Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

2006-03-20T14:05:00.000Z

>>>>Heads up for all UK readers<<

ENO new season

2006-03-20T12:25:00.000Z
Is it just me, or does anyone else reckon that all the soap-operatic turmoil at ENO has resulted in their liveliest new season for some time?

Links for the week

2006-03-16T17:25:00.000Z
Ivan Hewett marks Michael Finnissy' birthday;Assistant Blog has this iTunes-related scoop: "The French Parliament is on its way to passing a law that would force Apple's iTunes to open its online music store and enable consumers to download songs onto devices other than the iPod." Is this true? Allez les Bleus!I've already pencilled in Dubstep Allstars vol.03 as my album of the year, and it's not

Glyndebourne Hip H'Opera

2006-03-15T14:18:00.000Z
So, my first thought on hearing about Glyndebourne's plans to stage a 'Hip H'Opera' version of Cosi fan tutte was 'Hip H'Opera'??? Yikes!My second was in response to this quote from the director Clare Whistler, on her decision to chose Cosi as the meeting point between hip hop and opera: Because they're entirely different worlds, and I thought the one thing that could make it fusion is that it's

Links for the week

2006-03-10T13:15:00.000Z
The more observant among you will have noticed that it's been kind of quiet around here this week.Still, here's a piece on hiphop at the Smithsonian.A nice post, with plenty of links to follow through, on the perennial question from Marc Geelhoed.And Voltage links to a YouTube clip of Delia Derbyshire at work. If you can face the 180MB download, there's a video of the whole programme (a

Chadwick Jenkins: Variations on a Theme

2006-03-04T10:06:00.000Z
PopMatters isn't a site I visit all that often, so I was unaware that since November last year they have run a regular classical music column, Variations on a Theme, written by Chadwick Jenkins. The first article was the perhaps obligatory manifesto on Why Classical Matters, particularly 'why it matters to regular PopMatters readers'. While I don't agree with Jenkins' historicist approach in this

Links for the week

2006-03-02T11:20:00.000Z
.flickr-photo { border: 0px; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } birches | flickr | 24th February, 2006 Middle class American teen buys the new Coldplay single - all hail the new global musical revolution!Britten's score to a setting of Auden's Roman Wall Blues, thought lost, has been found.Free

Kultureflash

2006-03-02T11:00:00.000Z
Thanks to a reference in my referrals, I've just come across the excellent London-based contemporary culture newsletter Kultureflash. I'm so out of the loop it's just not true - KF has been around for four years now, and for most of those I've been in a futile search for exactly such a thing. All Thames-based lifeforms should head on over and subscribe at once. Unless, that is, you're cooler than

Hungarian stereotypes Watch: Eötvös edition

2006-03-01T12:19:00.000Z
In a review yesterday of a concert of Péter Eötvös's music, Geoff Brown asks the eternal question Is it being born in Transylvania that makes Peter Eötvös’s music so odd? Not that you’d wish to ward off this composer-conductor with garlic. Sigh.

Golijov-Watch, UK edition

2006-03-01T12:14:00.000Z
Following up on my survey of British press reaction to Osvaldo Golijov's first major concert in the UK, here's a summary of what the British papers have been saying about his Pasión, performed at the Barbican last week.The Times ran this preview, by Warwick Thompson, whose hyperbole ("Whether baying for Christ’s blood or lamenting his passing, whether punching the air in anger or swaying gently,

Corey Dargel and the Artsongwriters

2006-02-23T14:53:00.000Z
Spotted by Kyle, there's an excellent article by Corey Dargel on the current generation of nonpop singer-songwriters - or 'artsongwriters' as Dargel calls them - who are "moving away from the operatic influences that have too heavily affected the development of traditional art song". Dargel himself is a prime practitioner - samples of his work are here and here. Which gives me ample premise to

Twelve-Tone Masters

2006-02-23T10:01:00.000Z
'How many times have we been stunned by the virtuoso violin writing in Alban's Violin Concerto?'Priceless.UPDATE: Felsenmusick has some background info.

