Some people find the veins in hands to be sexy. A bank in Japan is now using a scan of your veins for identification. I guess it’s better than an implant chip. What a hoot!
“Left Behind” was the middle movement of HIDDEN LEGACIES, a 7 movement set for four synthesizers, bass, drums, soloists, and men’s chorus, commissioned by the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles, Jon Bailey, Director. What is not heard on this performance (Live at the Wiltern, 1992) is the choreography. 2-stepping was very big then. My partner and I were half-decent 2-steppers in those days. I wanted to incorporate it into the piece somehow. It was John Hall that juxtaposed a haunting lyric about the desolation of loneliness — being left behind, and the guilt that that often holds — with the bouncy life-goes-on country 2-step in the music. During the first part of the song, couples peal away from the chorus, two by two and begin 2-stepping around the stage. By the time the instrumental arrives, all collected dancers participate in a flashy line dance. When the singers comes back in, one by one, the dance partners “leave” their partners, leaving them alone, dancing alone, until at the very end, only one man is left dancing alone.
There is a “you-had-to-be-there” factor in this movement. The greatest impact this song had was in context of the rest of the 7-movement work. Excerpting it here, diminishes that effect greatly, but I found a tape of this historic performance and had to share it with whomever would be interested.
MP3: Play audio file (left.behind.mp3)
GMCLA, Jon Bailey, conductor. Live at the Wiltern, March 1992.
Left Behind
One man, solitary, a hard weight to carry;
Doors are closed, tears are cried,
There’s no feeling left inside.
With no map and no guide you’re just
Left Behind.Shadows of former selves beckon and call,
Dusty and shaky they try not to fall.
Like books on the shelves of a spare bedroom wall
Unloved and unread, not living not dead, they’re just
Left Behind.Left Behind.
Its hard to consider
Without sounding bitter,
Feelin’ lonely, cast aside and
Left Behind.And what of those people we don’t even know
Who give of themselves and try not to show
How short the time is when it’s your time to go and they’re just
Left Behind.And here’s to the girls who remember to care
Our lesbian sisters who nurtured us where
Damn few would follow the pain that we share and be
Left Behind.So let’s give a toast to the ones left behind,
They’re often forgotten, dismissed from our mind.
The tears that they’ve cried have left them half blind
‘Cause the pain that they feel is the very worst kind. They’re just
Left Behind.© 1992 by John Hall and Roger Bourland. yrmusic.com
These memories came back to me as I revise this song for impressario, author and conductor, Stan Hill, and the Twin Cities Gay Men’s Chorus who will be performing it in the Grand Old Opry this summer.
Sick of flying? Train is out of the question? Car? you’ve gotta be kidding…
Have you been wondering about the status of teleportation? To be honest, I have, and stumbled across this PDF in a Wired News post. The language is beyond my comprehension. I did see Uri Geller’s name at the end. If anyone can understand this document, report back. The Air Force backed the project.
download the air force document about teleportation
“Station de téléportation” by Christian Hoffman.
James Horner (one of UCLA’s graduates in composition who never finished his PhD because he started working for Roger Corman) did a marvelous job on the score for The New World.
My guess is that the director, fortunately, or unfortunately, fell in love with his temp music, in this case the opening of Wagner’s Das Rheingold that looped hypnotically forever, and Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.23 (2nd mvt). The Wagner was worth the price of the ticket. The Mozart got very tiresome: it’s great music, but it is NOT a leitmotiv that needs to keep coming back. Someone needs to teach Colin Farrell how to annunciate: jeez, he sounded like he had oral surgery, or mush-mouth or something. For that matter, the whole film had a kind of “stoned” feeling. It was very beautiful, great sound design, and everything, including the plot, kinda flows like the river. Go see it.
As I’ve gotten to explore more and more blogs, and specifically, ones in music, time after time I see links to Alex Ross’s “The Rest is Noise.” So, over the past couple of months, I’ve read nearly all of his writing, and I must say, I love it.
Author, oboist, composer, Alex Ross
Dear Alex:
This is not a down payment for a good review, just a celebration of a damned good writer.
Thanks Alex!
ps: I never did figure out what “The Rest is Noise” meant…
Today we discussed “Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk” (CaCM) and “Poses.”
Both of these songs are on this CD, “Poses” RW’s 2nd album
Discussing the music, we determined CaCM to have the following form:
A A A’ B
A A A’ B
B’(instrumental) A” A”’
A’ is the minor version of A; the instrumental “interlude” that appears after the second B is based upon the refrain “B.” The final section, A” is harmonically still A, but the melody is varied, and the last line of the A is repeated and varied (”Tower of Pisa…”). A”’ is simply the reiteration of the opening line, giving the song a book-end close.
The child-like qualities were identified with the piano introduction’s almost merry-go-round character. The tune is largely a pentatonic (the “black” keys) scale, which evokes a sense of simplicity.
Regarding the words, the class determined it was a song about “desire” or, to use Rufus’s favorite word “Want.” The “things we won’t mention” were thought to be sex and drugs. All objects of desire may ultimately leave one “brokenhearted.” Most of the imagery was self-explanatory, but I was surpised that only I found “the Tower of Pisa” to refer to an erection. “So please be kind if I’m a mess” shows Rufus’s state with his various obsessions/desires. (I will post a complete analytic essay on this in coming months.)
The class had some interesting interpretations as to the imagery in “Poses.” Many tapped into the notion of a self portrait in Manhattan, a reference Rufus himself has made. Different kinds of “poses” were found in the lyrics:
Other interesting observations included:
Harmonically, “Poses” is fairly straight forward. However, I pointed out the utterly unusual chord that plays against “all these poses, such beautiful poses” and how damn near impossible it is to analyze it. I pointed out that the powerful chord imprinted a marvelous sense of magic on each of the passages. The left hand figure was pointed out to resemble the latin rhythm, the habañera, not unlike the one from Bizet’s Carmen.
