Once again some interesting selections, for various reasons.
Starting with the required listening excerpts, "St. Louis Blues" is of course known to many. What I found most interesting in this selection was the insight that the text gave into the era in which it was released, revealing that until many songs were both published and recorded, a tune might have many possible variations as opposed to one or two versions being considered the standard. Seeing how both Handy's published music combined with artistic license was taken with Bessie Smith to create the version in which we consider the most "authentic" is quite interesting. Also hearing Louis Armstrong again just helps to cement in my mind his legacy in that time period, for he seems to be on quite a few of the recordings we as a class are blessed to be listening to.
I liked the Fletcher Henderson piece if only because of how much it showed his impact on the rise of swing, especially since I never remember hearing his name before. Going on to see how his arrangements were so central in many other groups, like the very next piece with Benny Goodman (one of my all time favorites as a clarinet player), was quite eye opening for me. His style fits right in with all the other examples, though the sound is a little more rough and nasal as opposed to the more rounded fullness of other examples in the era, like the Benny Goodman piece. What I was mildly surprised at in "Taking a Chance on Love" was Benny Goodman's tone. It was a little more open and less refined than I remember on other recordings, yet still not once loosing the polished control of a master I have always idolized. In "Paper Doll," a piece I do not believe I remember hearing before, I still found myself thinking I've heard it before. Maybe because it has been used somewhere in the background of a commercial or movie. Maybe because it has elements of form and harmony that sound sentimental and invoke the thought that I'm supposed to recognize it, even if I have never heard it before. I know there are other pieces described in the text meant to portray such feeling, but I was not expecting it with the group by the Mills Brothers. After reading the text analysis first, I was also expecting a different sound, more like in "Black Snake Moan." Evening looking back at the era years and years later, with the, I find myself falling into the trap of stereotyping.
As for the other required piece, "In the Mood" also surprised me for two reasons. First, I never believe I have heard cow bell in that piece near the end before! How is it when we have period recordings like this and I have never heard or played it like that before? Secondly, the background riff of the saxophones was not nearly as accented as I have been drilled to perform it. I find it perplexing that such a standard chart can have been modified so drastically by the majority of ensembles playing it today while attempting to be authentic.
The first of the elective listen I did was, as you may have guessed, "Black Snake Moan." I chose it simply because of watching the movie some years back, and wanting to know what music inspired the title of that film. The song, in all its grittiness, did not disappoint. I did not seem to mind the irregular and sometimes absent sense of a beat, in fact I hardly noticed it begin so enthralled with the imagery and feeling evoked by Blind Lemon Jefferson.
I also listened to Jimmie Rodgers sing "Blue Yodel No. 2" and was struck with how familiar with the yodel sound was to a song in the movie "O Brother, Where Art Thou" and after some research quickly discovered that the track I was thinking of entitled "In the Jailhouse Now" was written by Blind Blake and, you guessed it, Jimmie Rodgers! The style and pitches used in the yodel was almost the same a couple times.
Listening to "Caravan" I was surprised at how mysterious this version one was compared to version I have heard and played in the past that were much more "in your face." Other versions I have done have the percussion section, and I mean a full section, playing and much more robust and consistently on every beat driving pattern instead of this more every other beat pulsation demonstrated in this recording. "New San Antonio Rose" did not sound like what I expected at first, but when the vocals entered it began to take shape. I guess I just did not have a good mental construct of what to expect from western swing, with so many musical elements and style converging to make this piece come to life. The semi-mariachi style trumpet line was unexpected, even using the text analysis as a guide, and the rhythmic groove that was established while still having elements of big band swing was quite unique. The final selection I listened to was "Brazil" which made me feel like I should be in a Vegas showroom, but I enjoyed hearing this early version.
Wednesday, January 22, 2014
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Listening Journal Week 2
Once again an interesting week of listening examples to review.
