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Zorn List Digest         Monday, May 11 1998         Volume 02 : Number 363



In this issue:
-
       Magazines (& reviews & reviewers)
       Re: Recent Goodies
       Jazz Rock bk
       Re: Serialism
       Re: Henry kaiser Web Page
       Re: Recent Goodies
       Re: Why Zorn
       re: icecream w/evan parker (+zoviet:france)for five or six hours  before packing up
       Re: Recent Goodies
       Re: Recent Goodies
       painkiller and zorn interview
       re: painkiller and zorn interview
       Re: Sharpish

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 98 10:21:06 -0300
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Magazines (& reviews & reviewers)

On Friday 8, May 1998 Rusty Crump wrote:
"A lot of what passes for music reviewing and criticism has devolved
into a clever (perhaps Christgauesque) phrase and a couple of
comparisons, like "This new group is reminiscent of My Bloody Valentine
if Elvis Costello were the lead singer." That sort of crap does nothing
for me, and it's why I've stopped buying musci magazines except for the
occasional issue of The Wire..."

I DISAGREE WITH THIS.
COMPARISONS OFTEN ARE USEFUL BOTH FOR CRITICS AND READERS JUST TO PLACE
A LISTENING CONTEXT. I THINK YOU MUST BE SMART ENOUGH TO TAKE WHAT YOU
NEED; BUT YOU NEED READ FIRST.
AMOUNG OTHERS COMMENTS, RICHARD COOK (The Wire- Feb. '98) WROTE ON
ESKELIN/PARKINS/BLACK CD (One great day...-Hatology) THAT "...they are
serious about their humour, they can create some amazingly moving music
next to a madcap episode..."
I BOUGHT THE CD AND BEYOND LIKES AND DISLIKES I HAVE TO SAY THAT COOK
WAS PRETTY ACCURATE AND HIS REVIEW HAS BEEN ABSOLUTELY VALUABLE FOR ME.
ON THE OTHER HAND, IF YOU "stopped buying music magazines" YOU MISSED
READING FOR EXAMPLE:
ON JAZZIZ (APRIL '98):
BRAD SHEPIK & THE COMMUTERS, PACHORA, BEBOP & DESTRUCTION AND PIGPEN.
ALSO REVIEWS ON JOE MANIERI, TIM BERNE, CHRIS KELSEY TRIO, KISMET, THE
JULIUS HEMPHILL SEXTET, ARTHUR DOYLE AND JOHN ZORN CDS.

ON DOWN BEAT (MARCH '98):
REVIEWS ON JOE MORRIS, MARC JOHNSON, ARCANA, MATTHEW SHIPP DUO WITH JOE
MORRIS, JOE MORRIS & WILLIAM PARKER, R. PREVITE/J. ZORN CDS.
NOT ONLY - I REPEAT- WE MUST READ FIRST BUT WE OUGHT TO BE PATIENT,
CURIOUS AND OPEN-MINDED (NOT ONLY MUSICALLY), MAYBE THIS IS ONE OF THE
KEYS TO AVOID PATRICE'S SAYING: "Let's not forget that the confusion of
music writers (or they blunders) is the tip of the iceberg of the
audience in general".
This is my opinion.


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 09:20:46 -0800
From: George Grella <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Recent Goodies

Brian, your comments about your new purchases as intriguing.  Like you,
I find J.L. Adams too bland. ambience without an idea.  And the little I
know of Lee Hyla's work I've found interesting and energetic.  On Earle
Brown, though, I think I can add some more constructive comments.

It's great that Hat is recordings some of his work, but as far as I know
their stuff, and one Mode record with George Crumb, only features
Brown's solo and small chamber work.  He was the first lecturer we had
in when I started grad school at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music
and he made a big impression on me.  I had only know his scores for the
first "Folio," beautiful graphic notation.  He played some tapes for
larger ensembles and orchestral works, intriguing stuff.  He also had a
great quote; "I want my pieces to sound different each time they're
played, but I always want them to sound like Earle Brown."

From that you can get the idea of his basic technique, structured
freedom (improvisation) for the performer.  The performer gets to make
certain choices, depending on the piece, but the core idea is Brown's.

gg


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 12:24:29 -0400
From: Lang Thompson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Jazz Rock bk

Has anybody read the new Stuart Nicholson book "Jazz Rock"?  Has an
introduction by Bill Laswell.  Looks fairly interesting but the discography
doesn't seem to be in any useful order.

