Saturday, October 20, 2007

[233.1] HARRISON BIRTWISTLE ON OLIVIER MESSIAEN

This, slightly edited to read, from a good BBC radio interview by John Tusa. One inspiration on another (very different one), from my point of view. Read the whole thing here. It's about Birtwistle's formation, his journey in music, his approach to it, and the often confused controversy that has followed him. The idea that he writes atonally, for example, which, as he says, is "far from the truth".

[H]ow things are introduced, how things gather... that moment is extraordinary. And Messiaen to me is rather like that. The first Messiaen that I heard, I thought, there is another way of writing music. And he sort of explained it. I think that I performed in the first performance of the Quartet for the End of Time... but at the beginning of the Quartet for the End of Time, is that little chart about rhythm... And that was pretty moving because I thought , it gives you courage... somebody else is doing it, maybe there is something there. To talk to him about it, to listen to him talking, you'd think that he was in [that] tradition of music from the beginning of time, but he really did invent a sort of music in one go and he was still doing the same thing at the end of his life. I mean he managed to shuffle the cards in different ways ... but you know, the melodies he invented at the beginning were the same melodies at the end.

[Pic: Olivier Messiaen]

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Friday, October 19, 2007

[232.1] THE RHYTHM OF BLOG

Maybe Blog Action Day (on the environment) passed you by in 2007 - it was 15 October - but you can sign up for 2008, and they have a groovy little toooon going on in the background which will make you smile (unless you're a bit of a fuddy-duddy). "March to your own green beat"...

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Thursday, October 18, 2007

[231.1] WHEN HANDEL MET HENDRIX

I can't believe I missed out on this. Careless. And tragic. Hope it isn't the last ever performance.

The Handel-Hendrix Experience is a fascinating comedy about a surprising meeting between musical revolutionaries Handel and Hendrix, who lived in adjoining houses on Brook Street in London but over two centuries apart. For one night only, the dramatised reading took place at the splendid Handel House Museum on Sunday 2 September, with two performances at 5pm and 7pm.

The Handel-Hendrix Experience is a play by Perry Pontac, from an idea by Jack Rosenthal, directed by Maureen Lipman and starring Timothy West as Handel and Joseph Mydell as Hendrix. Laurence Cummings performs on harpsichord.

The play imagines how both immigrant musicians might have influenced and changed each other's musical careers. Some comic moments include Hendrix helping Handel to finish Messiah, and Handel advising Hendrix how to dress like a rock star and play the ‘guitar’ with his teeth.

See also: From Handel to Hendrix – The Composer in the Public Sphere by Michael Chanan, Verso, Londres, 2000, 342 pp. ISBN 1-85984-706-4 (Hbk)

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Saturday, October 06, 2007

[230.1] STOCKHAUSEN'S MASTERWORK

Extraordinary though it may seem (I blush at the memory myself), I once tried to date someone by inviting them to hear a five-hour performance of works by Karlheinz Stockhausen, including Stimmung, which I still think is wonderful. Needless to say, the response wasn't exactly "you've pulled". Though the fine woman concerned has since discovered an admirable taste for contemporary music, I gather, it certainly had little to do with me, I'm sure. Ah, well. That was 31 years ago. But Stimmung still marches on, and has been well reviewed by Andrew Clements in The Guardian.

"Like all the greatest music it is unclassifiable - part meditation, part gigantic motet, part phonetic game - and totally resistant to imitation. Though in essence it is a vast elaboration of a single six-note chord based on the overtones of the note B flat, it never seems to stale in performance, partly because of the extraordinary variety of rhythm, attack and colour that Stockhausen generates within the 51 "models" into which he divides the 70-minute piece, and partly through the freedom for performers that is built in to the score, allowing the singers to decide the order in which the models are sung and where in the sequence a series of 66 "magic names" and four erotic poems are inserted. This is only the third commercial recording of Stimmung; 25 years ago Paul Hillier was a member of Singcircle, the British group behind the second, following the original by Collegium Vocale Cologne, who gave the first performance in 1968. Now, with his Theatre of Voices, Hillier has directed his own version, recorded in Copenhagen last year." Continued here.

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Friday, October 05, 2007

[229.1] SOUND CHASER

Mercurial jazz-fusion guitarist Allan Holdsworth has announced the dates on his upcoming and long-awaited British tour, featuring an established trio and no keyboards. I shall certainly make every effort to be in London, and perhaps Southampton, too. The line-up is as follows:

Allan Holdsworth - guitar
Chad Wackerman - drums
Jimmy Johnson - bass


THU, NOV 22
International Guitar Festival Of Great Britain,
Birkenhead, Pacific Road Arts Center
www.bestguitarfest.com
www.pacificroad.co.uk
Tel. 0151 647 0752
Pacific Road, Birkenhead, Wirral CH41 1LJ.

SAT, NOV 24
Kendall, Brewery Arts Center
www.breweryarts.co.uk
Tel: 01539 795090
Highgate, Kendal, Cumbria LA9 4HE

SUN, NOV 25
Swindon, Arts Centre
www.bbc.co.uk/wiltshire/entertainment/theatre/artscentre.shtml
Tel: 01793 614837
Devizes Road, Old Town, Swindon SN1 4BJ

MON, NOV 26
London, Jazz Caffé
www.jazzcaffe.com
Tel. 0207 534 6955
Parkway, Camden Town, London, NW1

WED, NOV 28
Milton Keynes, The Stables
www.stables.org
Tel. 01908 280800
Stockwell Lane Wavendon, Milton Keynes MK17 8LU

THU, NOV 29
Manchester, Academy
www.manchesteracademy.net
Tel: 0161 275 2930
Manchester University Students Union, Oxford Road,
Manchester, M13 9PR

FRI, NOV 30
Newcastle, The Cluny
www.theheadofsteam.co.uk
Tel. 0191 2304474
36 Lime Street, Ouseburn, Newcastle upon Tyne, Tyne
and Wear NE1 2PQ

SAT, DEC 01
Leeds, Rios
www.rios-leeds.com
Tel. 0844 414 2182
The Grand Arcade, Leeds LS1 6PQ

SUN, DEC 02
Southampton, The Brook
www.the-brook.com
Tel. (023) 8055 5366
466 Portswood Road, Portswood, Southampton SO17 3AN

MON, DEC 03
Nuneaton, Queens Hall
www.queenshall.net
Tel. (0)2476 347402
75 Queens Road, Nuneaton, Warwickshire CV11 5LA

TUE, DEC 04
Abertillery, Metropole
www.the-met.co.uk
Tel. 01495 322510
Metre Street, Abertillery, Bleaneau Gwent NP13 1AL

WED, DEC 05
Bilston-Wolverhampton, Robin 2
www.therobin.co.uk
Tel 01902 401211
The Leisure Factory 20-22 Mount Pleasant,
Bilston-Wolverhampton WV14 7LJ

THU, DEC 06
Penzance, The Acorn
www.acornartscentre.co.uk
Tel. 01736 365520
Parade Street, Penzance, Cornwall TR18 4BU

Thursday, October 04, 2007



(International bloggers' day for Burma... let the music of justice and freedom play on...)