Though the recording quality of "Castle House Rag" was not stellar, it provided insight into to early days of recording. To put yourself back into that era as a listener it poses interesting questions like how much interpretation did particular listeners do internally while listening to recorded music like this? Did they mentally change the sound to reflect what they assumed it would sound like before hearing it live? Did those who never had a chance to hear music like this live before the mass movement to urban areas have the conceptualizations do even to this? An obviously upbeat and energetic song, I can easily see how this song, in addition to the others in Europe's repetiore could have helped propel this group to popularity. I listened to some other versions including this one by the Crown Syncopators, just so I could get a better feel for what the bass, harmony, and percussion lines were really about since in Europe's recording the percussion was very "boomy" that just stewed everything together burying most of the other lines the majority of the time, especially the bass and harmony lines. This provided a nice clear version to pick out the numerous lines, though most in this version are covered by the piano. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghMBChYGgbA
This interesting version provides another era recording that seems a little clearer, thus making it more of a nice middle ground recording, and it is just a fun listen, you'll see why... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldIxu4XYtLk
I've always enjoyed "Tiger Rag" but this recording opened my eyes a little about the racial segregation of the times and how some groups claiming to be authentic, proclaiming so even within their own group name (the Original Dixieland Jazz Band), while actually providing a slightly watered down version of the product they were peddling to get audiences to support them. Hearing "dipper Mouth Blues" by the Creole Jazz Band and King Joe Oliver was a great compliment in the text to show some of the difference, and I admittedly learned something new in the readings this week when I discovered that he was a mentor to a young Louis Armstrong. Hearing Louis in his early days where he was not the leader and hearing the proficiency of his mentor was fascinating to me.
I feel I have heard "East St. Louis Toodle-Oo" before (it's a song that is pretty hard to forget in my estimation with it's unique trumpet growl and somber mysterious feel), but as someone not familiar with jazz, I cannot recall exactly where. I feel as though it might have been in a movie sometime...
The listening examples that helped explained the very simplistic form of Tin Pan Alley songs and demonstrated some early crooners starting with Gene Austin were also enlightening. I find it surprising, even in the age in which he became popular, that he reached the level of success that he did, when by today's standards his vocal skill would be considered average. The clarity of the recording helped I have no doubt, as did his skill to use the relatively new microphone. I find that this trend continues on today, where substandard performers gain enormous popularity just because they know how to market themselves or the producers help them to introduce something new and innovative to audiences, and as long as the quality is "good enough" than the gullible will crave more.
In comparison, I can easily see how Bing Crosby, with the team of Irving Berlin, would gain popularity. A noticeable step up, he was much more elegant with his vocal prowess, adding nuances that are still appreciated today. Maybe it was the result of audiences becoming more educated through Austin's many recordings, that they were ready and able to appreciate Crosby's skill more, but that would not explain why we still go through similar situations in music today. I am not trying to downplay the importance of being a good entertainer, for I find that to be an integral part of performing music, but it still confounds me that this trend of average musical talent becoming so successful.
As for the last two (though one is doubled) recordings of "April Showers" and "I Got Rhythm," I thoroughly enjoyed both. "April Showers" to show how performers (or at least those with ambition) try to reinvent themselves or their songs, or keep things the same because that's what their audiences want. Using the innovation of the microphone to "spice" an old tune up, just a little, I believe is a work of genius, and a process that continues to this day, though today many groups go the other way and perform acoustically, without electronic enhancement, to create the new flavor to their old standards. In both tunes, it is very easy to see how very simple, yet preplanned techniques of syncopation and form, can help to create memorable songs that will appeal to large audiences. This can be very useful in teaching composition to students, and for the upcoming song writing project in this class. These are techniques that I have noticed in many songs I have been listening to on the radio and in this class. AABA form, or a variant of it, is everywhere! One cannot seem to escape Tin Pan Alley song form in popular music, even today, so I would be remiss to ignore that fact when working with students and composing songs myself.
I said it last week and I'll say it again. I hope that all the future listening assignments in upcoming weeks are as interesting as these last two have been, because I certainly believe I am learning a lot, and I find it extremely interesting!