Golijov: Pasión

2006-02-22T18:36:00.000Z
Plenty of blog love for Golijov in USA-land at the moment: see Steve Smith and Alex Ross (with a little counterpoint from Jerry Bowles). Somehow, I don't think it will be the same here when Pasión hits London on Friday. We shall see.Well, I won't, since photocopying in the British Library today has eaten all my concert budget for the week. :(

Classical music mp3 blogs

2006-02-21T17:45:00.000Z
.flickr-photo { border: 0px; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } hills | flickr | 20th February, 2006 Finding the classical mp3 blogs so you don't have to.I've pulled some of these names from the (surely exhaustive?) list at Hype Machine, and I can't say I've checked every link there - only the ones

Links for the week

2006-02-21T16:03:00.000Z
Indie music web portal Brainwashed have published a call for the dismantling of the RIAA.This poorly-researched, innuendo-ridden piece on pirate radio in Friday's Guardian has rightly annoyed the Dissensus crew; Blackdown's Pitchfork interview with the Rinse management is a valuable counter.Roots People Music has a two part interview with Kode 9.Canoe Jam has a one part interview with Philip

Urban Classic: the Reception

2006-02-21T12:56:00.000Z
Some of the Urban Classic aftermath:Photos at 1Xtra: "It's the night everyone's been waiting for"Bun-U: "Hey tonight we've made history, cuz we've made posh people say GET ME"Neil Fisher in The Times: "one left feeling that the orchestra had been asked to travel so far from their world that the product they were offering was largely superfluous."Robert Maycock in the Independent: "the biggest

Spurious conspiracy theory

2006-02-21T09:27:00.000Z
"Why is one of the world's top opera directors going into musicals?" asks the Guardian of Francesca Zambello, at the same as film director Zhang 'House of Flying Daggers' Yimou is booked to direct at the Met. Coincidence? Probably, but if Hal Prince directs any historical kung-fu films in the near future remember that you heard it here first.

River

2006-02-20T19:19:00.000Z
.flickr-photo { border: 0px; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } river | flickr | 20th February, 2006 Still testing out posting digital photos from flickr...Seem to have got something that works, anyway. Expect a bit more decoration round here from now on.

Links for the week

2006-02-15T12:01:00.000Z
Popular music is popular because it's popular: proven by science.Danceblogga points up the ironies of EMI earning a fat load of dosh out of the Paul MacCartney/Jay-Z Grammy collaboration. "Who is this Danger Mouse of which you speak?"Kid Kameleon draws attention to Golden Era Jungle - a vast forum, info site, and *licks lips* repository of 100+ classic jungle sets. Yowzer.And Londonist points to

Shamed by my referrals

2006-02-15T11:32:00.000Z
I notice in my referrals this morning a Google for 'critics Phillip Neil Martin', a composer I mentioned in a review of the Elysian Quartet last year. Well, since someone is looking, it behoves me to mention that I saw another work of Martin's, Standing Water in concert on Saturday, and thought it probably the best work of the concert. Martin is deeply interested in gagaku, and this work is a

Music Since 1960: Pärt: Cantus In memoriam Benjamin Britten

2006-02-14T17:56:00.000Z
Index here.Yikes - I definitely remember at some point deciding that I was going to steer clear of too-familiar choices here, and look what's come up, one of the most well-known slabs of modern classical soundtrack music there is. This piece really is up there with the second movement of Górecki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs as a short-cut route to post-religious grief, isn't it?Well, of course

Sidebar News!

2006-02-14T15:44:00.000Z
We interrupt this broadcast to bring you... a list of people who should have been in my sidebar for months and months by now (I've been reading y'all in Bloglines, honest), but I've been too slack to add them in. Sorry about that.So please give it up for:Avant Music NewsBlackdownDeceptively SimpleFelsenmusickGutterbreakzHalvorsenIron Tongue of MidnightKid KameleonThe Living ComposerThe Measures

Why 2006 is not 1994

2006-02-10T13:25:00.000Z
Picking up my recent predilection for comparing now with then, I've toyed for a while with the idea that now (with indie rock on one of its cyclical highs, and grime and dubstep keeping the underground/urban/pirate scene fresh) is a bit like the mid-90s (where grime = trip hop, dubstep = jungle and indie rock = er, indie rock). Well, no more.This silly, tunnel-visioned article in the Guardian

More Urban Classic

2006-02-10T12:35:00.000Z
Yeah, I'm gonna keep picking at this because it sort of does (and doesn't) have my name written all over it. Two articles in the Guardian and the ever-grime-friendly Independent take a peek at rehearsals for the upcoming Urban Classic event (Hackney Empire, 16th Feb; broadcasts on 1Xtra on the 18th, Radio 3 on the 24th). And both come out pretty enthused by the whole thing. The UK press is

William Bolcom wins three Grammys

2006-02-09T09:18:00.000Z
Well, since the official reports aren't going to mention it, I will: congratulations to William Bolcom, whose Songs of Innocence and Experience picked up Grammys for Classical Album, Choral Performance and Classical Contemporary Performance, a three-out-of-three clean sweep. (The recording in question was recently reviewed at ionarts.)A full list of winners is here.

