Day 73: Glenn Gould "Glenn Gould at the Movies" & Jan Garbarek "Visible World"

Sliding through the crate it's two CDs that I thought would be a good idea to have but wasn't anxious to listen to immediately, or ever since they were never opened. Also, today we get to the 100th Amazon player widget. For those with adblock, it's a little player box above each post that allows you to listen to samples of the disc I'm listening to if it happens to be available for download at Amazon. So far, 100 of them have been.

Glenn Gould
Glenn Gould at the Movies

I was trying to think about what I'd say about Glenn Gould because classical CDs have proven to be a little on the difficult side for me to create content about and I realize something, I'm more interested in Glenn Gould as a character, or element, than I am as a performer.

There's that Cuban cigar element to his playing. That kind of thing where you think, "How much better can it really be?" until you actually hear it. Well, alright, that's pretty amazing in a world of just amazing piano players...big deal, right?

Except for what that means. I tend to think of Charlie Parker in the same way and have even used him in the Albatross that way. That monumental performer that sort of owns an instrument or a style in a way that sort of becomes unrepeatable. There have been great saxophonists since Bird, there have been great guitarists since Hendrix, and there have been great piano players since Gould. But they don't get 'the' spot. A transformational piano performer now will be the 'greatest since Gould...'

There is a novel I keep wanting to read (but c'mon, it's seriously a 200 page paragraph...) about the two piano players that show up to study with Horowitz at the same time as Gould and what that does to them. That's the kind of thing that fascinates me about Gould. Not so much the legendary status or what it was like to 'be Gould,' that kind of thing doesn't interest me. What interests me is what it's like to live in the immediate world someone like that creates, how does that change you're view of self if you're an amazing piano player in the same time and place as the amazing piano player?

This is stuff he either selected or recorded especially for films, or was used in films after his death.  The first half is a bunch of harpsichord pieces played on a piano, which always feels wrong to me, but there's nothing really behind that.

On the last track he goes with 'original instrument' by playing the Art of the Fugue on an organ.

Jan Garbarek
Visible Worlds

 So there was this CD I got as a promo, it was one of those rare 'classical sensations,' not as big as Chant, but did well. And this time, it was something I actually liked quite a bit. The vocal group the Hillard Ensemble recorded some motets and Norwegian saxophonist Jan Gabarek improvised over them. It actually sounded pretty cool, I loved it. I played the hell out of it at the store and even managed to lose it a few times as a personal copy and had to replace it more than once. In fact, I'm pretty sure I no longer have it, but here's hoping because on Amazon it ranges from fifty to seventy bucks, apparently.

I even attended a concert performance of that in the Grace Cathedral on Nob Hill seated right behind some important Norwegian, I don't remember now if it was a politician or a member of the royal family. All I can really remember is thinking it would be really funny to lean forward and ask if he knew of my mom's family. It was a good night for impulse control.

The success of that CD meant that there were suddenly going to be a lot more Jan Garbarek CDs. Awesome, I thought. Sucker. For the most part, Garbarek produces some pretty mild smooth jazz, though still manages to have long open solos instead of repetitive riffing, but that's what he plays. Which I guess goes to why they selected him of all people to perform with the Hillard Ensemble, but I was hoping for more experimental stuff. I mean, he is a European jazz artist, most of the European jazz artists I had run into were mostly pretty caustic free jazz artists.

Not Jan, he's mellow. And I have multiple CDs by this guy. As far as I know they're all like this.

There is no liner notes to explain the theme of this album, just this rather intense photo of Mr. Garbarek. He kind of looks like he's about to perform a feat of mentalism with his sax rather than play it.

I sound like I'm hating on him for not living up to my completely made up expectations of him and my own bias' against smooth jazz. And I guess I am, if I was fairer I'd not that he really isn't that 'smooth' with his smooth jazz, this stuff is just out there enough to avoid being played on the Quiet Storm.

I wasn't prepared for the last song to have lyrics. Of course, I have no idea what she's saying.

