DIGITAL TO ANALOG CONVERSION

Day 58. Violent Femmes, Beethoven.

Posted on Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010 at 10:43 pm in Celia, Classical, Rock / Pop, Tamiko by josh

“Add It Up’ has got to be one of the best angry young man songs ever written. It is one of the few songs on the first Violent Femmes albums that has Gordon Gano playing some electric guitar, but it is still amazing how loud parts of this song are with just guitar, acoustic bass guitar and a single snare drum. I’m ripping four Violent Femmes CDs tonight, the first album, ‘Hallowed Ground’ (with some of the darkest music I think the Femmes ever made, plus some of the most out there – with some heavy thanks to John Zorn and his Horns of Dilemma), ‘Why Do Birds Sing’ and the ‘Add It Up’ compilation from ’93. I have a couple others in the back shelves of the book cases, but I’ll have to dig for those. The first album is – I really don’t know how to put it – every whiny teenage loser kids album of anthems? It certainly was there for me during my low points. What amazes me is how fun it is to listen to now since it makes me think ‘phew! I’m not there anymore’. And I get the sense that this is probably the case for the band as well. ‘Hallowed Ground’ is a solid album as well, but the Violent Femmes really were one of those bands who did their best and brightest on the first record. (Pink Martini, from last night, I think is also in that camp). And while ‘Blister In The Sun’ gets it’s fair share of radio play on ‘alternative’ stations still, ‘American Music’ from ten years later is really their big hit (though really no where near their best song… just more accessible I guess).

I got to see the Violent Femmes once at the Fillmore in San Francisco, and what a show that was. The group came to the stage THROUGH the middle of the audience playing snare drum, a trombone and a cymbals… hopped on stage and rocked out a great show. I’m still amazed how much these three guys were able to do together as a band (though at this point Victor DeLorenzo had been replaced on drum(s)… what a strange audition that must have been – ‘So, can you play a snare drum?’ ‘Sure’ ‘OK! You’re hired!’). Brian Ritchie played some pretty mean marimbas on ‘Gone Daddy Gone’ and it seemed like all three of them were picking up instruments here and there as needed. They looked like they were having lots of fun (to say the least). And opening that show was Carmaig DeForrest and his ‘Death Groove Love Party’… Carmaig only put out a handful of discs that were probably only available around shows in SF, but they sure were fun. Hmm… may need to rip that one in the next day or two.

There is something poetic though about how I wound up ripping the Violent Femmes tonight. Before bed, Celia came downstairs to pick out tonight’s rips and pulled out a couple of blank CD cases (because they were a pretty red), then she saw the first Violent Femmes record and said ‘Daddy! There’s a little girl on that one!’. So – Violent Femmes it was, because my daughter saw the little girl on the cover. The Violent Femmes – part of the soundtrack to my breakup with Tamiko (which, if it had stuck, would have meant no Celia in this world… WAAAHHHH!!!!). And it’s not like I can put it on for her tomorrow and say ‘Celia – here is the music with the girl on the cover!’… how do I explain ‘Kiss Off’? She’ll recognize that the man singing is counting, but why does he forget what 8 is for? Or ‘Gone Daddy Gone’ when one of her biggest fears is that I might leave in the middle of the night? (This as a result of a poorly planned trip on my part where I had to leave for the airport one time at 3am). No – I think Celia will just have to live in mystery of this disc for a bit of time.

