This is an offshoot of the jazz thread. I and others found that we could not talk about jazz without discussing other musical genres, as well as the philosophy of music. So, this is a thread in which people can suggest good music of all genres, and spout off your feelings about music itself.
i can almost understand why you favor the song . it has a certain mood perhaps induced by its slow tempo and the pleasant melody which seems to me to not quite emerge . his voice however i find a bit sharp and common . not quite Luciano Pavarotti particularly at 7:00 . i can not but wonder how the song would fare in the hands of say Cat Stevens the younger . as for lifting spirits Boogie Woogie All Day Long Baby
i know Kleiber and he is in the video i posted...Thanks for the suggestion ,it is the most universally recommended version among other great one...
When i spoke about musical time, i did not refer to measurable duration as in slow or less slow speedy etc...
Musical time refer for me to the way the time qualities impressions seems to be born from the musician gesture itself (or the maestro) and not from an external recommendation or even suggestion even by the composer...
«Musical time concepts include tempo (speed), meter (organization of beats into measures), time signatures (notation for meter), pulse (the steady underlying beat), and rhythm (the pattern of sounds and silences).These elements create the structured flow and patterns that define a piece of music»
The musical time is what tie all these elements and factors together in an organic non measurable qualitative whole. The musical time manifestation by an artist cannot be taught and cannot even be imitated.It is the most precious core of the musical miracle as pure individualisation of the universal as his time dimension.
Samson Francois is a cult French pianist. He was legendary and his interpretation of Scriabin sonata no-3 is proof...
If you can stream, here is suggestion: stream Beethoven's 7th Symphony by Karlos Kleiber. He does not play around with timing to milk emotions. At least that's what my ear hears. Yet, staying within fairly strict time constraints, he can seem to pull out more emotion than current conductors who like to ebb and flow a lot.
I am listening to my Samson Francois album. I bought it in a used record store and picked it up for Liszt's two piano concertos. I dismissed the pianist because I'd never heard of him. Now I can begin to appreciate him. He died relatively young.
On par with his Quartet, i think the 7th symphony of Beethoven is one of the most perfect symphony ever written...Only Bruckner may rival Beethoven.
Here a comparison between different interpretation using the allegretto, one of the most powerful piece of music ever written. Why?
Because for me it describe the power of life as an irreversible force growing in us and pushing even rocks and any obstacles... Death has no power against life but is only his servant ..
This allegretto is a seed growing which nothing can stop...
I had a kind of illumination about Beethoven quartets...
I never understood why they fascinated me till the day i "see" them as fractals of sound.....
As Bach created the "art of the fugue" as kind of complex geometry more resembling Riemann complex geometry, Beethoven create in some of his quartet a kind of illuminating fractals of sound...
I love very much Talich clean crystalline interpretation since the beginning of my love affair... ( more easier with them to see fractals in the sound ofthese quartet)
But i must listen many other versions this year...
Beethoven genius reach his peak in the quartets as Bach reach his peak in the "art of the fugue" ...
I am very happy to "see" this music meaning as form in time...
Anyway this "pure music" takes the human heart way over mundane feeling into pure spirit realm as Scriabin did, as Bruckner did, each in his own way with new means of expression...
I am posting an album I pull out and play very often. You'll probably all be scratching your heads, like what? Why does he like that? Partly for her poetics. Also I heard it when it first came out on the radio and it's been with me for many years. Nostalgia? Don't know. Just like it a lot.
I have a record of
Samson Francois playing something. I'll have to dig in my record collection and see what I have him playing. I have a "Mind" interface for my moon streamer. I wish I could interrogate my records as easily.
Apologies. The above long answer about pianists should have been to you. When I have extra time on my hands, I try to compare pianists playing the same piece. Listening to Schubert's Impromptus, especially D899, is when I realized I like Mitsuko Uchida so much. I have listened to that Impromptu by Alfred Brendel, Andras Schiff, Vladmir Horowitz, Artur Schnabel and others, and her fingers seem to possess so much more subtlety on that piece.