Though the recording quality of "Castle House Rag" was not stellar, it provided insight into to early days of recording. To put yourself back into that era as a listener it poses interesting questions like how much interpretation did particular listeners do internally while listening to recorded music like this? Did they mentally change the sound to reflect what they assumed it would sound like before hearing it live? Did those who never had a chance to hear music like this live before the mass movement to urban areas have the conceptualizations do even to this? An obviously upbeat and energetic song, I can easily see how this song, in addition to the others in Europe's repetiore could have helped propel this group to popularity. I listened to some other versions including this one by the Crown Syncopators, just so I could get a better feel for what the bass, harmony, and percussion lines were really about since in Europe's recording the percussion was very "boomy" that just stewed everything together burying most of the other lines the majority of the time, especially the bass and harmony lines. This provided a nice clear version to pick out the numerous lines, though most in this version are covered by the piano. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghMBChYGgbA
This interesting version provides another era recording that seems a little clearer, thus making it more of a nice middle ground recording, and it is just a fun listen, you'll see why... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldIxu4XYtLk
I've always enjoyed "Tiger Rag" but this recording opened my eyes a little about the racial segregation of the times and how some groups claiming to be authentic, proclaiming so even within their own group name (the Original Dixieland Jazz Band), while actually providing a slightly watered down version of the product they were peddling to get audiences to support them. Hearing "dipper Mouth Blues" by the Creole Jazz Band and King Joe Oliver was a great compliment in the text to show some of the difference, and I admittedly learned something new in the readings this week when I discovered that he was a mentor to a young Louis Armstrong. Hearing Louis in his early days where he was not the leader and hearing the proficiency of his mentor was fascinating to me.
I feel I have heard "East St. Louis Toodle-Oo" before (it's a song that is pretty hard to forget in my estimation with it's unique trumpet growl and somber mysterious feel), but as someone not familiar with jazz, I cannot recall exactly where. I feel as though it might have been in a movie sometime...
The listening examples that helped explained the very simplistic form of Tin Pan Alley songs and demonstrated some early crooners starting with Gene Austin were also enlightening. I find it surprising, even in the age in which he became popular, that he reached the level of success that he did, when by today's standards his vocal skill would be considered average. The clarity of the recording helped I have no doubt, as did his skill to use the relatively new microphone. I find that this trend continues on today, where substandard performers gain enormous popularity just because they know how to market themselves or the producers help them to introduce something new and innovative to audiences, and as long as the quality is "good enough" than the gullible will crave more.
In comparison, I can easily see how Bing Crosby, with the team of Irving Berlin, would gain popularity. A noticeable step up, he was much more elegant with his vocal prowess, adding nuances that are still appreciated today. Maybe it was the result of audiences becoming more educated through Austin's many recordings, that they were ready and able to appreciate Crosby's skill more, but that would not explain why we still go through similar situations in music today. I am not trying to downplay the importance of being a good entertainer, for I find that to be an integral part of performing music, but it still confounds me that this trend of average musical talent becoming so successful.
As for the last two (though one is doubled) recordings of "April Showers" and "I Got Rhythm," I thoroughly enjoyed both. "April Showers" to show how performers (or at least those with ambition) try to reinvent themselves or their songs, or keep things the same because that's what their audiences want. Using the innovation of the microphone to "spice" an old tune up, just a little, I believe is a work of genius, and a process that continues to this day, though today many groups go the other way and perform acoustically, without electronic enhancement, to create the new flavor to their old standards. In both tunes, it is very easy to see how very simple, yet preplanned techniques of syncopation and form, can help to create memorable songs that will appeal to large audiences. This can be very useful in teaching composition to students, and for the upcoming song writing project in this class. These are techniques that I have noticed in many songs I have been listening to on the radio and in this class. AABA form, or a variant of it, is everywhere! One cannot seem to escape Tin Pan Alley song form in popular music, even today, so I would be remiss to ignore that fact when working with students and composing songs myself.
I said it last week and I'll say it again. I hope that all the future listening assignments in upcoming weeks are as interesting as these last two have been, because I certainly believe I am learning a lot, and I find it extremely interesting!