I am beginning to suspect that part of my romanticization / longing for Berkeley must partly be a result of the strong, vivid memories that were formed there. Memories so strong and clear that I am actually surprised by them… am I still capable of these strong memories of what seem to be simple, small everyday details? I mean – I can still form them when the moment calls for it. I can still remember how both of our girls felt the first time they were in my arms for instance. But the memories that I am talking about are more about these moments that are NOT earth shattering life changing moments, but I can still recall the temperature in the air and the quality of the sound in a specific space. I described some of this a few days ago regarding Charlie Parker, and tonight is another one… this time around it is the first time I heard Beethoven’s String Trio, Op. 9 movement IV. Of course I didn’t know what it was (I was still acquiring mostly basic knowledge of classical repertoire) but I was walking (quickly) between the Tower in Berkeley to get to orchestra rehearsal. And as I walked past Henry’s on Durant, the little cafe at the street level (in the picture above, at the left edge of the frame) had the radio on over a couple of crappy in-ceiling speakers. And that is where I heard it… the last movement is fast and virtuosic and I stopped in my tracks and snuck a seat on the sidewalk. It was an early fall day, still warm with a little bite of cold in the air as the fog was getting ready to roll up to the Berkeley hills, the sun was about to set and there was a great golden color coming up the street, and I just sat there for about four minutes listening to the music hoping it was the radio and I could find out what it was. I was half expecting that if it WAS the radio someone would come up and ask if I was going to buy anything while the piece was named and I would miss it… but no. It ended and it was the Rostropovich / Anne Sophie Mutter recording of the Beethoven trio. It was Beethoven! So ‘classical’! I was so surprised (I really was expecting Haydn or Mozart or someone I hadn’t heard of before) since most of the Beethoven I knew up to this point were the moodier ‘hits’. Then I got up and headed off to orchestra rehearsal (Berlioz – ‘Symphonie Fantastique’) and found a recording the next day (as well as the score in the library).

Isn’t that a great story? I was able to walk down the street, hear classical music, sit down for a few minutes, listen and find out what it was in amazing surroundings! And like I said – I can still feel what that whole moment was like…

Tags: Beethoven, Violent Femmes
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Day 57. Pink Martini, She & Him and M. Ward.

Posted on Monday, March 22nd, 2010 at 10:38 pm in Jazz, Rock / Pop, Tamiko by josh

So – tonight I have been plugging away on some new code, trying to learn a bit more abbot programming interfaces for Apple’s Interface Builder (which creates the visual part of an application that we usually see when we launch an application). Fun. Kind of. But – I didn’t get to rip any discs. BUT I did buy a couple new ones. She and Him Volume 2 came out ‘today’ at 9pm (midnight east coast time) and I discovered that Pink Martini also has a new one. Or a newer one… at least one I hadn’t seen before. Not sure what to think about the new Pink Martini so far… one of the songs just ripped of the first Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto. And I don’t mean it quoted it… I mean it used bits of melody with a ‘wrong note’ every six or seven notes. The song before that sounded like ‘Cantaloupe Island’ by Herbie Hancock, but again, not quite. I’m hoping it gets better though. Pink Martini’s first album absolutely stunned me with how great it was. It came out in 1997 after the group had been together for a few years. It was, and still is, amazing. ‘Hang On Little Tomato’ came out 7 years after that, and was a great second album. ‘Hey, Eugene’ came out 3 years after that, and it was a little ‘eh’. The new one took two years. I’m concerned after just a couple tracks. I’ll listen to the rest later and hope it gets better… on to the new She and Him for now (so Tamiko can hear it as well right now as she sites next to me).

I thought the first She and Him was brilliant. It really grew on me, and there were a few weeks this last summer that I had it on just about everyday. So far, number 2 is sounding good as well. So melodic. And M. Ward really can do almost no wrong in my book. My friend Charles sent me a mix disc a couple years ago with ‘Chinese Translation’ on it and that was one of those songs that I immediately tracked down so I could buy the album. This was right after I started to use eMusic – and there he was. I went ahead and purchased a few other albums from him over the next couple weeks and he has been a steady part of my pop musical diet ever since. I eagerly await his (and their) new releases. I would even go so far as to say that if you are serious about pop music in the 00s, you need to have an opinion about M. Ward. (If you are serious about pop music in the 90s, I think you need to have an opinion about Yo La Tengo). These artists I think show that you know more then just what the music industry ‘tells us’ to listen to. If my musical snobbery is a mountain range, it is probably statements like these that are some of the peaks. I know this is not necessarily an attractive side to me, but I would also lie if I didn’t admit to it. Anyways, so far so good on the new She and Him… and that’s it for tonight. I’m beat.

Tags: M. Ward, Pink Martini, She & Him
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Day 56. Mark-Almond, Liszt and more Vivaldi.