I do not, however, think that she is best on all pieces. She specializes in Mozart and I have heard pianists I like better than her on certain piano concertos. I think I would recommend Geza Anda as my overall favorite on Mozart's piano concertos. I think that was because he was conducting the orchestra as well as playing piano. I have a recording of Mitsuko Uchida also conducting the orchestra while she plays two Mosart piano cincertos and I liked thos a lot better than when Jeffery Tate conducts while she plays.
I have seen Yuja Wang live several times and I will see her again soon. I met a violinist in the L.A. Phil the first time I saw her in a short, sexy dress. The violinist said that they don't talk about what piece they're playing when she performs. They talk about what dress she's wearing.He also said that the orchestra had a lot of trouble keeping up with her.
Yuja Wang is a petite woman, but she is one of the most powerful pianists I have heard. My impression of her is that her technical brilliance has been what shines when she plays. I have a few of her CDs. One of her playing Prokofiev's Second Piano Concerto. I like her playing of that. She uses nuance.
For now, I like Mitsuko Uchida, Martha Argerich, and some younger pianists, Fazil Say and Igor Levitt more than Yuja Wang. Yet, I think she is young, extremely talented and as she learns to pull back on speed and power and gets more into nuance, she will be as good as the pianists I have mentioned above.
I think you might listen to Fazil Say and Igor Levit. They are into deconstructing pieces and putting them back together in very interesting ways. I would recommend listening to Fazil Say's recordings of Mozart's piano sonatas. I compared them to Maria Joao Pires's pristine recordings and it almost had me laughing to listen to how Say has deconstructed those sonatas and plays them so differently than Pires. I also think that Igor Levit has very interesting and modern interpretations of Beethoven's piano sonatas.
I heard a live concert of the Phil. with Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla conducting with a woman violinist whose name I've forgotten. They played Tchaikovsky's Violin Conceto, and talk about deconstructing! In the places where a violinist like Itzak Perleman would play bold sweet lines, these women played small, almost satiric passages. I came away saying that only women could forgo large sweet passages with small, internal interpretations. I love listening to the new, young performers playing these old, classic pieces. And I will go to watch Yuja Wang perform whenever I get a chance. Now that I mention it, I will stream her and hear recordings I have not heard. Hopefully later recordings.
as for pianists i inquire of @audio-b-dog your thoughts on the incomparable Yuja Wang as you are obviously more knowledgeable than myself . i myself laugh out loud in astonishment at her pyrotechniques . .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVpnr8dI_50
I admire and love her for sure...
Once this is said his virtuosity takes all the place and this maybe a problem. I like as much if not more some other pianists which are not so technically gifted...
But my observation is not intended to be a critic of her genius, just to remark that virtuosity can put a veil sometimes on the music ...
But she is the most talented pianist i heard these last years ...
Music is not about walking fast or slow in the right tracks but about breathing...
taste is a matter of taste . always of interest what others consider pleasing and of quality .
when a child i heard Elvis Presly on the house radio the size of a small refrigerator and decided to myself i will never choose to listen to such common music . it seems i was born a snob .
it perhaps may be of scientific / psychological / sociological interest to note traditional Japanese music in particular Kabuki is not accepted in West however the opposite is not true as Beethoven etc. are there listened to or so i assume .
re/ taste i can not not listen to Chopin Preludes . also first few Chicago albums all day long baby .
as for pianists i inquire of @audio-b-dog your thoughts on the incomparable Yuja Wang as you are obviously more knowledgeable than myself . i myself laugh out loud in astonishment at her pyrotechniques . .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVpnr8dI_50
unfortunately i have attended few live concerts . Beethoven V Chicago Symphony front row seats . Beethoven IX Des Moines Symphony . Cat Stevens balcony seats . Drake University Orchestra balcony seats unfortunately i do not recall piece other than it was Classical . i relate this to note the most enjoyable by far was the Drake University Orchestra performance so much so i stood and shouted "Bravo !" by coincidence one of the violists was a student of another grad student and upon conversation stated re/ prior evenings’ performance "Someone in attendance shouted Bravo." . i confessed to her doing so . it seems to me youthful presentation ore imbued w/ a certain quality also in the visual arts which i are regularly organized and presented near former home in Chicago .
