It may seem odd to be posting a "wall-of-sound" mashup just days before Christmas, but the truth is that my latest little YouTube creation was inspired by the sounds of Christmas. As I hope you already know, Day 8 of the "12 Composers of Christmas" features one of the most famous passages in the piano repertoire, the barrage of octaves that precedes the last "big tune" statement in Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto. (Octaves = 8ths, of course.) When I was adding annotations/links to the "12 Composers" video last week, I was looking for a YouTube video that would start right at that spot in the 3rd movement. To my great delight, someone had posted the fiendishly amazing Martha Argerich playing just that passage, and so I'd found the perfect link, especially because you get to watch her hands doing miraculous things.
It turns out that the little Argerich excerpt was posted in response to another YouTuber who'd created a back-to-back-to-back, etc. recording of sixteen pianist playing those octaves, and pretty soon I'd discovered that someone else had also posted a slightly different lineup of octave-slayers. First of all, let's just pause to say that this is one of the oh-so-wonderful things about the Internet - that someone could post something like this for easy comparison. Twenty years ago, the best one might have hoped for was that some musicologist might write an article comparing such performances, and if you were lucky enough to stumble on that article, then you could read about the playing, look at tables of timings, take in some overly studious analysis, etc. But you wouldn't be able to hear anything. So, thank you, Internet, and thank you, YouTube.
Whether anyone will thank me for what follows is a bit harder to predict, but there was essentially no way I could keep from trying out the inevitable: playing all sixteen of those performances simultaneously. I've been dabbling in mashups for some time, and perhaps you'll recall that I recently discovered the work of self-proclaimed plunderer John Oswald, who once combined 24 recordings of the Also Sprach Zarathustra opening; but I don't think I'd topped the 4-track mark until now. Not surprisingly, there's nothing subtle about the sound of sixteen pianists storming the gates of a big Russian tune - the effect borders on incomprehensible, but it's quite a sound, thrilling in its own way.
It then occurred to me that maybe the perfect number would be an octave of pianists (putting aside the fact that these are actually double octaves). I chose the eight recordings from this video that were closest to each other in tempo, put them together, and here you get something a bit more recognizable - not as avant-garde perhaps, but ultimately more satisfying to my ears.
There's more fun number stuff here. The printed cadenza consists of 96 (nice round multiple of 8) octaves in each hand, which adds up to 384 notes in all. With 8 pianists playing, that's a total of 3072 notes heard in a span of about 16 seconds (another multiple of 8!) - or, about 192 notes/second. That means the 16-performer version includes about 384 notes/second, so it's hardly surprising that we end up with a virtual wall of sound at that point, especially since there are a lot more tempo variants included.
Incidentally, I have done other odd things to Tchaikovsky's music in the past few years. Here's a sampler.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
The Ghosts of MMmusing Past
The time has come to promote ye ol' MMmusing Christmas Specials - alas, there's nothing new to offer this year, but I'm a classical music person, so it's appropriate that I rely on classics from the past. By the way, it's possible that my creative well simply has run dry as a result of, for fatherhood-based reasons, listening to the Chipmunks' Christmas album about 30 times in the past month. Honestly, I don't mind the Chipmunks as much as you might expect, if only because my kids enjoy them so much and sing along with remarkable gusto. Anyway, the point is, here's some stuff I created a few years back:
Most importantly, the festive "12 Composers of Christmas." Last year's goal was to get the YouTube view-count up over 1000. It's now been viewed more than 6,000 times, but let's try to get that up to at least 10,000 this year. Then, if everything falls into place, I and my little animated stickman might get signed to a record contract as happened with these guys. Or not. Here you go (note that annotations [with links] were added this year):
Then, there's the delightfully cacophonous "Vertical Christmas Medley," seven popular tunes of the season bopping along simultaneously. Do you hear what I hear?
And, finally from 2000, my first ever movie, starring an adorable cast of nieces and nephews. I think this achievement is looking less impressive every year as homemade video editing is so much more common than it used to be; back in 2001 (when I'd finally finished all the editing), it seemed like a miracle to create those stunning special effects. I still think the script holds up, though, and the performances are as endearing as ever. Worth noting that the entire shooting schedule took place in about 2-3 days, with very little planning ahead of time. This is filmmaking as improvisation.
Part I:
Part II:
Most importantly, the festive "12 Composers of Christmas." Last year's goal was to get the YouTube view-count up over 1000. It's now been viewed more than 6,000 times, but let's try to get that up to at least 10,000 this year. Then, if everything falls into place, I and my little animated stickman might get signed to a record contract as happened with these guys. Or not. Here you go (note that annotations [with links] were added this year):
Then, there's the delightfully cacophonous "Vertical Christmas Medley," seven popular tunes of the season bopping along simultaneously. Do you hear what I hear?
And, finally from 2000, my first ever movie, starring an adorable cast of nieces and nephews. I think this achievement is looking less impressive every year as homemade video editing is so much more common than it used to be; back in 2001 (when I'd finally finished all the editing), it seemed like a miracle to create those stunning special effects. I still think the script holds up, though, and the performances are as endearing as ever. Worth noting that the entire shooting schedule took place in about 2-3 days, with very little planning ahead of time. This is filmmaking as improvisation.