Posted on Sunday, March 21st, 2010 at 9:34 pm in Classical, Rock / Pop, Tamiko by josh

Just a short post tonight. I plowed through the rest of my Vivaldi discs, grabbed Michelle Campanella’s recording of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies, and Mark-Almond’s Greatest Hits (no, not Soft Cell, but the British duo that played with John Mayall at one point). Of course, I can’t help but think of Looney Tunes when I listen to the Liszt (though there is SO much amazing music in this set of 19 pieces that it is also hard not to become completely engrossed in the piano writing), and I can’t help but think about being a really small kid in a dark rental house in Ohio when I hear the Mark-Almond. I put it on the other day because I had ‘The City’ stuck in my head for some reason, and Tamiko shot me a look that I interpreted as ‘why in the world are we listening to this 1970s old sad bastard music?’. When I said ‘hmm… are you wondering why we are listening to this 1970 old sad bastard music?’ she said – ‘yeah … I’m want you to hear something else) at which point I quickly took off Mark-Almond so she could play me her faves off a new mix discs she got from Bryn. Tamiko was right. BUT – I did put it on today while I had a little time alone, and I forgot how great some of that song is. There is also a cover of Billy Joel’s ‘New York State of Mind’ on it that doesn’t conjure up the stadium sized crowds that would cheer when Billy Joel would sing it, but more a run down slummy tenement in pre-Koch New York that is gritty and great. What a wonderful cover (even if listening to it may be depressing).

On the software front, still not sure what to replace Simplify Media with. So sad. DOT.TUNES really seems to have its CPU problems. I tested it at Origin 23 this afternoon, and running the laptop on battery power I saw the CPU spike and the ‘remaining time’ shrink to about an hour on full battery. Well – that just won’t do. And it is really too bad, since the interface in iTunes is EXACTLY what I would want. It mimics the playlist layout exactly (something the Simplify Media, for some reason, couldn’t seem to do). Hopefully more on this front later in the week.

Tags: Antonio Vivaldi, Liszt, Mark-Almond
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Day 55. Stravinsky (happy Spring everyone).

Posted on Saturday, March 20th, 2010 at 10:47 pm in Classical, Tamiko by josh

In honor of the first day of spring, I usually listen to Stravinsky’s ‘Rite of Spring’. A little cliche, but it also makes sure I get some Stravinsky in on a yearly basis. Well this year was a little different since I decided I would copy the 22 CD Stravinsky performs Stravinsky box set that Tamiko got me a couple years ago for Christmas. I remember my conductor at UC Berkeley (David Milnes) saying that Stravinsky conducting didn’t provide the best performances of his works. And I pretty much agree, but they aren’t bad either. Some are quite fun (Petrushka especially!). There is often this misconception that simply because a composer is performing one of their works, that it must be somehow definitive. The thing is, just because someone composes doesn’t mean they should be conducting theirs, or anyone else’s works. Conductors spend their lives shaping / creating other people’s music, and just like any creative pursuit, the creator doesn’t always see the big picture. And – like any other skill conducting is one that takes years / decades to learn. So – why would we expect a composer who may not have much conducting experience to be able to conduct there work? Much less something as a difficult as ‘Rite of Spring’?

So – couple quick Stravinsky stories. First – I had Music History with one of THE Stravinsky scholars, Richard Taruskin. He just finished his HUGE two volume book on Stravinsky’s works through the opera Mavra. He told the class that he had sent it off… and that it had been the focus of his work for 12 years. ‘I guess I just go and die now’, he says. Then after a beat: “Beethoven!”. The second actually took place around a performance of ‘Rite of Spring’. We played that, the Mass and ‘Symphony of Psalms’ for a concert program one semester (amazing concert). The first night was ok – but the second night hit and hit hard. It was amazing. We finished the ‘Rite of Spring’ to a full house, and for about 5 seconds, there wasn’t any applause. It was the most amazing sound I have ever heard. A hall full of people after one of the most intense performances I had ever heard – then silence. When the applause started, it was thunderous. What a moment.

I am 16 CDs through the 22 CD set right now, but I have also been trying out a new streaming app (and thanks to Eric Flesher for testing it with me). Looks like ‘SimplifyMedia’ is selling out. They pulled the app and sharing for the most part. Quite disappointing. So I began the search again tonight and found DOT.TUNES. So far, it seems OK. Eric got connected, and I seem to be able to connect as well. A little buggy though. Crashed once for me and once for Eric. And – it is Mac only (which won’t do for my PC friends). And when the host computer is streaming, the CPU jumps to 100%. I imagine it will get a bit warm as a result. So – this may not be the solution, but for now it will work.