Day 58: Angel Sept. 2000 Sampler & Ellingtonia: A Tribute to Duke Ellington

I should remember these moments every time I start a new bag or whatnot. These moments where I start doing the CDs I avoided because I didn't think they would be interesting or whatever. So what happens is that there is a big stack of CDs I dread for like a week and half. This is not the best sell for the post that is about to follow, I'm sure it will be awesome...

Various Artists
Angel Sept. 2000 Sampler

This is probably the most amount of prep I've done in the set up for the post. And not really much of it will matter.

I've done these kinds of CDs before, these are the pre-release samplers that would be handed out in advance of the actual releases to both garner my excitement and presumably for me to play in the store to excite customers (the latter hardly ever happened.)

I would almost never listen to these unless for some reason there was something on there that I recognized or was intrigued by, but it would have to stand out because I hardly ever read them either.

For today's post I actually found five of the seven albums sampled here for the player. I could have just put the individual tracks that are actually on this CD in the player to be better representative, but I didn't think of it until I was well underway, so I didn't. Also, iTunes was unable (for the first time) to identify this CD so I got to be the one who labeled everything. After musing on how to label classical CDs in the player I finally decided the best way to go about it was to consider the performer the artist and to list the name of the track with the composer first. My logic being that if I wanted to hear a specific piece I would more than likely know who wrote it, so I could look for, say, Respighi if I wanted to hear Pines of Rome. This is undermined by the fact that I had to look up how to spell his name.

I've always wondered how much is put into these samplers. I mean, these aren't for general release, they aren't themed and packaged on anything other than, "This is the stuff we're putting out next month." But it's still a sales job, I'm being the one sold. How much consideration is put into how the tracks work together, over which performance is selected? It's (presumably) for a discerning audience, but it also has to work for people like me and 'below,' who either know some classical but don't listen to enough to be that up on it or people who just don't hate classical but it's not their thing.

As it is it's a pretty accessible collection. These aren't daring selections without being 'classical greatest hits' kind of stuff. It's heavy on the opera, but I don't know if that's a product of the selection or just that September was big on opera. The selections are also consistently moody, which I think has to be a matter of selection. I don't obviously think the sampler is assembled like I would the last second before a road trip...I just wonder what the criteria is that goes into it.

As if to punctuate the moodiness of the CD, there's a Chopin Nocturne. Chopin has become the Dali print of a college music collection. I run into a lot of college age people who will casually list Chopin as part of their 'classical cred.' I suppose the next thing I should do is scoff at this and offer up other composers that should qualify, but frankly I like Chopin, too, and there are worse things that they could like.

It ends with a modern composer conducting his own piece. It has a kind of 'overture of dances' feel to it where the piece builds to an intensity, becomes a lot faster, and then breaks down so it can build back up again.

Various Artists
Ellingtonia: A Tribute To Duke

I think my fastidiousness borked iTunes. Building on what I had done in the last CD I went through and corrected all of the artist listing on this CD, but now it won't recognize the whole thing as one album in that little flip-book cover viewer it has, so it lists it as an 'unkown album.' But when I click 'get info' it knows exactly what album and associates the art with it.

Curse you digital media...

Anyway, here's yet another tribute to Ellington. This one is made up of either Canadian performers or performers who spend a lot of their time in Canada. I dig Canada, and apparently from the liner notes, so did Duke.

This was recorded for Ellington's 100th anniversary (which is probably why I have so many of them, aside from him being an immensely influential performer and composer). I don't know if it was assembled from already available recordings or if it was recorded special for this album. The groups are pretty different in their approach so far ranging from regular swing combos to big bands to a simple guitar and vocalist singing one of my favorites, In a Sentimental Mood. I never knew the lyrics to that song. I still don't for the most part, she had that 'jazzy Novocain' style of singing where the words kind of bend together.

The liner notes mine the more obscure and far ranging elements of Ellington's compositions in a classic liner notes 'look what I know' kind of display, but the selections are straight canon. Only thing missing is Satin Doll, though it does end with a Mingus composition that itself is a tribute to Ellington.

