 1990s, when I acquired one of the retrospective live ones.

Tracks from it pop up every now and again when I have the iPod on shuffle, and memories of awkward nights in discos in Birmingham and all those terrible television programmes made to jump on the disco band wagon arrive unbidden and in droves.  (And a quick search on google confirmed that the 1978 discomania episode of Starsky and Hutch was not a figment of an over excited imagination.)

But this weekend I spent some time listening to all the tracks I have, and I was properly reminded that between them, the BeeGees wrote a great collection of songs both for themselves and for others.  ’Alone’ felt all too much like an encapsulation of how the surviving family members might feel.

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by rowena on June 11, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on June 11, 2012

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Rufus Wainwright at the Lyceum Theatre

There were no signs outside the theatre that Rufus Wainwright would be playing there on Monday night.  It was perhaps only the complete absence of children in the crowds of adults of a certain age lining up for admission that gave any clue that we weren’t all there for a performance of The Lion King, the usual entertainment on offer at the Lyceum.  It’s such a long time since I’ve been to something that attracted the casual looking ticket touts who wander amongst the crowds of people waiting outside, speaking out of the sides of their mouths ‘want a ticket?’

Because the show was in a theatre, I hadn’t really thought that I’d have to sit through a warm up act, nor that the usual ‘sit down and stay there’ rule wouldn’t apply.  By the time Rufus did arrive on stage it was hard to tell whether it was the warm up act or the multiple plastic glasses of beer and wine that had been consumed during it.

So this was a bit like ‘Rufus does Pop’, a mixed programme of songs, but focussed around new songs with more ‘production’ than those with which I was more familiar, more electric guitar and drumming than in the winsome piano based tracks.  His set opened in darkness apart from Rufus singing unaccompanied, illuminated by only a few candles.  When the lights came up, bright and green, there he was, in tails, red sparkly shoes and sunglasses, his voice strong, hair floppy.

I’d read beforehand that his new album might represent his best chance at pop success, and a couple of times during the show he made humorous cracks about the popiness of some of the songs, but he would be unusual as a pop star in current times.  He was the sort of eccentric who achieved pop success in the 1970s, the idiosyncratic dresser with the poignant plaintive songs and great musical facility.

He danced awkwardly behind the mic when he was standing, but looked more comfortable at the piano and his voice had more complexity and strength to it than I’ve heard on the recordings I have.  I’m sorry to have to admit that I didn’t care much for the voices of the women providing the backing vocals: either too shouty or with that awful sloppy diction that leaves out all the consonants,

This was part of my programme to try new and different things; it was fun and I enjoyed it, although not enough to want to stay for the encores.

And as for the photo, it’s a fairly accurate record of what it’s possible to see from the very back of the Dress Circle in Row P.

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by rowena on May 3, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on May 3, 2012

http://rowenadunn.wordpress.com/2012/05/03/rufus-wainwright-at-the-lyceum-theatre/

Cesaria Evora RIP

In an odd coincidence or strange cosmic synchronicity I had thinking about writing a post about music I associate with the particular people who had introduced me to it.  Cesaria Evora is one artist that was on that list.

She has one of the great distinctive voices, once I had been introduced to it I could recognise it whenever I heard it again.  I saw her at the Royal Festival Hall about 8 years ago, leading a concert of artistes from Cape Verde, her home country.

There was no voice there to compare to hers.  She appeared on stage, barefoot, as I understand was her custom, walking as one might walk along the street, as if unaware that we were all there banked up in rows, waiting for her.  Interrupted from her usual days activities to sing to us, I could believe that she might just have come from cooking a meal or reading a book, she was a very unshowy performer, letting her voice and her band make the only splash that was needed.

I don’t understand the lyrics, but no matter, there is enough to listen to in her voice, the melodies and syncopations.

I was saddened to hear of her death.

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by rowena on December 19, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Finding inspiration
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Posted by rowena on December 19, 2011

http://rowenadunn.wordpress.com/2011/12/19/cesaria-evora-rip/

The Potency of Cheap Music

Noel Coward’s observation on the potency of cheap music came to mind on Saturday morning.  I’d arrived in the vicinity of my weekend art class half an hour early, so I went into a nearby Starbucks to kill a few moments out of the cold.

When I was in my last job I used to spend an hour or so each morning in one of the chain’s shops, not because I particularly like their coffee, but more because of the convenience of its location and the fact that the tables are the right height for writing to be comfortable.  It was a routine, but for only 10 months of the year.  Only 10 months, because I couldn’t stand to spend any time in the place in November and December when the air was filled with the most egregiously awful Christmas music imaginable.

Red Cup Alert!

I remembered this a few moments too late this weekend.  It was just as I paid for the coffee I didn’t really want, but which felt like the price of renting a table for the time I needed that the music began; something painful and twee about snow and ivy.  Then I noticed the stack of red paper cups, the signal I used to use as the warning to go further afield for sanctuary.  I’ll not make the same mistake again this season.

Music is such a critical element in creating a pleasing a comfortable environment, with both the power to attract and repel.  My aversion to the Starbucks Christmas soundtrack reminded me of how oppressed I felt by not being able to avoid the Muzak pumped into the air when I visited Disneyland a few years ago.  Everywhere we went from the park itself, to the shopping and restaurant area outside, to the bus stop, the bus and the lobby, lifts and corridors of the hotel.  Only in our room  could we enjoy silence.