LT
- ------------------------------------------------------
Lang Thompson
http://www.tcf.ua.edu/wlt4
New at Funhouse:  Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan obituary.

"Zathras beast of burden to many others.  Is sad
life.  Probably have sad death.  But at least
there is symmetry."  --  Zathras

- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 09:26:36 -0800
From: George Grella <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Serialism

That is hilarious!  That's definitely a parody; not only is the idea
ridiculous, in the best way, but if you bothered to check dates,
records, etc. you'd see it was off the mark historically.

BUT . . .  it's based vaguely in life, which is that there is a
continuing controversy over Webern's political values, how much of a
Nazi was he/wasn't he?  I don't know enough about the issue to add
anything of my own, but there are musicologist and historians who have
been pursuing the idea that Webern was, at least, a Nazi sympathizer.

Of course, being actual members of the Nazi party hasn't hurt the
posthumous reputations of Richard Strauss, Karl Boehm, Elizabeth
Schwartzkopf, or Willem Mengelberg [who was a Dutch sympathizer].  I
think that Weben being s subject of such an inquiry at so late a date
[nothing substantiated] marks how deeply antipathetic people still are
to the serial technique.

gg


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 11:32:49 -0500 (EST)
From: "M.A. Piper" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Henry kaiser Web Page

The URL is:

 http://php.indiana.edu/~mpiper/HKMain.html

On Mon, 11 May 1998, Louis Schwartz wrote:

    >A month or so ago someone posted the URL for a Henry Kaiser Web Page.  I've
    >recetly lost all my bookmarks and can't find the page.  Could that some one
    >please post it again or send it to me privately?

Best,
M. A. Piper






- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 11:40:08 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Joseph S. Zitt" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Recent Goodies

On Mon, 11 May 1998, George Grella wrote:

> >From that you can get the idea of his basic technique, structured
> freedom (improvisation) for the performer.  The performer gets to make
> certain choices, depending on the piece, but the core idea is Brown's.

That's an interesting idea, which I've mulled around a lot in my own
composing and performing. How does one identify what one is hearing as a
performance of a given piece? For example, if one were to come in in the
middle of an Ornette Coleman performance, how would one know (not having
heard the head) that, say, "Lonely Woman" was being played, rather than
"All my Life"? Is it possible to tell by ear that one is hearing Zorn's
"Cobra" rather than a free improv or a different game being played by that
group of musicians?

This first struck me, BTW (though, of course many people had thought about
it in previous decades) when I heard two performances of a string quartet
by Anthony Braxton: the two performances (one by Kronos and one by the
Robert Schumann Quartet) had no audible connection.

- - ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1----------
|||/ Joseph Zitt ===== [e-mail] ===== Human Systems \|||
||/ Maryland? = <*> SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List <*> = ecto \||
|/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt ====== Comma: Voices of New Music \|


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 09:48:06 -0700 (PDT)
From: SUGAR in their vitamins? <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Why Zorn

On Mon, 11 May 1998, Jeff Schuth wrote:

> actual music.  Doesn't anyone else get tired about people talking about
> what is good, instead of why something is good?

i'm not sure what you expect,
but it seems to me people have
been discussing exactly that
since the list's inception.

perhaps the only rub is "good"
and "bad" are generally subjective
terms and most people speak
from personal perspective.
i don't think there's any way
around that.

> example: Torture Garden can be listened to rather straight forward and
> for pure musical enjoyment--but how should one listen to Parachute
> years, which to many sounds like plain noise

i bristle at the idea of a prescribed
method. this is one of those things
best left up to the individual.

hasta.

Yes.  Beautiful, wonderful nature.  Hear it sing to us: *snap*  Yes.  natURE.


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 12:33:36 +0100
From: Dan Given <[e-mail]>
Subject: re: icecream w/evan parker (+zoviet:france)for five or six hours  before packing up

>I had ice cream w/ Mr. Parker and others afterword and asked him about
>the sort-of recent Zoviet:France gig.  He said ZF were one of several
>groups at the all-night rave in question, and he (EP) played with the
>group for five or six hours until he packed up (at 6:00 in the morning,
>and ZF wanted to keep going!).  I have NO IDEA where to start
>w/Zoviet:France, so if anyone has recommendations, I'd love to hear
>them. (Maybe you should reply off-list.)

Did Parker happen to say if, during this 5 or 6 hours, he stopped and took
the horn out of his mouth, or was this one of his amazing feats of circular
breathing?

