All Carter, All The Time

Wow. So, I am all for celebrating important figures in music--even those whose music I don't particularly care for--but THIS just seems so far over the top I can barely stand it!

I mean, yes, Eliot Carter is 100 years old. And yes, that's something special. And yes, he is an important composer, many would argue. But really? 10 concerts in 4 days? Really?! That seems like the kind of thing that almost no human being on earth could tolerate; even the composer himself!

Now, I am not trying to be all down on Carter's music. It is true, that his thing is not my thing, but that's not the point. Carter is clearly a bad-ass, and he is fully deserving of a centennial celebration. Really, the issue here is with the programming. This is a lot of music by one person to hear in so short a time.

I always look forward to seeing what's on the docket for the Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music each summer. Mostly, I find that it's not quite my thing--it often leaning toward the Carter end of the spectrum--but I still like finding out about composers I hadn't known before, and occasionally hearing something really fantastic. (And when I was a fellow there I heard performances that changed my life, for sure!) But this is really disappointing to me in that regard. It's just so monochromatic, in a way. (No pun intended.)

Oh well, good thing there is some diversity going on elsewhere in the region around the same time. I'll be there, you can be sure, and not long after will be playing a special summer show with Newspeak here. So if you aren't in the mood for ten million hours of Mr. Carter's music, you should come to one or both of those. At least there is still a reason to get out of the city and hit the Berkshires!

Whew! I was afraid my seersucker would have to go unworn this summer!

May 1st: No Peace No Work!

EM just sent me a great story about west coast dock workers who are sick of this war--along with 81 percent of Americans--and are doing something about it. The article says: "The (union's) motion (to protest) called (the war) an imperial action for oil in which the lives of working-class youth and Iraqi civilians were being wasted and declared May Day a "no peace, no work" holiday. Angered after supporting Democrats who received a mandate to end the war but who now continue to fund it, longshoremen decided to exercise their political power on the docks."

Right on. It's nice to see that normal people are getting involved in this, the way it ought to be. It's one thing when you see a bunch of feel-good hippies protesting the war, or east coast intelligentsia, but these are dock workers! Straight up dock workers. Right on! As they say above, these folks have political power, and know how to use it.

The other thing that I find interesting though, is that this extends beyond party politics. These folks are upset with the Democrats, and rightfully so! Could this be the straw the breaks the camel's back? Could this be end beginning of the end of the two-party system? John thinks so. I'll reserve judgement.

I have a couple of fears about this event, however. Mainly: government's don't like their docks closed. And you can see what they do the people who try to stop them here. (Thanks to FR for sending that along!) Will the government bring out the tear gas and water cannons, or this terrifying thing? Maybe it will all be peaceful: the president will invoke the Taft-Hartley Act, and everyone will go back to work. But what if they don't? What if they won't?

I don't know. Something tells me if this gets to a level seen in the video above, there will be a lot more people upset about it then when they lock up hippies. (Hell, I'd like to lock up a hippies every now and then!) Longshoreman are the people. I think it's hard to argue that point. Hippies, Punks, whatever, are a cultural other. If you oppress the longshoremen, you oppress the people. And, from all I have seen--and based on the very founding of this country--the people don't like to be oppressed.

Though maybe I am wrong. The article goes on to say that "At the start of the war in Iraq, hundreds of protesters demonstrated on the Oakland docks, and longshoremen honored their picket lines. Without warning, police in riot gear opened fire with so-called less-than-lethal weapons, shooting protesters and longshoremen alike with wooden dowels, rubber bullets, pellet bags, concussion grenades and tear gas. A U.N. Human Rights Commission investigator characterized the Oakland police attack as "the most violent" against anti-war protesters in the United States." Were people up in arms then? Not that I can recall, no.

So it all comes down to solidarity, I guess. Who will stand with these workers? And who among them will refuse to yield? "There is power in a union," the song says, and "And injury to one, is an injury to all." But above all you need solidarity. Will all of this "all" stand together?