Tags: DOT.TUNES, SimplifyMedia, Stravinsky
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Day 54. Charlie Parker.

Posted on Thursday, March 18th, 2010 at 10:20 pm in Jazz, Tamiko by josh

I came across Charlie Parker the first time in high school jazz band my freshman year. We played ‘K.C. Blues’ and I went out and found a compilation that afternoon (“Bird: The Original Recordings of Charlie Parker on Verve”). It was also my introduction to Verve Records and Bop. As I got more and more into jazz, Charlie Parker was one of the artists I explored first. I was playing alto sax at the time and had access to a few transcriptions of solos (which I simply couldn’t play).

During my years at the Tower in Roseville I would pick up discs as they would come in (and eventually order the ones I wanted). And he became on of the artists that Tamiko and I liked to listen to together. One of the best finds came with a box of Japanese imports that were just sent to the store. We didn’t know what was in the boxes – they were just packed together by Tower’s import department and sent to us. In one of these boxes was ‘Charlie Parker with Strings, the Complete Master Takes’. $35 for the disc and I took it to Tamiko the day I got it. This isn’t Bird in Bop mode, but Bird in melodic and romantic mode… great date music. This was the only copy of the disc we got as well (and I didn’t see it again for close to 10 years until it was re-issued in the states)

Tamiko had an old Datsun B-210 that, like most cars from the 70s that survived into the 90s had quirks. The B-210’s quirk was that, when cold started, would stall on a hill. And it just happened that her house in Roseville sat on a road that rose in the middle (creating a kind of hill to the curb). Well – someone broke into the B-210 and tired to steal it. Luckily, the car died. Unluckily a box of CDs that was in the back was taken, and along with it the Charlie Parker with Strings disc. Tamiko felt horrible about it, but I was just glad everything else was ok. About a week later I get to work and sitting in the return bin at Tower is the Charlie Parker discs along with a few others that were taken! The crook had returned them for store credit!!! No one remembered anything about the guy, but I was able to buy the disc back again.

Just now I put the recording on (after ripping it) and in just a couple of notes Tamiko shot me a smile. In the first couple of notes, I was hit with the image of the two of us in her apartment on Arch Street in Berkeley, listening to the disc with the windows open and the cool sea breeze streaming in. Sure – I have a good amount of Charlie Parker to rip tonight (lots of Bop especially – and a great disc with a VERY young Miles Davis playing backup) but I wonder how many of the discs on my shelves will create such a vivid memory for me (or make Tamiko smile so quickly). Probably not many.

Tags: Charlie Parker
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Day 53. Vivaldi

Posted on Wednesday, March 17th, 2010 at 11:00 pm in Classical by josh

Tonight was my own pick and it led to a wiki-pedia like branching of discovery. I wanted to hear a disc of Vivaldi concertos I have (somewhere – never found it tonight!) of cellist Anner Bylsma playing a number of cello concertos (as well as some other string concertos thrown in as well). There are two of these discs on Sony classics, and the first one (the missing one, the out of print one that I can’t even find an mp3 download for now … dammit!) has a SMOKING performance of the a minor RV 418 concerto. It was the recording that made me love Anner Bylsma as a cellist and made me seek out anything with him on it (and I don’t think I was ever really disappointed). Anyways – I dug out all the Vivaldi I could find (with about half of it stacked in the ‘second layer’ on the book shelves). But in the process of doing that I also found…

– A 4 disc set of Raphael Wallfisch playing the ‘complete’ Vivaldi cello concertos

– Idil Birit’s complete Chopin on Naxos (a great set)

– 3 complete Mahler cycles (??? – indeed!)

and a plethora (si jefe, a plethora) of historical recordings:

– A literal handful of the Toscanini double disc remasters on BMG (that are going to be on tap next I believe)

– Both volumes of historical recordings featuring Isaac Stern (one of my favorite Sibelius violin concerto recordings included

– Early Wilhelm Kempff recordings re-issued on DG in a box a few years back

So I have some fun times ahead. I haven’t really looked through that second layer in some time, so it was almost like digging through a bin at a record store. There is a LOT there I forgot I had.