Saturday, January 11, 2014
Listening Journal Week 1
This was a fascinating introduction to American popular music! So much of the listening helped to provoke very interesting ideas that I would have never expected.
Take "Long John" by Lightening Washington and fellow convicts for instance. I and countless other American children have been taught about work songs being tied to African American slavery, to include imagery about heading to freedom, many times tied to religious connotations and in turn conveyed many similar aspects and sometimes probably synonymous to black spirituals as described by Starr/Waterman. The scene being depicted could be interchanged between slave and prisoner, since those two terms are so much alike in themselves, and that is what strikes me. To ignore this fact is not something I ever consciously did, but I never really connected this before at the forefront of my mind, and it immediately grabbed my interest in listening when reading the analysis in the text, partly due to the fact that the example of a work song had been done at a prison. Recording did not exist at the height of slavery, and even though sharecroppers were around after the invention of the phonograph, it seems poignant to me that this example exists to show how the style continued to thrive, with little evolution, over such a period of time.
Another point that is prominent after doing the required listening is the stark difference between recordings of the same tune. Take "Soldier's Joy" from the old time music section. The regularity of the Skillet Lickers performance (with a bass line and clearly defined sections not to mention the added vocal line) in contrast to the much more almost slurred version (due to only being one instrument) of Tommy Jarrell was more profound than I was expecting going through the listening from one to the next, despite having read the text analysis direct before listening to each one. After listening to the Skillet Lickers version I found myself envisioning an arrangement for my small woodwind group, for it's upbeat and fun, but could also be utilized in unique ways when my ensembles goes to do school performances to do educational outreach, where we are expected not only to entertain, but to provide multiple facets of musical value for the students to learn beyond just showing skill as a performer. Then there are the two versions of "La Cumparsita" where I discovered that I recognized the tune only after beginning the audio for the Fransisco Canaro instrumental version. That is the version I have grown up considering to be the tango style. It was so eye-opening to discover that the version by Carlos Gardel was so indicative of early tango performance.
I was very intrigued by hearing mariachi performance of "La Negra," which I believe would be extremely useful in the instruction of "La Fiesta Mexicana" by H.Owen Reed for concert band. The third movement "Carnival" (after a few minutes) goes directly into a similar version of the tune and in this example it would seem that the director made sure to try and get the student to implement a more authentic performance in accordance to style from the gritos (yells) that are used and heavy use of wide vibrato by the trumpets. Start at about 16:05 in the recording https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EviV1lvCTi0 to see this in action. Did he play an original version of the song for the students first? That is unknown, but if I were to get back up in front of a concert band of high school students studying this piece for performance, I believe using this original version as performed by Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitian would be extremely useful, in addition to using more realistic techniques of the study of popular music, avid listening and imitation, regardless of the fact this may not be considered popular music today.
"Jeanie With the Light Brown Hair" was revelatory simply because of its connection to the television show I Dream of Jeannie. I honestly assumed before listening to this song that the television theme would have utilized more musical elements and motives even if drastically changed to the original. After intent listening it seems as if there are a couple moments when the original may have influences the theme but only for a few extremely short arpeggiated sections where diminution was utilized in the theme. With so very little to latch onto though in terms of musical material, I might just be imagining it and looking for something that is not there. It might very well be that the only similarity is the use of the first line as the name of the show.
Of the rest of the listening: Old Time Music ("Barbary Allen"), "Coo Coo," "Stack O'lee," "Enigue Nigue," and "After the Ball," the only one that I felt more than just a superficial appreciation of was "Barbary Allen." I found it obvious how much English influence there was in the piece through the British ballad tradition, but I could readily make out through the use of dialect how it has been adapted over time. I also agree with the text in which it describes her tone as "beautiful, and haunting" though I am not sure I concur with the description of "unaffected." There are moments when I heard very subtle slight distortions in her tone. This is not a bad thing however, I found it to be quite necessary in order to comply to the quintessential American style that she (and others) had adapted the song to.