Links for the week

2006-02-08T16:37:00.000Z
Some of these are pretty cool.Dorian Lynskey's Tube-Map-as-Music-History [pdf of the whole thing]I disagree with Matt, though, on The Great Bear (if I read him right) - one of the most appealing things about that is figuring out if there isn't some mad meaning behind the interchanges. Rhizomes, eh?The Independent, fittingly, ran a recent special on independent music (more links from that page);

Osvaldo Golijov reaches London

2006-02-07T11:50:00.000Z
For a few months now I've harboured a suspicion that Osvaldo Golijov is to the 2000s what Krzysztof Penderecki was to the 1960s. Both composers rapidly developed a worldwide, word-of-mouth enthusiasm for their music, which was seen by some as a new hope for a contemporary music that speaks to the heart as much as the head. That enthusiasm grew immensely with the composition of a Passion by each

Andante shuts up shop

2006-02-02T12:41:00.000Z
Here's some sad news: classical music web portal Andante.com has shut down for good. That's a pity. Although I wasn't a frequent user of Andante, their news pages were often useful, and it was one of only a small handful of well-presented, informative, mature websites on classical music. It's a shame, therefore, that the project has become no longer viable.

Soundscapes conference, Goldsmiths

2006-02-02T12:18:00.000Z
Heads up, soundscape fans: next weekend (11th and 12th Feb) Goldmsiths College are hosting Sound Practice 2006, a conference on Music Department > Conferences">Some details are here, the full conference programme is below, and includes soundscape installations around the college. The whole thing is free: PROGRAMMESaturday, 11th February9.30am [Small Hall]IntroductionJohn Levack Drever (

Links for the week

2006-02-01T12:33:00.000Z
Pazz and Jop 2005 is out, of course. Plenty of comment through the link.The Guardian on the BBC's Classical Grime project;The Independent on Kano;Ivan Hewett in the Telegraph sees in Iran's recent ban on Western music vindication for the view (which I share) that music is a very real, concrete influence on how people live their lives. "Part of me has a sneaking respect for a world-view which

I paid for this DVD, dammit

2006-01-31T17:21:00.000Z
If you've bought or rented a Fox DVD recently, you'll know what I'm talking about: those wretched intros that preach (incorrectly) that theft is the same as infringing copyright. They annoy me more than almost anything - I dread the day they start putting similar voiceovers onto CDs. I've not verified this, but it's my guess that you only get them on genuine DVDs, not pirates, which makes them

The Holst Singers, Temple Church, 28 January 2006

2006-01-29T14:14:00.000Z
Last night at the surprisingly well-hidden Temple Church, secreted in the passageways of establishment off Fleet Street, the Holst Singers, conducted by Stephen Layton, gave ample evidence of their claim to be one of Britain's foremost choirs. It has been a while since I last went to an all-choral concert, and a long time too since I last enjoyed a concert as consistently as this.The principal

Links for the week

2006-01-25T16:50:00.000Z
Just a quickie this one.Spotted by Avant Music News, Insect and Individual is an mp3 blog posting albums by artists on the famous Nurse With Wound list.And if you hadn't had enough IP shenanigans for one day, how about the absolute corker that is the 'Digital Content Protection Act of 2006', reported on WFMU. Here's some analysis that probably won't help you sleep better tonight.Ach, cheer up,

New License for Laptop DJs

2006-01-25T15:16:00.000Z
Some clarifications, and some applauseThe new license for digital DJs came onto the scene back in September (notwithstanding a growing backlash against laptop Djing), and is now causing a minor kerfuffle on Dissensus and at kode 9's place.The present worry is over section 3.1 of the example license posted by the Digital DJ resource site, in particular the following: 3.1 The Licensee hereby

A grammar geek writes

2006-01-23T09:28:00.000Z
Does anyone else's blood run cold at the phrase 'sort links by recency' that now appears at the top of Technorati results pages? It can't just be me, can it?*shudder*

Musical Deaths in 2005

2006-01-19T15:03:00.000Z
What follows is my second annual summary of all the musicians - who I'm aware of - who died in the last year. The list for 2004, with accompanying explanation, may be found here; an explanation of how this list was compiled may be found here. The list below is in rough reverse chronological order, and picks up where the 2004 list finished; as a result some of the earliest names in fact died very

Universal announce deleted music MP3 store

2006-01-19T11:07:00.000Z
This is an interesting development: Universal are to exhume 100,000 deleted tracks from their archive to sell online.First thoughts: 100,000 tracks doesn't sound like a very big back catalogue (iTunes has a million, and hardly any of them are what you want).But, this is a good thing in principle - UMG have finally clued up that people still want to buy the old stuff.Money quote: Barney Wragg,

