Category: Music
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Bad jazz. Didn’t Dante have something to say about that?
There are some musical instruments, and harmonic progressions, that have moral implications. Hear me out. Take the soprano sax. Look at those initials. Coincidence? I think not.
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Reich online, a Web-style birthday
Last weekend the Whitney Museum in New York had its 70th birthday concert for composer Steve Reich, featuring some of the city’s best new music groups (Alarm Will Sound’s transcriptions of Aphex Twin tunes are a must for anyone who loves geeky contemporary and geeky electronic music). Now they’ve posted the entire 4-hour concert on…
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Pärt dedicates works to murdered Russian reporter
On this side of the Atlantic, the apparent contract killing of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya a few weeks ago has been big news. She has been consistently one of the strongest, and bravest, media critics of Putin and Russian policy. On the eve of publishing a big story about Chechnya, she was killed. Much speculation…
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Hurdy-gurdy, the automatic vioin
We were walking up Nerudova to the Prague Castle last week, when I heard around a corner a strange droning music, a little like bagpipes, but not at all reedy. We turned the corner and an old street musician was there, sitting in a chair, with an unfamilar stringed instrument in his lap . It…
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Rain, ego, and marionette rock stars
It’s gray outside, which isn’t exactly new, but the persistence of the rain is. The temperature has dropped decidedly into fall territory, which seems a bit early to me. A year ago we arrived in Berlin to scout, and it was hot, T-shirt weather, a beautiful Indian summer. Since in SF we get our summers…
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Wild West on the banks of the Spree, and Polish hip-hop
So, cultures meld instead of clash. Or blend. But that would imply delicacy and grace. Whatever. A first part of the evening: The opening of a wild-west themed beach and flea market, built to look more or less frontier-style (don’t forget the Wild West massage) on the banks of the Spree. BBQ hamburgers and beer,…
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Nass, which doesn’t mean nice, for Sleater-Kinney
It’s wet outside. Nass, a word which I have just learned. It’s also wet inside, on me and through me. My fingers are too cold to type really efficiently; but just wait, I tell myself, they have real winters here, its no use complaining about the spring. We’ve just ridden back across town from the…
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Hammer from the sky. It’s Thor! Or the construction guys.
Every morning, at eight o’clock (weather permitting), the people turning our attic into a luxury penthouse begin hammering. There are no power tools in this job, except for the hoist they’re using to bring sheetrock and glass up the six stories. So we hear the bang through the walls. Bang. Bang. Bang. It’s better than…
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Apfeltaschen, blue sky and Boredoms
For the last week, the same weather pattern: Stunning blue mornings, and then low white clouds drift over, almost apologetically at first, as though one or two had lost their way and might ask directions before strolling off to their real destination; but then they thicken, and the wind begins to bend the trees and…
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Eurovision stunned as Arockolypse… well, rocks. Duh!
A quick word of explanation. We watch the entire Eurovision finals, which is kind of a hybrid of American Idol and the Olympics for Europe, but older than both. No, not older than the Olympics. But it is in Greece this year. The point being, rock. Something like 24 countries enter a national champion, and…
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Tra-la-la isn’t a weapon, it just looks that way
Last night Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra and Tra-La-La Band at Maria am Ufer, a little club tucked on the bank of the Spree, in I think what would used to have been the dead zone between Wall and West. They start by saying, “This is our third time in Berlin. The other times,…
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Les Paul, mugging at the Iridium
Les Paul is an old man now, and his guitar playing shows it. He plays Monday nights at the Iridium jazz club in Times Square, next door to the Mama Mia musical. People line up to see him. We were there for the second show of the night, at 10:00, in part because the first…
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Yougotmeup_web.mov (video/quicktime Object)
Jaimee Lidell dances with his cat. In black-ink animation. Purring soul music. My parents dog, Maggie, is jealous. Links: You Got Me Up
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calendarlive.com: Making a big deal of Minimalism
The LA Times remembers what a shock minimalism was in academic music circles in the 1960s. The writer carried an album of Terry Riley’s “In C” into class, prompting an outburst from his Berkeley composition professor: ‘”He betrayed Berkeley,” my red-faced professor shouted. ‘He betrayed music. He betrayed Gedalge. He betrayed everything this department stands…
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Does the truth confuse?
Andrew Hill, jazz pianist of elegant fractured melodies, angular dolphy-n rhythms, asks: “Am I confusing you? Does the truth confuse you?” Link: Andrew Hill: One Man’s Lifelong Search for the Melody in Rhythm