Indeed.

One Cold Dead Hand? Check.

Sorry. Is that horribly disrespectful? Probably. Sorry about that. But you know, someone had to say it, and I am sure I'm not the first, nor will I be the last.

Heston at a Civil Rights Rally, 1963
But yes, it's true. Charlton Heston is dead at 84. I mean, it's a sad thing of course, when people die and I am sorry for his family and loved ones. I am not so heartless, after all. (I mean, how could I be both heartless and bleeding-heart?) But with someone like Heston, who seems to have gone through a drastic political shift, one is almost forced to examine the situation with a certain degree of, um, distance. I think that there must have been some sort of major event in his life that caused him to make these drastic changes. But I'm not sure what it is. Let's look at the "facts" shall we?*

Before this mystery event, Heston:

Heston with Brando and Belafonte, Civil Rights Rally, 1963

* Campaigned for Stevenson in 1956 and JFK in 1960.
* Fought against segregation.
* Marched with Dr. King in 1963.
* Called for support for the Johnson Gun Control Act of 1968.
* Opposed the Vietnam War.

But then, something happened, and after this mystery event, he:

white men, white house, brown suits: the 80s
* Voted for Richard Nixon in 1972.
* Opposed affirmative action in the 1980s.
* Began to support "gun rights" ( "From My Cold Dead Hand")
* Spoke out against free speech in the Ice-T "Cop Killer" incident.
* Shifted from Democratic to Republican.
* Opposed reproductive rights.
* Campaigned for Reagan and both Bushes. (good job there, chief)

So, i mean. What is up with this?! I know that people change--I am thinking actually of the major change in composer George Rochberg's music after the death of his son--but this seems like a complete replacement of principles!

Thoughts here? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?


*(All of these "facts" were pulled from Wikipedia, so, you know, feel free to write with corrections and such, or check there for citations).

The (anti) King of the (anti) Avant-Garde?

Thanks to Alex for the kind words about my Still Life with Tank and iPod from Soldier Songs in a (by now semi-) recent interview in The Onion's A.V. Club. One of the on-line readers seemed to have a problem with the fact that my music was not avant enough, and decided to comment to that effect. Then, just now, I noticed that, on the wonderful On An Overgrown Path, the title caption for the blog reads "Avant-garde is French for bullshit. " The quotation is from John Lennon. To be honest, I sort of agree.

I'm not really a fan, I have to say. Most "avant-garde" music (whatever that even means anymore!) sort of makes me tired and/or gives me a headache. Not that I have a problem with other people liking it. I just don't like it, and frankly, I think that's fine. I find the avant-garde especially hard to take when one considers the problematic, often-elitist, and, according to Neil Nehring fear-based aesthetic judgments that walk hand-in-hand with that particular demarcation, especially when it is an avant-garde that stems from modernism. But we'll get to that another time. (Seriously, we will.)

But it was nice to get a little hate. (I mean, I usually get so much love all the time! ) A good friend (and apparently also my biographer!) suggested to me that it's just the tip of that iceberg, and I don't doubt it.

And speaking of John Lennon, did you all catch Matt Marks' super fantastic arrangement of The Beatles' Revolution No. 9 for Alarm Will Sound? I hope you did! It's really quite great. (Sorry, I know this is old news, but I've been pretty busy lately.) AWS is going to be playing it again at the Bang on a Can Marathon--which I will unfortunately have to miss--and hopefully many times more. You should be sure to catch it.

Matt is a really great musician who is responsible, in whole or in part, for many of my favorite things of late, often sharing awesomeness duty with another favorite among my collaborators.

Check him out.

Do it.

Valued Skill Set

Well, at least he can throw a baseball...



...actually, he doesn't even do that very well does he?


(You did notice that the crowd was booing, right?)

Bin ich ein Kritiker geworden?