Get Carpark

2006-01-19T10:32:00.000Z
In case you're wondering, by the way, I wasn't at any of the Get [Elliott] Carter business at the Barbican at the weekend. I was, however, in Gateshead, in sight of the Get Carter carpark, which is a nice little coincidence, and something I also found easier to muster enthusiasm for.Although the site was down last time I looked, there are some beautiful pictures of Owen Luder's masterpiece here,

Links for the week

2006-01-17T10:37:00.000Z
Gerard McBurney writes in the Guardian on Shostakovich's continuing ability to divide the critics.Avant-garde/free jazz freakout fans take note: Ubuweb have posted mp3s of the long out-of-print John Cage meets Sun Ra album [thanks Free Albums Galore and Avant Music News for the notice]. In fact, WFMU have a complete run-down of recent Ubu additions.And if City of Sound's post on digital music was

New Music Notes, new blog

2006-01-16T16:29:00.000Z
A quick heads up on a newish new music blog that has been brought to my attention: Alan Taylor's New Music Notes. Alan is a composer himself [homepage] and his posts are frequently embellished with MIDI and mp3 extracts of his own music.

Small observation

2006-01-16T10:25:00.000Z
I was in Waterstones over the weekend, and noticed that although they have a shelf devoted to 'digital music', the entire shelf was given over to iPod/iTunes user guides. Loads of them. This means one of two things to me:1. People with a Zen, or other mp3 player, are smart enough to be able to work it without an expensive self-help guide. [Update: the situation may be worse than first thought]2.

Holst Singers – Paweł Łukaszewski

2006-01-12T16:24:00.000Z
I've been made aware of a couple of concerts that the Holst Singers are giving in London later this year, which well deserve attention. Having recently begun a partnership with Paweł Łukaszewski the choir is including works by the 37-year-old Polish composer in each concert. For anyone that knows me, the words 'young Polish composer' are enough to grab my notice from the start. The first, on 28

Links for the week

2006-01-10T12:43:00.000Z
Some of these are held over from Christmas/New Year period, so bear with: Andreas Scholl - too cool for school. At least judging by the contents of his iPod. (Although, can we now draw a line under this 'half-arsed analysis of public figures via free commercial advertising' please? Oh, apparently not.)All crew should check out last night's Breezeblock show via BBC Radio 1's Listen again. This

Contact details for Mark Plummer?

2005-12-31T12:50:00.000Z
I realise this post resembles one of those 'Almost met' ads in the back of Time Out, but if Mark reads this, or if someone knows how to contact him, I would be very grateful for the information. I'm just after some information on his Melody Maker review mentioned below. With thanks in anticipation...

Homepage

2005-12-20T10:10:00.000Z
That's a very Web 1.0 word, I know, but is there a better replacement? Anyway, I've finally got around to putting one of these together. It's pretty rudimentary, and mostly points back here, but those of a curious persuasion might fancy a look.

The good old days

2005-12-16T18:04:00.000Z
Morning spent at the British Library's reading rooms in Colindale, hunting out reviews of Ligeti and Polish music from back in the day. Mark Plummer's review of the London premiere of the Ligeti Requiem in the 20th November 1971 edition of Melody Maker was a nice read. The Ligeti was only the first half of the concert though, but I doubt a review of Beethoven's Ninth - or any Beethoven symphony -

Blackdown's end of year

2005-12-15T11:53:00.000Z
Most sane people's choice for blogger of the year, Blackdown has, since last week, been posting a daily end of year commentary from a big grime or dubstep player. Kicking things off strongly on Friday was a call from Logan Sama for the grime scene to get its act together, and the posts continue "once a day every day for the rest of the year, until they run out. Because fuckitt, I'm bored of

cac.ophono.us

2005-12-15T10:53:00.000Z
Some potentially very interesting development being trailed in two posts at beepSNORT. It's all to do with Jeff Harrington's latest web/new music/interconnectivity project, cac.ophono.us, linking del.icio.us and new music recordings on the net. Read the beepSNORT posts for more explanation, but basically the deal is that cac.ophono.us is designed to become a live holding site for recordings of

Links for the week

2005-12-15T10:48:00.000Z
Birtwistle, Finnissy, Tarik O'Regan and Errollyn Wallen were among the winners at the British Composer Awards; more through this Gramophone article and this Radio 3 page.French MPs blame hiphop - not poverty, racism, or segregation - for the country's recent riots.Washington radio station WETA loses ratings after dropping classical music from its broadcasts (thanks ionarts for the link).Here's a

Links for the week, Postclassic edition

2005-12-07T15:10:00.000Z
Kyle Gann has written a couple of interesting posts recently (well, more than two, but two of interest to me). They're deserving of a little more comment than a single link, so I'm putting them together here:The first, on Postclassic Radio's brush with the DMCA, brings up the tricky issue of how the bit of the DMCA being applied (no more than two songs from one album consecutively) legislates

