Are you awake now?
Update: The quartet is “Salut Salon.” Their website is here, and their YouTube channel is here.
Category: Music
Arriving at Harmony Row
I early acquired the habit of listening to music from the bottom up. A tune with an energetic bass line is far more likely to catch my attention than one in which the bass merely marks chord changes. I took to Cream immediately, partly because of Clapton and Baker, but mainly because of bassist, singer and songwriter Jack Bruce. There are many musicians whose bass playing I’ve enjoyed, but Bruce has always been my favorite.
Jack Bruce passed away today. R.I.P.
Here’s Bruce with Ginger Baker and Eric Clapton:
Seeing red
“Is She U.N. Owen?” is probably the best-known piece of music from the vast Touhou Project, ((except possibly for “Bad Apple“)) and you can find innumerable versions in every style, from orchestral to nightcore, on YouTube. I stumbled across the one above recently while looking for something else.
Another version of the tune, impressive yet ridiculous.
Incidentally, “U.N. Owen” is not “Death Waltz.” This is “Death Waltz:”
Update: Yet another version of “U.N. Owen,” this one by Floating Cloud.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=VpNvGNRlFaE
Fifty years ago today …
… Bob Moog introduced his modular synthesizer.
Anybody have a spare $150,000?
October song
“Hocus Pocus” was released on album 43 years ago this month and as a single a year later. The Borderline Boy says that this is the best song in the known universe, and I won’t argue. Certainly the lyrics alone are worth the entire output of any dozen singer/songwriters combined.
Two-fisted fiddle player
My friend Roger, musician and aficionado of fine anime, acquired another fiddle for his collection Friday in the old-time fiddle competition at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas.
This was his encore:
Update: A better-quality recording of Roger from a jam session later in the festival:
Name that tune
These are the lyrics to a certain over-familiar song rewritten as a sonnet. Can you identify the original? Here’s a hint the answer. There are more sonnets here.
(Via Fillyjonk.)
Rock and reel
When does a fiddle contest require a referee?
(Translation of the text at YouTube via a friend: “Annual competition in Pembroke which has about 25 fiddlers playing reels in turn without stopping and without playing a reel that has been played before. Towards the end, the fiddler must play only the “A” of a reel (which only lasts 10 seconds). This video shows the final minutes of the contest Sep 5, 2010, while there were only three participants. April Verch, Shane Cook and Danny Perreault. The contest lasted about two hours. Judge: René Dacier. Winner 2010: April Verch. In the end, Danny Perreault played one of his compositions (Breakdown at Rosary) and Germain Leduc accompanies on the piano in a funny way …”)
Sabbath in the padded cell with Herbert
Life continues insane here, and I spend much of my time banging my head against the wall. If you’d like to bang your head along with me, here’s some suitable music.
There’s an excess of real life …
… so things will continue quiet here for a while. In the meantime, here’s Masumi Itou with a piano version of the closing theme to Jinrui wa Suitai Shimashita: ((You can listen to the tune in context here, and follow the key changes here.))
1944-2014
R.I.P., Johnny Winter.
Crimson on wheels, with peaches
With bells on, too.
Update: The Professor thinks that this may be the coolest thing ever:
Perhaps, but it lacks Segways.
A few notes
None of this summer’s anime looks likely to break on through my indifference. Yet another Nobunaga story? Momotaro, with fan service? An undead idol? Meh. I have better ways to waste my time. There are a couple I might take a look at anyway — Sailor Moon, to see if it’s any improvement on the original, and Hanayamata, to see the dance — but none of the descriptions has piqued my curiosity in the way that the previews of Shin Sekai Yori and Joshiraku did.
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Who is this unfriendly gentleman? I guarantee you that you’ve heard of him. The answer is here.
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Tricia Spencer and Howard Rains will play a concert that you can listen to live online Thursday evening. I’ve heard Tricia several times at Winfield, and I can certify that she is one hell of a good old-time fiddler.
One more apple
I condensed “Bad Apple” down to two strains in 32 measures, suitable for playing in jam sessions or for dances, which I’m posting in case anyone else might find it useful. It’s in E minor now, a much friendlier key for diatonic instruments than the E-flat minor of the score I worked from. It’s not obligatory to play it as written: fiddle with the rhythm and add a few triplets, and you have a perfectly fine hornpipe. I expect you could tease a strathspey out of it with a bit of ingenuity. For inspiration, see Floating Cloud. (Click to embiggenify, right-click to save to your disc.)
Update: “Bad Apple” as a strathspey and reel can be found here.
Feeling a little Puckish
I found a complete performance of Balanchine‘s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. If you remember the play, you can follow the story pretty well, though Balanchine made many changes in adapting it. Even if you haven’t read Shakespeare, you can enjoy the spectacle, and there’s always the music.
Frederick Ashton also choreographed the play in The Dream. In his version, the transformed Bottom dances on pointe for added grotesquerie.
Digital nostalgia for the analog past
If you have a MIDI keyboard you can plug into your computer and a VST or AU host, here’s a very nice freebie you can play with. It’s based on the Oberheim OB series of synthesizers. It works fine in Logic on my aging Mac laptop. I haven’t had time yet to do more than try some presets, but it sounds very ’80’s to my ear.