Anyways, if anyone out there by any chance has my ‘Vivaldi: Concertos for Strings’ with Anner Bylsma and Tafelmusik, please let me know. It is missed.

As for what I am ripping now though, I am mostly through with the cello concertos (and I’m listening to a slightly tamer RV 418 at the moment) and enjoying them quite a bit. Stravinsky’s dismissal of Vivaldi’s work as ‘the same concerto 400 times’ is a bit harsh. As far as string writing goes, the solo parts are often stunningly virtuosic. And while the ritornello form is used to exhausting ends, there was a reason for this. It works quite well, and gives an elegant balance to the whole orchestra and the soloist(s). What is especially interesting to me as well is that, as a form, it doesn’t have the boxiness that the later classical period seemed to develop with phrasing. Sections are not evenly paced (4 measures, another 4 measures, followed by another 4 measures etc. etc.). The tutti sections often cut off early or abbreviate their appearance, or sometimes extend and modulate to unexpected places. In this respect, the form that Vivaldi explored so deeply is quite conversational. Both sides get to speak (especially in the outer movements) and while the tutti sections are louder and more forceful, it is the solo parts that have an intricate mastery. Vivaldi’s solo writing can be quite virtuosic, and at other times his operatic tendencies come through (especially in the slower movements). While Stravinsky may have scoffed at Vivaldi’s work (and part of me would be surprised if there isn’t more to that quote then what is usually said), I can say that it looks like I will be ripping a good 80 of these concertos in the next night or two… and I am pretty sure I will have a good time listening to all of them. And after that I still have the ‘Stabat Mater’ to listen to again (what a great piece).

Tags: Antonio Vivaldi
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Day 52. R.E.M.

Posted on Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 at 2:58 pm in Celia, Mira, Rock / Pop, Tamiko by josh

Events of the past few days have kept me from ripping CDs until this morning. The days have been filled with a mixture of things – anniversaries and adversaries, bugs external and internal, comfort, family and smoking melted combs. It is also the end of a quarter and the beginning of spring (break). My friend Christina suggested we ‘smudge’ the house with a sage burning to begin again – get rid of the evils of the past few months and start fresh. The idea is appealing, but as I was discussing with my friend Jill the other day, even the bad has its purpose and I feel like with all that has been going on with us here at the Parmura household, me, Tamiko, Celia and Mira have learned and are figuring out quite a bit. These past months have been pretty rough in different ways for all four of us. When it comes down to it I wouldn’t get rid of the crap we have had to deal with. I know we are growing because of it. But I have also found myself with music from my ‘angry young man’ days running through my head off and on. So today I ripped a good chunk of my R.E.M. CDs (‘Life’s Rich Pageant’, ‘Document’, ‘Green’, ‘Out of Time’ and ‘Monster’). If all is calm after tonight’s class listening session, I may try to work in the first couple Violent Femmes albums as well, maybe some early Cure. While I did have a good amount of Ministry and Nine Inch Nails that I played during my senior year of high school, I am glad that the mostly melodic and ‘angry’ alternative 90s staples mentioned above are what I still listen to when I feel a little agro and need to get some energy out. I’m more comfortable with my masculinity now then I was in 1992.

I have ‘Life’s Rich Pageant’ on at the moment, but earlier I had ‘Green’ on with the girls. Mira (who is recovering from a stomach bug, as well as a hard night at the urgent care to make sure she didn’t have a bladder infection) started to dance in my arms when ‘Pop Song ’89’ came on. I actually hadn’t even listened to ‘Green’ or ‘Out of Time’ for awhile. Then main exception is my yearly mix-disc ritual where I rip ‘Losing My Religion’ as part of the first round of cuts for that years disc (only to have it weeded out as the music is cut down to the 80 minutes needed for a blank CD). It’s a great song, but too obvious to just have thrown onto a mix disc without carefully leading into and out of it. Maybe this year. Probably not