Links for the week

2005-12-07T15:06:00.000Z
First up, this Guardian article on Judith Weir's TV opera Armida, to be screened on Channel 4 on Christmas Day. Looks good, thought-provoking stuff. Probably one to video and watch slightly later on. Now, silliness: First Mark E. Smith does the football, then Blixa Bargeld does DIY store adverts! Catch them at The Standing Room! Next week - Björk does the speaking clock. Breakdancing robots! [

Classical music and grime

2005-12-07T12:38:00.000Z
Urban Classic will unite grime producer DaVinChe with jazz musician Jason Yarde and conductor Charles Hazlewood. Highlights from the 16 February concert will be broadcast on BBC digital station 1Xtra and BBC Radio 3. London MCs Bruza, Tor, Pase, Purple and beatboxer Faith SFX will perform the finished suite with the BBC Concert Orchestra, with DJ sets from 1Xtra's Semtex and Cameo.This BBC

Links for the week

2005-11-29T12:27:00.000Z
Music industry losing money? I blame the children. Mwanji keeps finding those blogging jazzers. Scott posts on music in other disciplines. Kyle posts on meter and postclassicism, and includes a surprising András Schiff exposé... And Matt previews some of the graphics he's done for the Practice Hours 2 DVD. Cool. Plus there's some characteristically heartfelt introspection on the state of

György Kurtág wins 2006 Grawemeyer

2005-11-29T10:14:00.000Z
I've just read on Sequenza21 that György Kurtág has won this year's 200,000 dollar Grawemeyer award for composition for Concertante Op.42 for violin, viola and orchestra. A very deserved winner - David Salvage on Sequenza21 calls him "the best alive", and I don't think he's far off the mark. The already illustrious list of previous winners has been further enhanced.

Mark E. Smith and the Football Results

2005-11-25T10:42:00.000Z
God bless WFMU, who have posted a video of Mark E. Smith reading of the football results, as noted back in September. In an experience familiar to all us fans of League Two clubs, you have to wait a while before you get to the good bit - which in this case is Ray Stubbs floundering (no! surely not!) as Smith slags off his haircut. Bonus track: Mark E. Smith removes his dentures on a Newsnight

About the Music Deathwatch

2005-11-22T17:02:00.000Z
This has been running in my sidebar for more than a year now, but I thought it required some sort of explanation and clarification for new visitors to the blog. The list is a regularly updated feed, drawn from musician obituaries I post to my del.icio.us account, and processed for presentation here by the very fine Feed digest. When I see that a musician has died (via any number of sources), I

'Re-imagining' Shostakovich

2005-11-22T14:06:00.000Z
Here's a free new music event that slipped under the radar for November's cheap new music post, but it looks good enough to warrant a post of its own. This Sunday, Vladimir Ashkenazy will be performing Shostakovich's Sixth Symphony (plus some other stuff) with the Philharmonia at Bristol's Colston Hall. Should be a splendid do, but it hardly qualifies as new music (and it's a full-price evening).

Links for the week

2005-11-21T12:05:00.000Z
Sony rootkit mini-special:The BBC report that uninstalling Sony's XCP copy protection system could leave your computer vulnerable to malicious hackers.Wired unwraps the real story of the Sony rootkit, and finds "extreme hubris", "incompetence" and "collusion between big media companies who try to control what we do on our computers and computer-security companies who are supposed to be protecting

Madonna loses 'Frozen' plagiarism case

2005-11-21T11:24:00.000Z
Madonna has lost the plagiarism case made against her by Salvatore Acquaviva. Acqauviva's claim that 'Frozen' uses 4 bars of his song 'Ma vie fout l'camp' has been upheld by a Belgian court, with costly implications for Madonna and her record companies. The judge has ordered radio and TV stations in Belgium to stop playing 'Frozen', and EMI, Sony and Warners must withdraw the single, and Ray of

2005-11-21T10:27:00.000Z
Most frequent word in my comments at the moment? 'Oops', perhaps. Standards in the Rambler editorial pool have got sloppy. Bananas have been witheld and things should get better...

