The great pianist-arranger-composer
Clare Fischer has died. Besides being a mean pianist who even Herbie Hancock called a huge influence, very few could claim the achievements of this man, who worked with everyone from Dizzy Gillespie, the Hi-Los and other jazzmen to Prince, Rufus and Chaka Khan, Paul McCartney, Prince, and so many more.
posted by Seekerofsplendor
on Jan 28, 2012 -
9 comments
“Our souls are worn down through continuous contact with one another,” Sibelius wrote in his diary. And: “I am building a studio for myself—at least one. Next to me are all the children whose babbling and pranks ruin everything.” But he never did build himself a studio; instead, he relocated his study upstairs and forbade the noise of any instrument while he was in the house. The children had to wait until he had gone for his daily walk to do their music practice. [more inside]
posted by smcg
on Dec 13, 2011 -
16 comments
Brian Eno - Composers as Gardeners "My topic is the shift from 'architect' to 'gardener', where 'architect' stands for 'someone who carries a full picture of the work before it is made', to 'gardener' standing for 'someone who plants seeds and waits to see exactly what will come up'. I will argue that today's composer are more frequently 'gardeners' than 'architects' and, further, that the 'composer as architect' metaphor was a transitory historical blip."
Brian Eno quoted from
Edge.org issue
11.10.11
posted by ThenCameNow
on Nov 13, 2011 -
40 comments
What then happens is an unbelievable series of Kafkaesque email threads, out-of-office messages, invented holidays, bizarre threats, secret handshakes. If you’re lucky, and very very persistent, you might end up with a CD of it, along with a note saying that “this never happened” and “don’t tell anybody you have this.” Nico Muhly on the difficulty of
listening to one's own work.
posted by villanelles at dawn
on Sep 10, 2011 -
11 comments
While the self-appointed task of one creative act per day continues to exist, I present the sonic explorations of
Clang Jingle Clang . Highlights of Kerrith Livengood's early morning posts include a
Goomba attack, political
musings, and a fable from
Aesop.
posted by Bistle
on Jan 14, 2011 -
2 comments
The “LSER” is a response to longstanding requests from subscription holders for a faster mode of self-ejection from the concert hall...The LSER will be a particularly comforting addition to the concert-going experience for patrons anxious about contemporary music, as in the case next month when music director Alan Gilbert will present “Le Grand Macabre” by the twentieth century master György Ligeti.
NY Philharmonic to install new Speedy Exit Ramp. via
Hell Mouth, the blog of
John Adams.
[more inside]
posted by Lutoslawski
on May 13, 2010 -
22 comments
Partituras - Hundreds of perfectly scanned "classical" music scores (and parts) in PDF. Chose a composer from the pop-up menu in the middle of the page to browse the available works by that composer.
posted by persona non grata
on Sep 21, 2006 -
19 comments
Classic Cat describes itself as "the free classical music directory," and offers links to 3rd-party-hosted downloadable recordings, sliced and diced by
hits,
composer,
performer, and
more. There are active
fora. Given the old-school look of the site, I was surprised not to find it in my repost search.
posted by mwhybark
on Feb 13, 2005 -
13 comments
The Song Is You: If
ever there was
a perfect singer - and I do mean
perfect - it was
Ella Fitzgerald. Her
Songbooks (
please scroll down for the listings and samples) are still - and will
always be - the best collection there is of the great American standards. That is, if you don't mind crying and having the little hairs on the nape of your neck stand up and revolt. And
swing. They'd be the last
records objects I'd be willing to part with: they're the mother's milk of
American Western popular culture. So imagine my surprise when I found their perfect counterpart on the Web: the best-ever collection of lyrics to the songs of the greatest American composers: Harold Arlen, Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Duke Ellington and Richard Rodgers. Admirably, the compiler has gone way beyond his duty and included wonderful standards (quite a few unknown to me) that even Ella never got around to singing. Thank you,
Todd. And God bless you, Sir!
posted by MiguelCardoso
on Sep 22, 2003 -
26 comments
Bernard Herrmann: I've always loved Bernard Herrmann's music (symphonic or film) but I didn't know until this afternoon that he was responsible for the two most recognizable bars of music in the last 30 years: the theme for The Twilight Zone.
posted by realjanetkagan
on Sep 10, 2002 -
8 comments
Was Richard Rodgers The Greatest American Popular Composer So Far? 2002 is his Centennial. He may be less cool and more bourgeois than the other greats like Harold
Arlen, Irving
Berlin, George
Gershwin, Jerome
Kern, Frank
Loesser, Cole
Porter and Stephen
Sondheim. But even the most cursory look at the long list of the wonderful songs he wrote(try the excellent
song search feature), with
Hart, then
Hammerstein(and some other lyricists, including himself)makes it very difficult to deny there never was - and probably never will be - a more talented and versatile tunesmith. Miles Davis was right. He
was a genius. And yet...[
Flash required for the (interesting) intro]
posted by MiguelCardoso
on Apr 18, 2002 -
41 comments