Dan


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 10:18:31 -0800
From: George Grella <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Recent Goodies

Joseph S. Zitt writes:

> That's an interesting idea, which I've mulled around a lot in my own
> composing and performing. How does one identify what one is hearing as a
> performance of a given piece? For example, if one were to come in in the
> middle of an Ornette Coleman performance, how would one know (not having
> heard the head) that, say, "Lonely Woman" was being played, rather than
> "All my Life"? Is it possible to tell by ear that one is hearing Zorn's
> "Cobra" rather than a free improv or a different game being played by that
> group of musicians?

I believe this is a structural problem that the composer must solve, and
one in which the comparison between Brown and "Cobra" works better than
between Brown and Ornette; while I do think that "Lonely Woman," as
played, can be picked out even if you start in the middle [the
harmonic/melodic materials mark it instantly for me], the point of the
structure of Ornette's is different than Brown's.

Brown's first "Folio" contains several different pieces, one of which is
entirely graphically notated, another which is written on staves in such
a way that the paper can be turned "upside-down" and the music can still
be read and played.  In each way, this gives structure to the player
throughout the duration of the piece, from specific pitches and rhythms
in the latter to specific, but complete, abstraction in the former.
While performances would be different, the performer(s) is working with
the same score each time.

That's Browns idea.  I can't say how well it works, since the only
performances of "Folio" I've heard are on the "New York School" CD.  I
think it can work, definitely, but it takes a sensitive performance from
players who really know that ideas behind the paper in Brown's work, I
don't think one can pick up the abstract scores in particular and just
start "blowing" them without regard to the context in which they were
produced.

This is all just an example from what I know of Brown's work; I have not
scene all his types of notation, and they are more varied than I've
mentioned above.

gg

- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 12:39:26 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Joseph S. Zitt" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Recent Goodies

On Mon, 11 May 1998, George Grella wrote:

> I believe this is a structural problem that the composer must solve, and
> one in which the comparison between Brown and "Cobra" works better than
> between Brown and Ornette; while I do think that "Lonely Woman," as
> played, can be picked out even if you start in the middle [the
> harmonic/melodic materials mark it instantly for me], the point of the
> structure of Ornette's is different than Brown's.

Hmm... while the harmonic/melodic matterials might mark the more
sensitively played versions of "Lonely Woman", I don't think that any
aspects of the piece are prescribed as necessary in the middle, in the way
that bebop changes or the time frames and choices of instruments in Cage's
number pieces are.

> Brown's first "Folio" contains several different pieces, one of which is
> entirely graphically notated, another which is written on staves in such
> a way that the paper can be turned "upside-down" and the music can still
> be read and played.  In each way, this gives structure to the player
> throughout the duration of the piece, from specific pitches and rhythms
> in the latter to specific, but complete, abstraction in the former.
> While performances would be different, the performer(s) is working with
> the same score each time.

Not having seen the score or heard them: in the invertable piece, are the
note streams identifiable as the same piece either way they're played?

The only score of his that I've seen is "November 1952", which is
completely abstract, consisting of lines on a sort of grid (I don't recall
whether the grid is visible).

Playing graphic scores is interesting. At a Comma performancea couple of
weeks ago, we used a painting as a graphic score, though we didn't
pre-plan how we would approach it. The result went over well.

(When I was in high school, I walked out of a workshop with Donald Erb,
since I thought his idea of playing graphic scores was ridiculous. I have
since kicked myself repeatedly for doing so...)

- - ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1----------
|||/ Joseph Zitt ===== [e-mail] ===== Human Systems \|||
||/ Maryland? = <*> SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List <*> = ecto \||
|/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt ====== Comma: Voices of New Music \|


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 13:44:42 -0400
From: Pierre Toussaint <[e-mail]>
Subject: painkiller and zorn interview

Painkiller will play in Montreal on july 8 at Theatre Maisonneuve (same
building as the MSO but not the same stage). This concert is in the
Montrea Jazz Festival series of 1998. Tickets are on sale now.

Other news, there's an interview with Zorn in the Montreal "Mirror" of
may 7 through 14. It's a free newspaper. He's talking about is
participation for the Victoriaville festival of next weekend.