New music on a shoestring: November

2005-11-18T12:17:00.000Z
Frankly peeps it's far too cold to go out for anything less than a great bargain at the moment. I love my radiators too much and have a stack of DVDs to catch up on, so I'm not getting up to much this month - but you could do worse than head along, with gloves and hat, to some of the following. You'll still have plenty of change left for Christmas shopping:Tonight! Impressively-haired, media

Links for the week

2005-11-16T12:33:00.000Z
Sony are facing at least three lawsuits over their dodgy DRM system;The Independent talks to Kano and Wiley looking for another angle on the 'why isn't Grime huge yet' question;Alex Ross writes on Scelsi - plus behind-the-scenes material at the blog;the always-excellent Kid Kameleon has a new mix at riddim method - a Peter K tribute special;WFMU links to this great nostalgia site - pictures of

Bad news indeed

2005-11-15T14:48:00.000Z
One of the big grime bloggers, Silverdollarcircle, calls it a day. Boo! Still - Simon's promising a grime pirate radio mp3 site in the future, so it's not all bad news. Keep 'em peeled.

Good news indeed

2005-11-15T09:53:00.000Z
Woebot's back!. Hurrah!

Hooray!

2005-11-10T10:45:00.000Z
At last - someone understands what I've been driving at this last couple of weeks. Thanks, Eppy!I qualify things a little in my comments to Eppy's post. I absolutely agree that I probably got a bit carried away with the whole "walk down the street and then Bang! Messiaen". Although this example is actually based on personal experience - I do believe that Messiaen's music has changed how I see and

Links for the week

2005-11-09T14:06:00.000Z
Roll Deep win best album award at the Third Annual Urban Music Awards; two articles on Stevie Wonder in the Independent; Felsenmusik is another classical composer/critic's blog, by Daniel Felsenfeld; Ofcom have been cracking down on UK pirate radio, although the article linked makes them sound confused about exactly why; And you may have heard that Sony have been giving us plenty of friendly

Oh, great.

2005-11-05T10:32:00.000Z
I'm Google's no.1 hit for 'nobly porno'.

(Belated) Links for the week

2005-11-03T11:28:00.000Z
New Paris Transatlantic is out, including reviews of a couple of tasty-sounding numbers by Candlesnuffer and Jonathan Kane. With John Gill on 'Macho Jazz', Bob Gilmore on Anne La Berge, Massimo Rcci on Lindsay Cooper, and more, they're touting it as their 'finest issue yet'. Check it. The mighty Bassnation - purveyor of fine old skool hardcore, techno, jungle, dubstep and reggae mix action - is

'Applicability' in music: towards a definition

2005-10-26T16:03:00.000+01:00
The 'relevance' debate rolls on in comments to my earlier post. I think some clarifications and some concrete examples might be needed. First of all, my thoughts on all this have kind of spun away from the original Greg Sandow post that set them off, so they probably shouldn't taken as endorsement or otherwise of what he said back there.OK. I want to get away (on these pages at least, if nowhere

Links for the week

2005-10-26T14:32:00.000+01:00
So, Pete Townshend is the latest blogging rocker, which may be of interest to Jessica Duchen, recent Who convert;John Peel's records no longer look as though they will immediately be donated to the British Library, as his widow confesses that she can't bear to part with them for now;Kyle Gann (and other ArtsJournal blogs) has redesigned (with comments enabled), and two important posts on Charles

Pre-Stockhausen round-up

2005-10-21T13:16:00.000+01:00
Since Stockhausen is in London today and tomorrow for the Frieze Art Fair - today he's giving an illustrated lecture, tomorrow a much-heralded performance of Kontakte and Oktophonie - here's a quick round-up of what people are saying in anticipation of the event:Charlotte Higgins at the Guardian's Culture Vulture blog is fretting over ticket prices (and booking fees). The whole thing has cost me

New music on a showestring: addendum

2005-10-21T10:14:00.000+01:00
Just a quick addition to the New Music on a Shoestring list for this month: next Friday sees the launch of Goldsmiths College's Centre for Contemporary Music Cultures; this is a pretty cool thing in its own right of course, but more immediately pertinent is that the launch event includes a free concert of music, centring around three student ensembles who represent the ideas behind setting up the

Music Since 1960: Cage: Apartment House 1776

2005-10-18T12:34:00.000+01:00
Index here.Unashamedly reworking my own material, but here's a sort of example of what I mean by applicability.Apartment House 1776 is one of Cage's 'musicircus'-style works, in that it involves small groups of musicians playing independently against one another, within the confines of a larger scheme. In this work it is to be performed within the confines of a single stage, and there is a fully

Relevance and applicability in music

2005-10-18T10:40:00.000+01:00
Ach, go on then, here's something half thought-through. A little while ago, in this post-Dr Atomic world, Greg Sandow was defending his stance on 'relevance' and classical music. Greg makes some fine points, and I appreciate where he's coming from on all of this. However, by the end of his post, I started to wonder whether he actually did want to jettison all music that isn't new (yes, this is me

