Just a while ago, Patrice <proussel@ichips.intel.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 23 Aug 2000 18:46:23 +0200 "Stephane Vuilleumier" wrote:
> >
> > swiss banks have always been desperate to sponsor
> > but they sponsor an enormous lot of mainstream crap. hat hut was an
> > exception and I never understood why they did it....
>
> But Werner Uhlinger (spelling?), the owner of Hat Hut, is a rich man, if
> I remember well. This means that he also has powerful connections. At
least
> he applied from sponsorship, the banks might have thought: "If a serious
> man like Werner asks to money that might be for something worthwhile."
I don't know... how serious is someone who gives up a top job in the
chemical industry to produce jazz records? ;-)
Stephane
- -
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 10:34:46 -0700
From: "Mike Biffle" <mbiffle@svg.com>
Subject: Re: sponsorship
>> sponsoring IS the real world - but not for music margins. so it was =
just as well that hat hut was getting it. I bet you that the hat hut money =
will now go to something really crappy
> But Werner Uhlinger (spelling?), the owner of Hat Hut, is a rich man, if =
I remember well. This means that he also has powerful connections. At =
least he applied from sponsorship, the banks might have thought: "If a =
serious man like Werner asks to money that might be for something =
worthwhile." Patrice (guessing).
This is a good example of money making more money! Quite the (un)funny =
paradox... God forbid banks loaning money to people who actually need it!
- -Miko
- -
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Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 10:38:07 -0700
From: "Patrice L. Roussel" <proussel@ichips.intel.com>
Subject: Re: sponsorship
On Wed, 23 Aug 2000 19:34:45 +0200 "Stephane Vuilleumier" wrote:
>
> I don't know... how serious is someone who gives up a top job in the
> chemical industry to produce jazz records? ;-)
Sure, but it is easier for a bank to loan money to somebody who does not
need it :-).
Patrice.
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Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 10:40:59 -0700
From: "Patrice L. Roussel" <proussel@ichips.intel.com>
Subject: Re: sponsorship
On Wed, 23 Aug 2000 10:34:46 -0700 "Mike Biffle" wrote:
>
> >> sponsoring IS the real world - but not for music margins. so it was just as well that hat hut was getting it. I bet you that the hat hut money will now go to something really crappy
>
> > But Werner Uhlinger (spelling?), the owner of Hat Hut, is a rich man, if I remember well. This means that he also has powerful connections. At least he applied from sponsorship, the banks might have
thought: "If a serious man like Werner asks to money that might be for something worthwhile." Patrice (guessing).
>
> This is a good example of money making more money! Quite the (un)funny
> paradox... God forbid banks loaning money to people who actually need it!
I doubt that this a good example (unless you have a twisted sense of what
good means). Putting money in producing records is not something people
do to make more money... At least not in the genres that Hat Hut focuses
>> >So if any of you know any millionaire, another national bank union, or
>> >any other potential investor ... it may help. <snip>
>>
>> Steve@cuneiform:
>>
>>With all due respect to Hat Hut, who I agree *are* a great label, I must
>say
>> "Welcome to the real world".
>>
>> My point is that there's lots of great labels in a wide variety of fields
>> that don't get even a crumb in terms of "arts money". It might be nice is
>> some of that arts money got spread around a little more, imo.
>
>Stephane Vuilleumier
>well, I see it like this
>
>swiss banks have always been desperate to sponsor
> but they sponsor an enormous lot of mainstream crap. hat hut was an
>exception
> and I never understood why they did it....
>
>sponsoring IS the real world - but not for music margins. so it was just as
>well that hat hut
>was getting it. I bet you that the hat hut money will now go to something
>really crappy
- -
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 14:54:06 -0400
From: wlt4@mindspring.com
Subject: Re: Re: sponsorship
>sponsoring IS the real world - but not for music margins. so it was
Maybe in Europe but not the US where really only the music margins are sponsored, usually classical labels like New World or CRI and possibly others like Folkways (now owned by Smithsonian, ie the US Government or the American people take your pick) counts.
Lang
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Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 14:01:45 CDT
From: "Kristopher S. Handley" <thesubtlebody@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: sponsorship
>Of course, I suppose everybody on the list would like to see "arts money
>spread around more". To more record labels, more musicians, more clubs and
>venues. But as Stephane said, the money that used to go from UBS to Hat Hut
>will probably go to "to something really crappy". That's why I still think
>this is still sad news whatever the "real world" may be like.
>
>Pascal
One refreshing thing about "the arts" is their uselessness. In the recent
thread about persistent fear and loathing of Coltrane's late music, Bill
Ashline makes passing reference to "common sense" identifications of a
music's (art's, etc) worth with its "use value": that is, to what further
end can this object/experience be put? And how
concrete/immediate/sensual/profitable is that further end? (This gives new
meaning to the phrase "instrumental music". Ha!) A possible danger in our
seeking refuge in the useless is that we bend toward an "art pour l'art"
view of creative productions. (Well, not on the Zorn-list; but surely we
know arts establishments which thrive or die on the level of grant money
they receive.) Patronage is, quite simply I believe, the very history of
the arts. It's woven into the fibers of human creation, at the very least
in the West. So everything that's heretofore defined our aesthetic and the
structures within which we operate (or which we push against, defining
ourselves negatively)---as auditors or as performer/producers---is
historically saturated with dependency.
DIY (do it youself!) is refreshing to me for that reason: I don't care for
most of the teenage (mentality) punk bands I hear, and I don't have any love
for vinyl exotica, 7" records, or that kind of thing (commodity fetishism,
all of it ;)---but the gauntlet is thrown down in the face of 1.) big
capital and cynical [if I'd spelled it 'Cynical', I'd have been referring to
a healthy attitude that permeates the (?) counterculture] marketing
strategy; and, more significantly, 2.) the fragility of patronage, which is
economic effeminacy. The kind of aggressive rigor and world-wise Phillip
Marlowe marketing savvy that an outsider-hostile climate (like, perhaps, the
USA) can provide is crucial to the persistence of the arts. Who woulda
thought that I'd ever extol the virtues of US Capital? Go team!
I will be sad if/when HatArt folds, or dilutes its content; however, I will
be sadder at the thought that labels like HatArt fall into the complacency
of a dependence on patronage in order to persist. That's only thrown into
relief when the crisis arrives, i.e. the money STOPS. As for the patronage
itself: if I thought I could resist the insinuation of moneyed interests
into the operations of my (hypothetical) label, I would probably not refuse
the money, unless I did so on principle. I'm not trying to propose some
kind of "gob on the passing limo" fundamentalism.
- -----s
P.S. Interesting that HatArt, to my knowledge, would have had at least
marginally DIY beginnings: I own several of the original Joe McPhee LPs
which initiated the label, and the packaging is rather cheap-looking, as is
the vinyl (lightweight). I understand some of the great early McPhee
records (TENOR, at least) were made on Uehlinger's portable tape deck, and
it sure sounds like it. Am I bad fooled?
P.P.S. On the old Free Music Production site, there was an (unoffical?)
slogan: "Working against capitalism from within capitalism." Immanence!
Is there any other way to go?
NP: INDEPENDENCE DAY, the movie (kidding! kidding!)
