aworks :: "new" american classical music

Alleluia and Fugue (1940). Alan Hovhaness /prolificacy/

Mark at Occam's Razor (not to be confused with another blogger I read -- Marc at Occam's Razor) says to not "snub" the music of the prolific Alan Hovhaness. As he describes his introduction to the music, Mark particularly enthuses about Alleluia and Fugue for string orchestra:

Godly music worthy of Bach himself.

Dunno, haven't heard it. But at its peak, I agree Hovhaness' music is superb.

I happen to be listening to a library CD lecture set by Robert Greenberg about the life and sic /sic?/ music of Franz Joseph Haydn. (It's ok but hasn't inspired me to seek out new music by the man. I suppose I need to care more about the music to care about the life and vice versa). Still, Greenberg points out that while only experts can recognize all of Haydn's vast output, it nonetheless represents a transcendence of the style of the time, and thus to be treasured, even if not easily distinguished.

Well, it occurred to me to ask if the same will eventually be said for Hovhaness and Glass, two of the most prolific composers of our time?

For Glass, I think so and for Hovhaness, I think not. Off the top of my head, Glass' greatest achievements (Music in Twelve Parts? the operas, Mad Rush?) are not significiantly better than much of the rest of his output while I think Hovhaness' peaks do outshine the rest of his output (or at least what I've heard, maybe 15 or so works). Although, It's possible that Hovhaness will be seen as someone with a unique and authentic expression of American assimilation. Of course, only time will tell if either composer ultimately transcends his times (or proves to be folly -- Barbara Tuchman historical criteria via Digby here).

Let's see some examples of what critics think about Hovhaness so far:

Paul Griffiths in the Penguin Companion to Classical Music:

...an enormous body of music (434 Op. numbers) in which Western Renaissance-Baroque counterpoint is fused with the entranced harmonic stasis and representation of Asian traditions and given colourful scoring.

Norman Lebrecht in the 20th Century Music Companion:

...he indulged the melismas of his paternal ancestry in a wearisome profusion of 65 symphonies and 23 concertos.

So far, I side on the music being colorful rather than wearisome although I find the "Mount St. Helens" symphony both colorful and wearisome. The last time I played it was in the car and it startled me...

haydn: 104 symphonies, 68 (or so) string quartets, 13 masses,... glass: 32 orchestral/concerto works, 30 soundtracks, 21 operas, 17 theatre pieces, 8 ballets,...

Vitebsk (1928). Aaron Copland

Via Avant Music News, a concert with music by Eric Dolphy and Aaron Copland as well as others:

In fact the program is a study in contrast. Music from the early 20th century as well as very recent works; Mayer's 80th year and the young Lefkowitz at the beginning his career; and a contrast of styles with very free jazz and more regimented, composed music. But isn't America, also, a study in contrasts?

In reality it may not work, but this kind of concert fascinates me.

By the way, Wikipedia says Eric Dolphy recorded Varèse's Density 21.5.

program: god bless the child dolphy. suite for piano lefkowitz. vitebsk piano trio copland. dream's end mayer.

Danzón Cubano (1942). Aaron Copland

You probably scoff at classical music adaptations like techno remixes, jazz arrangements, weird electric guitar improvisations etc. Well, I'll suggest an instance where the remix improves on the original, namely the Baker Bros' Copland Died on December 4th, a remix of Aaron Copland's Danzón Cubano combined with Jay-Z's December 4th from The Black Album. MP3 page here (Soundclick registration required).

After listening to the remix, the original sounds lifeless and bland. But when Copland's melody and orchestration is combined with spirited (and sometimes reflective) vocals, the track is more than the sum of its parts. The effect is compounded when comparing it to the tediously slow recording conducted by Copland himself.

Note that Aaron Copland actually died on a December 2nd. I remember reading about it in the next day's NY Times while waiting for Caltrain on a cold morning in Palo Alto. From his obituary by John Rockwell:

Of many notable achievements, Mr. Copland's greatest gift was his ability to be both serious and popular, to adhere to the formal integrity and moral earnestness of modernism and also to espouse the generous accessibility of the dominant political mores of the 1930's and 40's.

rgable: aworks great depression/wwii era copland: copland house aworks del.icio.us wikipedia google news yahoo audio singingfish john adams on copland baker bros: U of M interview of half the Baker Bros December 4th lyrics

Lincoln Portrait (1942). Aaron Copland

I see that Barak Obama, Senator from Illinois, narrated Aaron Copland's Lincoln Portrait in a Chicago 9/11 concert:

Obama brought an orator's skill without an actor's slick veneer to Copland's "Lincoln Portrait.'' The comforting quality of his voice gave added emotional resonance to Lincoln's words.