Interesting about the speaker floating in water. The waves it creates look like record grooves. I'm sure you've all made a paper cone and put a needle through it, then played it on an old beatup record. The paper cone translates the grooves into music, just like speakers receiving an electric signal.
I’d like to think that in such a scenario P. Townshend would come to recognize at least one commonality shared by the Who and the Dead -- both bands had one of the best-ever Rock rhythm guitar players.
September’s here again. This year’s fall colors coincide with an abundance of mountain chickadees to the neighborhood. And boy do they love a conversation. Finishing each other’s sentences is particularly interesting. They chop things up like slang or shorthand it seems depending on the audience. Interpolations of sound and silence. I’m now most curious about what is beyond the limits of my hearing, and, likewise, what sounds I am actually vocalizing. I still kind of feel like Pete Townsend sitting in at a Grateful Dead performance. AI is definitely going to unlock a few discoveries here.
I am enjoying pieces of Africa. I am also posting a youtube recording of Missa Luba. It is a very old recording. I've had i with me it seems my entire life. If you haven't heard it, here it is:
i have nothing profound to say re/ music only a few experiences and tastes .
re/ taste i greatly enjoyed Kronos Quartet "Pieces of Africa" it was played on my automobile tape player so frequently the player ceased function . also the quartet has an album which a brief excerpt i once heard sounded as glass breaking . i am fascinated by it but have not been successful in locating .
a little story : whilst relaxing to a classical FM station the announcer stated the upcoming play of a performance of the scene of Wagner’s "Die Walkure" w/ prelude "Ride of the Valkyries" conducted by Toscanini was in his words "electrifying" i did not believe him . however upon play i felt electricity coursing through my arms . the system was NAD 7020 receiver and Spendor BC1 speakers .
another little story : after many years of listening to records on a General Electric portable record player for which i now shudder to think its effect on the poor helpless grooves i decided upon earning an income to purchase the above proper equipment . in particular i had a clear even vivid idea as to the speaker performance i favored . at presumably respected dealer whose method of selection i do not recall as many are located in my home town id est Chicago several were auditioned .which i did not particularly favor at the price i was willing to pay . eventually the aforementioned Spendor BC1 was emplaced to the audition system . tears came to my eyes . i still own the pair but they sit in boxes as the bespoke stands were somehow lost in a move however the Spendor A7 are now my choice though i miss the BBC "Classic" sound .
another little story : after purchasing the soundtrack in record form of "Blade Runner"at a large respected record store in Chicago id est Rose Records i decided to view writing instruments at a nearby large presumably also respected stationary store whilst carrying in hand the bright yellow bag w/ name of record store emblazed . upon approaching the counter of said instruments the pretty young lady behind counter inquired "Is that the new Vangelis album?" i did not know what a Vangelis was so i briefly mumbled something unintelligible in reply . however upon returning to residence and examining the details as printed on back of album cover i espy "Composer Vangelis" , how did she know this ?
Yes, I’ve read her early on. I think we are now entering a very patriarchal period with all these strong-men autocrats around the world. Should make my book more popular if only I can finish it.
Back to music, I am posting what I think is one of the most spiritual records along with "Love Supreme."
You are more patient than i am and probably wiser...
Then no hard feelings...
I understand more about your motives which is writing a novel....
Instead of Gimbutas which is an academic had you read Riane Eisler ?
She use Gimbutas in his own approach which i appreciated ( i read long ago "the Chalice and the blade) :
«Eisler’s research indicates that the switch from partnership to domination led to a shift from in-group versus out-group attitudes. Group hierarchy and relationships were now based on factors such as sex, race, and other differences. Violence was ultimately the basis for maintaining these hierarchies, and was built into the system. The “conquest of nature,” massive inequality, and devaluing the work of caring for people started to become common practice. The work of caring for our natural life-support systems was also undervalued, taken for granted, and removed from the money economy.» Wiki
By the way it is clear for me that women before "history" in group "educated" individual ego driven young male beast using mocking, humor, derision, defusion as collective matriarchal hierarchies defense and educative tool...