Links for the week

2005-10-17T11:09:00.000+01:00
Everyone knows by now about the recent discovery of a manuscript copy of Beethoven's Grosse Fuge transcribed for piano; Tom Service at the Guardian explains why this is important. Meanwhile, Service, in his more familiar contemporary music guise, gives an appropriately tongue-in-cheek account of an email interview with "celestial being" Karlheinz Stockhausen.The Telegraph asks, uncertainly, can

A small mystery solved

2005-10-11T09:15:00.000+01:00
So there I was wondering about the sudden leap in my hits over the last couple of weeks. According to sitemeter, they're mostly from people searching MSN and Google for 'Rambler'. I always get a background of these hits in any case - www.rambler.ru is a big Russian hubsite of some sort - but why so many all of a sudden?Well, mystery solved. I went to see the very good, if flawed, Nightwatch (

Links for the week

2005-10-05T12:51:00.000+01:00
Thanks to Zoilus for the pointer: the whole of the infamous Van Morrison Contractual Obligation Album, first brought to my attention and possibly yours by Ubuweb's 365 Days Project, is now online at WFMU. Ooooooo, you've got ringworm.But this aside, Dr Atomic is absolutelyeverywhere. The 'sphere isn't really talking about much else. Unfortunately I haven't time to read through all the press. No

New Music on a Shoestring: October

2005-10-03T14:29:00.000+01:00
Regular readers will have noticed that I've been posting tips for new music concerts and gigs in London at the beginning of most months. Well, I've decided to refine this slightly (and attempt to be more regular about it at the same time) to focus on those concerts that are for people of more discerning wallets. There's plenty of publicity available in any case for the big showcase events, but

Post holiday

2005-10-03T09:45:00.000+01:00
I'm not going to blog my week away (holiday posts being extremely dull to everyone but the writer), but can anyone enlighten me on what the hell happened to my hits in the last few days, which have more than doubled? (Naturally, my vanity is thrilled, so welcome to all of you!) Technorati isn't showing anything particularly enlightening...

Ramblin' on holiday

2005-09-23T17:31:00.000+01:00
Right, y'all, I'm on holiday from about .... NOW.... I'm off to Croatia for a week for some belated summer hols; have a good 'un in the mean time. Everything in the sidebar is worth a few moments of your time while I'm away.

Manchester City 1-uh

2005-09-23T15:25:00.000+01:00
Just when we're all about to give up on the dratted game, this news comes in (via Assistant). Mark E Smith's found himself so popular he's been asked to read the footy scores on BBC1. A longtime football fan and supporter of Manchester City, Smith will read the results on BBC One's Final Score television programme on Saturday, November 17th. All that remains between now and then is to imagine

Underground Overground Underwater

2005-09-22T17:46:00.000+01:00
London geography obssesives (that'll be me, then) should take note of this first part of an account to be serialised (I suppose that's the term) on Londonist over the next couple of days of two bloke's journey by bike to all 316 Underground and DLR stations - used and disused. Oh, and randomly swims in London's 6 lidos at the same time. Day 1 (Chesham to Uxbridge) passes through the areas I was

A thought on British music and politics

2005-09-22T10:00:00.000+01:00
Here's a thing that occured to me late yesterday evening: 10-or-so years ago, everyone was sick to the back teeth of John Major's Conservative government. At the same time, the britpop, jungle and triphop scenes were flourishing. Ten years later, everyone is sick to the back teeth of Tony Blair's Labour government. At the same time, the dubstep, grime and, er, britpop scenes are flourishing.

Gerald Barry: The Bitter Tears of Petra Kant

2005-09-21T11:34:00.000+01:00
Gerald Barry's new opera, The Bitter Tears of Petra Kant has been causing one heck of stir, featuring as it does that unbeatable combo of lesbianism, a giant purple kangaroo, and uncompromising music. For reasons of wallet and being out of the country all of next week I don't think I'm going to get to see it (although there are two shows left when I get back, so we'll see), but there is plenty of

More on relating your music collection

2005-09-21T11:08:00.000+01:00
Continuing from yesterday's post on the Pandora system, I spotted on halvorsen Duke Listens!, which has a bunch of links to very cool-looking systems for mapping - in 3D, no less - your music collection.

The music genome project

2005-09-19T14:16:00.000+01:00
Pandora media's music genome project has been around for a while, but a recent Independent article article ahs only just alerted my interest. I'm glad that there's a corporate role for 400 trained musicologists, but I can't help thinking that the tendency of all technology like this is to homogenise, to find connections and to keep people's music selections similar. Which is not at all how people

Links for the week

2005-09-19T13:42:00.000+01:00
Interesting links I've been clicking recently:Ghetto fabulousObserver article on Baile FunkWoozy head musicDave Stelfox on DJ Screw in the TelegraphClassic albums given thumbs down in 'overrated list'News of a BBC 6 Music poll to find the most overrated album of all time. Hmm - only read the submitted user comments if you fancy shouting at people who are apparently already deaf...Reconstructing

U B U W E B : Film

2005-09-18T11:42:00.000+01:00
Thanks to Ben for the pointer, but this isn't happy reading. Boo, hiss, etc.