Also, if I had finished reading the liner notes I would know that in fact these are recordings lifted from other albums and assembled here, each track is credited with its original album release. I guess you could look at that as the cheap way to go, to assemble stuff already paid for in your library, package it up, find a jazz critic to write a blurb inside the liner and you're set. But in a way it's almost a more honest tribute, what better way to show the influence of Ellington than being able to pull together a bunch of tracks from unrelated artists who were already performing his works for no other reason then they were good.

I used to play the snot out of Do Nothing Til You Hear From Me. I have no idea why I dug that song so much, except maybe the little figure in the A melody that would happen between phrases. Maybe it was because I actually knew the lyrics (which a girlfriend at the time forbid me to sing because she felt like I was singing to her my intent to cheat on her...).

I don't know what it is specifically, but piano pounders really like Lush Life.

The last three tracks move a little away from the standard Ellington catalog with recordings of Melancholia, Day Dream, and Chelsea Bridge.

Day 57: Luiz Bonfa "The Composer of Black Orpheus Plays and Sings Bossa Nova" and Novosibirsk Philharmonic Orchestra Rachmaninov Symphic Dances and Stravinsky Jeu de Cartes

Every time I start to think I'm about done with this bag another pack of unprocessed CDs pop up. The themes are staying pretty consistent, though.

Luiz Bonfa
The Composer of Black Orpheus Plays and Sings Bossa Nova

Bossa Nova is somewhere between a successful date with The Continental and a dirty phone call. This might have a lot to do with the fact that I keep listening to this stuff on headphones, But it's that whisper singing that they do, it always gives me the impression that they're telling me something dirty.

I don't speak Portuguese, so maybe they are. Who knows. It is certainly one of the most mellow forms of music out there.

This is kind of a classic LP, I think. For some reason when I think of LPs it's always something like this, like 'so and so plays such and such.'

I know I know Black Orpheus but I can't think of it right now. This certainly provides a different feel to The Hurt Locker.

I'm starting to dread the bossa nova CDs because I didn't really have much to say about them in the first place and now I'm pretty much tapped out as far as insight goes. This recording bounces back and forth between the 'full orchestra' kind of stuff and the more simple percussion and guitar.

Of course I made the whisper sing comment, and the last track actually starts off with them really whispering "bossa nova cha cha" in my ear. Awesome.

This is a really short album, less than 40 minutes. This is the kind of thing where normally they would add bonus tracks to the original recording to fill things out, but not this time.

Novosibirsk Philharmonic Orchestra
Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances Op. 45, Vocalise op 34 no 14 / Stravinsky Jeu De Cartes

This was an especially difficult type of classical CD to file. The Novosibirsk Philharmonic Orchestra wasn't necessarily an in demand orchestra. But then it isn't a single composer CD, so how do I file it so that whoever might be looking for it would find it?

Sony Classical seemed to put preference towards Rachmaninov. But it's not like Stavinsky is a complete unknown.

Ultimately I erred towards the standard I had set. I had laid this out earlier, if it was a single composer it would be filed by composer, multiple composers under the performer. So the Novosibirsk Philharmonic Orchestra got a leader card.

I didn't get far enough to do a lot of studying of Russian composers. I know that Charlie Parker was obsessed with Stravinsky and piano players love Rachmaninov.

iTunes has an even harder time with classifying the CD since it attributed the whole CD to Rachmaninov, even the Stravinsky pieces.

This album contains a performance of Vocalise, which somewhere I also have performed on a theremin. Kind of awesome.

I'm as stuck with mainstream classical as I am with bossa nova, I don't really know what to say. I'm guilty of letting classical be background music, but really there's so much that goes on in music like this that it deserves more attention, not less. Somewhere we flipped it, classical became background music and we give attention to simpler, more repetitive music. I understand why that is, but it's still kind of backwards.

Day 21: Tama "Nostalgie" and Peter Maxwell Davies "Job"

So much of the Albatross is made up of pretense. It's easy to be pretentious when the CDs you're getting are free. I don't know that it's all that uncommon for people to want their music tastes to say something about themselves and who they are to other people. We play our music loud, our clothing styles are often influenced by the music tastes we have, at least in our youth.

It's hard to say exactly what message I was trying to send with this collection (obsessive hoarder?), but for a lot of these selections it's hard to argue that they weren't as much for the bookshelf as they were for the CD player.