I apologize if I am being short with you or seem to be dismissing you. I have been doing research for this novel for fifteen years. I have had to learn an art of researching for my purposes. At first, I tried to use source material, but it was much too slow and tedius. For example, I tried reading the famous archeaologist Marija Gimbutas, but she was writing for academics. Or Robert Graves writing about the Celtic pre-Christian beliefs. Also too tedius. If I were writing a Ph.D. thesis I would need to refer to source material, but I am writing a novel and I happily don’t need to refer to any research I have done.
The way I research is that a question arises in my writing that I believe I need answers for. I look for books that are about source material, not the source material itself. So, Goethe might be discussed in the book. I am not reading Galeleo on mathematics, I am reading a book that tells me about Galeleo and how he pertains to consciousness.
I am not as voracious a reader as you are. Also, as a writer, I read novels. And I often watch stupid TV for recreation. So I carefully choose books that cover a wide swath of material, relating to a question I am interested in for my novel.
Anyway, that is why I don’t read the research you suggest. Hopefully, no hard feelings.
Almost every book is too old. Here are three data points that mark history: Enheduanna, the daughter of Sargon of Akkad is the first known poet (circa 2300 BCE). Her poems were written about the lowering of the goddess Inanna below the male gods. I think that suggests that women were once in a higher position and that position fell at or before the Sumerian Empire. I'd say five or six thousand years ago.
The second data point is the dig at Catalhuyuk, Turkey. It gives strong evidence that 8,000 years ago gods and godesses, as well as men and women, were equals. Also there was no war or war weapons at Catalhuyuk and its surrounding communities.
Third data point, only very recently established, is that women were the original cave painters, and therefore shamans and priests.
Just draw a line through those data points, all recently discovered, and you will see an historical throughline that was not known before this century.
Now, since this is a music forum, I will post a great song by Cat Stevens.
First to answer your feminine/masculine polarities...
You are not wrong but insisting about interpreting all history with these glasses with 2 windows is worst than being wrong : it drive us in false antinomies and classification : this is feminine this is not etc etc ...
This is why i recommended you Jean Gebser book .... it is not an obsolete book ..
I could propose to you a shorter book with no feminine/masculine polarities but with a deeper perspective : Owen Barfield "Saving the appearences" it is short book unlike Gebser complex book ...it say the same thing but in a very direct and simple way ...
By the way his book "poetic diction " a short book too is one of the most important book i ever read, he describe what is poetry,clearly and few people succeeded as well in simple and deep explanation.. I read all his books... ...
What I am saying is that even our sciences reflect the suppression of women. I read a book called "The Passion of the Western Mind" by Richard Tarnas. He does not talk about women at all. He talks about how Western Society, in developing our sciences and philsophies, have ignored the world of dreams in which we live one third of our lives. I equate this world of dreams with the feminine. The unconscious mind sees things that we cannot recognize because we do not have the language or a way of thinking about it.
I know very well Tarnas and the book you read is good but you must read the second one too : "Cosmos and psyche " about depth astrology and history ...
By the way i posted recommendation for all those reading here not just you then dont feel under siege by my propositions of books and articles... It was my past job....
I am in the middle of three books, all dealing with different aspects of what I'm talking about. I'm not sure I'll get to your articles. Maybe one.
The thing I think I haven't gotten across to you is that I do not want a strictly feminine world. I don't think, however, that most people understand what an absolute male world we live in and to what degree the feminine has been repressed. When you study the history of humanity going far back before Biblical times to proto-Sumerians, the repression is stark.
