click here to hear Oh, Was He Still Around? I confess - the title was my first thought upon hearing about the death of György Ligeti.Copyright © June 13, 2006 by David Ocker - 42 seconds
I've been finding some interesting online reading about composers.
Alex Ross wrote this fascinating article in the New Yorker entitled American Sublime. It's about Morton Feldman. (Alas, even Ross refers to John Cage's piece 4'33" as the "silent piece" - it's not silent, but it is a piece of music in which the performer makes no sound. A previous Mixed Meters article about 4'33" is here.)
Next are two links which didn't fit into the long delayed Mixed Meters post entitled "Varèse, Zappa & Slonimsky" which was nearly finished last Sunday but I lost most of it when my browser crashed. Sigh. Watch for it - soon - maybe.
This over-reaching and politically correct article by Paul Reale is entitled Los Angeles, 1994: The next Paris? The title has got to be good for at least a chuckle - if you don't live in L.A.More interesting is this 1984 interview with Los Angeles bassoonist Don Christlieb about new music here starting in the 1930s.
For example, he talks about Monday Evening Concerts and the early Ojai Festival and tells many very humanizing things about Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky - including one story which includes this question: "Mr. Stravinsky, how is it you only live a few miles from Mr. Schoenberg and we never see you two together?" (Alex Ross posted this letter about Arnold Schoenberg's auto.)
Video? You'll have to make a choice - a bit of lip-syncing, sepia-toned opera silliness or maybe you'd prefer more cowbell?
Explanation of 30 second spots
P.S. Blogger's spell checker suggested that I replace the word "bassoonist" with "pessimist".
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