Mind the Gap: April 2010 Archives

In contrast to that last post highlighting the "dare you to define it" music I have in heavy rotation this week, Tom Service points to the good in the stuff of blatant genre crossing, awarding an A for effort in an era when the "genres of 'pop' and 'classical' now demand such different things from singers that the days of meaningful genre-hopping--when Enrico Caruso and Mario Lanza ruled the charts, the stage and the screen--may be over."

Though it doesn't do it for me--the fact that they went there in the first place seems to me to be too large a part of why anyone would care about the exercises--maybe I'm underselling the experience. The whole thing just makes me cover-my-eyes nervous and squirmy, particularly for the kids. The Aston ensemble, also offering their take on classical filtering pop, notes that "it's a classical musician's job to play other people's music. We have just decided to play someone a little bit different." Hard to argue with that sentiment, of course, though, this kind of thing lives on a two-way street.

I personally have my own weakness for a certain style of creative cover song, though I'm not sure where in the contemporary compendium of such work you'd shelve it. "Studied disaffected split-screen crossover"? It's been a tough week technology-wise here for the AJ crew, so I thought we'd just go light on the analysis and finish up with a little fun. If your heart doesn't melt a little when he sets up his portable theremin, well, we should probably not listen to records together anymore.

[via]

Though I don't wake up with post-show ink-stamped hands that often anymore, my current temporary tattoo is a souvenir from Owen Pallett's performance last night at Baltimore's Metro Gallery. He's touring his latest, Heartland, and since a distinctively employed violin is a personal weakness of mine, I had to see how this guy did it first hand. Nitsuh Abebe, who turned me on to Pallett's work in the first place, already paid the new album his compliments and, well, what he said. Pallett creates the kind of music that encompasses so much detail and subtlety you can't catch it all live and so I'm now spending a rainy afternoon pouring over it on record, but here's a stripped down live version of a track I loved during last night's set.

Pallett's show was probably the only reason I wasn't too jealous when, elsewhere, my well-traveled husband spent his evening in the company of Jónsi's tour for Go. If their route doesn't cut through your town, you can still take a taste here. Just try and stop yourself from pounding your heel on the floor under your desk while you type.

And okay, since we're already playing six degrees of Nico Muhly, I'd be remiss if I wrapped this post without checking in on Sam Amidon's latest awesomeness, I See the Sign.

All those who have been asking what's good out there and getting that blank look from me these past few months? Yeah, the stereo is back on, and this is the set list.

Now, I know there's that saying about how the only bad publicity is no publicity. And isn't making orchestral performance just another part of American life on the list of how we are going to save classical music? But still, if the older woman + Depend undergarments + symphony set-up doesn't make you cringe, just wait for the "magic wand" line. Between that and an inability to operate the complex mechanics of a music stand, this spot may have just set the perception of women conductors back 30 years in 30 seconds.

Of course it's great that products like this exist so that people with certain medical conditions can maintain active lives without stress and embarrassment, but really Depend, did you need to pin your marketing angle on an industry already fighting to build up sex appeal and play down the aging audience factor? Oh, yeah, I guess I see how that could happen...Shh, make sure the Cialis people don't get wind of this.

Who says a listener can't get in the groove without a discernible backbeat? Composers given to making complex statements just have to come at the issue from a different angle. Or at least that's the challenge Richard Carrick threw down for himself.

I'm taking a little personal time out this week, but I filed this tidbit before shutting off the office lights. Luckily, Carrick was very kind to your humble reporter and never made me try and say "Csíkszentmihályi" on tape. It wasn't pretty! Eyjafjallajökull reporters, you have my sympathies.

Man, it's the track that just keeps giving. Though in some ways not quite as awesome as this one, the version below has a toy piano, tax code/cow tipping/leaf peeping references, and extensive Robert Frost quoting. I'm torn!

[via BoingBoing]

Lately when I consume media online, I've noticed that I read a few graphs or watch a few minutes and then, in an increasingly frequent breach of self-control, I skip down to the comments to see what kind of discussion the piece generated. The comments can be pretty pointless, but in many places readers offer additional information, alternative viewpoints, etc. that fill out the topic at hand in some cool/useful way. Particularly if it's something like a recipe, I can look for tips or corrections to the original. In an age that has decided it can largely do without fact checkers, I guess I'm also going there to check the public vote count on how trustworthy the reporting source is deemed to be. And such ready access to feedback has actually changed how I digest new information. Back in the days of paper and ink, I trusted what writers told me to a much higher degree because there was no peanut gallery (aside from whatever family member was in the room) to affirm or question the accuracy of what I had just read. There was certainly no Googling it.

I see the inherent flaws in crowd sourcing your editorial team, but I think I'm also starting to find more and more value it in. Or, at the very least, it has become a defining part of how I consume content for better and worse. On days when it just seems like a time waster, I've tried to cut myself off from the comment reading, but I can't seem to stop. Am I just fact policing? Looking for community? For affirmation of my own opinions? For a laugh? Why is this content so addictive? Why do I let strangers help me make purchases? I particularly wonder about the power I give these people because of how often I'm reminded that, just like the real world, the virtual team is far from infallible. I did successfully install a fill valve this morning with a little help from the internet handy people (though real-world instruction from dad helped way more), but this past weekend's macaron disaster was in no way diverted by online chef support. I guess at the very root of things I turn to it because, no matter the outcome, it's good to feel a bit like that Verizon guy when flying solo into uncharted territory.

Life in (and therefore the music of) New Orleans mixed up with the creators of The Wire. As a now-somewhat-established Baltimorean with a passion for great music, that's an epic TV series equation. Sadly for me, we are not HBO subscribers; the early reviews for Treme only rub salt in that wound.

The show premieres tonight at 10 p.m., for those who find themselves in more connected circumstances.

And now to fly in the face of what I said previously, perhaps education is exactly what we need. At least the building and a 17-year-old kid with creativity to burn.

[via boingboing]

Sometimes aural context is everything, or at least it's a pretty good chunk.

Speaking of the power of musical association: When the weather turns no-jacket warm again, I always fall into a bit of windows down/car stereo music revery, in that "this has been the soundtrack of my life" kind of way. This past weekend has been a good climate for that. The music stores so much information in addition to what the composer/artist was trying to get across. Visual images come back in a flood, feelings, experiences. Music as personal culture. And though often as vague and changeable as a memory, it also has a strong root buried the notes. I like this storage method. No hard drive crash or deleted account will disappear with these pieces of my life. I used to wonder if we could each create amazingly nuanced autobiographies using a series of YouTube music videos, and then I came to understand why this wouldn't really work. There's an incredible amount of information contained in music that only we hear.