I'm A New Soul

Steve Reich's new album "Double Sextet, 2x5" is streaming IN ITS ENTIRETY on the NPR website. It's a new sound, and it's been getting great reviews...


(bonus: Reich does an interview with Pitchfork and Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore? It happened.)

Short People Got No Reason

Neumes on your shorts! High fashion? Um, maybe...
From Cafepress.



(bonus: I don't know anything about them except that they have a myspace page under Folk/Jazz/Rock - but what a great name, right?: The Neumes.)

So Airplane / Airplane / Sorry I'm Late

Stranded on a runway
landed on a plan
what else to do but
impromptu jam?

Mozart-style.



(via consumerist)
(thank you to mburns!)

My Baby Loves A Bunch Of Authors

Excellent article of the day: Famous Rappers and their 20th Century Literary Counterparts.

The comments (hilarious, by the way) seem to indicate some people are scandalized, but I say: WHY NOT.

(via flavorwire)

Stormy Weather

QUOTE:

"Recently, I have begun translating weather data collected in cities into musical scores, which are then translated into sculptures as well as being a source for collaboration with musicians. These pieces are not only devices that map meteorological conditions of a specific time and place, but are also functional musical scores to be played by musicians. While musicians have freedom to interpret, they are asked not to change the essential relationship of the notes to ensure that what is still heard is indeed the meteorological relationship of weather data."

UNQUOTE

Nathalie Miebach works across disciplines like it's her job. You can see more scores, sculptures, and hear the music realized on her website.

I'm Not Your Toy

Modified Toy Orchestra: exactly what it sounds like. Plus, the BBC's got a behind-the-scenes video article.

The interesting part about this: "we take these [toys] and learn how to play them as instruments." As if there is an instrument buried inside every object if only you know how to make it sound. I like it.


(special thanks to Kevin!)

Grow Up And Blow Away

Tuned Pale Ale by Matt Braun. TA DA! Think about all the time we could save with these pre-tuned beer bottles! (Since obviously it's going to happen one way or another.)

(via notcot)

Tiny Dancer / In The Sand

Have you guys heard of NPR's Tiny Desk Concerts? And if so, why didn't you clue me in sooner?

They're mini-concerts video-recorded live in the perfectly cluttered office of "All Songs Considered" host Bob Boilen. Indie, gospel, hip-hop, jazz, classical, reggae, gypsy punk: there's something for everyone. Most artists play a set of three or four songs, every now and again there's a little talk, some bring friends along for the ride. What a lovely idea!

Recommended sampling:
Ana Tijoux
Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros
The Tallest Man On Earth

What's He Building In There?

It's a housing complex specifically designed for musicians. Created by Netherlands-based 24H architecture, each ultra-modern house has a designated music room (centrally located and featuring a skylight). As if that's not enough, the entire complex is super-duper-eco-friendly thanks to a system that recycles heat from a nearby harbor.

Designed specifically for musicians! Why? I have no idea! I bet living there would be like summer music camp. But with fewer bugs.

(via notcot)

Guess Who's Back / Tell A Friend

My peace offering is interactive: a tonematrix by André Michelle that lets you create sweet loops. Soothing, sort of inherently-derivative-minimalist - you're not going to get a compositional masterpiece out of the deal, but it's an addicting build-up ease-down process with which you can do no wrong (ie. the customer is always Reich).

Yeah, that happened.

(special thanks to Aaron)

C'mon Baby / Light My Fire

And the best part is: he just looks so satisfied with himself.

(via neato)

Never Failed Me Yet

The Portsmouth Sinfonia - formed in 1970, there was one major entrance requirement: you had to either be a non-musician, or pick up an instrument you'd never touched before.
Hilarity ensues! A corollary rule required the musicians to play to the best of their ability (ie. not to play badly intentionally), but that only gets you so far on an unknown instrument, you know? As Dan Visconti at NewMusicBox points out, there's a certain joie de vivre (and, I think, earnestness) that makes this a "laugh with" rather than a "laugh at."

And it's not just the funny; there's some history going on here too. The idea of an ensemble made up of people who don't know how to play their instruments was a nod to Cardew's scratch orchestra and the state of experimental music; Gavin Bryars and Brian Eno were both on board - plus (of course) a select group of amateurs and enthusiasts. By the time it fell apart in 1979, the Portsmouth Sinfonia had played concerts, put out records, and even a film. That is wonderful.



(via newmusicbox)

Weeping Chandelier

It's not often that I post on just-music-that-I'm-listening-to, but I'm crazy about this particular album, and here's why:

1. It's a collaboration between the "world's foremost Death Oompah band," the Tiger Lillies, and the new music lovin' Kronos Quartet.
2. The instrumentation consists of: (1) avant-garde cabaret band (accordion! musical saw! theremin! falsetto vocals! percussion! contra bass!) + (1) string quartet.
3. All of the lyrics are culled from previously unpublished poems given to the band by Mr. Edward Gorey.

(If that's not of some musicological-literary note, I don't know what is.)
Bottom line: released in 2003, The Gorey End is weird and compelling. BOTH. And that is why I've been listening to it on repeat.




(Amazon)

I'll Tape It / Cause I Know You Won't

(National Geographic April 1973; vintage ads)

Ahem ahem: "You want a tape deck that lasts? We'll give you a tape deck that lasts. And lasts. ... Whatever weird instrument your great-grandson will be playing, the Sony TC-377 will capture it."

Weird instruments are the best, guys.

(via boingboing)

Music Of My Heart

The Heart Chamber Orchestra might be a little bit of a niche-group.
See here: The twelve musicians hook themselves up to ECG sensors monitoring their heartbeats. That information is fed to a software program designed to generate a score in real time and send it to the laptop screens placed in front of the musicians.

The idea is that the music literally "comes from the heart." KIND OF CHEESY? But also kind of wonderful: I think this would be an amazing (if somewhat style-limited) live performance - the concept, the visuals, the sound...

(Question: I wonder what would happen if one of the musicians had a heart attack?)

Heart Chamber Orchestra from pure on Vimeo.

(via notcot and wired)

And Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect

David Leventi's latest project is entitled "Bjoerling’s Larynx: World Famous Opera Houses": a photo series documenting famous and not-so-famous (but always opulent) theaters. The Arthur Roger Gallery in New Orleans will display the photos August 7 - September 11, 2010, but you can see them online at the artist's website here.

(via neatorama and pdn)

The World

From Saeed Kamali Dehghan's Aug. 2, 2010 Guardian article:

"In some of the most extreme comments by a senior regime figure since the 1979 revolution, [Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei said: 'Although music is halal, promoting and teaching it is not compatible with the highest values of the sacred regime of the Islamic Republic.'
Khamenei's comments came in response to a request for a ruling by a 21-year-old follower of his, who was thinking of starting music lessons, but wanted to know if they were acceptable according to Islam, the semi-official Fars news agency reported. 'It's better that our dear youth spend their valuable time in learning science and essential and useful skills and fill their time with sport and healthy recreations instead of music,' he said."

(Guardian)

Take A Bow

"Entrada" by Stephen Scott, performed by the Bowed Piano Ensemble of Colorado College.
Ryan Raul Bañagale (one of the original performers, and co-founder of the blog Amusicology - a favorite of mine, not to mention the place I found this video) points out the pretty intense choreography that necessarily goes along with a piece like this. Not to get back on the "some-music-would-be-perceived-differently-if-you-couldn't-see-the-performance" horse again, but: well, yes. Plus: what sounds! And all of them from a grand piano.

(If I had known about this in college, you can bet I would have tried to make it happen. Or at least thought about trying to make it happen before succumbing to comps.)

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)