To be fair to myself, there was an equal amount of curiosity involved, too. I mean, at free there was no risk for me in taking home a CD and trying it out. Except that I never got to all of them and they just kept piling up. Two curios make the selection today in that vein.


Tama
Nostalgie

I had no idea what this was going to be. African, clearly, but no idea what part or in what way. iTunes classified it as pop. It's on the Real World Records label, started by Peter Gabriel as part of his whole WOMAD festival thing (which I attended in San Francisco).

Real World is also responsible for the spinning display rack I took home and made into one of my many storage shelves for the Albatross. It's one of the better ones, because I can just tape the CDs into the tall spinning rack and move the whole thing, CDs and all.

The liner notes are a write-off, and the license sticker obscures the translation of the tracks. Before I go looking this guy up and seeing what he's all about, it does sound like that kind of pretentious mid-nineties pop by long-established artists like Gabriel and Paul Simon, where there is an electronic underpinning that is then bolstered by African percussion and some string instruments. This is clearly the music that Gabriel was listening to when he did songs like Biko. The only real difference is I can't understand what the guy is saying, but as I mentioned before, most the time I don't care anyway.

Well, right off the bat, I'm already wrong about at least one thing. It's a band, not a guy (Did you hear Lynyrd Skynyrd was marrying Molly Hatchet? Pink Floyd is the best man...etc.) Real World really promotes them on the idea of a 'band of equals' and doesn't really tell me much else except that they're from Mali, the UK and Guinea-Bissau. I don't know if this is a dominant feature of the band or if Real World is just really committed to that whole 'one world aesthetic.'  There doesn't appear to be a Wiki page on them.

I guess there is something to be said to experiencing the music without being pitched, to only know so little about it.

This doesn't really jump out at me, but I do find myself moving my head to it now and then.

It's good enough, and has a unique sound to it. There is a legitimate reason to listen to this even if you're not from Mali. You're only likely to get imitations of this music elsewhere. But I don't know that it would be that easy to give someone listening to this the benefit of the doubt. It's completely unfair, as I write this, to be that way about it, because on at least some level I'm genuinely enjoying it. But if I was hitching a ride with someone who had this on their car stereo, I'd expect it to be a beat up Subaru with a worn dreamcatcher hanging from the mirror, the driver to be barefoot and laying a lot on me about 'one world' or things of that nature. Or, if they looked 'normal', I would think they're really like that and trying to 'pass.'


Peter Maxwell Davies
Job
 

This is the first 'complete' work to go into the hard drive, a modern oratorio based on the book of Job, obviously. Or at least obviously I think. The book is fused together.

There really are two classes of modern composition, there's the evolution of harmonies in the vein of Shostakovich and Stravinsky that use unconventional voicings, structure, and the like. And then there is the clanking and banging kind that stretches what our definition of music is and should be, à la John Cage.

This is the former. The sad thing is that when operas, operettas and oratorios are in English, I can't help but think I'm listening to an overbearing musical. Though this would be a pretty damn intense musical. I can't really make out what they're saying all the time, just a few choice moments.

So far the only information I can find is from a British website selling sheet music to the whole thing. Rather than paraphrase, here it is:

A substantial work for four soli, SATB chorus and orchestra, using text from the translation of Stephen Mitchell's The Book Of Job.
Like Vaughan Williams in his Job: A Masque for Dancing, Davies was inspired in part by William Blake's 21 engravings for the Book of Job. His oratorio, however, is less dependent on find parallels for Blake's visual details, given the direct poetry in David Lemon's adaptation of the Stephen Mitchell translation from the biblical original, it is hardly surprising that the spotlight should be so much on Job's suffering litany. The baritone has the lion's share of the setting, though the other soloists occasionally reinforce his plea and chorale-like episodes universalize his predicament. Davies frames with work with two seminal plainsong-like passages; there is also plenty of dramatic contrast both within Job's monologues and in the vivid orchestral writing for the smarmy Comforters, the initially shrill God who finally appears out of a dazzling orchestral whirlwind and the animal life he uses to illustrate the wonders of creation to a humbled Job.
Commissioned by the University of British Colombia, it was first performed in May 1997 by Valdine Anderson (soprano), Linda Maguire (mezzo soprano), Paul Moore (tenor) and Kevin McMillan (baritone) with the Vancouver Bach Choir and the CBC Vancouver Orchestra, conducted by the composer.
Vocal score with piano reduction of the orchestral score. Duration c. 70mins.