If all the upcoming weeks of this class contain such interesting content in both the reading and the listening, this should prove to be a very interesting, fun, and enlightening course!
Take "Long John" by Lightening Washington and fellow convicts for instance. I and countless other American children have been taught about work songs being tied to African American slavery, to include imagery about heading to freedom, many times tied to religious connotations and in turn conveyed many similar aspects and sometimes probably synonymous to black spirituals as described by Starr/Waterman. The scene being depicted could be interchanged between slave and prisoner, since those two terms are so much alike in themselves, and that is what strikes me. To ignore this fact is not something I ever consciously did, but I never really connected this before at the forefront of my mind, and it immediately grabbed my interest in listening when reading the analysis in the text, partly due to the fact that the example of a work song had been done at a prison. Recording did not exist at the height of slavery, and even though sharecroppers were around after the invention of the phonograph, it seems poignant to me that this example exists to show how the style continued to thrive, with little evolution, over such a period of time.
Another point that is prominent after doing the required listening is the stark difference between recordings of the same tune. Take "Soldier's Joy" from the old time music section. The regularity of the Skillet Lickers performance (with a bass line and clearly defined sections not to mention the added vocal line) in contrast to the much more almost slurred version (due to only being one instrument) of Tommy Jarrell was more profound than I was expecting going through the listening from one to the next, despite having read the text analysis direct before listening to each one. After listening to the Skillet Lickers version I found myself envisioning an arrangement for my small woodwind group, for it's upbeat and fun, but could also be utilized in unique ways when my ensembles goes to do school performances to do educational outreach, where we are expected not only to entertain, but to provide multiple facets of musical value for the students to learn beyond just showing skill as a performer. Then there are the two versions of "La Cumparsita" where I discovered that I recognized the tune only after beginning the audio for the Fransisco Canaro instrumental version. That is the version I have grown up considering to be the tango style. It was so eye-opening to discover that the version by Carlos Gardel was so indicative of early tango performance.
I was very intrigued by hearing mariachi performance of "La Negra," which I believe would be extremely useful in the instruction of "La Fiesta Mexicana" by H.Owen Reed for concert band. The third movement "Carnival" (after a few minutes) goes directly into a similar version of the tune and in this example it would seem that the director made sure to try and get the student to implement a more authentic performance in accordance to style from the gritos (yells) that are used and heavy use of wide vibrato by the trumpets. Start at about 16:05 in the recording https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EviV1lvCTi0 to see this in action. Did he play an original version of the song for the students first? That is unknown, but if I were to get back up in front of a concert band of high school students studying this piece for performance, I believe using this original version as performed by Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitian would be extremely useful, in addition to using more realistic techniques of the study of popular music, avid listening and imitation, regardless of the fact this may not be considered popular music today.
"Jeanie With the Light Brown Hair" was revelatory simply because of its connection to the television show I Dream of Jeannie. I honestly assumed before listening to this song that the television theme would have utilized more musical elements and motives even if drastically changed to the original. After intent listening it seems as if there are a couple moments when the original may have influences the theme but only for a few extremely short arpeggiated sections where diminution was utilized in the theme. With so very little to latch onto though in terms of musical material, I might just be imagining it and looking for something that is not there. It might very well be that the only similarity is the use of the first line as the name of the show.
Of the rest of the listening: Old Time Music ("Barbary Allen"), "Coo Coo," "Stack O'lee," "Enigue Nigue," and "After the Ball," the only one that I felt more than just a superficial appreciation of was "Barbary Allen." I found it obvious how much English influence there was in the piece through the British ballad tradition, but I could readily make out through the use of dialect how it has been adapted over time. I also agree with the text in which it describes her tone as "beautiful, and haunting" though I am not sure I concur with the description of "unaffected." There are moments when I heard very subtle slight distortions in her tone. This is not a bad thing however, I found it to be quite necessary in order to comply to the quintessential American style that she (and others) had adapted the song to.
If all the upcoming weeks of this class contain such interesting content in both the reading and the listening, this should prove to be a very interesting, fun, and enlightening course!
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