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1998-05-10
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From: owner-zorn-list-digest@lists.xmission.com (Zorn List Digest)
To: zorn-list-digest@lists.xmission.com
Subject: Zorn List Digest V2 #364
Reply-To: zorn-list
Sender: owner-zorn-list-digest@lists.xmission.com
Errors-To: owner-zorn-list-digest@lists.xmission.com
Precedence: bulk
Zorn List Digest Monday, May 11 1998 Volume 02 : Number 364
In this issue:
-
Masada in SF
Re: Sharpish
Re[2]: Cage
Re: Recent Goodies
Re: Sharpish
Re: Sharpish
Re: BECK / UNAUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTION OF SOUND RECORDINGS
Re: BECK / UNAUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTION OF SOUND RECORDINGS
Re: Sharpish (now Philoso-fish)
Re[2]: Recent Goodies
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 10:50:48 -0700 (PDT)
From: "m. rizzi" <rizzi@netcom.com>
Subject: Masada in SF
Yesterdays paper had an advert for a Masada concert at Slim's
in San Francisco on May 30th.
Is this a one-off gig (like last weeks NYC shows) or part
of a tour?
mike
- -
rizzi@netcom.com -------------------------------------- www.browbeat.com
"Another nerd with a soulpatch"
- -------- browbeat magazine, po box 11124, oakland, ca 94611-1124 -------
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 13:28:51 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Joseph S. Zitt" <jzitt@humansystems.com>
Subject: Re: Sharpish
On Mon, 11 May 1998, George Grella wrote:
> 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 think the point that some of us are making is that while the sheer
sounds of the music are simply sounds, the means of making those sounds
are deeply entangled in politics and economics -- but then, so is any
interaction with other people, some of whom control resources (recording
studios, instruments, performance spaces, publishing companies) that are
necessary for absolutely any type of music to be heard (with the single
exception of body-produced sounds made for whoever happens to be within
earshot). Can you describe any situation, other than that exception (and
the trivial case in which someone has written markings on paper intended
to be turned into music but not yet realized), in which that is not the
case?
(Hmmm... come to think of it, what do _you_ mean when you say "politics"?
We may be working from completely disjunct definitions...)
> 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.
It's significant that each choice that you mention is a *negative*,
choosing not to experience something that is out there already. Can we
choose to listen to music that no one is performing?
> 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.
Considering that he has managed to get his work played by major orchestra
and widely recorded, it appears that he has negotiated the politics and
economics of getting his music heard rather well.
- - ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1----------
|||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== 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 17:02:03 UT
From: peter_risser@cinfin.com
Subject: Re[2]: Cage
<<
At 09:21 PM 5/8/98 PDT, you wrote:
>In which recording I find Cage's "4'33''"?
>Thank you,
>Juan
Why not just perform it for yourself?
>>
I would agree. Walk outside and perform it yourself.
Cage talks in later literature about how he performs it occasionally when he's
out doing one of his mushroom gatherings or anything else.
I've done it a number of times, the most powerful of which was when my wife was
in labor in the triage room and hooked up to the fetal heart monitor. The room
was so still and the only sound was this intense, liquidy bulbous, rhythmic
zoom. Not to mention that particular performance had immense emotional value.
I've done it in other places too. I like empty buildings and stairwells. Those
are my favorites. Places that echo and have interesting mechanical noises. Old
factories or printing shops. Stuff like that.
The key is to realize that you're listening and to just stop and listen and
appreciate. If you done that, you've performed the piece, at least how Cage
interpreted it later on.
PeterR
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 12:05:55 -0800
From: George Grella <george_grella@pop3.decisionanalytics.com>
Subject: Re: Recent Goodies
Joseph S. Zitt writes:
> 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.
>
Not prescribed in theory, but in practice . . . let's just say that I
can identify "Lonely Woman" almost instantly, because of the way people
play it!
> 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).
>
The note streams should be identifiable with enough experience of the
piece. The pitches and their order don't change, regardless of what
part of the page you start on. "November 1952" is part of the first
"Folio," it doesn't have a visible grid, just horizontal and vertical
blocks [I think that's more accurate than lines, since they're not
long]. It's quite beautifully made.
gg
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 12:28:29 -0800
From: George Grella <george_grella@pop3.decisionanalytics.com>
Subject: Re: Sharpish
Joseph s. Zitt writes:
> I think the point that some of us are making is that while the sheer
> sounds of the music are simply sounds, the means of making those sounds
> are deeply entangled in politics and economics -- but then, so is any
> interaction with other people, some of whom control resources (recording
> studios, instruments, performance spaces, publishing companies) that are
> necessary for absolutely any type of music to be heard (with the single
> exception of body-produced sounds made for whoever happens to be within
> earshot). Can you describe any situation, other than that exception (and
> the trivial case in which someone has written markings on paper intended
> to be turned into music but not yet realized), in which that is not the
> case?
