This was one of my favourite movies when I was a kid. It's a Swedish 'Neverending Story' of sorts. My sister got a set of pan pipes just so we could play the theme tune. It's so funny how in the last variation on the theme in the video it just goes through loads of funky key changes. What's not to love?
30 December 2015
23 December 2015
The Hillcrest Club - Breakfast at Christmas
...Who are the Hillrest Club? Has anyone heard of them?
Happy Christmas!
11 December 2015
Field Hymns Records
I cannot for the life of me find out how to embed Bandcamp links in posts. but you can find the link to the Field Hymns label here.It's a really intriguing little label, probably because so many of the releases cite early tape music and synth pioneers as influences. One of the artists, Foton, is actually the person behind Curd Lake who I posted about earlier this year. That's their album art below.
28 November 2015
Free talks by Pauline Oliveros, Morton Subotnick and others (LCMF 2015)
This year at the London Contemporary Music Festival there will be a few free talks on 12th and 13th December with, among other speakers, Pauline Oliveros and Morton Subotnick. (!!!) It's happening alongside the 'West Coast Night' which will feature compositions from the San Francisco Tape Music Centre. Pretty cool. (more info here)
However, a tiny note of caution is due about these kinds of events: they can be either completely mind-blowing or completely anticlimactic. The last time I went to an evening dedicated to mostly minimalist music, held at Café OTO earlier this year, it was definitely the latter experience. The highlight of the night was supposed to be a performance of Terry Riley's 'In C'. A massive orchestra assembled, a Moog Voyager was placed proudly in the center -- it certainly looked like it would be exciting.
As it happened my idea of what was to follow was very vague, and little did I expect that my main thought for the whole pain-staking 45 minutes (and 57 seconds) would be "this is time I will never get back". Those were actually the very first words my sister said me to me when we were out of earshot of my friend, who was really enthusiastic about the whole thing, and who had taken us to Café OTO in the first place. Incidentally the Moog was used about once every 10 minutes solely to play a drone note; one could ask, very rightly, how it is possible to use such an innovative instrument so unninovatively. Of course, everyone is entitled to their own opinion but, more importantly, everyone is entitled to their informed opinion. So my personal informed opinion is that sometimes experimental music can feel a little too understated when played live. Though perhaps everything changes when the composer plays his/her own pieces themself, which wasn't the case at Café OTO.
At any rate, the LCMF talks are bound to be interesting. And they're free!
However, a tiny note of caution is due about these kinds of events: they can be either completely mind-blowing or completely anticlimactic. The last time I went to an evening dedicated to mostly minimalist music, held at Café OTO earlier this year, it was definitely the latter experience. The highlight of the night was supposed to be a performance of Terry Riley's 'In C'. A massive orchestra assembled, a Moog Voyager was placed proudly in the center -- it certainly looked like it would be exciting.
As it happened my idea of what was to follow was very vague, and little did I expect that my main thought for the whole pain-staking 45 minutes (and 57 seconds) would be "this is time I will never get back". Those were actually the very first words my sister said me to me when we were out of earshot of my friend, who was really enthusiastic about the whole thing, and who had taken us to Café OTO in the first place. Incidentally the Moog was used about once every 10 minutes solely to play a drone note; one could ask, very rightly, how it is possible to use such an innovative instrument so unninovatively. Of course, everyone is entitled to their own opinion but, more importantly, everyone is entitled to their informed opinion. So my personal informed opinion is that sometimes experimental music can feel a little too understated when played live. Though perhaps everything changes when the composer plays his/her own pieces themself, which wasn't the case at Café OTO.
At any rate, the LCMF talks are bound to be interesting. And they're free!
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25 November 2015
17 November 2015
.... Featuring a kaleidoscope that my mum gave me on my tenth birthday and music by the inimitable Alexey Rybnikov. This particular excerpt is from an old animation of Comet in Moominland, based on a book by Tove Jansson.
Update: have only just realised how atrocious the video quality is... My advice - don't try full screen.
17 October 2015
Just another Radiophonic reminiscence
Special Sound: The Creation and Legacy of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop by Louis Niebur was my first proper cover-to-cover read of a book in the electronic music field. Like anything it has more and less successful aspects, but generally it provides just the right level of detail -- just enough to understand the inner workings of the RW, the people involved and its general development over time. Occasionally the book slips into cinema lingo that isn't really of interest to musicians; is it really necessary, for example, to know the definition of terms such as "acousmetre" and "synchresis"? I'd have much preferred some more in-depth information about how the music was actually produced rather than long analyses of its effects and functions on British TV.
Username: Music2
Password: Book4416
The "Cloud Burst" excerpt featuring music by Roger Limb is definitely a favourite (see 5.1 of the Video section). It's perfectly representative of that time in the early 70s when the RW was at its prime because at long last it was not being held back by shortages of equipment and funding. And when I say "at its prime" I mean the Workshop at large. In terms of individual achievement Delia's work in the 60s is always going to beat anything produced later, in my opinion. Incidentally the excerpts from Amor Dei (3.7-3.9 of Audio), mostly done by Delia in 1964, are also quite unqiue in that they shed light on her working process. It's almost unthinkable how the voice of a solitary boy soprano (3.7) became the formless and ethereal swell of voices in 3.9.
Still, there are several really neat things about this book, one of which is that it's linked to a website which has some rare audio and video examples; these are then used as a basis for explanation and analysis in the book itself. The website is password-protected, which is strange considering it's possible to view both username and password on the first page of any preview from Google Books or Amazon. With that in mind, I hope no one kills me if I share the website and login details (which are the same for every copy of the book)
www.oup.com/us/specialsoundUsername: Music2
Password: Book4416
The "Cloud Burst" excerpt featuring music by Roger Limb is definitely a favourite (see 5.1 of the Video section). It's perfectly representative of that time in the early 70s when the RW was at its prime because at long last it was not being held back by shortages of equipment and funding. And when I say "at its prime" I mean the Workshop at large. In terms of individual achievement Delia's work in the 60s is always going to beat anything produced later, in my opinion. Incidentally the excerpts from Amor Dei (3.7-3.9 of Audio), mostly done by Delia in 1964, are also quite unqiue in that they shed light on her working process. It's almost unthinkable how the voice of a solitary boy soprano (3.7) became the formless and ethereal swell of voices in 3.9.
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