Category: Tune of the day

Although Arthur Farwell wrote settings of Emily Dickinson poems and music for a play by Lord Dunsany among many other works, he is probably best-known today, insofar as he is remembered at all, for his “Indianist” music.

Pioneering fusion by the fiddler who worked with both Frank Zappa and John McLaughlin.

I’ve never been able to take Metallica seriously.

It’s hard to sit still listening to The Bothy Band.

Another tune from my childhood sojourn with the Martian side of the family.

See Dave Barry for the historical background.

Godowsky’s music probably isn’t excessively difficult for pianists with three or four hands. For those with only two, it’s more of a challenge.

Bill Nelson from his BBD days.

So you think you’ve heard everything?

“Hot Smoke and Sasafrass” (sic) was their big hit, but I liked the flip side, too.

Another barcarolle by Gabriel Fauré. He wrote thirteen of them, all worth hearing. Fauré’s music is not easy to play; Franz Liszt said of his first attempt at one of Fauré’s pieces, “I’ve run out of fingers.”

One of the curious facts about the composers of game music is that Nobuo Uematsu, probably the best-known and most popular (except maybe for Koji Kondo) had the least formal training.

A laid-back tune from Gatton’s second and last Major Label Recording.

Enoch Soames may or may not have made an appearance in the reading room of the British Museum on June 3, 1997, but the guy with the Shure 55SH mic did indeed keep an appointment made 22 years earlier.

Harry Nilsson had some big hits, but none of them were as good as this early number.

It’s snowing as I type this¹, and the temperatures will soon be subzero. I’m impatient to hear the voices of spring.

Presenting “Django Johnny.”

The Sadistic Mika Band were the first Japanese band to tour Great Britain, and were influenced the likes of Marc Bolan and David Bowie. Every website discussing them has a different explanation of their name, none of them convincing.

Jon Hiseman’s Colosseum in their early days.