For the most part now I tend to put on ‘Life’s Rich Pageant’, ‘Document’ and ‘Automatic For The People’ now when I listen to R.E.M. Yes, I know which one doesn’t belong with the others but I will unapologetically say that it is a great album, And I think you can be a good R.E.M. fan and like songs like ‘Drive’ and ‘The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight’. Along with the first Violent Femmes album, one of the Cure greatest hits albums and the Pixies ‘Trompe Le Monde’, this album was part of the soundtrack for a getaway weekend with some high school friends to Fort Bragg. Tamiko and I were going through our ‘He’s still in high school and a loser and being WAAAAY to immature for his college girlfriend’ break-up (complete with my purple hair) and a few good friends (Josh, Cheryl and Molly) decided we needed to head to Molly’s families beach house in Fort Bragg. And we all (just friends) spent a good chunk of time jumping off sand dune cliffs, hiking around and relaxing on the beach between figuring out what we could find at the grocery store to eat. Later in the year, some tension was created among the four of us because of someone else I dated and the other three, as well as other teenage tensions among the four of us towards each other. The four of us, by the end of the school year pretty much weren’t talking much to each other (and looking back now, I imagine uncertainty about where we would be ending up after high school was probably a big part of the problem). But for that weekend and a couple months afterwards, we had lots of fun together just hanging out.

One thing that is hard about the ‘soundtrack’ for this weekend in Fort Bragg though is the fact that, for me, lots of things sucked. Tamiko and I were breaking up and it was really hard (though we obviously get back together and I think we both see that time now as a great period of growing up for both of us – though especially me – and I also think that we were a much stronger couple afterwards). If I ever tell Celia this story, she would probably say – ‘Dad, this sounds like a horrible time for you! Would you want to remember it? No!’. (Celia has begun to rhetorically answer her own questions) But the fact of the matter is, these three friends really kept me together that weekend and, while they may not know it, I am very grateful for this. And while the break-up sucked, lots of good came from it eventually.

Like almost any real thing that happens in life, it is difficult for there to be clear-cut good times and bad times. I remember times when I was a kid and really sick (especially one very scary trip to an ER because of a severe asthma attack when I was 4 or 5, another time when I had a finger nail ripped off of my finger). And I have a feeling that Celia will remember when she is older about the time Mira seemed really sick and we needed to take her to urgent care. Celia was terribly worried about Mira last night, and very sad that she couldn’t go with us… but for now (and maybe in 20 years?) I have the image of a slightly feverish Mira in my arms dancing to R.E.M. with Celia smiling at the table while she is eating jammy toast. Celia knows her sister is feeling better. Maybe R.E.M. will subconsciously trigger this memory for her.

Tags: R.E.M.
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Day 51. Haydn. LOTS of Haydn. And Schubert.

Posted on Saturday, March 13th, 2010 at 9:04 pm in Classical by josh

It has been a tumultuous couple of days on one hand, simply busy on the other. Last night was simply hectic, and today we had my parents over for their anniversary. Ripping CDs has been a low priority as a result, so I transferred more purchases (mp3 downloads) from the past year or so from my main laptop onto the server computer. After ripping all the Mozart symphonies the other day (and already having all the Beethoven symphonies on that computer) I decided today was a good day to round out the Classical periods heavy hitting symphonists. So the 45-CD Antal Dorati complete Haydn symphonies and the Goodman / Hanover Band Schubert symphonies are on deck for tonight.

I don’t know why, but I am always so surprised how much I like Haydn when I listen to him. And the Dorati recordings are lots of fun. First of all, they are complete and this is no small task. 104 numbered symphonies, a few lettered ones and all sorts of works that basically are symphonies (just not in name). It is one thing to have 104 orchestral works under your wing (as Dorati does here) but this of course was not all Dorati did. During the 50s and 60s, his Mercury Living Presence recordings (especially the Bartok recordings) are just fabulous. He recorded an amazing amount of music well. And to take on a project the size of the Haydn symphonies is nothing short of impressive.

