 Archive for the ‘Modern music’ Category
All Images Elli Chortara © 2010
What is fascinating is that radio frequencies in those isolated places are amazingly rich, due to the military, due to the late reflection of SW signals, and of course due to the position in the geographical sense and isolation. Of course there is a myth that accompanies all these theories about being able to listen to natural phenomena and atmospheric reactions in VLF frequencies. I am not a scientist, that is why that doesn’t worry me, I believe in it. For instance, in Borealis, a Fieldwork I shot in the tundra in Siberia, I recorded an aurora borealis with very low VLF signs, the sound was so beautiful and so synaesthetic on that special moment that it was a revelation, that responded in my mind to what I was seeing, whether that was the sound of an aurora borealis or not it is not important, for me it was, it was at that instant. That is what is magical about using radio frequencies, there is a certain ghostly and ethereal relation with the image. Somehow it is directly connected, sometimes it is magic…
Like in Smoke, another Fieldwork I filmed in Patagonia, where suddenly an AM programme started to transmit a tango classic at 4AM that was somehow filling the atmosphere too, in amazing ways. Of course I felt it so close to the image I was filming that it was somehow directing it, which brings me back to my collaboration with Phill Niblock that I will speak about later…
Is all this work about the sense of loneliness and alienation that can emerge, perversely, in an era in which we are all connected all of the time? It is interesting that you speak about alienation because it is probably the key to understand both ends of the equation. Somehow it is a certain necessity to this alienation in order to activate something again, to understand some things we have lost, some things past, forgotten, and also a certain alienation in terms of subject, meaning that also because that extreme connectionness of the present, that this work is relevant. It alienates the spectator… con en el blog de (adventures in modern music). I am amazed with his
Music to Paintings This album can be considered a series of musical conversations with abstracts paintings by . Edvard Lieber presents a multidimensional set of compositions that challenges the listener to accept new musical forms and harmonies. Creating an overall feeling that is probably similar to what many first-time viewers (and art critics) of abstract expressionism felt. Lieber became a close friend of Willem and Elaine de Kooning and also about the couple and their experiences as emerging artists in NYC called Willem de Kooning: Reflections in the Studio.
Artists from CSS Studios’ , , and facilities have received a total of seven nominations for sound in contention for the 2010 Emmy Awards. Todd-AO Re-Recording Mixers Michael Minkler and Daniel J. Leahy received four nominations for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Mini-series or Movie for HBO’s “The Pacific” (Parts Two, Five, Eight and Nine). Todd-AO Re-Recording Mixers Craig Mann and Marc Fishman each received one nomination in the category. The Todd-AO artists share the nominations with Production Mixers Andrew Ramage and Gary Wilkins. Soundelux Supervising Sound Editor Tom Bellfort is nominated for Outstanding Sound Editing for a Mini-series or Movie for “The Pacific” (Part Five). He shares the nomination with artists from Soundelux, Modern Music, Todd-AO and other facilities, including Supervising Sound Effects Editor Benjamin Cook; Supervising Dialogue and ADR Editor Daniel S. Irwin; Sound Effects Editor Hector Gika; Sound Effects Editors Charles Maynes and Paul Aulicino; Dialogue and ADR Editors John C. Stuver, David Williams and Michelle Pazer; Music Editor John Finklea; and Foley Artists Jody Thomas and Katie Rose. Todd-AO Re-Recording Mixers Dennis Kirk and Alec St. John received a nomination for Outstanding Sound Mixing For A Comedy or Drama Series (Half-Hour) for the episode “One Car, Two, Car, Red Car, Blue Car” of the HBO Series “Entourage.” They share the nomination with Production Mixer Tom Stasinis. Kirk has won two previous Emmy Awards for his work on “Entourage,” including last year. Sound One Re-Recording Mixer Dominick Tavella received a nomination for Outstanding Sound Mixing for Nonfiction Programming for PBS’s “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea.” “On behalf of all of us at CSS Studios, I congratulate these talented artists on their Emmy nominations,” said CSS Studios President, Robert C. Rosenthal. “We take great pride in our association with dedicated professionals such as these who represent the pinnacle of the craft of sound.”