  This got me thinking about who else has narrated the work. I knew James Earl Jones and General Schwartzkopf had but a quick check on Amazon also reveals Henry Fonda, Carl Sandburg (who wrote the original text), Judy Collins and actor Melvyn Douglas from 1946. Spike Lee's He Got Game used the music without narration. And from an announcement of a recent rendition by the lieutenant governor of Missouri:

Copland wrote Lincoln Portrait shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor, hoping that the piece would help to boost patriotic pride and morale at a time when the nation’s fortunes seemed at low ebb.

From the text:

"Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this congress and this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation. We, even we here, hold the power and bear the responsibility." [Annual Message to Congress, December 1, 1862]

He was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, and lived in Illinois. And this is what he said. This is what Abe Lincoln said.

rgable: aworks great depression/wwii era copland: copland house aworks del.icio.us wikipedia google news yahoo audio singingfish asteroid named after the composer music used by dylan john adams on copland lincoln portrait: wikipedia npr with stream voice of america 1953 new york times article (including withdrawl from the eisenhower inauguration ceremony) boosey & hawkes review of the judy collins cd australian performance lebrecht on margaret thatcher

Quiet City (1940). Aaron Copland /new york and new orleans/

For today, Copland's Quiet City sounds apt, and the play may have more depth than I realized. Harold Clurman wrote about Irwin Shaw's work:

It's theme, the recurrent one of the troubled conscience of the middle class that cannot quite reconcile itself to its life in a distraught world -- which, when it retains its honesty and sensitivity, it identifies with a life of sin -- was here given full orchestration.

A brief search indicates the play includes a character who abandons his artistic aspirations and his Jewishness in order to achieve material success, but is reminded of what he has done via his brother's trumpet playing.

rgable: aworks great depression/wwii era copland: aworks del.icio.us wikipedia google news yahoo audio singingfish copland's music as uniter after hurricane hugo

Ecuatorial (1934). Edgard Varèse

The San Francisco Symphony season:

• I Met Heine on the Rue Fürstenburg. Feldman. September. Feldman in a Paul Griffiths interview re: titles here.
• Appalachian Spring. Fanfare for the Common Man. Copland. September.
• Piano Concerto. Gershwin. Jean-Yves Thibaudet. October. Clip.
• Symphonic Dances. Bernstein. Violin Concerto. Barber. Symphony No. 1. Corigliano. National Symphony Orchestra and Itzhak Perlman. October.
• Drala. Lieberson. December.
• Decoration Day. Ives. January.
• New England Holidays. Ives. April. (along with Webern and Lorraine Hunt Lieberson singing Mahler).
• Ecuatorial. Varèse. May. Score includes two theremins or ondes martenot.

Short Symphony (1931-33). Aaron Copland /modernism/

  As modernist music goes, Copland's Short Symphony (Symphony No. 2) is relatively benign. Over on the Yahoo C20M list, someone just named it in a list of top twenty symphonies. And then tonight, I read this blast at modernism on James Howard Kunstler's blog:

      The tragic futility of the suburban growth racket and the towering hubris of Modernism go hand-in-hand. Both rest on ideologies that drive relentlessy toward death. Both depend on a condition of widespread and extreme narcissism among individual members of society to continue their operations. Both represent a kind of wickedness that does not require religious transliteration to understand. Both will be defeated by reality.

Those words are hard to link with Aaron Copland. But then I suppose Copland was never a true idealogue or suburbanist. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to name a more appropriate musical narcissist.

From the Wikipedia article on modernism in music, "Modernism is a testing of the limits of aesthetic construction," with its primary features:

1. Comprehensiveness and depth.
2. Semantic specificity and density.
3. Extensions and destructions of tonality.

An American in Paris (1928). George Gershwin /meme/

The Standing Room sends me the music meme going around. While I don't have a particular interest in online quizzes like a fifteen-year-old girl, it occurs to me that much of my music perspective was shaped in my youth...

Total volume of music in your computer: iTunes reports 6683 songs in 48 Gigabytes. I got the record collecting bug early in high school, probably when I bought Bruce Springsteen's Born to Run (BTR lyric drinking glasses here),  Devadip Carlos Santana and John McLaughlin's Welcome, and a Shostakovich Tenth Symphony. Also around that time, my cousin brought back from Germany a Leonard Bernstein Beethoven album on Deutsche Gramaphone that struck me as the ultimate in sophistication. Note that I didn't hear opera until my twenties and even today, without that early introduction, it is low on my list of interests.