To me a good example is the survivors of Epstein's sex trafficking of young girls as young as 12. Important men paid a lot of money to have sex with these underage girls. The now women) have now developed the bravery to come forward and say that they want justice. What does Trump who is the essence of the patriarchy say? "It's a hoax." Trump is just the spokesperson for how America feels about women. They are not allowed to be heard when they speak about their feelings.
It's this way all around the world. And this example is only a dramatic way of trying to point out how seriously we are locked into patriarchy. Women know. Ask them.
What I am saying is that even our sciences reflect the suppression of women. I read a book called "The Passion of the Western Mind" by Richard Tarnas. He does not talk about women at all. He talks about how Western Society, in developing our sciences and philsophies, have ignored the world of dreams in which we live one third of our lives. I equate this world of dreams with the feminine. The unconscious mind sees things that we cannot recognize because we do not have the language or a way of thinking about it.
So, I am with you. I want to bring the feminine into balance. But, God help us, the Patriarchy will fight like hell, and religion will stand behind them, to make sure that the feminine is kept down. We might just have one big war just to destroy the threat of the feminine coming into balance.
Goff is right about the genius of Galileo but the price to pay for this mathematical method was the erasure of not only qualities of perception but the being of the observer as a conscious living entity...
Goethe was the first confronting Newton on light and color and doing so creating advance in neurophysiology of perception and in art, he was the first to explain that the "delicate empiricism" he asked for imply the transformation of the observer...
It is not just about a more empathetical and more sensible, more concrete and more feminine participation to the world , as it was originally for what Barfield called "original participation" and Gebser called the mythical and magical participation, but Goethe went for a " final participation" as Barfield called it or a aperspectival consciousness as Gebser described it ...
Then it is not so much about going back from the masculine to the feminine but going forward to a new balance with ourselves and the world...
The only thinker that describe it extensively with a clear diagnostic but also the complete set of solutions in almost all fields is the last universal genius and a spiritual seer, Rudolf Steiner, who is the main modern Goethean scholar and disciple, with 360 books. ( i read 200) He created the greater pedagogy movement existing on earth in all countries, a new medecine, a new agronomy, new art (eurythmy) architecture, even a new conception of the social body who goes well over social engineering materialism.
Wolfgang Schad used Goethe and Steiner method in zoology. His book is 1500 pages...
The last pupil of Steiner discovered reading him the geometry of the heart with the creation of a new form called the "Chestahedron"...
This video is the best description of the creativity in science i ever see :
But the best introduction to Goethe method in only one book is by the physicist Henri Bortoft : "taking appearence seriously"
"In music, man feels the echo of the inmost life of things" Rudolf Steiner
If we want to understand this Steiner quote the best book on acoustic was written by a Nigerian Acoustician who revolutionize acoustics :
Akpan J. Essien...
Read this article to get a taste of his idea about "sound" as meaning and information coming from the vibrating sound source and not just mathematical proportion (Pythagoras) or physical wave...
Essien book is called: "Sound Source"
But with this article you will have a gist of his deep thinking...
read this article first and you will understand the link with Goethe method...
Now if you read these two short article you will understand why Essien is right and why the (masculine) vision of Pythagoras about music must change for a more (feminine) ecological theory about hearing ...
The universal archetype of music is not number but the timbre perception by the human body...
Sound is the first awaking perception by us in the mother body....
I'll have to go back and pay closer attention to that movement.
The book I am reading on consciousness is called "Gallileo"s Error." Gallileo was a mathematician who wanted to describe everything mathematically. He was the first, perhaps, to realize that this could be done. A red ball thrown through the air could be described by math. Everything but the redness of it. He called sight (colors, etc.), sound (music), etc. qualities and he said qualities resided in the soul.
Basically, in his mathemtatical description of the world qualities were not paid attention to. The writer of "Galilleo's Error" says that Gallileo went in the wrong direction. Qualities need to be considered along with quantities. If sceince had been invented through a feminine lens, I"m sure that sweet-smelling flowers, and delicious-smelling hot bread, and all qualities, good and bad, would have been included in our science. Now, I think, we have to start all over again.