Part I:
Part II:
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Testing with the Stars
A few years back, for reasons forgotten and perhaps better unknown, I started inserting pictures of famous music types into the final exam margins for the two quads (Baroque & Classical) of music history I teach. The tradition began with some of the amusingly coiffed heroes of the Baroque, in pictures lifted from the pages of Norton's A History of Western Music. A year later, these history stars began spouting mostly comforting advice to the inevitably nervous test-takers. Then, last year's Classical Era exam featured some stunningly bad puns from that well-known cast of characters. [NOTE: Bach and Handel actually kick off this quad in my arrangement.]
Remarkably, one of the students who'd endured all of that last Spring wrote the following on my Facebook wall today: " I think I'm going to miss having cartoons on my exams this semester." In retrospect, he may have done this knowing that I couldn't resist the temptation to conjure up a few words of wisdom from the finest the 20th century has to offer. (I don't teach that class, alas.) I happened to be home "watching" the kids, so it was pretty much inevitable that this student (let's call him "Joe") would end up with a little gallery of composerly advice on his Facebook wall. I figured I might as well get a blog post out of all this as well.
Here's the first batch of Baroque sages who, I believe, debuted in March of 2007:
Then, last Spring's "Classical Era" exam featured these highly unoriginal, cringe-inducing puns:
If, by some miracle, you haven't fled this post in pain, here are my little 20th-century additions to the genre, created on this very afternoon:
NOTE: You can reveal the identify of all of the above by clicking on the images - well, except the first 20th-century image has two composers, the second of whom is this guy. The horrible Haydn thing is, of course, a reference to my oft-confessed lack of affinity for Papa Joe.
UPDATE: A new batch from 2010.
Remarkably, one of the students who'd endured all of that last Spring wrote the following on my Facebook wall today: " I think I'm going to miss having cartoons on my exams this semester." In retrospect, he may have done this knowing that I couldn't resist the temptation to conjure up a few words of wisdom from the finest the 20th century has to offer. (I don't teach that class, alas.) I happened to be home "watching" the kids, so it was pretty much inevitable that this student (let's call him "Joe") would end up with a little gallery of composerly advice on his Facebook wall. I figured I might as well get a blog post out of all this as well.
Here's the first batch of Baroque sages who, I believe, debuted in March of 2007:
If, by some miracle, you haven't fled this post in pain, here are my little 20th-century additions to the genre, created on this very afternoon:
UPDATE: A new batch from 2010.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Les lignes mystérieuses...
My recent collaborative "encounter" with artist Jim Zingarelli found us not only decorating old scores, but also creating a sort of music from the act of drawing itself. I've been intrigued for some time by the contrasting ways in musicians and visual artists think of and experience direction. I've heard Jim talk many times about the ways in which an image can lead a viewer to follow a kind of path in the act of viewing, but it's quite a different thing than the temporally prescribed way in which one experiences the events in a piece of music. (Let's put aside for now the complex ways in which a listener does indeed keep "in mind" musical events that have passed or that are yet to come.)
[NOTE: I mused on this issue at some length here, including some reference to Jim's work, although that was long before we'd imagined this collaboration. There's also some further commentary on the matter from Dan B. at Thoughtlights, with yet further comments by me in the comments to his post.]
Whatever you might think of this distinction between the worlds of art and music, I wanted to see and document what it would be like to watch a drawing unfold as a sort of performance. I decided a fun way to do that would be to have Jim sketch on my Tablet PC, using screen capture software to record all the strokes of the pen. The first time I handed him the tablet, he immediately threw a challenge back at me by asking me to play something for him to "draw to." Not being an improviser (see previous post), I pulled Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier off the shelf and faked my way through the C Minor Prelude from Book I. Not my finest moment as a pianist (nor had my office piano been tuned yet for the semester, so things were less well-tempered than ideal), but afterwards we were both captivated by the sight of watching his lines dash across the screen. Even the sound of the pen tapping against the tablet added something surprisingly satisfying. [Perhaps some day I'll have the courage to post this first session, although I'll have to load it up with as many disclaimers as possible about my playing.]
[NOTE: I mused on this issue at some length here, including some reference to Jim's work, although that was long before we'd imagined this collaboration. There's also some further commentary on the matter from Dan B. at Thoughtlights, with yet further comments by me in the comments to his post.]
Whatever you might think of this distinction between the worlds of art and music, I wanted to see and document what it would be like to watch a drawing unfold as a sort of performance. I decided a fun way to do that would be to have Jim sketch on my Tablet PC, using screen capture software to record all the strokes of the pen. The first time I handed him the tablet, he immediately threw a challenge back at me by asking me to play something for him to "draw to." Not being an improviser (see previous post), I pulled Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier off the shelf and faked my way through the C Minor Prelude from Book I. Not my finest moment as a pianist (nor had my office piano been tuned yet for the semester, so things were less well-tempered than ideal), but afterwards we were both captivated by the sight of watching his lines dash across the screen. Even the sound of the pen tapping against the tablet added something surprisingly satisfying. [Perhaps some day I'll have the courage to post this first session, although I'll have to load it up with as many disclaimers as possible about my playing.]
So, for now, I'm going to post a "live drawing" we did several weeks after that first encounter with Bach. In this case, having already embarked on our adventure with ornamenting a Couperin score, I decided to play what is probably Couperin's most famous work, "Les barricades mystérieuses," a bewitching little piece I compared to Schumann last month. What you see below is Jim's pen dancing along to the notes as I play. It's an unrehearsed, one-take, unedited performance by both of us. The point here is not to present some finished product, but rather to see what happens when these two worlds join forces, and when a drawing becomes something which can literally be experienced as unfolding in time.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Illuminating Ornamentation
I mentioned about a month ago that I recently collaborated with artist Jim Zingarelli as part of an exhibit called "Drawing as Encounter." Again, just to be be clear, he did all the drawing/painting/etc. I was just an encounteree, although that did produce some musical performances from me that have become part of the exhibit. The process of talking with Jim about the different ways we think as artists - he as free-thinking creator in visual media, I mostly as a recreator of existing musical scores - brought us back several times to thinking about the phenomenon of the musical score, both as visual object and as a somewhat vexing authority figure.
