brettworks

thinking through music

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September 14, 2017

Freestyle: Hearing Steve Reich’s “Mallet Quartet” As NPR Soundtrack Music

Yesterday, while driving back from buying a shower curtain and an orchid (yes, a strange mix*) I turned on NPR, just catching the tail end of Terry Gross’s Fresh Air. Underneath the news, I noticed the familiar pulsing malletwork of Steve Reich’s music. It was a recent piece from 2013 called Mallet Quartet (Part I,… Continue reading

freestyle, modernism, NPR, soundtracks, Uncategorized
September 13, 2017

Art About Music: Gary Larson’s “The Far Side” (c. 1982)

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art about music, minor keys, soundtracks, Uncategorized
September 11, 2017

Organ and Crotales Music

Download at iTunes, bandcamp, cdbaby. Stream it on Spotify. Continue reading

Uncategorized
September 8, 2017

Curating The Week: Creative Work, Style And Monoculture, Ambient Church Music

• An article about creative work. “Resist the urge to judge your art prematurely, or to abandon it altogether. Just welcome what comes, and let it be that simple.” • An article about style and monoculture. “Since the early 1990s, Eijkelboom has surreptitiously photographed pedestrians in urban settings, for no longer than two hours in… Continue reading

Curating The Week, Uncategorized
September 7, 2017

Freestyle: A Brief Telephone Conversation About Music

Hey what’s up? Nothing. You? I’m working. Oh ya? Ya. • What—Is it some new music? Yeah, but you interrupted it. (laughs) I was right in the middle of something and I had to stop recording. • Where are you? Driving. Okay. • You’re happy as a clam when you’re in that little world, eh?… Continue reading

freestyle, telephony, Uncategorized
September 6, 2017

Art About Music: Charles M. Schulz’s “Peanuts” (1952) (1960)

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art about music, comics, Uncategorized
September 5, 2017

Meta-Reflection: Talking About Creativity And The Value Of Performance

“Craft is what enables you to be successful when you’re not inspired.” – Brian Eno As a research flâneur, one of my favorite meta-subjects is the nature of the creative process and the question of how new and original ideas arise. Over the course of reading about music I’ve wandered into some compelling efforts to… Continue reading

Creativity, groovology, meta-reflection, performance, Uncategorized
August 30, 2017

Art About Music: Jacob Lawrence’s “Bootleg Whiskey” (1943) And “The Lovers” (1946)

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art about music, radio, record players, Uncategorized
August 29, 2017

Curating The Week: How To Read A Poem, Music Software Skeuomorphism, Kelly Moran

• An article on how to read a poem (or: how to listen to music?). “When we release ourselves from the need to boil the poem down to a single meaning or theme, the mind can move in a dreamlike, associative way. This associative movement in poetry can at first feel disorienting, but it is… Continue reading

Curating The Week, Uncategorized
August 25, 2017

Unknowing

It sounds new age (it’s not) instead of an exceptional technique, gifts of novice: that first time when you don’t know what you’re doing so head first you dive into its rhythm (a bypassing move) swift and sure trusting form is sound context becomes clear means generate ends because this first time practice beats theory… Continue reading

poetry, Uncategorized, unknowing

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.