At the end of Herman Hess's "Steppenwolf" Harry the protagonist has a vision where he is finally on a green field with the woman he always wanted but would never approach. What does he do? He stabs her to death. The guide says, "Is that any way to treat a lady, Harry? Now we'll have to start all over again."
My prefered version is by Borodin quartet...I love these quartet a lot ...
These three quartet are so moving Tchaikovsky wrote this in his journal :
«"Never in my life have I been so moved by the pride of authorship as when Lev Tolstoy, sitting by me and listening to the Andante of my Quartet, burst into tears"
Thank you for the book suggestions. The more I dive into this, the more I realize how many other people have delved into this subject before me.
Back to music, since that is what this forum is about. I pulled up Tchaikovsky's name on Qobuz and looked for pieces of his I've never heard. I am listening to his string quartets. They are quite lovely.
You are not completely wrong, in fact your intuition touch something deep and true...
it is not that there exist a male physics and a feminine one... Not at all ...
But there is a male vision of Nature, which put nature on a Procustean bed and torture her for answers (what do the military complex ? ) ...
It begun with Nominalism then Bacon and the loss of the "original participation " to the world (Barfield ) .
It was as it was , history is directed by spiritual forces also and we are free beings but under many influences ...
But there is another more feminine way to study Nature...Then here you are right not about physics as we do it now but about all sciences of Nature...
The greatest exponent was Goethe. I recommend Henri Bortoft book about him a physicist especially to begin with :"taking the appearences seriously" ...
Goethe called his method "a delicate empiricism" where the observer is changed in the observing process...
Then with quantum physics, dark matter, etc we go on with the "male physics"... And Nature dont exist anymore, and the "soul" is just as said Hinton the result of computations, "Nature" it is an obsolete concept for the industrial military complex the main user of physicist minds now ...
Calling this "feminine physics" is misleading then, it will not change "male physics" in a more human balanced approach to nature ... Read the last Husserl book : "The crisis of European science" to see my point ...
You called Jean Gebser obsolete ... You will not call Bortoft obsolete, he was a physicist knowing very well the physics technology of today (male approach) ...
There is no feminine physics but there is a more feminine approach in Nature sciences which is way more general and deep than just specialized physics...Reducing all Nature science to material physics is a reductionist male approach to use your concept ...Quitting reductionism is the feminine deeper way...
If you want to go in details in Goethe approach... I recommend Wolfgang Schad mammoth book on zoology, an unrivalled masterpiece. one of the greatest changing life existing book in science :
Having said that, let me give you a quick answer on the spiritual front. My spirituality comes from my knowledge of science. I believe that the universe has a creative aspect that has been lost to modern science, but might be found in their exploration of dark matter and dark energy. In terms of the soul, I think the universe is the great consciousness and we are all flecks of that consciousness. When we die, we return to the great universal consciousness.
By the way do you know that just before Goethe completion of his prophetic Faust, a British royal society reunion, with Wavell and the founder of computing machine Babbage and few others , decided to change the title "philosopher of Nature" for the more modernn name "scientist" ?
Do you know what it means ?
It means that free gentleman occupied by understanding Nature Goddess, will now became payed specialised workers for the corporate interest of The British Empire ..
Goethe foresaw it in his Faust wriitten just before this assembly in the years 1835 .. i dont remember the exact year...There is even a book about the meaning of this historical fact... Because i am retired my memory fail me here , no students ask me anything now...
«A new study reveals we don’t just hear sounds – we feel it in our cells. Researchers at Kyoto University have found evidence that audible sound waves can influence the behavior of individual cells, altering gene activity and even affecting how certain cells develop – without touching or chemically treating them»
Thank you. I wrote that poem so long ago, I could not do it now. Since I write prose, my poetry brain is rusty. And although my French was never good, I've pretty much lost the little I had. When I traveled around the world in 1968, I traveled with French people who could not speak English, so I had to use my high-school French. When I wrote that poem I was reading the biographies of Baudelaire and Rimbaud. I was also reading their poetry. Now my mind is into what I am writing in prose. I've lived many lives of the mind.