Silence does seem to be an underrated virtue.  Most people appear to avoid the unpleasant noises in their environment by plugging themselves into their own music systems, unhitching the earphones only when there is no option but to talk to another person.  Some day we may all be deaf to the silences in between all the noise.

It occurs to me I’m not the first to notice the powerful oppression it is possible to exert through the imposition of unwelcome noise: Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-four dreams of being able to turn off the television screen in his flat, while the rules about a child’s place in society are fed to them through attachments to their heads while they sleep in Brave New World.  

But George Orwell had a totalitarian political system in mind…….

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by rowena on November 23, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on November 23, 2011

http://rowenadunn.wordpress.com/2011/11/23/the-potency-of-cheap-music/

Different Shades of Choral Singing – Manipulation or Inspiration?

There seems to be a lot of Choirs out and about in the zeitgeist at the moment.  Maybe it’s just because once I’ve noticed one, I see them everywhere.

Last week I wrote about the impact that the first episode of the new series of ‘The Choir‘ on BBC had on me, and indeed I found the second equally affecting;  there is such a feeling of genuine enthusiasm and belief in the power of singing together.

But just as I am enthused and moved by the stories told in that programme, I am repelled by the attempts to flog me stuff in adverts filled with groups of people singing.  There’s one for a bank, one for IT education; there are car ads, and dairy spreads.  Enough! I shout at the television whenever they appear.

I suppose that’s how advertising works though, isn’t it?  Pick up on something that is happening organically and then exploit it to piggyback on the positive connotations in the hope that we won’t notice that it’s all just junk, and to turn what had once been interesting and inspiring into so much commercial dust.

So let’s enjoy the real thing before it’s degraded beyond repair.

On Saturday evening I went to part of a performance by Edinburgh Academy choir, in which one of the children with whom I’m staying this week participates.  A large number of children, ranging from rather dishevelled little boys, wearing school shirts clearly bought for growth, to young women in eye-liner and carefully styled hair, joined together to give a nuanced and engaging performance of Gershwin songs.  From my vantage point to the side of the choir, in the circular venue, I had a perfect view of the teacher conducting.  So swept along by his energy and focussed control, it was hard to resist the temptation to join in.

I’ve subsequently learned that as well as this full, ‘anyone can join in’ choir, the school also has a smaller selected chamber group, who are the reigning champions of a BBC school choir competition.

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by rowena on November 16, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by rowena on November 16, 2011

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Understanding Song Lyrics ……. Or Not

I’ve heard a couple of instances recently of pop song lyrics being compared to poetry.  Firstly, it seems that some of Jarvis Cocker’s lyrics are being published by Faber & Faber.  While I heard him on the radio denying that he would compare his compositions to poetry, publication by such a prominent poetry publisher, suggests something to the contrary.

I am utterly unqualified to comment on either Jarvis Cocker or poetry, but there was a striking synchronicity in that news on the one hand, and a segment in the recent Stephen Fry programme about language ‘Fry’s Planet World‘.  The series in itself was an interesting one, looking at the development of language and the way it is used, and in the final episode, among other people, he spoke to Richard Curtis who commented on how powerful he found many popular song lyrics; they say things simply and effectively.  Part of his argument about their strength was the idea that we share the experience of them and the accompanying music with thousands of other people and that increases their power.

That assertion is somewhat mysterious to me.   I’m not sure I could even tell you what the words in most of my favourite songs actually are.  I hear some of the words, or more specifically I hear some of the vowel sounds and make assumptions about what the words are; I rarely hear a coherent idea, or more than three words in a row.

As a teenager in the age of the LP, part of the whole experience was to play the vinyl on my record player and lie on my bed with the album cover propped on my stomach reading the lyrics off the back of the sleeve.  I think that probably means that the last time I paid any particular attention to song lyrics was before I left university.  Given the number of tracks I now have on my iPod, that’s an awful lot of words that have totally passed me by.

Interestingly, though, I do notice if the lyrics are simple-minded and repetitive, and switch those songs off.  Otherwise, I think it is the combination of the music, the shapes of the sounds and the timbre of the performer’s voice that appeal to me; I’d listen to Michael Stipe sing pretty much anything, but couldn’t be persuaded to sit through a single minute of Celine Dion do the least thing.

Richard Curtis’s comments about the shared experience of listening to pop songs reminded me of possibly one of the most ludicrous experiences of my working life.  I was invited to partake of corporate hospitality at a U2 concert at Earls Court in London by a firm of accounting advisors.  I accepted because, when I can close my eyes and ears to their self obsessed pretentiousness, I’m a fan.  It was somewhat disconcerting to be in  group of accountants dressed in their office wear, standing, waving their arms in the air, bellowing along to the chorus of ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’.  I felt utterly displaced, as if I was having an experience which would be categorised as the polar opposite of a ‘shared’ one.

But here’s one song in which I can hear all the words, and which appeals to me, probably because of the fantastically economical way it tells a whole life story.  I also like the, possibly apocryphal, story that Mary Chapin Carpenter was inspired to write it after seeing a tremendously patronising advertisement for Geritol, a US multi vitamin, which was, at the time, directed at women.

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by rowena on October 25, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Words, Writing as a commodity
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Posted by rowena on October 25, 2011

http://rowenadunn.wordpress.com/2011/10/25/understanding-song-lyrics-or-not/

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