 I have to say, I've never really got what the book of Job was supposed to be all about. Like, if you're life sucks and bad things keep happening to you don't worry, it's God getting into a pissing contest with the Devil and fucking you over to win a bet? I always kind of feel like the Devil won this one. It sort of proved that God is a fickle, insecure douche who will grind your life to butter just to prove a point to someone else.

A friend and fellow playwright in college wrote an allegory of the story of Job as rival gangs where the loyalty of a henchman is tested. When you see it played out like that, it's hard not to see the guy buying into the bet as a tool and jerk. I don't know if he's still shopping that play, but at the time it was called "The Job." If you see that playing somewhere, check it out.

Unfortunately, it seems that the CD player wasn't able to get all the tracks off in their entirety. That's too bad. I'm never sure how to handle this, it's not the first time. I guess I'll put it with the discs that need repair and later try and re-import it.

I wish the book wasn't deteriorated; from some of the lyrics I'm catching here and there it seems like there is some cool stuff going on. Orchestrally, it has the expected, really. All in all, an interesting piece. I'm sort of surprised I didn't listen to this when I got it. Though I might have and just turned it off once I realized it was in English. Well, I've listened to most of it now...

Day 20: Soundtrack to "Hilary and Jacky" and Buddy Guy & Junior Wells "The Real Blues"

What I'm finding most is how much I remember of getting certain CDs more than I am how much I forgot about getting others. I think I remember getting one of today's CDs, while the other is a complete and total mystery to me. They clearly come from different places in my collection because they are in entirely different conditions.

Let's get started.


Barrington Pheloung
Soundtrack to Hilary & Jackie

Every once in a while a promo gets taken home completely by accident. You're taking home a big stack of promos, and somehow one of these promos that's only in a sleeve slips in with them. You can't do anything about it, you can't sell them, they usually only have enough information on them for ordering when ordering was relevant, so when you discover them months later you really have no idea what they are or what to do with them.

I probably picked this one up on purpose, though, it's a soundtrack and it's a classical CD, so it was 'up my alley' so to speak.

Actually, as I look through the accumulated grime (this CD was still in its wrapper, so that was some persistent grime) it's actually mostly the work of composer Barrington Pheloung. I don't feel too bad, iTunes thinks the whole album is Elgar's Concerto for Cello.

I don't know very much about this movie. And by 'very much' I mean I don't know anything about it. Apparently it's a biopic about famous cellist Jacqueline du Pré from the point of view of her sister who wrote the memoir the film is based on. This explains the dominance of cello music and the inclusion of cello pieces from noted composers. The opening recording is by du Pré herself, the others are by Caroline Dale.

I've never heard of du Pré before, despite having a love for the cello. I'm not sure if I should feel ashamed of that or not. Apparently the movie was well received and nominated for two Oscars. What the hell was I doing in 1998 that I completely missed this?

It might have been right after I quit the movie theater where I had been a projectionist for a number of years. There was about a year or so I just stopped watching movies because for the previous years I had almost literally watched every major release to come out.

The music is dark and deeply emotional. The cello is really an expressive instrument. For a CD I really knew pretty much nothing about, this is kind of a treasure.

I was going to mention this on the Canadian Brass album, but there is something about classical music that makes people cough. I guess people cough at every concert, you can just hear it in classical. Even in recordings that don't appear to be 'live' recordings.

This provides a much classier soundtrack for the climax of Days of Thunder and this episode of Miami Vice, by the way. I don't know why I don't turn the TV off to do this. I have really good headphones, so I can't really hear it. I'm just used to having it on even if I don't particularly pay that much attention to it.

I'm kind of surprised that this CD has survived this entire time. To be as dirty as it was it must have been in some of the more neglected piles. I'm glad it did, I can always do with some good cello music. I might have to dig this movie up, it sounds kind of racy if not completely depressing.