Having said that, let me give you a quick answer on the spiritual front. My spirituality comes from my knowledge of science. I believe that the universe has a creative aspect that has been lost to modern science, but might be found in their exploration of dark matter and dark energy. In terms of the soul, I think the universe is the great consciousness and we are all flecks of that consciousness. When we die, we return to the great universal consciousness.
I cannot believe any system that judges humans for their behavior. There have been too many moral codes, all of which judge us for breaking that code. If I follow one code, I break another. I think almost all of us know inherently what is constructive and positive and what is not. Each of us finds our own way back to the universal soul or consciousness. What is consciousness? I'm not sure. That's why I'm reading a philosophy book on the subject.
Since you are French speaking I'm posting a poem I translated from Baudelaire. I am not very fluent in French and it took me quite a while. But if you look up the French original, you will see all the work I did. I did not like the sing-song English translations I read with end-line rhymes, so I gave it internal rhymes. Basically, I wanted to sound like Baudelaire would sound in current English. I wanted to capture his music.
STRANDS OF HAIR
Oh, loose strands of hair just touching your collar!
Those curls! Perfume heavy with indifference!
Ecstasy! Tonight I will wake each sleeping
Memory from your hair, shaking them from
Kerchiefs in the dark air of my haunted room.
Slumbering Asia, Africa ablaze, every distant
Corner of this expiring world forgotten,
Lives in the depths of these fragrant forests.
Just as others' spirits float upon a song,
Mine, oh my love! swims in your perfume!
I will go where trees and men flush with sap
Swoon ever under the passion of the skies.
Thick braids, your waves will carry me away!
And bound by those ebony seas are dazzling
Dreams of oarsmen, sails, flags and masts:
A boisterous port where my soul can drink
Billowing wafts of perfume, sounds and color;
Where vessels gliding on gold and moire
Open their great arms to embrace the glory
Of pure heaven trembling with eternal passion.
I will dive my love-drunk head where others
Have been swallowed by the black sea; then
My quick spirit, caressed by swells, will renew
Itself in you again, oh bountiful indolence
Forever swooning at the sweet smell of laziness.
Your hair, spread taut like a blue veil
Will be my sky, so round and so immense.
I am dizzy with the confusion of scents,
The oil of coconut, musk and pitch
Along the downy, twisting fringe of locks.
Always! My hand in your heavy hair,
Forever sowing rubies, sapphire and pearl.
My only desire is that you must never dull!
Aren't you the oasis where I dream, the skin
Where I take long sips of memory's wine?
Translated from La Chevelure by Charles Baudelaire
I think you and I overlap on our ven diagrams sometimes, but not always. I like great geniuses, other times I pull out an album for a different reason. I don't at all think of where the music I want to listen to sits in the pantheon of music. Genius. Just regular guy or gal. I don't care. I just feel like hearing them at the moment. So I'm going to post, here on our little chat, an album I listen to oftern called "Rock Swings" by Paul Anka. I thought about posting it on the Jazz forum, but I didn't dare. Those guys can get snooty. What can I say about it? I have listened to it many times. I like it. Sue me. I am not a real "Jazz Aficianado." BTW, I have friends who look down their noses at me for listening to the Eagles. I like what I like when I like it.
I remind you that i like Roberta Flack, i even kept an album of her with Hathaway...
I like singers who capture a generation, not so much ones who surpass generations.
A singer is a singer, i dont mind the genre of the culture , the singer communicate emotion from the lowest to the highest spirit level or not...
I am not much in nostalgia about who represent a generation way different for different listeners...
All artists represent an aspect known or not so well known of their generation...
But few surpass their own generation their gesture being located over time in the Human eternal Nature ...
Bach was forgotten as was past musical generation, Mendelsshonn make it more recognized and discovered anew as a master over any generation.
The same is true in many genre and styles...
Great singer add something way over their usual specialised chosen singing style... There is something in Billie Holiday that transcend jazz singing ...
The same is true for Marian Anderson ... And some others singers in other cultures...
