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Literary Distillation: Notes On Bruce Weber’s “Life Is A Wheel”
Among the many lessons offered in Bruce Weber’s Life Is A Wheel, a flowing and meditative memoir about bicycling across the United States, are two delightful insights about the nature of thinking and progress. Riding all those miles each day, Weber has lots of time and space to think his thoughts (and then write… Continue reading
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David Hockney On Perspective
I’ve been reading more Lawrence Weschler lately, this time his engaging study of the painter David Hockney, True to Life: Twenty-Five Years of Conversations with David Hockney (University of California Press, 2009). I first encountered Hockney’s work in the mid-1990s at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. The exhibit was a show of Hockney’s English… Continue reading
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Pantha Du Prince And The Bell Laboratory Play Terry Riley’s “In C”
American composer Terry Riley’s “In C” (1964) is widely considered one of the first and most important minimalist compositions. The piece, scored for an ensemble of unspecified instruments and size, consists of 53 short melodic phrases that musicians play and repeat as many times as they wish before moving onto the next. When all the… Continue reading
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On Creative Analogies: Lessons From Coi
“Perfect food is born of perfect order.” – Daniel Patterson, Coi I have written previously on this blog (see culinary arts posts) about connections between cooking and music. To add to that mix, I recently read Daniel Patterson’s excellent Coi cookbook. The book is structured around a series of short narratives that provide context for… Continue reading
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On Michael Jackson’s Vocal Artistry
A real audio gem recently appeared via a blog devoted to Michael Jackson. The gem I’m referring to is a clip of Jackson singing one of his biggest hits, “Beat It.” But it’s not the finished song we all know. It’s a demo of Jackson’s ideas for the yet-to-be song. It sounds like he’s in the studio,… Continue reading
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On Endless Vibrations: Locating Soca Music
Lots of people recently returned from Trinidad and Tobago Carnival thoroughly energized from the parties, dancing, and most of all, the powerfully loud and beat-driven soca music. If you’ve never hear this music up close, blasting from the slow-moving soundsystem trucks that crawl their way through the streets of Port Of Spain, it’s quite an… Continue reading
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A Note On Blog Writing
Writing– while riding the subway, while compartmentalized and in motion, while there’s little else to do, while time is without essence, while the alternative is awaiting arrival at my destination. Continue reading
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On A Repeating Less Is More: Beck’s “Wave”
“He’s found the right sound for his disposition and he resonates like crazy with that sound.” – Ben Ratliff (The New York Times) “In ‘Wave,’ the angst pours out like a mantra. – Jody Rosen (vulture.com) “‘Wave,’ for instance, is a floating impressionistic orchestral dirge, Beck letting the strings surrounding his voice lift it up… Continue reading
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On Mouse On The Keys’ “Aom”
“The concept was: ‘Utilizing elements of modern French music represented by composers such as Debussy and Ravel, along with the hardcore music of the ’80s and ’90s (…) and mixing them in a style reminiscent of Detroit techno.” – Akira Kawasaki I recently came across some music that reminds me of what it might sound… Continue reading
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Sound Artifacts Or Buried Treasure?
A few months ago Alain and I were talking about my bowl music project. Alain, a sound engineer with keen ears, was mastering the tracks, taking out some of the noise on my original recording (e.g. the sound of scraping a wooden dowel on bowl rim, room noise). He had noticed something. “You know those… Continue reading
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