Maybe a third of my American classical music has been ripped to MP3s but most of my pop/rock/European classical music remains as seldom played CDs (or no longer played LPs). I sold part of my LP collection in college (at the great Second Time Around in Indianapolis). I vowed to never sell another recording again and have since updated my vow by deciding to never delete an MP3.

Last CD you bought: The Spamalot original cast recording, as a surprise gift for Laura who really, really wants to see the show in New York.  I was a hard-core Monty Python fan in high school, though my plan to drive with my buddy all the way to see them live at City Center fell through. Probably won't drive to see this one either. Of course, Spamalot is not your father's Broadway show, and it has reawakened that initial attraction. The Song That Goes Like This is meta-genius.

Song currently playing? Mark Anderson playing a piano arrangement of Gershwin's An American in Paris. I have an amazing talent to misidentify this piece. Before dinner, I was listening to the Varese streaming orgy and when I came back after dinner to turn on iTunes, I thought I had resumed the stream but not realizing it, I had selected An American in Paris instead. My first thought upon hearing what I thought was an unknown Varese piano piece was how impressive his music sounds when you strip away all that orchestral noise.  Oops. Earlier this year, I was driving my 83-year-old Mom home from a hospital stay in Indiana and we were listening to classical music on the (surprisingly good) Ball State public radio station. An American in Paris came on and I thought to myself, what is this? Copland? Bernstein? Unprompted, Mom speaks up suggesting this is An American in Paris. Of course.

Five songs I listen to a lot or that mean a lot to me?  Again, I'll focus on songs as I grew up. At age six, watching my brother listen on the car radio  to I Want To Hold Your Hand by the Beatles was a seminal moment as I realized the excitement and power and social significance of pop music (ok, maybe I didn't realize all that at the time but the image is still burned into my mind) . Playing Adagio for Strings by Barber as a tenor saxophonist in a 15-piece woodwind ensemble was probably my deepest creative experience. On the jazz side, I began to learn to improvise by transcribing Dear Lord by John Coltrane -- it was slow enough that, after some effort, I could begin to make sense out of it. Although, now that I think of it, I also invented saxophone riffs while listening to Pink Floyd's Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun.  Even from an early age, boundaries between different kinds of music were there for me to cross. Back to the present, I've listened to Everywhen by Massive Attack probably fifty times in the last month. I told myself yesterday I needed to give it a break.

Five people to whom I'm passing the baton? Sorry, I'm more of a meme sync than a meme propagator which may help explain why my career move into marketing in my twenties was, shall we say, not a great fit. I will point out that Don Nunn is one of my favorite "meme-sters" to read (mildly unpleasant childhood tricycle accident meme response here).

By the way, I no longer have any desire to listen to Bruce Springsteen and I don't actually have any Beatles MP3s. Maybe I am waiting for the respective (and hypothetical) Broadway shows. And for some reason, I  greatly prefer Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue over An American in Paris, although I don't think it has anything to do with Broadway.

Two Songs (Poems of Catherine Riegger) (1933). Henry Cowell

Top 10 Tracks of the Week:

1. Take Time. The Books. MP3 sample.
2. En Gallop. Joanna Newsom.
3. First Gamelan. Lou Harrison. Keith Jarrett.
4. Rachell's Weepage. Christopher Tye. Kronos Quartet.
5. In the Name of the Holocaust -- A. John Cage. Margaret Leng Tan.
6. Go to Sleep. Radiohead.
7. Paint the Silence. South.
8. 2005-03-13. Cinema Volta.
9. Two Songs (Poems of Catherine Riegger). Henry Cowell. Raymond Murcell and Cheryl Seltzer.
10. Symphony No. 3. Roy Harris. Leonard Bernstein.

This is the only track by The Books that I have...Tower Records in Mountain View didn't have the Joanna Newsom CD so I am still listening to my one track for her as well...Paint the Silence is from the OC tv soundtrack, of all things...Cinema Volta is a daily ambient composition podcast Kyle Gann had pointed out...Vocal music by Cowell is as intense and as weird as you might expect. The liner notes call it a blend of the modern and the traditional and identifies Catherine Riegger as the daughter of the composer Wallingford Riegger...I hadn't heard the Harris symphony for maybe a year and I'm surprised how much I like it, in a melodic, organic way, reminding me a bit of the late British composer Robert Simpson.