I got 3 new movie soundtracks from the library today. (I LOVE that place!) I am very excited, because: 1. and are AMAZING! 2. The soundtracks I got are totally EPIC! 3. I listen to movie soundtracks while I write. What’s so good about movie soundtracks, you ask? Well, there are a few things I like about movie soundtracks that no other music can really compete with. One, I’m part musician (I say part, because I quit band. Now I only play piano at home) so music, real music, is very important to me. I like to listen to Rock and Alternative and New Age, and other modern music, but the main problem with most of those is: They have WORDS! I am not averse to lyrics in songs. I love them. They let me sing at the top of my lungs, and make a complete fool of myself, and I feel like I’m contributing to the music somewhat. But, while that is good for when you are home alone, and no one is around to watch you sing off-pitch to a song you don’t entirely know so you have to substitute some words with La La La occasionally, that is not ideal for writing in my opinion. For a few reasons. When you write while listening to the lyrics in a song, eventually you stop paying attention to what you are writing so you can hear the words properly. And if you don’t do that, you might end up writing the words in your book on accident, which can be extremely stressful and embarrassing for your characters. Such as in this situation I (made up on the spot right now) wrote with the song Do You Wanna Dance by the Beach Boys in mind. They sat and waited for the intruders. She clutched a cleaver and a handheld pistol as if they were a life jacket, and she was lost at sea, while his sweat dripped on the shotgun in his hands. The house moaned as if to mourn the predicament the two were in. She remembered what her doctor told her to do if she got too excited, or in this case, extremely scared, and was not with her inhaler. She had her inhaler, but she took deep breaths, in her nose and out her mouth, as a precaution. It couldn’t hurt. He was trying to focus on staying calm, and having the guts to pull the trigger when the time came. He didn’t want to think about it, but he knew they both might die in less than a minute, so he turned to her, and in a serious solemn tone said, “Do you wanna dance?” …hmmm, now what?… Then she replied, “Uh… No,” Flatly. Of course she doesn’t want to dance! They are about to DIE! This is pretty serious stuff happening. Something is coming after them, the house is making scary noises, and they are both holding onto weapons as if their life depended on it! Then, of course naturally he would want to dance right now. Yeah, that’s not going to work. You have to learn to tune out the music in order to write to that, and then your music only turns into background noise. That can be good, if it works for you. Everyone is different, I personally feel that the music isn’t being treated fairly when used as background noise. Now I wrote that just now listening to the Sherlock Holmes movie soundtrack. It helped put me and keep me in a (In this link, if you get past the first few minutes, the end awesome! I would start at minute 5. It’s a long song) mood. For me, what music you listen to helps decide the mood your writing takes. I also tie music into what I write. If a certain song I had listened to while I wrote came on the radio, my head would pop up, and I would say “Time to write!” Because that helps put me into the mindset. I turn into one of , and then feel the need to write! What I like about movie soundtracks, is that they aren’t always played on the radio, so I wouldn’t have the urge to write while at the mall. Also they are modern. When I am writing about a world being attacked by giant flies, and am writing the climax where the hero is duel wielding fly swatters, in one hand the electric zappity-zap-zap fly swatter, and in the other hand a real fly swatter that smacks the flies that have landed somewhere, I don’t exactly want to listen to Bach or Mozart, (even though they are amazing) I want something that can apply to what I am writing. something that will put me in the mindset. When I am writing about a really serious subject I would like in the background, because he was a serious superhero. When you listen to Batman there is no around. All aside You get stuff done. Also They are not boring. How many times have you gone to the movie theater and came out and said “The music was boring,” ? Very few. You may say the movie was boring but that’s different. Most movie soundtracks are either (As you probably guessed I got The Dark Knight movie soundtrack today) or ! Also movie soundtracks aren’t that overbearing. They have to play them in movies, with dialogue in the background. They won’t drown out your thoughts. They will keep you motivated to stay in the mood you are writing, (if you got the right soundtrack) and will feed you ideas, and you don’t have to worry about accidently plagiarizing the Beach Boys. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? -Brianne
“Sir, what music do you listen to?” “I listen to good music.” “No, but sir, I mean who do you like the most?” “I quite like Elvis Presley.” “Sir, he’s too old. Who else?” “Roy Orbison.” “Who?” “He was around the same time as Elvis.” “What about, like, new people?” “You mean modern bands and modern music?” “Yes! Why do you like old musicians?” “Because modern music today is bad. It’s like a consumable: Made one day in a factory, put on a shelf, has an expirery date. You go and buy it, you enjoy it for as long as it lasts – a few months to a year usually, but never longer – and then you throw it away. You go back to the store and buy a new song. It’s as if songs these days have an experation date, and they all die off after that. Gone are the days when a musician was remembered for their music years and years after they had finished their careers, and not for their personal lives. It seems now that I know more about the personal lives of singers than I do their music. I know more about Britney Spears’ personal breakdown than I do her music. Modern music, for the majority of it, is just bad.” “Oh … so do you liek Justin Beiber?” Thomas.