Musicians, of course, tend to refer to the score as "the music" even though, as I cleverly demonstrated at the exhibit opening by holding The Well-Tempered Clavier up to a microphone, the score doesn't produce any actual music. The process of interpreting those little black specks is an art in itself (I like to think), but one fraught with all sorts of tension about being true to the composer's wishes, etc.
Jim had the idea of emancipating the score, in a way, by treating it as a sort of canvas to which he could add his own decorations. We talked about various possibilities, including some music of Poulenc, whose musical spirit reminds me of Z's work. Jim showed me a little impromptu watercolor sketch he'd made that was inspired by listening to some Poulenc I'd suggested. The delicate figurative intricacy of the sketch somehow brought to mind the kind of florid ornamentation one sees and hears in the French Baroque style. It occurred to me that the music of François Couperin, whose scores are readily available in public domain form, might make an interesting canvas for our experiments since the music lends itself to liberal ornamentation from the performer.
The first score I gave him is a beautiful little piece charmingly self-titled "Le Couperin." I chose it partly because it can be played slowly enough that florid elaborations are possible; I actually removed all of Couperin's indicated ornaments and then basically instructed Jim to do whatever he wanted to with the rest. His intent was not to try to think like a musician, but rather to respond to the score as a visual object. My job, then, was to perform it, finding whatever suggestion and inspiration I chose to from Jim's encounter with Couperin.
I don't mind admitting that I'm no expert when it comes to Baroque improvisation - or when it comes to any kind of improvisation, for that matter. In fact, this is part of what I hoped to gain from the experience - the enigmatically ornamented score presented itself less as an academic challenge in following instructions than as inspiration to be freely creative. Although I did settle on some consistent ways of interpreting some of the colorful markings, I gave myself permission not to be too constrained by them. Still, one of the outcomes of the experiment was finding that the new score was not just liberating - I also learned that certain ideas (end of m.4, for example) worked so naturally that they became, in my mind, settled ways of reading some of the markings.
But, I'm not going to try to explain or defend any of my choices here. There are still some passages that I'd like to explore more, but I won't say which ones. Here then, complete with the Couperin/Zingarelli score, is one possible interpretation:
Note that there are ways in which this sort of visually inspired interpretative process is related to some of shuffling experiments I've blogged about recently. Although Jim's score markings (or "illuminations," as I like to call them, thinking of medieval manuscripts and the like) aren't exactly random, the way in which they interact with the notes is at best tangentially related to the kinds of instructions that notes are supposed to convey. So, just as shuffling an iPod can lead to unexpected connections and discoveries, using an artist as intermediary can provide a fresh way of looking at an old score.
Musicians, of course, tend to refer to the score as "the music" even though, as I cleverly demonstrated at the exhibit opening by holding The Well-Tempered Clavier up to a microphone, the score doesn't produce any actual music. The process of interpreting those little black specks is an art in itself (I like to think), but one fraught with all sorts of tension about being true to the composer's wishes, etc.
Jim had the idea of emancipating the score, in a way, by treating it as a sort of canvas to which he could add his own decorations. We talked about various possibilities, including some music of Poulenc, whose musical spirit reminds me of Z's work. Jim showed me a little impromptu watercolor sketch he'd made that was inspired by listening to some Poulenc I'd suggested. The delicate figurative intricacy of the sketch somehow brought to mind the kind of florid ornamentation one sees and hears in the French Baroque style. It occurred to me that the music of François Couperin, whose scores are readily available in public domain form, might make an interesting canvas for our experiments since the music lends itself to liberal ornamentation from the performer.
The first score I gave him is a beautiful little piece charmingly self-titled "Le Couperin." I chose it partly because it can be played slowly enough that florid elaborations are possible; I actually removed all of Couperin's indicated ornaments and then basically instructed Jim to do whatever he wanted to with the rest. His intent was not to try to think like a musician, but rather to respond to the score as a visual object. My job, then, was to perform it, finding whatever suggestion and inspiration I chose to from Jim's encounter with Couperin.
I don't mind admitting that I'm no expert when it comes to Baroque improvisation - or when it comes to any kind of improvisation, for that matter. In fact, this is part of what I hoped to gain from the experience - the enigmatically ornamented score presented itself less as an academic challenge in following instructions than as inspiration to be freely creative. Although I did settle on some consistent ways of interpreting some of the colorful markings, I gave myself permission not to be too constrained by them. Still, one of the outcomes of the experiment was finding that the new score was not just liberating - I also learned that certain ideas (end of m.4, for example) worked so naturally that they became, in my mind, settled ways of reading some of the markings.
