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Zorn List Digest       Tuesday, November 3 1998       Volume 02 : Number 518



In this issue:
-
       PIGPEN/Zony/Naked City
       recent goodies
       John Kennedy + Lee harvey Oswald = John Oswald.
       re:deadly weapons
       Re:  John Kennedy + Lee harvey Oswald = John Oswald.
       Re: recent goodies
       Re: recent goodies
       John Oswald/David Prentice across the states
       Re: deadly weapons
       Re: On the Subject of Zorn and Composing

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

Date: Mon, 2 Nov 1998 17:06:33 -0700
From: [e-mail] (Steven Nilsen)
Subject: PIGPEN/Zony/Naked City

I doubt Wayne Horvitz is trying to sound anythiong like Naked City with
Zony Mash, but he may had been in some ways trying to rekindle the energy
of Naked City in Pigpen.
At first listen I didn't know what to make of Cold Spell.  It's a very
stark recording with a sort of hollow sound.  In no way does Cold Spell
match the intesity of live Zony Mash, but Brand Spanking New sure does.
The latter is excellently recorded with much deeper texture.  The songs on
Cold Spell do leave a lasting memory when performed live, and the Brand
Spanking New songs seem to deepen the Zony Mash sound.  For example Slide
By is certainly one of the grooviest songs Wayne has ever written, it's
down right infectous.  It should be obvious that Wayne isn't trying to
sound anymore like Naked City than he is like the Meters with tis group.  I
like to think of Zony Mash as avant-funk.
I find Pigpen, on the whole, much more exciting to listen to.  I don't know
anybody who can't feel the driving energy of Band of Joeys off Halfrack.
Pigpen's sound is much groovier than anything Naked City played, to most
audiences.  However, you can hear similarities between Briggan Krauss and
JZ, which was probably what captured Wayne's ear when putting togther the
band (pure speculation).  This is probably why it's tempting to compare
Pigpen with Naked City.
I'll argue that Wayne was not at all trying to sound like Naked City, but
is actually using Pigpen to breath new life into the tunes of The
President, his former band.  Check out those releases and I think you'll
hear it.  Many of the Pigpen songs sound like rearrangements of President
tunes.  Horvitz's use of Zorn tunes is surely just a tip of the hat to a
long time friend.

Well I hope I don't step on too many toes with my assumptive nature, but
this is just my take on the music.

- -Steven



- -

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

Date: Mon, 02 Nov 1998 21:11:24 -0500
From: "Caleb T. Deupree" <[e-mail]>
Subject: recent goodies

It's been a while since I reported on recent purchases, but unfortunately
my employment opportunities came up empty for a while, forcing me to cut
back, even on basic necessities like new CDs.  All better now, so some of
these are from a recent culling.

My recent posts have mostly been about electroacoustic (EA) music, rather
than the improv elements of JZ's music, but there is a junction of these
two musics, and I have found some very interesting works which fall into
this category.  On ReR, there's a new release by Tim Hodgkinson (of Henry
Cow) on guitar, alto and clarinet, with the Italian EA group Ossatura.
This should be of interest to everyone who likes textured, noisy,
can't-tell-who's-playing-what improv, similar to Polwechsel, Evan Parker's
EA Ensemble, Archery, etc.  There are some inspired moments with Hodgkinson
on sax, but mostly it's well textured noise, a delight.

Also on ReR is the Latvian group ZGA, whose release End of an Epoch
features a trio including two players of EA objects along with a guitarist.
 Sometimes, unfortunately, you can tell they used to play rock, as they
have loud guitar chords with plodding drums and heavily treated vocals.
But their better moments are subtle and very inventive, deserving a wider
audience.

Coming to this arena more from the classical side is Charivari Music by
Morphogenesis (Paradigm), an EA improv group from England featuring
notables Clive Bell, Michael Prime, and Roger Sutherland (whose book _New
Perspectives in Music_ turned me on to this group).  My reference point
here is definitely Stockhausen's intuitive music, partially because
someone's playing piano in a very Kontarsky-like fashion.  The textures are
sometimes more sparse than Ossatura, but I'm enjoying this album and would
definitely be interested in hearing more from this group.

