New Slang / When You Notice The Stripes

A little late to the game on this one, but Q2 and NPR released a crowd-sourced 100 Composers Under 40 list way back in April.

Generally I don't buy into Lists, but I do think it's interesting to see what "the people" have come up with as representative of today's musical culture (ahem ahem: a lot of music that might fit in the much-disputed indie-classical genre). I'm a musicologist and I actively search for music by young composers - and even so, I've only heard works by 37 of the finalists. New music: not dead yet!

How did you do?

Melody / It Was A Second Name

If you can't appreciate a 35-year-old man playing Josquin on multi-tracked melodica, then I don't want to know you.



(check out James Howard Young's youtube channel.)
(via metafilter)

I'm A Sinner / I'm A Saint / I Do Not Feel Ashamed

Suggestion of the week: If you've got an extra 50 euros to spend on a spa treatment in Austria (so there's that bit of fine print...), why not get the "Hildegard von Bingen steam bath (with fine amethyst crystals)" at the Kitzbühel Royal Spa or Schlosshotel Fiss?

Part II: at first I thought this was a joke, but it's a REAL MOVIE that's actually making the theater rounds right now. Plus the trailer will fill your intensity quota for the day.



(Vision: From the Life of Hildegard von Bingen)
(NYTimes review)

I Whistle A Happy Tune

You've got to love Hindemith. Maybe not. In any case: I love this!

Paul Hindemith: "The Flying Dutchman Overture as Sight-Read by a Bad Spa Orchestra by the Village Well at Seven in the Morning" (1925).

This Is A Gift / It Comes With A Price

I'm directing you to an archived post at 2'23" for a little bit of Tuesday-relief/classical-music-humor:

It's titled... Hunting Babbitts.

You laughed.

New Found Glory

You guys! One of Magnus Lindberg's early works (that would be: Kraft) requires the percussionists to pick out materials for the performance from a local junkyard. (That way every performance is unique and locally-based, see.) So here it is - percussionists of the NYPO finding their instruments:



I wish this was an everyday occurrence. Although maybe with an expanded hunting-ground; I don't spend much time hanging out in junkyards.

(via fileunder?)
("Kraft" would be such a great piece to hear live...in the meantime, there's always NAXOS.)

Listen As The Wind Blows / From Across The Great Divide

I read Pauline Oliveros' book Deep Listening sometime last spring, and for awhile went through this phase where I would try her slow-walk exercise in busy spaces - on the El, in the middle of Millenium Park, at the Mother's Day-themed limerick contest I attended*. The idea is that a slow walk forces you to engage with your immediate (sonic) environment. It's very specific: you're supposed to place your heel, slowly slowly let down the outside of your sole, feel your pinkie toe make contact, and then settle the rest of your foot to balance point. (Think you're doing it? NO WAY: you can always go slower.) Busy spaces, I thought, would make for the most interesting environments - and if I was doing it right, nobody would notice I was moving anyway.

I didn't usually do it right: people noticed. (It was only a short phase.)

ANYWAY: Oliveros is one of the founders of the Deep Listening Institute. You can take classes and get certified (hey!) in what amounts to focusing on the difference between involuntary hearing and selective listening. I don't know that I buy the Institute lock, stock, and barrel - but reading her book really did make me more aware of everyday sound.

Friends: this video is not terribly entertaining. But if you want a little bit of a window into the Deep Listening method / if you want to see Oliveros do her thing: this is for you.






*Okay this one - busy: not so much.

I Just Met A Girl Named Maria

On September 26, 1957, West Side Story opened on Broadway.

Here's a Fun Fact: originally, the musical was titled "East Side Story."
And again: Bernstein wrote the song "One Hand, One Heart" for "Candide" - it got cut, and he saw an opportunity to recycle.

Best of all, this is a video of a 2007 50th anniversary tribute rehearsal featuring 22 of the original cast members performing alongside the new blood.



Multi-generational singing and dancing: sign me up!

(more at ThisDayInHistory and imdb)

I Choose To Celebrate The First

The NPR classical music blog Deceptive Cadence just finished up a week devoted to "First Loves" - stories by famous musicians about the moment when classical music grabbed on and wouldn't let go. Tim Munro on Ives, Nico Muhly on Byrd, Zuill Bailey on Rostropovich, Nick Cords on Nadien, Jason Vieaux on Villa-Lobos, and Marian Alsop on Brahms.

That's quite a line-up - but maybe my favorite part of this feature is the invitation extended to blog readers to post their own "first loves". It'll warm the cockles of your heart.