U B U W E B

2005-09-15T09:34:00.000+01:00
... is back. Ah, sweet bliss...

Carnival of Music: Ashes Edition

2005-09-13T10:02:00.000+01:00
Cricket and music. They go together like tea and toast, trust me. Most people agree that this Ashes contest has been one of the greatest Test series of all time - not least for the fact that we won it!!! - and so (with apologies for some tardiness) this week's carnival is an hommage to the best England team in years.Opening partnership: the immovable Londonist opens with a post on the

Astrodome Radio Station Blocked

2005-09-09T09:38:00.000+01:00
This story from Wired (via WFMU) on the opposition to a low-power FM radio station to provide regular information to those in the New Orleans Astrodome is basically another addition to the pile of belief-beggaring cock-ups in Louisiana, but it's particularly jaw-dropping for revealing the priorities of the emergency relief authorities. Food? Shelter? Medicine? All in good time, but there's no way

Paris Transatlantic

2005-09-06T09:31:00.000+01:00
New edition of the magazine is out. Includes reviews of Shadowtime in New York, a new CD of Tristan Murail's piano music [wish list...] and Rip it Up and Start Again, as well as a short obituary for Luc Ferrari, and an Elliott Sharp. And some other stuff as well. Clicky clicky...

Carnival of Music

2005-09-05T11:28:00.000+01:00
And while I'm on the subject of the Carnival of Music, I've volunteered as next week's host. Please send submissions of the week's best music blogging to the email address at top right of the page, or to music.carnival@gmail.com and they'll be forwarded to me. More details at the Carnival of Music homepage.The Carnival of Music is a celebration of all things musical - listening to or playing it,

Links for the week

2005-09-05T11:21:00.000+01:00
Odds and sods for this week: Wayne&Wax awesome again on mashups and sampling at Riddim Method; The Telegraph reports on orchestras going indie (thankfully with fewer whey-faced youths); And Owlish mutterings has this week's Carnival. But really, the thing you all want to see is Kanye West's balls of steel. Aaron Wherry has links and comment.

The Rambler

*****New location*****

CD review: Corey Dargel: Less Famous than You

Links for the week

New Music on a Shoestring - April

Questions for WordPress users

Links for the week

Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

ENO new season

Links for the week

Glyndebourne Hip H'Opera

Links for the week

Chadwick Jenkins: Variations on a Theme

Links for the week

Kultureflash

Hungarian stereotypes Watch: Eötvös edition

Golijov-Watch, UK edition

Corey Dargel and the Artsongwriters

Twelve-Tone Masters

Golijov: Pasión

Classical music mp3 blogs

Links for the week

Urban Classic: the Reception

Spurious conspiracy theory

River

Links for the week

Shamed by my referrals

Music Since 1960: Pärt: Cantus In memoriam Benjamin Britten

Sidebar News!

Why 2006 is not 1994

More Urban Classic

William Bolcom wins three Grammys

Links for the week

Osvaldo Golijov reaches London

Andante shuts up shop

Soundscapes conference, Goldsmiths

Links for the week

I paid for this DVD, dammit

The Holst Singers, Temple Church, 28 January 2006

Links for the week

New License for Laptop DJs

A grammar geek writes

Musical Deaths in 2005

Universal announce deleted music MP3 store

Get Carpark

Links for the week

New Music Notes, new blog

Small observation

Holst Singers – Paweł Łukaszewski

Links for the week

Contact details for Mark Plummer?

Homepage

The good old days

Blackdown's end of year

cac.ophono.us

Links for the week

Links for the week, Postclassic edition

Links for the week

Classical music and grime

Links for the week

György Kurtág wins 2006 Grawemeyer

Mark E. Smith and the Football Results

About the Music Deathwatch

'Re-imagining' Shostakovich

Links for the week

Madonna loses 'Frozen' plagiarism case

New music on a shoestring: November

Links for the week

Bad news indeed

Good news indeed

Hooray!

Links for the week

Oh, great.

(Belated) Links for the week

'Applicability' in music: towards a definition

Links for the week

Pre-Stockhausen round-up

New music on a showestring: addendum

Music Since 1960: Cage: Apartment House 1776

Relevance and applicability in music

New location