But, I'm not going to try to explain or defend any of my choices here. There are still some passages that I'd like to explore more, but I won't say which ones. Here then, complete with the Couperin/Zingarelli score, is one possible interpretation:
Note that there are ways in which this sort of visually inspired interpretative process is related to some of shuffling experiments I've blogged about recently. Although Jim's score markings (or "illuminations," as I like to call them, thinking of medieval manuscripts and the like) aren't exactly random, the way in which they interact with the notes is at best tangentially related to the kinds of instructions that notes are supposed to convey. So, just as shuffling an iPod can lead to unexpected connections and discoveries, using an artist as intermediary can provide a fresh way of looking at an old score.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
I wrote last year about the Boston Symphony's lame "video" podcasting ventures, and it seems nothing has changed. Having just heard the BSO last night in a terrific concert with Joshua Bell, I stopped by www.bso.org a few minutes ago and see they're proudly proclaiming: "NEW! Video Exclusive - interview with Joshua Bell - WATCH IT NOW." I'm not gonna break this down like I did last time, but suffice it to say, the "video" is mostly just publicity stills of Mr. Bell that zoom slowly in and out with little rhyme or reason. (For example, when Bell is talking about visiting the White House recently, are there photos of the White House? Uh, no.)
Oh wait, no, I just realized that, a few minutes in, they've inserted some actual video footage of Bell performing with the BSO (looks Tanglewood-y) which, quite frankly, is even more bizarre. We see him passionately playing with not even the slightest audio hint of what he's playing. (Actually, it's just occurred to me that it could make a fun "violin puzzler" game to figure out what he's playing; maybe later.) They use this video as a sort of wallpaper a couple of times in the "video" podcast, but it's basically a poorly enhanced audio interview. Yet they're desperately urging us not to listen, but to WATCH.
Here's my point: it's astounding to me that as we approach 2010, this is what passes for multimedia on a major orchestra's website. The interview is fine, if rather tepid, but the BSO is about music, not talking. I know there are all sorts of union issues involved, but it's ridiculous that an orchestra website isn't filled with audio and video of actual musical performances. As I type, I'm sitting and watching NFL football for free, and yet the NFL stadiums are packed and the league makes plenty of money.
I feel certain that if the BSO website was filled with musicmaking, visitors to the site would be much more likely to think about buying tickets. They don't need to put up complete performances if they're afraid of giving away the farm, but 30 seconds of watching Joshua Bell actually playing the Brahms concerto would certainly do more than 10 minutes of him talking. Could a union really not agree to that? (Actually, don't answer that.) Orchestras need to figure this out.
UPDATE: I just noticed that there is a "music player" option on the front of the BSO website, though the button is hardly featured. Actually, this little music player is nice, with quite a few listening options (though it doesn't seem to ID the performers clearly). I can't imagine why it's not more prominently featured, but maybe it's a start.
UPDATE 2 (12/2): I see (via BSO's Twitter account) that the Bell interview "video" is on YouTube as well. I noticed that there are some images of Bell playing in the White House, so either I was mistaken above or the video's been updated a little. I probably just missed them; they don't exactly scream "White House," but I apologize for suggesting no White House images were used.
See also: an MMmusing podcast that actually uses images to enhance what's being talked about in the interview.
Oh wait, no, I just realized that, a few minutes in, they've inserted some actual video footage of Bell performing with the BSO (looks Tanglewood-y) which, quite frankly, is even more bizarre. We see him passionately playing with not even the slightest audio hint of what he's playing. (Actually, it's just occurred to me that it could make a fun "violin puzzler" game to figure out what he's playing; maybe later.) They use this video as a sort of wallpaper a couple of times in the "video" podcast, but it's basically a poorly enhanced audio interview. Yet they're desperately urging us not to listen, but to WATCH.
Here's my point: it's astounding to me that as we approach 2010, this is what passes for multimedia on a major orchestra's website. The interview is fine, if rather tepid, but the BSO is about music, not talking. I know there are all sorts of union issues involved, but it's ridiculous that an orchestra website isn't filled with audio and video of actual musical performances. As I type, I'm sitting and watching NFL football for free, and yet the NFL stadiums are packed and the league makes plenty of money.
I feel certain that if the BSO website was filled with musicmaking, visitors to the site would be much more likely to think about buying tickets. They don't need to put up complete performances if they're afraid of giving away the farm, but 30 seconds of watching Joshua Bell actually playing the Brahms concerto would certainly do more than 10 minutes of him talking. Could a union really not agree to that? (Actually, don't answer that.) Orchestras need to figure this out.
UPDATE: I just noticed that there is a "music player" option on the front of the BSO website, though the button is hardly featured. Actually, this little music player is nice, with quite a few listening options (though it doesn't seem to ID the performers clearly). I can't imagine why it's not more prominently featured, but maybe it's a start.
UPDATE 2 (12/2): I see (via BSO's Twitter account) that the Bell interview "video" is on YouTube as well. I noticed that there are some images of Bell playing in the White House, so either I was mistaken above or the video's been updated a little. I probably just missed them; they don't exactly scream "White House," but I apologize for suggesting no White House images were used.
See also: an MMmusing podcast that actually uses images to enhance what's being talked about in the interview.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Do the MMmusing Shuffle
| Click → |  |
← Click |
So, spin the wheel and see what happens...and you can always spin again using the machine over there in the margin.
[Last updated 11/10/14, now with about 300 possible outcomes.]
See also: The Power of Random
Thursday, November 19, 2009
-bert to -mann
I promise this won't be as long as the previous post, but I had another recent experience noticing an unexpected connection between two works. Sunday night, I heard the terrific cellist Carol Ou play Schubert's "Arpeggione" Sonata and, as pianist Noreen Cassidy-Polera introduced the main theme, I suddenly realized how similar it is to the main theme of Schumann's Piano Concerto. I happen to have a student working on the Schumann right now, so that may explain why it was available for easy comparison-noting in my subconscious playlist. I've actually played both works, the Schubert many times, but perhaps never in close proximity to each other. Schumann was, of course, a great admirer of Schubert, so perhaps he knew the "Arpeggione," although Wikipedia informs me the sonata wasn't published until 1871, well after Schumann's death.