On the straight EA side, the tenth volume in the long-running series of
prize winners from the Bourges Cultures Electroniques has the usual bunch
of something for everyone's taste.  For those who are unfamiliar with the
series, it contains prize winners in several categories of EA: Program
Music, music with instruments, studio music, and one of 'musique de
caractere' (won coincidentally by one of the members of Ossatura).  There
are ten pieces, almost 150 minutes of music, and most of the names were
unknown to me, except for Roger Doyle (whose Babel series on World Serpent
I've enjoyed) and Andrew Lewis (whose been featured in this series before).
 As usual, there are a couple of vocal pieces which do little for me (one
of them is a tribute to John Cage, composed of audible and recognizable
elements from Herbert Henke's vinyl recording of Music of Changes and Cage
reading from the Indeterminacy lectures, it's growing on me).  The
Magistere is a work for piano and tape which is fascinating, and the grand
prize is for tape alone, monumental in scope.

Tetsu Inoue's new piece, Waterloo Terminal.  Before you think, 'wait, did
someone just switch me over to the ambient list?', the reference point here
is much more Oval than any dub, ambient, or space music.  Crunchy noises,
made in part by scanning pictures and plans from the Terminal into a sound
generator program, dominate this new entry in Caipirinha's latest entry in
the architecture series.  I've only heard this once so far, but (despite my
name dropping of Oval) it doesn't really sound like anything else, and I
think has promise.  I haven't heard his Tzadik album, so I can't compare
them directly, but I did read a recent interview that indicates that Inoue
is getting into this new direction in his music, and took more care with
this one because he wasn't trying to break out of his rut any more.

I've also been seeking out drone music, and a Staalplaat release The
Stomach of the Sky by MNORTHAM/JGRZNICH (sic) delivers.  Supposedly
including natural sounds (although who can tell), with interludes of
silence, this appeals to the same part of me that likes Trente Oiseaux.
The drones have enough of an edge to keep this away from any new-ageyness.

Finally, I have to recommend the Massacre album Funny Valentine on Tzadik,
but will caution anyone expecting more of the same (as if nothing has
happened to Frith, Laswell or Hayward in the last 20 years).  The
suppleness of the rhythm and the inventiveness of the guitar reminded me
more of the first Arcana album, although there is definitely more noise
here, and I'm not suggesting at all that Frith has started sounding like
Bailey.  Gone are the rock stylings, the foot tappings, even the kick-ass
stuff like Legs (one of my favorite rock pieces of all time), but that
doesn't keep this from a fairly regular entry in the CDPlayer, already.



- --
Caleb Deupree
[e-mail]

Computers are useless; they can only give you answers
- -- Pablo Picasso

- -

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

Date: Mon, 2 Nov 1998 23:14:56 EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: John Kennedy + Lee harvey Oswald = John Oswald.

I have a question about John Oswald, for those of you who have heard the
plexure cd. How long is it? i know it's not the lenght that matters, and a
love supreme is only 33 minutes, but my wallet is speaking to me here :) can
anyone help me out?

from
matt

- -

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

Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 01:36:47 EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: re:deadly weapons

> I'm a new subscriber & I'm sure this has been covered before, but the
> local (Cola. SC) used CD place has had a copy of this for several
> months that I keep almost buying; I'm wondering: wd. my $10 be better
> spent elsewhere?

i rather enjoy it. its kinda spy jazz sounding. $10? can't go wrong...

- -

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

Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 01:39:17 EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Re:  John Kennedy + Lee harvey Oswald = John Oswald.

In a message dated 11/2/98 23:18:03, you wrote:

>I have a question about John Oswald, for those of you who have heard the
>plexure cd. How long is it? i know it's not the lenght that matters, and a
>love supreme is only 33 minutes, but my wallet is speaking to me here :) can
>anyone help me out?

its 19:40 if memory serves. sure its probably over a dollar a minute, but what
the hell? it rules!

- -

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

Date: Tue, 03 Nov 1998 01:44:35 -0500
From: Steve Smith <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: recent goodies

Caleb T. Deupree wrote:

[large snippage of some fascinating reportage]

> Tetsu Inoue's new piece, Waterloo Terminal.  [snip]  Crunchy noises,
> made in part by scanning pictures and plans from the Terminal into a sound
> generator program, dominate this new entry in Caipirinha's latest entry in
> the architecture series.

Great f****n' liner notes, too, don't you think?  ;-)

Thanks for the fine music reviews.  I, too, have been in somewhat of a draught
lately when it comes to new purchases - last new things I remember buying were
"The Bribe," "Aporias" and the first album by Jega.  (Nifty, nifty and nifty,
in case you were wondering...)