I came across by Stefan Beyst on Nono’s Prometeo – a revolutionary work, if there was ever one in this century (although calling it “revolutionary” is already lame since everyone who ever comes across it immediately does so). Nono worked on Prometeo for a long time in collaboration with an Italian philosopher (and all-around intellectual) Massimo Cacciari. The result was a performance at San Lorenzo in Venice in 1984 that was quite interesting – a new sort of stage production was constructed with electronic and spacial innovations. Some background info for the curios can be found . I thought this section of the essay was curious:
Last night saw the end of John Adams’ first week as guest conductor for the National Symphony Orchestra. It was the start of his two week guest conducting run with the NSO, and it has been “highly anticipated” by many in the community. Maybe this is why I received an offer for $29 premium orchestra seats. Highly anticipated, or highly undersold? The first half started with Copland’s “Billy the Kid Suite”, followed by a piece by Adams based on a poem by Walt Whitman called “” featuring baritone, , who Adams also cast in his most recent opera, . The second half began with the highly recognizable and hauntingly emotive “Adagio for Strings”, by Samuel Barber. This was followed by Elgar’s “Enigma Variations”. The “Adagio” and parts of the “Enigma Variations” notwithstanding, I was not highly impressed. I listen to this kind of music all the time. By “this kind of music” I mean orchestral, classical, symphonic.. whatever you want to call it, music. All eras; all composers. I don’t discriminate. So, I always think, if my highly committed musical ear is struggling to hear harmonies and find context and meaning, I can only imagine what the average listener must be thinking. This was the case for Adams’ piece, “The Wound Dresser”. The piece was set around a poem Walt Whitman wrote towards the end of his life. It reflects on his time during the Civil War when he helped care the thousands of wounded Union soldiers on what is now the National Mall. This large piece of land in Washington, D.C. was used at the time as a makeshift medical station, and the sanitary conditions were so awful many of the soldiers died not from their wounds but from infection. Whitman was so touched by his experience, and so loved these men he cared for, that he wrote “The Wound Dresser”. Clearly, the emotional story is there within Whitman’s poetry, and could lend perfectly to a musical setting. However, I am not entirely pleased with how Adams’ constructed the music around the words. The music is definitely Adams’. One can hear that immediately. And there were moments where I felt, “Yes, that harmonic structure matches that emotion in the text.”, but the majority of the time, I felt the text’s meaning was lost in the tonal clusters and complex textures of a highly talented composer. The words spoke of guttural, raw emotions and ugly situations, yet I did not feel those emotions from the music most of the time. Most interesting for me was what my friend who accompanied me said afterwards. When I asked him what he thought of the Adams’ piece, he simply said, “I didn’t get it.”. I think that sentiment speaks to what most average or occasional classical music listeners think when they hear many works by modern composers. The composer’s intent is lost in the over complexity of his/her work. Is tonal complexity necessary nowadays in order to be respected as a musician? Maybe I should rephrase that… is tonal complexity necessary in order to be respected BY musicians??? Are composers trying to create pieces that they find intellectually challenging or that appeal to average auditory experience?
By Oliver Messiaen. Orchestre Philharmonique De Radio France, Conductor: Myung-Whun Chung. Horn solist: Jean-Jacques Justafré.
is/was an interesting character in contemporary music. All of his works fit on a nice 3CD set (like ). Aside from the famous Piano Sonata, I also like this piece (which I was reminded of while reading about Nono’s Il canto sospeso):
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