Anyway, it doesn't take much analysis to see how closely these A minor tunes parallel each other at their outsets, both in rhythm and melodic structure. And that's really all I have to say about this; I did play around briefly with some sort of mashup idea (such as replacing Schumann's piano statement of the theme [which follows woodwind statement] with Schubert's theme), but nothing worked. So at least now you have evidence that I won't just slap ANY two tunes together. (Well, OK, you can hear the beginnings of the two tunes slapped together by clicking the third image below.)
Schumann
[click to play]
Schumbertmann
[click to play]
Anyway, it doesn't take much analysis to see how closely these A minor tunes parallel each other at their outsets, both in rhythm and melodic structure. And that's really all I have to say about this; I did play around briefly with some sort of mashup idea (such as replacing Schumann's piano statement of the theme [which follows woodwind statement] with Schubert's theme), but nothing worked. So at least now you have evidence that I won't just slap ANY two tunes together. (Well, OK, you can hear the beginnings of the two tunes slapped together by clicking the third image below.)
Schubert
[click to play]
[click to play]
Schumann
[click to play]
Schumbertmann
[click to play]
Don't forget to visit my old Tune Theft archive, though the above doesn't quite qualify as tune theft in my book.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Name that Bassoon
I continue to find iPod shuffling to be one of the more creatively engaging ways to listen. Not only is shuffling fun in a "name that tune" sense, but it can so often spark unexpected connections. As I've written many times before, I think that finding interesting connections is basically what creativity is all about, and inviting random input can be a remarkably effective way to find such links.
So, just yesterday I was driving home from work and the iPod shuffled to a track beginning with a lonely bassoon note, seemingly suspended in time. I assumed almost immediately that this was the beginning of the 2nd mvt of the Mendelssohn violin concerto, which famously begins with a lone bassoon B held over from the big finish of the 1st movement. And, though I don't have perfect pitch, it turns out that I was hearing a B in the correct register, and I'm sure that contributed to my sense that this was surely Mendelssohn - except, of course, it wasn't. Instead, it quickly became clear that this was Copland's Appalachian Spring - specifically, a reflective little connecting passage that precedes the famous "Simple Gifts" variations. I went back and listened several times, then cross-checked against Mendelssohn, not at all surprised to find it was the same pitch. Some pitch-moments are just loaded into the memory banks.
Not only do these two passages (from very different composers) begin with the same pitch on unaccompanied bassoon, but each then resolves up to a C. If you've been following this blog recently, you won't be surprised to know that I quickly thought of playing these two passages simultaneously, but I was quite surprised to find other little resonances. Most notably, Mendelssohn's C is followed by a G-sharp, while Copland's C is followed by an E-flat leading quickly to A-flat. Of course, G-sharp and A-flat are enharmonic equivalents - in piano terms, they are the same pitch! This is quite a coincidence, especially since neither is what would be expected in the respective contexts. Each passage is clearly in searching mode, but they start off searching in the same unusual direction.
From that point, the two excerpts head in different directions, with that Mendelssohn G-sharp creeping up to an A while Copland's A-flat holds steady. Still, there are some other nice little simultaneities - Copland arrives at a high G (melodic peak) where Mendelssohn arrives at a low G (lowest note) and when Mendelssohn's bass G resolves up to a C Major chord, Copland's melody lands on a C. By the end of this little mashup, we have Mendelssohn C Major nestling against Copland A-flat Major, two chords which share only that first C. The other pitches in those two chords clash wonderfully, and create a lovely bitonal sonority. Actually, the Copland passage (which is exactly like the opening of Appalachian Spring, except a half-step lower) already has some bitonal sonorities, with A-flat and E-flat chords coexisting in mm. 3-6 below. Thus, the clash with the Mendelssohn just seems like a logical extension of the sound world that's already in play.
Most amazingly, when I put the two audio files together, it turns out that almost all the barlines align pretty closely, even though Mendelsson is in 6/8 and Copland is in 4/4. Obviously, I got lucky with the recordings I happened to choose - there's no guarantee this would always happen, but I'm fascinated by how many connections can be heard and seen in this randomly discovered pairing. I find the result quite beautiful in its own way. Here's a reasonably accurate depiction of how the two scores line up (Mendelssohn on top):
[click to enlarge]
Here they are again, with annotations:
[click to enlarge]
So, I don't really know what this all means, but it was fun to explore. Here are links to the original audio for each excerpt: Mendelssohn | Copland
And here's what they sound like together:
More MMmashups.
So, just yesterday I was driving home from work and the iPod shuffled to a track beginning with a lonely bassoon note, seemingly suspended in time. I assumed almost immediately that this was the beginning of the 2nd mvt of the Mendelssohn violin concerto, which famously begins with a lone bassoon B held over from the big finish of the 1st movement. And, though I don't have perfect pitch, it turns out that I was hearing a B in the correct register, and I'm sure that contributed to my sense that this was surely Mendelssohn - except, of course, it wasn't. Instead, it quickly became clear that this was Copland's Appalachian Spring - specifically, a reflective little connecting passage that precedes the famous "Simple Gifts" variations. I went back and listened several times, then cross-checked against Mendelssohn, not at all surprised to find it was the same pitch. Some pitch-moments are just loaded into the memory banks.