Chopper City

In my German class this summer, we were asked to present on an influential figure tied to Deutschland - and I chose Stockhausen. Obviously.
My classmates (though wonderful) were perhaps not people, um, steeped in the classical music tradition, and it took a good bit of talking to convince them Stockhausen was even a real person - much less an influential person. On the other hand, part of that was my own fault: shouting "Hubschrauber!" and miming a cello probably wasn't the most coherent way to introduce the Helicopter String Quartet (1995). I was just so excited about it, guys!

Here we are now after the fact, and Ubuweb just posted a documentary showing bits and pieces of "Helikopter Streichquartett" rehearsals and performance with the Arditti Quartet. Four string players in four different helicopters with the music piped down to the audience below - apparently the idea came to Stockhausen in a dream. This documentary is fascinating.

(CD at Amazon)

You And Me Baby We Ain't Nothing' But Mammals

Where was I last night?
Funny you should ask. I was at Millenium Park, listening to the Grant Park Orchestra accompany segments of Planet Earth projected onto a huge screen. It's part of a six-concert tour (Chicago, Dallas, Atlanta, Baltimore, LA, Philadelphia), and it was - breathtaking. This is the best of sweeping movie music, guys.

Click here for a short interview with composer/conductor George Fulton. You know the BBC flew him to the Arctic to prep for the third installment of the documentary trilogy? Not a bad gig for a composer, am I right?

I'll leave you with this giant shark. (Imagine the music LIVE.)

I Write Mostly On Hotel Paper

Typewriter Music tickatackatickaboom. Composed by Leroy Anderson in the 1950; played here by the Strauss Festival Orchestra in 2008.



(via neatorama)

Hey! Next you hear from me I'll be back on the States-side of the Atlantic, and then I'll have the time and internet access to get you some real doozies I've stored up for just this occasion...get excited please.

All These Buildings and Mountains

What major work of Alban Berg are you?!?!?

*Please note: that is the actual title of the quiz.

*Please further note: I am the Chamber Concerto.

(I was pointed in this direction by therestisnoise)

And They Say That A Hero Will Save Us

Michael Tilson Thomas talks re: Mahler.

UE Mahler Interviews: Michael Tilson Thomas from Universal Edition on Vimeo.

Michael Tilson Thomas: sometimes I call him MTT, but only when I know he's not listening.

(via openculture)

These Are A Few Of My Favorite Things

Obviously I used up my vuvuzela post too soon.

No matter: I refer you to Alex Ross' The Rest is Noise for a little Brahms vuvuzela-style.

(As Maureen points out: Alex Ross AND classical music (okay, no surprise there) AND Germany AND men in tuxes AND soccer - what's not to like?)
(Vielen Dank, Maureen!)

Your Flight Was Smooth, I Hope?

A complete video recording of Adams' "Nixon in China"! In seventeen parts.

(I'll get you started:)



(what a treasure! via metafilter)

It Gets Complicated

"I Am Sitting in a Video Room" by Canzona. (This is what happens when you upload and re-upload a video to youtube a thousand times.) But the best part? It was (explicitly) inspired by Alvin Lucier's 1969 "I Am Sitting In A Room."



Here's the updated text:

I am sitting in a room different from the one you are in now. I am recording the sound of my speaking voice as well as the image of myself, and I am going to upload it to YouTube, rip it from YouTube, and upload it again and again, until the original characteristics of both my voice and my image are destroyed. What you will see and hear, then, are the artifacts inherent in the video codec of both YouTube and the mp4 format I convert it to on my computer. I regard this activity not so much as a demonstration of a digital fact, but more as a way to eliminate all human qualities my speech and image might have.

(via sequenza21)

The Key To Songs

Feeling cultureless? I got you Morton Subotnick's ballet for chamber music. Problem: fixed.

People Who Need People

Berliner StaatsOper für alle!
You can't see me, because I was in the front row. YEAH.
An estimated 50,000 people showed up for free opera (Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin) Saturday night, and an early Sunday concert featuring Tchaikovsky's Fourth.
(This is my way of encouraging you to go to outside classical music in YOUR city.)
(Bonus anecdote: because I was right there in the front, I was exactly one person removed from catching the flowers Daniel Barenboim threw into the crowd after the performance! Oh, to be a little bit taller...)

You Ain't Nothin' But A Hound Dog

Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson are putting together "an inter-species social gathering on a scale never seen before in Australia" - by which I mean: a concert that centers around frequencies audible to dogs, but not to humans. The BBC asked for a comment from Ms. Anderson, who informed them that "The show... will last for 20 minutes as...'dogs don't have a giant concentration span'."

(BBC article)
(via metafilter)
(adorable photo! (entitled "happy dogs"))