brettworks

thinking through music

Thomas Brett

March 16, 2021

Art About Music: Laurent de La Hyre’s “Allegory of Music” (1649)

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art about music
March 15, 2021

Long Tone Music

(Available on Spotify.) Continue reading

new music
March 12, 2021

Curating The Week: The Disappearance Of Musical Genre, Musicality In EDM, Wind

• An article about the disappearance of musical genre. “Genre is a reductive, old-fashioned, and inherently problematic idea, and we should all be eager to see it rendered moot, but I remain curious about the contours of a post-genre world—what that might open up for the future, and what might be sacrificed.” • An essay… Continue reading

Curating The Week
March 11, 2021

Arrows Of Attention: The Musical Minimalist’s Manual

Identify your idea’s smallest musical unit. What part, aspect, or quality of what you’re playing or composing is its essence? Is it a rhythm, a series of chords, a melody, a stasis, an unusual orchestration, a timbre combination? Identify the essence and pursue it, amplify it. One sound, one part at a time. Refine and… Continue reading

arrows of attention, mindware, minimalism, minimalism and maximalism, minimum force, minor epiphanies
March 10, 2021

Brett’s Sound Picks: The Black Dog’s “Ringinglow Oscillation” (2021)

(Follow Brett’s Sound Picks 2021 playlist.) Continue reading

Brett’s Sound Picks
March 9, 2021

Art About Music: John George Brown’s “The Music Lesson” (1870)

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art about music
March 8, 2021

On Thin Ice

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motion, movement, sampling, sketch
March 5, 2021

Curating The Week: Decolonizing Music Software, Max Mathews, Ambience Rooms

• An article about decolonizing electronic music software. “I find Ableton pushes me towards following the beat grid. Everything sounds somehow Western—very mechanical, not organic like the rough tones and raw drums I heard growing up in Nairobi. Even as I try to break away from the loops and the 1-2-3-4 drive of these music… Continue reading

ambience rooms, Curating The Week
March 4, 2021

Not’s Power

When you’re not selling anythingnot networkingnot trying to get aheadnot leveraging upon your existing skillsnot building on your successnot trying to fit innot playing to the crowdnot being on messagenot showing gratitudenot easy listeningnot putting on airsnot seeing it in perspectivenot humble braggingnot doing it with a goal in mindnot giving a shout outnot tipping… Continue reading

Uncategorized
March 3, 2021

Brett’s Sound Picks: Shivkumar Sharma’s “Raga Bhinna Kauns” (2021)

(Listen to the dynamic range, down to whisper soft.) (Brett’s Sound Picks 2021.) Continue reading

Brett’s Sound Picks, raga

Thomas Brett is a musician and writer who holds a PhD in ethnomusicology from New York University. He is the author of Principles of Electronic Music Production and The Creative Electronic Music Producer, a book described by Sound On Sound magazine as “a deep philosophical analysis of the various creative inspirations, ideas and processes involved in producing electronic music.” His essays have appeared in the journals Popular Music and Popular Music and Society, as well as edited collections by Routledge, Oxford, and Cambridge University presses. Thomas has played percussion on Broadway since 1997 and writes about music at brettworks.com.