Papa Haydn’s most significant achievement, in my opinion, was his formalizing of the structures and forms that would occupy most of the Viennese Classical period. And the symphonies are a large part of that (though in the String Quartets you can see these ideas grow and solidify). He had what any composer today would call a pretty cool gig… writing music for a prince with a house orchestra. The prince also played Baryton (a COOL instrument) so he also wrote a huge body of work for that instrument. His music had rhetoric, from the contrasting ideas that exhibit tension then harmony in the sonata-allegro form to the ‘Farewell’ symphony that he wrote to tell the prince that the musicians needed a vacation. But what surprised me most about Haydn when I listen to him is that you really can hear how his approach to motive and development would find its greatest continuation in the music of Beethoven. Haydn wrote 104 symphonies, and as Beethoven’s career closes out the Classical period he finishes 9 that really define and develop the form into the Romantic tradition.

Schubert is the other side of this coin in my mind. He picks up where Mozart left off and does a similar kind of expansion of form with the similar kinds of melodic gifts that Mozart had. The Goodman recordings are on period instruments and use an orchestra appropriate to Schubert’s time. Like Beethoven, Schubert’s work tends to be overly romanticized as well and the Goodman recordings do a great job placing Schubert within the Classical tradition. The recordings have a lightness to them at times, and more detail comes out from the winds (having a smaller proportion to the strings then most modern orchestras). The ‘Unfinished’ benefits particularly well. The second movement is light and airy at times, dramatic at others. These contrasts are shaped even better when the period instruments are used.

With the Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert discs all on the computer now there are over 75 discs of classical symphonies. As the rest of the discs of this repertoire are eventually ripped (multiple Beethoven recordings, another Schubert set as well as quite a few individual recordings of Haydn and Mozart symphonies) I think there will be over 100 discs represented. Until tonight, I don’t think I realized what a huge proportion of my recordings represented the Classical Symphony.

Tags: Franz Joseph Haydn, Schubert
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Day 50. Mozart. Lots of Mozart.

Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010 at 9:22 pm in Classical by josh

Tonight I continued ripping Christopher Hogwood’s and Jaap Schroder’s Academy of Ancient Music recordings of the complete Mozart Symphonies (plus 27 other symphonic works). 27 other works. Plus an alternate version of the 40th symphony and works that MAY have been written by Mozart (but listed even in the liner notes as doubtful). It is 19 discs. The research that Hogwood went into for these recordings is also very deep, trying to match the orchestral forces to the ones that would have performed these symphonies during Mozart’s life time. If he could have, I imagine Hogwood would have found a way to decipher out of the background noise of every day life echoes that still vibrate in the air from these performances to discover if there were mistakes made at first performances so they could be recreated here, for us, the modern listener.

Before I bought this set (which was released as a budget box in the 90s) I remember reading a Penguin review that gave these recordings much of the credit for the early music ‘authentic’ recording movement. The idea was to find instruments and figure out the performance practices that were happening during the time when a work was composed and try to recreate it so we could hear what the composer would have heard. Of course, this is really impossible. Even when written down, music is ephemeral. Even with digital recordings, there are so many variables in playback systems that the same disc can sound different in two different homes – when it comes down to it every device or performance will make the air vibrate in a different way. So why try to recreate the moment when something was performed?

By the 50s, it would not be unheard of to have Mahler sized orchestras performing the works of Mozart. These were modern interpretations and it is interesting to hear recordings of these performances. They do play Mozart, but they also tell us about how Mozart was expected to be heard. When I was taking my music history classes at UC Berkeley with Richard Taruskin, he has us read one of his articles that talked about the early music movement, and about how the movement, like any other performance practice is a reflection of its time. I don’t think he was rejecting the idea that performance practice shouldn’t be studied, but that we shouldn’t think of the performances as what the composer would have heard. We should think of them as what we want to think Mozart would have heard, but that these are modern performances with modern scholarship. The performances of any other time were just as informed, and reflected the ideas of their time. And from the 70s on, part of this thinking was ‘perhaps we don’t need to turn things way up to hear them better’. In fact what I hear in these performances (and in the Bach one-per-part performances I ripped a couple weeks ago) is a sense of clarity. With a different balance between winds and strings, musical lines that may be buried with larger orchestra forces may appear. With these Mozart recordings, I remember being surprised how much more contrapuntal Mozart’s writing seemed to be (and the use of continuo in later symphonies link the performance tradition more to the Baroque then I was used to). And also how much lighter. When you hear Mozart on fortepiano for instance, the bass strings are weaker and the sound thinner. But his orchestration (in his piano and orchestral writing) find ways around these limitations. Octave doublings bring a different force to the lines in these recordings then many modern, larger recordings. These moments pop out of the texture much more brilliantly. I like these ‘modern’ performances… of course, they are 30 years old now. And I haven’t purchased a disc of Mozart symphonies for probably close to ten years… maybe I should see if there is anything new-ish on eMusic just to see where things have been going lately.