Not only do these two passages (from very different composers) begin with the same pitch on unaccompanied bassoon, but each then resolves up to a C. If you've been following this blog recently, you won't be surprised to know that I quickly thought of playing these two passages simultaneously, but I was quite surprised to find other little resonances. Most notably, Mendelssohn's C is followed by a G-sharp, while Copland's C is followed by an E-flat leading quickly to A-flat. Of course, G-sharp and A-flat are enharmonic equivalents - in piano terms, they are the same pitch! This is quite a coincidence, especially since neither is what would be expected in the respective contexts. Each passage is clearly in searching mode, but they start off searching in the same unusual direction.
From that point, the two excerpts head in different directions, with that Mendelssohn G-sharp creeping up to an A while Copland's A-flat holds steady. Still, there are some other nice little simultaneities - Copland arrives at a high G (melodic peak) where Mendelssohn arrives at a low G (lowest note) and when Mendelssohn's bass G resolves up to a C Major chord, Copland's melody lands on a C. By the end of this little mashup, we have Mendelssohn C Major nestling against Copland A-flat Major, two chords which share only that first C. The other pitches in those two chords clash wonderfully, and create a lovely bitonal sonority. Actually, the Copland passage (which is exactly like the opening of Appalachian Spring, except a half-step lower) already has some bitonal sonorities, with A-flat and E-flat chords coexisting in mm. 3-6 below. Thus, the clash with the Mendelssohn just seems like a logical extension of the sound world that's already in play.
Most amazingly, when I put the two audio files together, it turns out that almost all the barlines align pretty closely, even though Mendelsson is in 6/8 and Copland is in 4/4. Obviously, I got lucky with the recordings I happened to choose - there's no guarantee this would always happen, but I'm fascinated by how many connections can be heard and seen in this randomly discovered pairing. I find the result quite beautiful in its own way. Here's a reasonably accurate depiction of how the two scores line up (Mendelssohn on top):
[click to enlarge]
[click to enlarge]So, I don't really know what this all means, but it was fun to explore. Here are links to the original audio for each excerpt: Mendelssohn | Copland
And here's what they sound like together:
More MMmashups.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Marylou Speaker Churchill
I only heard yesterday that Marylou Speaker Churchill, a great teacher and long time principal 2nd violinist of the BSO, passed away late Tuesday evening. She was only 64 and I find it heartbreaking to know that she's no longer around. One of the great benefits of being an accompanist is getting to work with such a wide range of teachers. I didn't accompany for Mrs. Churchill's studio all that often and not at all for the past ten years, but she is unquestionably the most perfect teacher I've ever encountered, absolutely committed to the highest levels of musicianship, but also generous and loving to a degree that can't easily be described. Actually, read through some of the tributes to her on Facebook and you'll get some glimmer of what made her so special.From a selfish perspective, I had always hoped that some day my daughter might get to study with Marylou, not just because one couldn't hope for a better teacher, but because I always so enjoyed being around her. That radiant smile! I didn't get as many chances to hear her play as I wish, but I remember vividly once playing through the final movement of Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time with her. She just wanted to run it with piano in advance of an out-of-town performance to come, but it was a great moment for me. Titled "Praise to the Immortality of Jesus," it is some of the most divinely transcendent music imaginable; perhaps she's playing it now. I know that she provided countless great moments for so many other students and musicians. My thoughts and prayers go out to her dear husband Mark and their two daughters. Such an amazing life, and such a tremendous loss.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
The Joy of (looking at) Music
As my participation in the "Drawing as Encounter" exhibit might suggest, I'm fascinated by ways in which music can be seen as well as heard. We explored that in a couple of ways in the exhibit (which I promise to get around to blogging about soon [UPDATE: here & here]), but I'm most interested in ways that visuals can be used to help listeners listen more effectively. As much as I like the Fantasia films, I suspect that type of fully realized visual can be so compelling that the music becomes of secondary interest. (Although you can read here about how Michael Steinberg avoided that problem.) I mentioned this "Fantasia Problem" when praising the simplicity of the fabulous Ries Rollercoaster ad.
I have all sorts of great ideas running around in my head about various video/animation possibilities, but more and more I'm convinced that we tend to underestimate the best visual of all: the score itself. Not just in the sense that a score can be a beautiful thing to look at, although it can. Rather, following a score can be a wonderfully engaging way of hearing more deeply and insightfully, without generally becoming an end in itself. Since I'm a sightreader by nature, it makes sense that I might feel this way, but I've come to find that even the untrained eye/ear can get a kick out of watching as little black specks come to life.
I had an unexpectedly big success with this simple concept last month when our Piano Hero team was invited to participate in a campus-wide Homecoming faculty/staff/student talent show. For an audience of a thousand or so (I'm guessing at the number), three pianist colleagues and I played this arrangement of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. As we had done back in May for a modest Piano Hero audience, we asked the audience to be the cannon-firers - everyone was given paper bags suitable for inflating/exploding. Although we'd had fun using a student armed with pop-gun to signal the cannons back in May, in this case I decided to go with a PowerPoint slide show.