So, last night, I had the opportunity to attend the New York Philharmonic's performance of Bach's St. Matthew Passion, under Kurt Masur. Overall, I would say it was a very good performance, but for a few really bad bits, all of which Anthony Tommasini nailed in his review of the previous evening's show. I am sorry so say those bits didn't improve for Thursday night's performance. Anyway, I had few thoughts on the evening, which I thought I would list here in no particular order.

* Bach is amazing. I know this is obvious. But unlike most amazing things, Bach is amazing at a level where you feel like you just have to say it aloud, as it is almost unbelievable. Then you pinch yourself to make sure you're not dreaming.

* Apparently Kurt Masur doesn't like to have to conduct. (At least this is what my friend Danielle reports. Danielle rocked as part of the überfantastisch Westminster Choir, and so was privy to rehearsals.) He'll be there to help if needed, but generally, the music should sort of play itself. And so, he won't conduct unless you make him conduct.

* Apparently the Bass-baritone really wanted Masur to conduct. At least it seemed this way based on what appeared to be a complete inability to count. (This was the NYPhil he was singing with, right? You'd think he would have practiced his part a little bit!) Anyway, the great part about this was to see Masur save the orchestra from a total train wreck by giving a huuuuge down beat and bringing the strings in a bar early. That bar wasn't really necessary anyway, right? Anyway, nice save Maestro!

* A Viola de Gamba, when not tuned, and poorly played, can make the New York Philharmonic sounds like a middle school orchestra from rural New Jersey. I have played in that middle school orchestra. It's not a sound you want to hear.

* Avery Fischer feels strangely Soviet to me. Is this weird? I walked in a felt like I was in Dresden, ca. 1972, just without the misery or the Stasi. Well, sorta.

* Matthias Goerne is a little creepy. I mean this is a good way, though. I kind of loved it.

* Kevin looks good in his new glasses.

* It was great to have a performance where, at any one time, no more than half of the musicians on stage were performing. This allowed for as strange sort of voyeurism, in which the audience got to watch very fine musicians listen. This was very interesting. More interesting was to see which members of the orchestra were moved to the point of physical movement, and which members just looked bored.

* Otherwise wonderful musical events are not improved when the woman sitting next to you insists on singing along with the Chorales at the ninth above the melody.

* Hightlights of the work for me, at least from last night: No. 39, Aria: Erbarme dich, mein Gott, No. 59, Recitative: Ach, Golgotha, unselges Golgotha, and No. 62, Chorale: Wenn ich einmal soll sheiden.

(dis)agree?

"Art...is not social only because it is brought about in such a way that it embodies the dialectic of forces and relations of production. Nor is art social only because it derives its material content from society. Rather it is social primarily because it stands opposed to society. Now this opposition art can mount only when it has become autonomous. By congealing into an entity unto itself—rather than obeying existing social norms and thus proving itself ‘socially useful’—art criticized society just by being there. (...) Art will live on only as long as it has the power to resist society. If it refuses to objectify itself, it becomes a commodity. What it contributes to society is not some directly communicable content, but some more mediate, i.e. resistance. (...) There is nothing in art that is directly social, not even when direct sociality is the artist’s express aim. (…) What is social in art is not its political stance, but its immanent dynamic in opposition to society. (…) If any social function can be ascribed to art at all, it is the function to have no function.”

-Adorno, Aesthetic Theory

So as you might suspect, I'm working on my dissertation. It's a theory of "socially engaged music." Apparently I am totally wrong about everything, according to Big Teddy up there. But then again, according to him my music and most of the music I love would be awful too, so whatever.

The problem here is that I don't really disagree with him. I disagree, however, with people who used this sort of thinking to call their music "political" when, in fact, they were just second-rate modernists. It's like: Yeah, sure, Mr. Modernist. Your music is political. Of course. I mean, after all it "stands opposed to society," right? So what more do you have to do? Just write some crap that sounds terrible. Call it "autonomous" and BAM! - you're an instant politico!