But I just happened to amble into the Union Square Virgin Megastore this
evening, and a 20%-off sale on all things Polygram was all the excuse I needed
to finally break down and buy the new complete Varese set by the Royal
Concertgebouw Orchestra (one of the finest orchestras on the planet, bar none),
the ASKO Ensemble (ditto the above, only add the word "chamber" before the word
"orchestra") and a variety of soloists, all led by capable and broadminded
conductor Riccardo Chailly [pronounced "shy-YEE" -- former classical radio DJ
Steve], on London Classics.

I've only just started listening to the set as I type, but the recording
quality is exceptional and really seems to capture the breadth of Varese's
incredible and singular sound world.  The performance sounds to me to be
exceptional as well... the Concertgebouw Orchestra has always seemed to me to
be one of the fewish orchestras in the world that takes playing avant garde
music as seriously as playing the "classics."  For instance, in Ameriques the
offstage brass is captured with clarity and a proper distance, the sirens,
whistles, wind machine sounds and rubber ducky noises are all appropriately
bizarre and well-registered, and the score is recorded in its (reconstructed)
original form for the first time ever.

The notes, by Varese friend - disciple - expert - fellow composer Chou
Wen-Chung, are exceptional in really giving a concise but illuminating portrait
of the composer and his true role in music history, bigger than one might have
thought, as well as the ideas and stories behind each of the pieces.

The set includes Ameriques (original version), Poeme Electronique, Arcana (the
logical next step after Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, which Arcana often
resembles), Nocturnal, Un Grand Sommeil Noir (original version for soprano and
piano, and a new orchestral version by Anthony Beaumont that strikes me somehow
as echht-Gorecki-cum-Basil Poledouris-circa-"Conan the Barbarian"), Offrandes,
Hyperprism, Octandre, Integrales, Ecuatorial, Ionisation (one of the most
important of all 20th century "classical" compositions, the first
all-percussion piece that mattered), Density 21.5 (devastating and lovely solo
flute piece - inspired Eric Dolphy, among others), and Deserts, plus two "new"
Varese pieces reconstructed from sketches by Chou... Tuning Up (something of a
hyperkinetic new music parody meant to be a concert opener... put me in mind of
Zorn mixed with Leonard Bernstein in orchestral populist mode) and Dance for
Burgess (haven't heard yet).

Simply put, Varese was one of the most important composers this century has to
offer.  Anyone interested in modern orchestral music, respectfully and lovingly
played, and also anyone with the slightest interest in Frank Zappa's classical
ouerve (all lovingly but explicitly derived from Varese's music), needs to get
this set.

I don't claim to be an expert, but to my ears these are the best Varese
recordings I've ever heard, and certainly among the best performances.

(...although the massed male chorus on Nocturnal, chanting "You belong to the
night" repeatedly in differing rhythms, somehow struck me as belonging more to
"The Rocky Horror Picture Show" than to breakthrough classical music.  Is it
only because they're Dutch speaking English?  And the soprano replies, "Perfume
and sperm / I have lost my brother..." whereupon the basses begin to sound like
deranged and increasingly insistent and rapacious Oompa-Loompas, chanting
something that is not "To-ga!  To-ga!  To-ga!" yet the scansion is much the
same.  How can you possibly resist this?

Steve Smith
[e-mail]
NP - Varese, "Arcana"

P.S.  Typing the phrase "Zorn mixed with Leonard Bernstein" made me think that
a mix of these two would make for a damn fine "Great Jewish Music" series
entry.  But would the fact that Bernstein was explicitly Jewish (as contrasted
with Bacharach, Gainsbourg and Bolan, who have not/did not make their Jewish
heritage an overt part of their character and artistry) render him exempt from
the series?  I'd hope not... there were more than enough inherent
contradictions in Bernstein's life to render him a fascinating potential
subject for the series.

P.P.S.  Personally, though, I'm still hoping for "Great Jewish Music: Stanley
Eisen and Chaim Witz" (I'm absolutely serious... engage me in debate on the
subject if you dare...).


- -

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

Date: Mon, 2 Nov 1998 23:10:18 -0800
From: "Christian Heslop" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: recent goodies

It doesn't include "Le Croix De Sud"? A fantastic song.

