Thomas Brett

December 23, 2021

Curating The Week: Attention, Time, Decolonizing Electronic Music Software

• An essay about attention (and time). “The phrase attention economy poses attention as a commodity to be portioned off and sold, usually on the internet. (We also say that attention is something to be ‘paid.’) But maybe attention is more a state of mind, akin to happiness or disgust, than a currency. It’s a feeling, a Continue reading

Curating The Week
December 22, 2021

Brett’s Sound Picks: Huerco S.’s “Plonk VI” (2021)

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Brett’s Sound Picks
December 21, 2021

Art About Music: Salvador Dali’s “Music – The Red Orchestra” (1957)

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art about music
December 20, 2021

Cadences 10

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Uncategorized
December 17, 2021

Keeping The Hands In Play

(Photo: Gerrit Dou’s “A Woman Playing A Clavichord”, c. 1665) “The musician, like the writer or speaker, regularly confronts his conduct as performance or not.” David Sudnow, Talk’s Body (1979), p. 65. 1. Whenever I feel I’m disconnected from the musical because I’ve been looking at the screen and tinkering with parameters too much, I Continue reading

play, playing music
December 16, 2021

Resonant thoughts: Kalefa Sanneh’s “Major Labels” (2021)

“When I was working as a pop music critic, I tried not to think too much about quality—at least not directly. My belief, then as now, was that there was no useful difference between loving a song and considering it good, or between not liking one and considering it bad. (If it is possible for Continue reading

Resonant Thoughts
December 15, 2021

Brett’s Sound Picks: Ian Hawgood And Wil Bolton’s “Emerging” (2021)

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Brett’s Sound Picks
December 14, 2021

Art About Music: Jose Manuel Capuletti’s “Allegory Of Music” (1946)

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art about music
December 13, 2021

Dub 4

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Uncategorized
December 10, 2021

Cadences 8

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cadences

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.