Joseph Haydn, Piano Sonata No. 24 in D major, excerpt (2nd Movement)
Sviatoslav Richter, live
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
Logic does not exist for me. I float on the waves of art and life and never really know how to distinguish what belongs to the one or the other or what is common to both. Life unfolds for me like a theatre presenting a sequence of somewhat unreal sentiments; while the things of art are real to me and go straight to my heart.
—Sviatoslav Richter
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reading table
After a black day, I play Haydn,
and feel a little warmth in my hands.
The keys are ready. Kind hammers fall.
The sound is spirited, green, and full of silence.
The sound says that freedom exists
and someone pays no taxes to Caesar.
I shove my hands in my haydnpockets
and act like a man who is calm about it all.
I raise my haydnflag. The signal is:
“We do not surrender. But want peace.”
The music is a house of glass standing on a slope;
rocks are flying, rocks are rolling.
The rocks roll straight through the house
but every pane of glass is still whole.
—Tomas Transtromer (winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature), “Allegro,” trans. from the Swedish by Robert Bly
Last night, opening a book at random, I came upon this—another reminder that Emily Dickinson, surely one of my desert-island writers, takes a backseat to no one when it comes to strangeness.
I see thee better — in the Dark —
I do not need a Light —
The Love of Thee — a Prism be —
Excelling Violet —
I see thee better for the Years
That hunch themselves between —
The Miner’s Lamp — sufficient be —
To nullify the Mine —
And in the Grave — I see Thee best —
Its little Panels be
Aglow — All ruddy — with the Light
I held so high, for Thee —
What need of Day —
To those whose Dark — hath so — surpassing Sun —
It deem it be — Continually —
At the Meridian?
• WKCR-FM (broadcasting from Columbia University)
—Lester Young/Charlie Parker birthday marathon
—John Coltrane birthday broadcast
—Bird Flight (Phil Schaap, jazz [Charlie Parker])
—Traditions in Swing (Phil Schaap, jazz)
—Eastern Standard Time (Carter Van Pelt, Jamaican music)
• WFMU-FM
—Mudd Up! (DJ/Rupture, “new bass and beats”)
—Sinner’s Crossroads(Kevin Nutt, gospel) —Airborne Event (Dan Bodah, “electronic noise to free jazz, drone rock to a capella African song”)
—Give the Drummer Some (Doug Schulkind, sui generis, web only)
—Transpacific Sound Paradise (Rob Weisberg, “popular and unpopular music from around the world”)
• WHPK-FM (broadcasting from University of Chicago)
—The Blues Excursion (Arkansas Red)
The other night, as I listened to the radio,* this (“Patient Observation”) floated out of the speakers.
Falling From Trees, Neon Productions, music by Peter Broderick
Premiered at The Place, London, 1/09
Excerpt, Part 2, “Patient Observation”
Vodpod videos no longer available.
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Full Length
Vodpod videos no longer available.
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Falling From Trees is a 30-minute production set in a psychiatric hospital that delves into the mind of a resident patient. The piece explores how a neurological disease can alter your sense of self and relationship to the world and people around you. Peter Broderick’s score has been created solely on piano and strings; it is also the first time Broderick has created music specifically for dance.
Don Byron New Gospel Quintet (DB, tenor saxophone & clarinet; DK Dyson, vocals; Xavier Davis, piano; Brad Jones, bass; Pheeroan akLaff, drums), “Precious Lord” (T. A. Dorsey), live, Brazil (São Paulo), 2010
Vodpod videos no longer available.
Last night I heard these folks live at the University of Chicago. Whenever I go out and hear someone, I’m reminded, again, that even (especially?) today, when records and the ’net make more music more available than ever before, there’s no substitute for live music. No recording offers the textures and nuances of a great live performance. (Never, for instance, have I heard a recording that truly reproduces the sounds of a drum kit, much less the interplay between horn and drums.) Not only is there more to hear live, your focus is sharper: you know you won’t have another opportunity to experience these sounds. And when you go to a club or a concert hall, you become, for that night, a member of an ad hoc musical community—something you can’t do sitting in your living room.
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