- ----------
> From: Steve Smith <[e-mail]>
> the new complete Varese set by the Royal
>Concertgebouw Orchestra (one of the finest orchestras on the planet, bar
none),
> the ASKO Ensemble (ditto the above, only add the word "chamber" before
the word
> "orchestra") and a variety of soloists, all led by capable and
broadminded
>
> The set includes Ameriques (original version), Poeme Electronique, Arcana
(the
> logical next step after Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, which Arcana often
> resembles), Nocturnal, Un Grand Sommeil Noir (original version for
soprano and
> piano, and a new orchestral version by Anthony Beaumont that strikes me
somehow
> as echht-Gorecki-cum-Basil Poledouris-circa-"Conan the Barbarian"),
Offrandes,
> Hyperprism, Octandre, Integrales, Ecuatorial, Ionisation (one of the most
> important of all 20th century "classical" compositions, the first
> all-percussion piece that mattered), Density 21.5 (devastating and lovely
solo
> flute piece - inspired Eric Dolphy, among others), and Deserts, plus two
"new"
> Varese pieces reconstructed from sketches by Chou... Tuning Up (something
of a
> hyperkinetic new music parody meant to be a concert opener... put me in
mind of
> Zorn mixed with Leonard Bernstein in orchestral populist mode) and Dance
for
> Burgess (haven't heard yet).
>


- -

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

Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 04:49:29 -0500
From: [e-mail] (Adam MacGregor)
Subject: John Oswald/David Prentice across the states

Hey all,

If you get a chance to catch Oswald/Prentice, I'd strongly encourage you to
go go go!

Oswald's alto sax playing sounds to me like a combination between a train
wreck and the exhaust of hell.  He unleashes these flurries of overblown
notes (very rhytmically, with lots of spaces in between phrases) and even
repeats these impossible phrases several times in a row--he definitely knows
what hes doing...

Prentice did some nice skronking on the violin as well--very tritoney a lot
of the time and some cool nails on the balckboard screeches here and there.

They were selling a couple of limited edition CD's there (and signing them
as well) but they were a limited run of 10 copies and $20 apiece too (i
picked up the new Merzbow from the distro at the venue instead--eek) so it
was kinda out of the question.  However, does anybody know of any recordings
in existence of Oswald on alto?  I'd like to relive those glorious several
minutes of terror...

thanks,

adam


- -

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

Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 04:58:32 EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: deadly weapons

In a message dated 11/2/98 2:01:16 PM Eastern Standard Time,
[e-mail] writes:

> I'm a new subscriber & I'm sure this has been covered before, but the
>  local (Cola. SC) used CD place has had a copy of this for several
>  months that I keep almost buying; I'm wondering: wd. my $10 be better
>  spent elsewhere?

Papa Jazz is the "place", am I to assume?  Anyway, _Deadly Weapons_  was one
of my first Zorn LPs.  David Toop, Steve Beresford, and Tonie Marshall share
equally on this outing, so calling it a "Zorn" work is probably a bit
misleading.  It's a bit hard to compare this CD to his recent work- or to any
of his previous work, to be honest.  It's got some cut'n'paste compositions
reminiscent of his _Cobra_ era, and it's got some lounge-y tracks that sound
as if they've been lifted off of a Francoise Hardy LP.  It's a fun CD, so
don't be expecting a Masada-like work by any means...

=dgasque=

- -

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

Date: Tue, 03 Nov 1998 05:46:31 -0500
From: stephen drury <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: On the Subject of Zorn and Composing

At 03:05 AM 10/18/98 -0600, Peter wrote:
>I know this is late, but I been reading the subject of, does Zorn really =
>deserve the "Composer" credit or royalties considering the musicians are =
>improvising and doing the real "work"....

This is also a late response, as I've been on the road in Europe with our
boy this last 2 weeks.  What with the large and growing body of fully
written-out material using traditional notation JZ has created (Angelus
Novus, Carny, Dark River, Aporias, Cat o Nine Tails, etc. -- pieces where
every sound the musicians make is completely notated), the notational
complexity and detailed, intricate quality of the music (layers of stuff you
only hear with a score in hand or after dozens of hearings), and continuing
attention to detail (on this last tour, I saw JZ making ever-more refined
adjustments of the writing at nearly every performance -- an octave
displacement here, a volume change there, removing or adding a few notes or
a few bars), not to mention the structural symmetries and abstract
consideration of form that lie behind an improvisation-based piece like
Cobra (the relationships between certain calls is really fascinating, such
as the balance between the "mouth" cues which produce a fixed group of
players and the "nose" cues which create evolving, fluctuating groups), it
seems clear to me that JZ had earned the right to be regarded as a composer.
- --- steve


- -

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

End of Zorn List Digest V2 #518
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