Part of the idea was that the PowerPoint could be used not only to cue the cannons, but also to provide all sorts of information about the themes as the music went along. I thought through several different ways to present the information, but it finally dawned on me that the score could be used as the basic visual backbone. This had the practical advantage that all I needed from the PowerPoint operator was someone who could read music, clicking at the end of each page. It turned out to be impractical to display the 8-hand piano arrangement because the parts don't line up with each other nicely, but since Piano Hero is all about sightreading AND recreating orchestral works via the piano, it seemed appropriate simply to use the orchestral score. [Part of the idea here is that, as with watching gamers play Guitar Hero or Rock Band, the audience gets to see what it is we're gunning for.]
Of course, following such a score takes some training and experience, but I used the old "highlight the leading instrument" approach to help with that; and, most importantly, since we had someone to take care of changing the slides at the right time, the viewer could always easily get back on track if lost. (By the way, I have a lot of affection for the "highlighted" score system; I've written before about an old Norton anthology that was big inspiration for me once upon a time, and I'm not sure I could have navigated it without the highlighted lines.)
The upshot of all this is that the performance was a HUGE success. I think we played fine, and it was certainly exciting to be up on stage (and hear a tremendous rustling of paper bags throughout), but I also think the success had a lot to do with 1) letting the audience participate in the performance, and 2) giving them something engaging to follow leading up to those cannons. I had so many people tell me how satisfying it felt to be able to "follow" a score, and the information about themes and the like that would usually get lost in program notes was presented in a way that people could hear immediately. I honestly think orchestras could have a lot of success with this kind of experiment.
And, in the interest of promoting my own last-minute laziness, I'd also suggest that the somewhat rough and improvised look of the slides (inconsistently sized staves, below-average resolution, hand-scrawled highlights, etc.) helps them to function more as catalysts for listening rather than as captivating visuals in their own right. I wish I hadn't misspelled cannon a couple of times (fixed in the video below), but even that might not have been such a bad thing. The bottom line is that the audience, not at all composed of classical music types, loved the whole experience in ways that surprised me and them.
So, here is what the PowerPoint looked like, more or less. The screen capture software I used to make this video doesn't do a great job with motion, so there are a few fade-in, fade-out moments when the video quality is much worse than what our audience saw. Also, there's one spot [3:26] where the score zooms up and in that looked much smoother in real life. Oh yeah, and in this case you don't get to hear our 8-handed piano sound - just a boring orchestra. (Thanks to the invaluable René Köhler and his National Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra.) Be sure to go full-screen to get the best effect.
Also, we did take a cut [at 9:27], so it's not quite the whole Tchaikovsky. As for the cannon countdowns, they do require a little more specific timing on the part of the slideshow operator, but there's certainly nothing very complicated about running it. If you're interested in using the PowerPoint file, let me know.
P.S. If you want to skip ahead to the cannons, the countdowns start soon after the cut at 9:27.
Also, you can see samples of a couple of earlier Piano Hero score projections here and here.
UPDATE: Thanks to the first commenter, I now realize that the video above does not contain the spelling corrections I made to the PowerPoint, post-performance. Oh well, that makes the video more accurate historically, since that's the spelling our audience saw. And, as regular visitors here should know, I like canons.
I have all sorts of great ideas running around in my head about various video/animation possibilities, but more and more I'm convinced that we tend to underestimate the best visual of all: the score itself. Not just in the sense that a score can be a beautiful thing to look at, although it can. Rather, following a score can be a wonderfully engaging way of hearing more deeply and insightfully, without generally becoming an end in itself. Since I'm a sightreader by nature, it makes sense that I might feel this way, but I've come to find that even the untrained eye/ear can get a kick out of watching as little black specks come to life.
I had an unexpectedly big success with this simple concept last month when our Piano Hero team was invited to participate in a campus-wide Homecoming faculty/staff/student talent show. For an audience of a thousand or so (I'm guessing at the number), three pianist colleagues and I played this arrangement of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. As we had done back in May for a modest Piano Hero audience, we asked the audience to be the cannon-firers - everyone was given paper bags suitable for inflating/exploding. Although we'd had fun using a student armed with pop-gun to signal the cannons back in May, in this case I decided to go with a PowerPoint slide show.
Part of the idea was that the PowerPoint could be used not only to cue the cannons, but also to provide all sorts of information about the themes as the music went along. I thought through several different ways to present the information, but it finally dawned on me that the score could be used as the basic visual backbone. This had the practical advantage that all I needed from the PowerPoint operator was someone who could read music, clicking at the end of each page. It turned out to be impractical to display the 8-hand piano arrangement because the parts don't line up with each other nicely, but since Piano Hero is all about sightreading AND recreating orchestral works via the piano, it seemed appropriate simply to use the orchestral score. [Part of the idea here is that, as with watching gamers play Guitar Hero or Rock Band, the audience gets to see what it is we're gunning for.]
Of course, following such a score takes some training and experience, but I used the old "highlight the leading instrument" approach to help with that; and, most importantly, since we had someone to take care of changing the slides at the right time, the viewer could always easily get back on track if lost. (By the way, I have a lot of affection for the "highlighted" score system; I've written before about an old Norton anthology that was big inspiration for me once upon a time, and I'm not sure I could have navigated it without the highlighted lines.)
The upshot of all this is that the performance was a HUGE success. I think we played fine, and it was certainly exciting to be up on stage (and hear a tremendous rustling of paper bags throughout), but I also think the success had a lot to do with 1) letting the audience participate in the performance, and 2) giving them something engaging to follow leading up to those cannons. I had so many people tell me how satisfying it felt to be able to "follow" a score, and the information about themes and the like that would usually get lost in program notes was presented in a way that people could hear immediately. I honestly think orchestras could have a lot of success with this kind of experiment.