Now just to find a way to eloquently express my relatively subtle disagreement, without resorting to name calling...the big jerks.

5 Years Too Many.

Andrew Mamiotis, left, a Vietnam War protester, takes his 11 year-old son, Mikos to an Iraq war protest on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war in Chicago, Wednesday, March 19, 2008. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

Moral Certainty

Ebay sells the darndest things...

Easing back in...

So, I've been away for a while. Sorry. There's just really been little I wanted to post about, so I chose just not to. I know it's been tough, but it's okay. I'm back and will be posting more soon, including posts on nine inch nails, E-Z Pass, decadence, and, oh yeah, political music.

At any rate, I thought I would ease back into things by sharing an interesting passage from Jesse Green's review of the new Aldridge/Garfein opera "Elmer Gantry"--after Sinclair Lewis--which opens tomorrow at Montclair State University after a well-received run in Nashville. As a composer who is starting to write more and more in the "operatic" world--for lack of a better word--I found this passage quite illuminating.

"Writing an opera requires a certain amount of arrogance, and putting one on takes at least enough incompetence to cause producers to risk financial suicide. It’s tempting to say that the system as it now exists is designed to frustrate both qualities in favor of safe mediocrity, except that the system has no design at all."

- Jesse Green, NY TImes, January 20, 2008

Ah, that definitely makes me feel better.

RIP Patato

I was very saddened to read about the passing of legendary conguero Carlos Valdés, aka Patato. Patato was one of those figures who, as a drummer, you couldn't help but know about, even if the music that you played was the furthest thing from Latin jazz. He was a towering presence who played with, among others, Tito Puente, Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey and Elvin Jones. The world of percussion has lost one of its greats.

(photo by Martin Cohen, from www.lpmusic.com)

Panzon

In memory of the great muralist Diego Rivera, who died fifty years ago today, please spend some time exploring the Diego Rivera Web Museum .

(Photo by Carl Van Vechten)

On Evolution (Yes, that's right: Evolution)

So things have been really busy, and I have been traveling around a lot. It's been great, but has prevented me from having the sort of ruminations I'd have if I were staying at home and working. My latest travels have brought me to the one and only Austin, Texas, where on Monday Audio Inversions performed my descanso (waiting) to rave reviews, and tonight--in about an hour--the UT Wind Symphony will rock my über-cacophonous homage to home, East Coast Attitude.

It's been a great trip, overall, and I have had a chance to get caught up with old friends and see a bit of the Austin freak culture I have heard so much about. Keep Austin weird, indeed.

But today something happened which tainted the experience a little for me. After the dress rehearsal with the UT crew, I went over to the little museum that's right across the street. After about 45 minutes of checking out the old dinosaurs and assorted taxidermy mammals, I ended up on the evolution floor. Getting out of the elevator, I overheard a young boy ask the question: "Mom, what's evolution?"

Fair question I thought. He initially confused evolution with revolution, which I thought was really cute since I have been reading a whole bunch of revolutionary theory. (Nerdsville, totally.) The mother's ultimate answer--or really, non-answer-- troubled me, however.

"What's evolution?" she said, "Well, we don't believe in evolution. We know that God made everything." This was her answer. In a science museum, this was her answer! Why even pretend to educate our children by taking them to a museum and then give them an answer like that!?

Now, I don't care if people believe in creationism--fine, really, do what you want--but please, for the love of Pete, give a better answer than that when your kid asks what evolution is! She didn't even explain the idea of evolution, she just skipped right to the dismissal!

Some public schools teach creationism as "another theory," alongside evolution--in fact, in NJ it's required by law! In light of this, doesn't it only seem fair that a creationist could at least have the courtesy to say what evolution is before dismissing it?

I wanted to yell, as the elevator closed: "God sure did make everything; even evolution!" But then I remembered that it's legal to carry concealed weapons in Texas, so I decided to keep my big Yankee mouth shut. I head back to the cold New York area tomorrow morning, and am looking forward to its snarky charms.