Each of us , i am 74, have our own choice for the singer who represent the best the generation born after the war and who was near 20 in 1965...
For me being French speaking it is poets, as Dylan, Baez, Cohen, Leo Ferre, Jacques Douai.... For a musician of the guitar it may be Hendrix or any other rocker guitarist genius... Or any rock groups Beatles or Rolling Stones....
But i look also not to those who represent my generation for my own eyes and personal perspective but those who transcend their era...
I wanted to be moved not just entering nostalgia...
As i said i understand you, i like Roberta Flack... But there is other choices...
As your thread title say, and i love it, we speak music independent of genres...I thank you for this thread idea ...
I am interested by geniuses not so much by "genres" or by my own experience era ....And music is for me more than leisure listening only ...a passion for the spirit lets say ...
Roberta Flack and Marian Anderson are two different types of singers in my opinion. I think of Roberta Flack almost like a jazz singer. Marian Anderson is a different kind of singer in my mind. In regard to all the other singers you named, I did qualify my praise of Roberta Flack by saying she was the best singer "of her generation." What that means is that I will more often pull out her record than other singers of her generation, although I have been known to pull out Joan Baez's
"Farewell Angelina" and "Joan Baez #5." I never play Marian Anderson, although I have heard her sing. I like singers who capture a generation, not so much ones who surpass generations.
I like Roberta Flack for sure...I love Joan Baez though and Billie Holiday more ...
What about one of the true greatest American singer beside Leontyne Price or Jessie Norman or Billie Holiday or Ella Fitzgerald ?
What about Marian Anderson ?
Why is she over any other Western female singer i know in my opinion but i am not alone thinking this for sure ?
Simple, she is the only one able to sing spirituals, Bach, Verdi or Shubert at a level of heart moving power equal in all genre with a natural so evident, Toscanini, the master of all singers, said "there is one voice like this by century" ... Sibelius encountering her after a recital was in awe...
Listen to verify two Bach song first and two spirituals and Schubert Ave maria :
There is a version of this Ave Maria where Stokowski looked at her amazed when directing the orchestra... Who can sing this with so powerful faith and power ? None other.
In my opinion not only she is one of the greatest American singer but one of the greatest female singer on Earth beside a handful one... And none of these other one can sing spiritual music as her, but she can sing any lied as good if not better than most ... She sang popular music, hymns, spirituals better than most and rival any other famous opera voice...
A beautifully recorded, delightful jazz album with the great Stephane Grappelli, the Gypsy violinist who played with Django Reinhardt, and Teresa Brewer. Not a spiritual album. Just something to be enjoyed.
I want to promote Roberta Flack. I think she is underappreciated because her singing did not fall into any genre. Like Aretha Franklin, she learned to sing in church and has a beautiful gospel voice. For me, she has the most full and expressive voice of all of the female vocalists of her generation, white or black. Here is a sample of her singing "Bridge Over Troubled Waters." Think about how she has taken this very popular song and made it her own.
Any Gregorian song will do save the Old Gregorian of Iegor Reznikov, it is impossible to listen to this walking. Iegor is a mathematician who begun singing and rediscover old Gregorian before the Gregorian reform All his albums now impossible to buy are miracles of "harmonic singing " well recorded :
When i was young. I read the Bible at 10 because there was no other book. I read the Egyptian and Tibetan book of dead many years later.
But the books that changed my life was not an orthodox book from any religion.
At 20 i read "talking with angels" translated by Gitta Mallasz this book has nothing to do with reincarnation but throw me with another book " The freedom of doubt" by Alexis-Preyre, a book so extraordinary that i begun to understand what is spiritual experience...
If there is reincarnation, it would make no difference in how I live my life. So it's not an avenue that I feel urgent to explore. I have had people accurately predict very specific events in my future, but I decided that pursuing that avenue was not something that would help me or change my life.
Back to music. What did you think about my cateforization of performers: get out of the composer's way, seek beauty, have a free tempo for soul wrenching music?
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