MP3: Play audio file (habanera.mp3)
Maria Callas in Bizet’s “Habañera” from Carmen.
Both songs exemplify an excellent sense of overall melodic shape and design, with a dramatic sensitivity to placing the high notes in the appropriate structural place. Both songs were deemed to be self-portraits.
I was a fan of Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention from the beginnning. Alright, I confess I lost some interest after “Don’t Eat the Yellow Snow.” My father tried to dissuade me from listening to Zappa (I think it was “Hot Rats” — still a classic as far as I”m concerned). I especially love the early orchestral stuff (”Lumpy Gravy”) and the chamber music on “Weasils Ripped My Flesh.” But I must confess, I think Zappa could have used 3 years of college education in composition and orchestration, but as he was such a rebellious bastard, I realized that he could never bring himself to pursue it. Well, if Edgard Varese had offered, I’m sure he would have taken him up on it.
These memories all came galumphing back when I saw this great drawing of Frank Zappa at moonbug dot org and I realized what a marvelous artist he was. Frank, you are missed.
I can’t figure out what human is behind “moonbug dot org,” but whoever s/he is, it’s a great blog and they are a marvelous artist.
I had posts about who could sing Rufus’s gay specific songs? Well, Willy Nelson won’t be singing a Rufus song, but will be releasing what may be the first gay cowboy song (yeah right) “Cowboys Are Frequently, Secretly (Fond of Each Other)” which will be available exclusively through iTunes. Yahoo news tells us:
“…the song features choppy Tex-Mex style guitar runs and Nelson’s deadpan delivery of lines like, “What did you think all them saddles and boots was about?” and “Inside every cowboy there’s a lady who’d love to slip out.”
Wow Willy! You go girl!
Composer Elaine Barkin, since her retirement from UCLA, has taken on a new passion: Hubcap Art.
“Faygele” (2006) by Elaine Barkin.
Yes Elaine is still composing and travelling and writing, but the hubcap thing is very cool. Here is a portion of Elaine’s piece called “for my friends’ pleasure”:
MP3: Play audio file (friends.01.mp3)
Elaine Barkin; photo by Roger Bourland.
I keep thinking that when I leave teaching (”retire”) I’ll take up oil painting. I’ve done it from time to time over my life, but abandoned it for the moment.
“Music is a jealous mistress”
Claude Debussy
Elaine and I have hours of recorded improvisations of just the two of us. We often did it on Sunday mornings. I’ll never forget the day that we played the organ studio. It’s a small reverberant organ studio with beautiful natural lighting, and a small Baroque organ. We brought along sound making devices of all kinds, and also “played the organ.” Well, we left the organ turned OFF, but played the casing, the keys, the pedals, the enclosures, we raped the thing with our fingers without having ever played a note. We would get in these gnat-like singing duos that would go on for a while. The Dionysian indulgence of pure improvisation can be cathartic: try it after dinner some night. Just tell everyone to shut up, the begin to play the things around you (gently — wine glasses are great with water), being sure to listen to everyone, play together, make music.
Elaine used to be a very strict 12-tone composer. Um, she doesn’t do that any longer. She has wildly eclectic tastes, and when she doesn’t like something, it’s “not my cup of tea.”
She has learned “Sibelius” (the music notation program, not the composer), and has been copying some of her early piano works. She’s played some of them for me, and they are gorgeous. I’ll be seeing her next week, so maybe I’ll hear the next set…
It was sad to learn from my students that our local Rhino Records CD store closed it’s doors for good a few weeks back. Another CD store in Hollywood also went under. The overwhelming and enormous Amoeba Records seems to be doing quite well selling and buying used CDs, LPs, cassettes and DVDs.
Yes, I guess I’m ready to make the switch myself as our “progress” makes our electronic physical reality smaller and smaller. I used to have huge rack of synthesizers, digital processors and mixers in my studio, now, they all inside my Apple G5 tower, and all that old electronic stuff is sitting in my basement.
I have a wall of LPs from my own life, as well as a small opera collection I inherited from a friend, and I have a closet full of CDs and cassettes as well. I have digitized a handful of my LPs, but as my turntable still works, I don’t see the necessity in doing so. The thing that makes me nervous about the downloadable next chapter is the lack of program notes. I want to see who wrote what, and who is playing on what, and what the composer/songwriter has to say about the music. And, for that matter, I’d like to know what the piece/song is called. How often have you been driving in your car, you hear something, but the DJ doesn’t let you know what the music is until up to a half hour later? If you REALLY want to know, you can go to the radio station’s website and find out (as I did recently with Imogen Heap’s new CD). Many of us miss the bigness of the LP, it’s artwork, and readable text, but who wants to schlep a huge LP collection when we move? No one. Well, I did. I still use them as a Professor at UCLA, where we still have turntables in our classrooms.
I see that the New York Philharmonic will be pursuing making it’s live concerts available as downloads. Other orchestras are doing the same thing:
“In the rubble of the current classical recording landscape, all sorts of experiments are being tried. Opera houses are providing online streaming. The Sydney Symphony in Australia will provide 10 streamed and downloadable concerts. The London Symphony Orchestra produces its own CD’s. The Philadelphia Orchestra has a three-year deal with the Ondine label, under which it will produce its own concerts and Ondine will distribute and market them. The Milwaukee Symphony this year began MSO Classics, which offers concerts for downloading on iTunes.”
Hail! Brave new world!
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