(and by the way – just finished disc 13 / 19… I hope these finish up tonight!)

Tags: Mozart
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Day 49. Kaija Saariaho.

Posted on Wednesday, March 10th, 2010 at 10:47 pm in Classical by josh

I have started to rip the complete Mozart Symphonies by Christoper Hogwood, but that is 19 discs and I know that will continue into tomorrow. But I also pulled most of my Kaija Saariaho collection tonight as well. I’m not positive, but she might be the first living composer I have put onto the computer so far… partly because so much of my music by living composers is downloaded (since finding actual discs these days of this music is next to impossible) and partly because while I appreciate a good deal of it, liking it enough to have in the front layer of CDs of things is a different story. I know where Steve Reich is when I need his music for something (my own reference or for a class) but I don’t think I am just going to throw him on for an evening of listening. Kaija Saariaho is a different story though. Her symphonic works can be hit or miss in my opinion, but her chamber music can be beautiful and thrilling.

Dawn Upshaw’s performance of ‘Lonh’ is wonderful. The electronics part is wonderful. The vocal writing is wonderful. It is also so many things that most contemporary music with electronics is not – a dynamic piece that is composed on more then a single idea. Most of her work actually exhibits a large degree of dynamic change and structure that is more then the usual brick of noodling around a single concept that so much contemporary music often gets caught up in. If you have been to an ICMC or SEAMUS conference, I am sure you know exactly what I mean. The computer part in ‘Lonh’ is also not just a ‘background’ for the vocal part, but an equal partner in the piece. Again – this is something that she does particularly well. Her works for cello and electronics (‘Pres’ and ‘Petals’) are both dramatic works that grow better on repeated listening. In some ways, she is also very classical. Her work tends to be experimental while at the same time giving great credit to her listeners time, attention and memory. Her works don’t need to be studied from the score to be appreciated or enjoyed, yet they are challenging and dramatic.

As I began to work more and more with pieces and live electronics, she is someone that I think I have learned quite a bit from. And her finished pieces (and the precision she is able to create with her electronics processing) reminds me that I have LOTS of work to do still in my own learning. When I was looking at some of her works, I came across her catalog on the chesternovello.com site, and noticed something that I hadn’t really seen before (but have seen quite a bit of since): she also has downloadable versions of the computer parts for her pieces available for anyone to download. For example, after I heard ‘Lonh’ I was able to find the electronics here: http://www.chesternovello.com/documents/additional/lonh.htm. I couldn’t believe how valuable a resource something like this was, and on top of that what a great source of documentation for the work. The question of ‘what is the score’ is often a difficult one to answer when it comes to live electronics. The code / patch that makes the piece work is an important part of the score actually, and to see it freely available is a wonderful learning opportunity for young composers. I certainly don’t hold myself in her league at this point, but as I developed more and more pieces (as well as the software to run them), the idea of posting my code for anyone else to look at was something I came to believe in. Maybe someday someone will get something useful from one of my pieces as well, and as technology changes (and the computer as an instrument starts to make its way out of the stone age) perhaps some of the stuff I do now will influence what things will become. In many ways, computer music is currently at a stage of development like that of western classical music was when early notation was beginning to be used. As works were written down and disseminated a huge amount of musical development began (rhythm, polyphony, etc.) simply because others could study and build on it. It is exciting to be around at a similar time again.

Tags: Kaija Saariaho
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Day 58. Violent Femmes, Beethoven.

Day 57. Pink Martini, She & Him and M. Ward.

Day 56. Mark-Almond, Liszt and more Vivaldi.

Day 55. Stravinsky (happy Spring everyone).

Day 54. Charlie Parker.

Day 53. Vivaldi

Day 52. R.E.M.

Day 51. Haydn. LOTS of Haydn. And Schubert.

Day 50. Mozart. Lots of Mozart.

Day 49. Kaija Saariaho.

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