>
Allow me to qualify first; the means of writing a piece are determined
by a composer, the means of making the sound of that music is another
thing. Our lives to begin with are deeply and irretrievably entangled
in economics, and music is made out of the grist of people's lives.
That entanglement is so intrinsic, however, that it it is no argument at
all to say that all music is economic, it's a tautology. Might as well
say our lives our deeply entangled in eating and breathing and shitting
and that therefore music is as well. In fact, that is my personal view;
I know my music is informed by eating and breathing and shitting becuase
I want it to be, I don't want it to be informed by the economics of my
life.
Performance, as I've said before, is a different thing. Performances
cost money, either the composers own or that of another
person/organization. So a composer can take a job that pays enough for
them to save up for the cost of performance, or put their energy into
finding a source for funding, among other methods. A composer may
choose to write music they know will be cheaper to peform, but is NOT
OBLIGATED TO DO SO.
Now, politics, again. Tell me, what is politics? If you define it as
relationships betwenn colleagues, for example, then yes, cadging
performances does have its political side. But if politics is a
constructed theory/ideology that defines one's mediation of public and
private life, then a composer may choose to entangle their music in
politics but is NOT OBLIGATED TO DO SO. Again, if politics covers every
aspect of living, as Benjamin implied, so that the rejection of politics
is also politicis, then that's simply an argument I will avoid, because
it is an unfair one.
I believe in free will. I try and exercise it as much as I can, I
especially try to think for myself. The results of that, and the
results I've seen in the lives of other musicians, shows me that this
political aspect of creativity is OPTIONAL, a CHOICE. I reject,
absolutely, the deterministic view that politics and economics are the
controlling factors in creating music. It smacks of the Soviets
proscribing the tritone for political reasons; what political values are
expressed by the tritone? What are the economic features of a harmonic
minor scale? If someone believes they can describe them, more power to
them. I wonder how anyone would know if they were right or not.
> It's significant that each choice that you mention is a *negative*,
> choosing not to experience something that is out there already. Can we
> choose to listen to music that no one is performing?
>
I have 1,000 CDs of music that will never be on MTV. I have 1,000 CDs
of music for which I've never read any reviews of whatsoever. They are
actual, physcially existing recordings, a positive presence. Avoiding
the mainstream, commercially controlled music media does not negate all
music choices; there's other stuff out there; listen to those CDs, go to
those concerts. That's the "significance" of my choices; I feel like
I'm having to state the stultifyingly obvious here. As for your
question, I'll leave that to the spirit of John Cage.
gg
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 14:42:04 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Joseph S. Zitt" <jzitt@humansystems.com>
Subject: Re: Sharpish
On Mon, 11 May 1998, George Grella wrote:
> Performance, as I've said before, is a different thing. Performances
> cost money, either the composers own or that of another
> person/organization. So a composer can take a job that pays enough for
> them to save up for the cost of performance, or put their energy into
> finding a source for funding, among other methods. A composer may
> choose to write music they know will be cheaper to peform, but is NOT
> OBLIGATED TO DO SO.
Hmmm... well, music is sound, no? If one writes notation on a piece of
paper, can that person be said to have made music?
> Now, politics, again. Tell me, what is politics? If you define it as
> relationships betwenn colleagues, for example, then yes, cadging
> performances does have its political side.
Good, then we agree.
> But if politics is a
> constructed theory/ideology that defines one's mediation of public and
> private life, then a composer may choose to entangle their music in
> politics but is NOT OBLIGATED TO DO SO.
I don't define politics that way, though some others do and act that way.
> Again, if politics covers every
> aspect of living, as Benjamin implied, so that the rejection of politics
> is also politicis, then that's simply an argument I will avoid, because
> it is an unfair one.
Well, every interaction with other does involve some aspect of politics,
as in your first definition.
> > It's significant that each choice that you mention is a *negative*,
> > choosing not to experience something that is out there already. Can we
> > choose to listen to music that no one is performing?
> >
>
> I have 1,000 CDs of music that will never be on MTV. I have 1,000 CDs
> of music for which I've never read any reviews of whatsoever. They are
> actual, physcially existing recordings, a positive presence. Avoiding
> the mainstream, commercially controlled music media does not negate all
> music choices; there's other stuff out there; listen to those CDs, go to
> those concerts. That's the "significance" of my choices; I feel like
> I'm having to state the stultifyingly obvious here.
And I feel like the stultifyingly obvious is being missed. Tell me: how
did you learn of and acquire these CDs?
> As for your
> question, I'll leave that to the spirit of John Cage.
The way I see it, music is a way of perceiving sound, not a way of making
it. Can one hear a sound that is not sounded?
- - ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1----------
|||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== 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 14:57:49 -0500
From: Rich Williams <punkjazz@snet.net>
Subject: Re: BECK / UNAUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTION OF SOUND RECORDINGS
peter_risser@cinfin.com wrote:
>
> RE: BECK / UNAUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTION OF SOUND RECORDINGS
(a whole bunch of corporate legalese snipped)
From what Ive heard about "Deconstructing Beck" it seems that it would
easily fall under the category of Parody, and as such, would be
protected from this kind of prosecution.
Rich
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 13:04:35 -0700
From: "Patrice L. Roussel" <proussel@ichips.intel.com>
Subject: Re: BECK / UNAUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTION OF SOUND RECORDINGS
On Mon, 11 May 1998 14:57:49 -0500 Rich Williams wrote:
>
> peter_risser@cinfin.com wrote:
>
>
> >
> > RE: BECK / UNAUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTION OF SOUND RECORDINGS
>
> (a whole bunch of corporate legalese snipped)
>
> From what Ive heard about "Deconstructing Beck" it seems that it would
> easily fall under the category of Parody, and as such, would be
> protected from this kind of prosecution.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I hope for them that it won't be the case, because if it is really the way
things end up, the affair will be immediately closed and they won't have
any reasons to complain and act like martyrs.
Let's pray that Geffen gives a hard time to our heros (who are taking so
much risks at trying to piss the big business :-)! If not, we will immediately
forget them, and it would be so sad.
Patrice.
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 13:16:57 -0800
From: George Grella <george_grella@pop3.decisionanalytics.com>
Subject: Re: Sharpish (now Philoso-fish)
Joseph S. Zitt writes:
First, the hard stuff:
> > I have 1,000 CDs of music that will never be on MTV. I have 1,000 CDs
> > of music for which I've never read any reviews of whatsoever. They are
> > actual, physcially existing recordings, a positive presence. Avoiding
> > the mainstream, commercially controlled music media does not negate all
> > music choices; there's other stuff out there; listen to those CDs, go to
> > those concerts. That's the "significance" of my choices; I feel like
> > I'm having to state the stultifyingly obvious here.
>
> And I feel like the stultifyingly obvious is being missed. Tell me: how
> did you learn of and acquire these CDs?
>
A lot of them I picked up out of curiousity, they led to others, through
acceptance or rejection, in the same manner. Others I remembered from
listening to the records of a friend's parents in their basement. Still
othe; music I had played, or music by people whose music I had play.
Then there was word or mouth, or reputation passed on by other musicians
I had learned from. There's a lot of options out there other than
"Option," "Wired," "downbeat," MTV, "The New York Times," commercial
radio. The one radio station that I will gladly thank for pointing out
a lot of unrealized music to me was WKCR, but if anyone wants to claim
that WKCR is part of mainstream, commercial society than I live in a
different universe than they do.
Now, this:
> Hmmm... well, music is sound, no? If one writes notation on a piece of
> paper, can that person be said to have made music?
>
> The way I see it, music is a way of perceiving sound, not a way of making
> it. Can one hear a sound that is not sounded?
>
If someone writes music on a piece of paper, then they have made a piece
of music. If it is played, then that music has been realized.
I agree that music is a way of perceiving sound. Your phrasing implies
that it is nothing else, which I would reject. Music is also something
that is made, it is produced as music, and when played exists as music
in a physical way before the sound waves have actually reached the
listener. I would not exclude that idea.
And as a composer, I hear sounds that are not sounded, i.e. physically
manifested, all the time, in my head. That's an indispensible part of
the process for me, since I write away from the piano.
gg
- -
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 May 98 16:25:43 -0500
From: brian_olewnick@smtplink.mssm.edu
Subject: Re[2]: Recent Goodies
George Grella wrote:
>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.
Joseph Z. mentioned the piece in a subsequent post, but the one I
thought of upon reading yours was Zorn's COBRA. I recall JZ (the, um,
other JZ) likening COBRA to a baseball game: There are a specific set
of rules such that the result is always a baseball game, but within
those parameters, the result can vary widely. The "baseballness" will,
however, always be apparent.
I love this analogy (and not just bacause I happen to be a wild-eyed
baseball fan!) though I'm not sure it comes across, audibly, in COBRA.
I've heard perhaps four or five versions and, while I enjoy most of
them, don't detect a particularly "Cobraic" aspect. Perhaps I simply
need to hear more "games" to form a fuller understanding.
Whether that Brownian quality also percolates up through other
performances of his graphic scores is something I'm quite interested
to hear.
Anyway, thanks to George and Joseph for some enlightening
back-and-forth.
Brian Olewnick
- -
------------------------------
End of Zorn List Digest V2 #364
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