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 13:50:07 -0400
From: Pierre Toussaint <[e-mail]>
Subject: re: painkiller and zorn interview

If you want more details for yhe painkiller show in montreal go here

http://www.montrealjazzfest.com/

if you want to read the zorn interview go here

http://www.montrealmirror.com/meat/music1.html


- -

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 09:14:02 -0800
From: George Grella <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Sharpish

Oooh, baby,  I thought I had said all I could, but I realize there's a
bit more, mostly for clarification.  But I also want to take the
opportunity to apologize to Zorn listeners in general for for drawing
too broad a picture of the group in my comments, as Chris Hamilton
pointed out to me.  No for the good stuff:

Benjamin Pequet writes:


> In your answer you clearly put things right about the meaning in which you
> take the word politic, and hence why we can't agree. So do you with
> post-modernism.
> You say music is a political thing if it wants to be or if listeners make it
> so for themselves. No, music is economic and music is politic, not just if
> it wants to be (and by the way I have no clue how music could ever chose
> anything for itself). My point was that I am really fighting and having a
> hard time to find my way into the music I listen to because it is meaningful
> to me - be it for esthetic reasons or politic or whatever you wish to
> qualify my reasons.
>

You provide the clue right there, Benjamin.  Music can't choose politics
and economics for itself, music is music.  That's how I take it.  It's
important to me to make the distinction that because YOU say music is
political and economic, it doesn't make it that way for
anyone/everyone.  I raise my voice in opposition to point out that it's
up to you, or me, or whomever.


> I can't nor do I want to get rid
> of the thought that expressions are screened by an amount of political and
> economical parameters, canalized in the press and media, that our tastes are
> shaped in a way or another by what we get to listen, etc.
> To me this is political, in the way that it affects social life. And it
> becomes violent, in the way that as individuals we don't really have a
> choice or that our choices are considerably limited, expressions disappear
> everyday because they don't get to be listened to.
>

But we do have choices.  Don't listen to the radio, don't watch MTV,
don't read the music press.  Explore/Listen/Decide for yourself.  It's
not a perfect world and not every musician with something worth saying
gets their worl distributed, but enough do to provide a huge humber of
choices for active, dedicated listeners.


> I think you chose to take a definition of what is political and what is not
> that is less inclusive than mine. In my sense then you don't make a
> political choice when you think you are making one. But I understand that
> you are logical with your way of looking at things.
>

Benjamin, your definitions or politics and the "post-modern society" are
so broad and thin that they mean nothing to me.  By defining everything
as politicial and post-modern you allow nothing to exist outside those
definitions, allow no opposition with which to sharpen your definition.
It's circular reasoning; everything is politicial, even the things you
don't consider political - that choice alone is political.  It's
tautology and it doesn't hold.


> In what you say something strikes me each time, it is when you shield your
> opinion behind your status of composer or musician, as if this allowed you a
> position outside of the game and hence gave an objective and indiscutable
> quality to your statements.
> You can decide for you that you are not making politics if you decide not
> to, but for me it's a politic statement as well, and with which thus I can't
> agree, at any level. But if that's just to do with the definition I have of
> politics and you of yours that's fine and I don't want to fight for that, as
> long as we understand that our mutual views are valid.
>
  It's not a shield, Benjamin, one doesn't have to be a musician to
express and informed opinion.  I'm trying to make clear and emphasize
that for me, my feelings about music are much more strongly aesthetic
and craft-oriented that political, something that my training as a
musician has influenced.  You see that as a political statement, but as
I write above, seeing EVERYTHING as political makes nothing worth any
politicial currency.  You harm your own views by by making such claims.


> Otherwise I understand we might get to such a ridiculous situation where you
> would for example be ready to quote a booklet (as gospel ?) that you don't
> have right there, to denounce and prove wrong some kind of orthodoxy and
> fan-worship that you see me represent and defend.
>

I quote his statement because it's apposite.  The CD is Ligeti Edition
#3, Works for Piano, featuring his first two books of Etudes and the
first one from the third book.  This is some of the greatest piano music
ever written in the history of music, and Ligeti is forthright in the
notes about writing it because he loves the instrument and the music it
makes.  His ideas are purely aesthetic.  He is just writing music, which
he describes as "neither tonal nor atonal."  It is what it is.  And he
adds "the ironic theatricalizing of the past that is post-modernism is
quite foreign to me."  The guy just wants to make music, free of
politics and theory.  And he has done so, regardless of how wrong you
could tell him he is, Benjamin.  This is a long way of saying "Speak for
yourself," don't presume to describe how music is for everyone.

gg





- -

------------------------------

End of Zorn List Digest V2 #363
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