And, in the interest of promoting my own last-minute laziness, I'd also suggest that the somewhat rough and improvised look of the slides (inconsistently sized staves, below-average resolution, hand-scrawled highlights, etc.) helps them to function more as catalysts for listening rather than as captivating visuals in their own right. I wish I hadn't misspelled cannon a couple of times (fixed in the video below), but even that might not have been such a bad thing. The bottom line is that the audience, not at all composed of classical music types, loved the whole experience in ways that surprised me and them.
So, here is what the PowerPoint looked like, more or less. The screen capture software I used to make this video doesn't do a great job with motion, so there are a few fade-in, fade-out moments when the video quality is much worse than what our audience saw. Also, there's one spot [3:26] where the score zooms up and in that looked much smoother in real life. Oh yeah, and in this case you don't get to hear our 8-handed piano sound - just a boring orchestra. (Thanks to the invaluable René Köhler and his National Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra.) Be sure to go full-screen to get the best effect.
Also, we did take a cut [at 9:27], so it's not quite the whole Tchaikovsky. As for the cannon countdowns, they do require a little more specific timing on the part of the slideshow operator, but there's certainly nothing very complicated about running it. If you're interested in using the PowerPoint file, let me know.
P.S. If you want to skip ahead to the cannons, the countdowns start soon after the cut at 9:27.
Also, you can see samples of a couple of earlier Piano Hero score projections here and here.
UPDATE: Thanks to the first commenter, I now realize that the video above does not contain the spelling corrections I made to the PowerPoint, post-performance. Oh well, that makes the video more accurate historically, since that's the spelling our audience saw. And, as regular visitors here should know, I like canons.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Alas, no submarines are featured in this exhibit...
Maybe I haven't been blogging so much, but I am featured in my first ever art exhibition, as you can sort of see above [click pic to enlarge]. I'm even listed as a composer, which is perhaps misleading, but it's the kind of misleading I could get used to. So, no, I did not write the little musical excerpt you see above (can you ID it?), although I did introduce it to Jim Zingarelli, who then went to work on it in ways I'll explain in a post yet to come. [One of Jim's fantastic paintings figured in a past post which anticipated some of the questions that came up in our collaboration.]I'm not much of an artist myself, although I have drawn my share of submarines and intersecting planes (geometrical, not aeronautical) while listening to various classroom lectures over the years. Still, it was lots of fun to rub shoulders with art types at the Opening on Saturday, and the experience of the collaboration has inspired all sorts of thoughts that I hope to blog about some day. For today, you just get the pretty picture above.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Chopin's Funeral March (with ghosts!)
Last night, while thinking about music I might use to frighten the trick-or-treaters, I posted on Twitter links to Horowitz playing the 3rd and 4th movements of Chopin's second piano sonata. The 3rd movement is perhaps the most famous funeral march ever written, but the ghostly 4th movement is even more harrowing - just frighteningly fast unison triplets played mostly at a deathly whisper, often described as "wind howling around the gravestones."
So, naturally, I accidentally opened both videos at the same time and another mashup possibility was born. (You can easily experiment yourself by playing the above videos simultaneously.) I think this one works particularly well, hearing the funeral march in the foreground with the 4th mvt providing an eerie backdrop. I tweaked the tempi just a bit to make things end satisfactorily, so here you go. If you'd like to see the actual score, you can go here (pp.15-20), although the 4th movement notes aren't much easier to follow even when they're sitting still on the page.
Previous MMmashups: Canon a 2 Tempi ~ Campanella Canon ~ The Rite of Appalachian Spring ~ Webern in Mayberry ~ Four Roses
| 3rd mvt | 4th mvt | |
So, naturally, I accidentally opened both videos at the same time and another mashup possibility was born. (You can easily experiment yourself by playing the above videos simultaneously.) I think this one works particularly well, hearing the funeral march in the foreground with the 4th mvt providing an eerie backdrop. I tweaked the tempi just a bit to make things end satisfactorily, so here you go. If you'd like to see the actual score, you can go here (pp.15-20), although the 4th movement notes aren't much easier to follow even when they're sitting still on the page.
Previous MMmashups: Canon a 2 Tempi ~ Campanella Canon ~ The Rite of Appalachian Spring ~ Webern in Mayberry ~ Four Roses
Saturday, October 31, 2009
When the Sun Comes Out
I've been mildly obsessed with Sibelius' Symphony No. 5 lately, partly due to rereading Alex Ross's The Rest is Noise, a book which I'm having a class read and which has a wonderful chapter on Sibelius. I came across this video of a performance in which a J.M.W. Turner painting (I think it's Turner) is slowly unveiled behind the stage at the first big climax (about 2:25 into the video). Although I think music should certainly be given a chance to speak for itself as a general rule, I find this quite effective. It does a good job of cuing the listener to the magnificence of the moment without being so visually engaging that the music becomes mere soundtrack.
If you don't know this inspiring work, be sure to stick around for the stunning conclusion.
See also: Seeing Music & Music as Image/Image as Music
P.S. I should add that it's not 100% clear whether or not the Turner image was just added to the video post-performance, but I suspect audiences would enjoy this kind of thing live.
If you don't know this inspiring work, be sure to stick around for the stunning conclusion.
See also: Seeing Music & Music as Image/Image as Music
P.S. I should add that it's not 100% clear whether or not the Turner image was just added to the video post-performance, but I suspect audiences would enjoy this kind of thing live.
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