Buddy Guy and Junior Wells
Real Blues

Once again, I am completely stunned by the amount of blues in the collection so far.

There are no liner notes (disappointing for a blues CD, as I mentioned earlier) and I can find virtually no information on the CD except that it is widely available for download.

This is clearly a live recording, including his announcements to the audience and thanks to an unnamed sponsor for the concert. The first half is Buddy Guy who is joined on the second half by Junior Wells.

The instruments are recorded well enough, but the voice mic sounds like he was using a pair of headphones.

I've never heard a blues version of Satisfaction...interesting. Also, by the time this song started they have apparently improved the voice mic, it's not great, but it's better.

So far the Albatross has dealt up Chicago Blues, we just keeping getting older and older.

Well, the mic problem is back, which is too bad because I love Messin' With the Kid. Now it seems like they're running the guitar through the same amp. All in all this has a bootleg quality to it. But really, for blues, that might lend a legitimacy to it.  Talking about the recording quality of a blues CD might be akin to complaining the seats aren't comfortable in a vintage sports car. This kind of recording gives it a kind of authentic feel. But the recording can't be that old that they can't mix it properly.

Well, we had a fade out on the last live CD, now we have a fade in. That's a little weird. I would guess that this is an anthology, but the recording quality is consistently poor. The copyrights on the back are 1994 and 1999. The CD was still in its wrapper. The performances are pretty good, obviously, and if you don't have a problem with that 'bootleg' sound, then you wouldn't have a problem with this.

I'm kind of floored at how little info I have on this recording. It's another short one, too, at 42 minutes.

Feedback even. Was this recorded in a school gym? This is probably the best known blues artists to go in so far and it sounds like it was recorded on a $10 budget.

Still and all, it's kind of cool not in spite of its flaws but because of them, in a very weird way. What could I expect for free, I guess...

Day 19: Arnett Cobb/Dinah Washington "Cobb and His Mob in Concert" and The Canadian Brass "Super Hits"

As the CDs have emptied from the bag, it has started to lose integrity and the CDs have degenerated into a pile in the bottom of the bag. As a result, the selection method has become less meticulous and there is a more honest "reach in and grab two" bingo style method in place now.

I know that none of this really matters as long as I don't actively select the CDs. I guess it wouldn't matter if I did that either, but this method feels more honest and interesting to me. Certainly more representative of my relationship with the Albatross.

So, lets get to what has come up in today's musical bingo-


Arnett Cobb
Cobb and his Mob in Concert featuring Dinah Washington

Once again I wander into the world of people I know of but don't really know. I was likely more excited about Dinah Washington than about Cobb.

Well, more than likely this was one of the CDs handed directly to me by a small label rep who was being especially nice to me. Most of the Big 6 reps visited me only briefly - I made them very little money so they didn't care. They were nice enough, but I was the short pit stop on the way out the door before they went off to a big store to woo their main buyer.

But small distributors, especially ones that had a lot of jazz and classical labels on them, they treated me like big shot. Well, not really a big shot, but they were nice to me the way that the Big 6 reps were nice to the store's main buyer.

So I'd get handed these promos personally instead of in mail addressed to me or handed out with a bunch of other crap on the way out the door. And it would usually be something obscure, or like this with black and white packaging and all of the original recording imperfections in place (it actually sounds like it was recorded straight off someone's old record) and I'd always say about the same thing, "Cool" or "Sweet" or some equivalent and then struggle to see if I could remember anything about the artist being handed to me while simultaneously trying to mask the fact that I didn't already know. A great deal of my experience in music is based on bluff.

It's too bad I didn't actually listen to this album or look into it, because I have a longstanding love of 'jump-jive' or 'jump-blues' or whatever you want to call it. I had run across a band at the Sacramento Dixieland Jazz Jubilee (now apparently called the Sac Jazz Festival & Jubilee) called Fat Sam's Band that did Cab Calloway and Louis Jordan tunes and I was completely taken. I even went and got pleated pants and suspenders despite having sloping shoulders that made suspenders a comically bad idea.

Years later, of course, jump-jive or "swing" would get a huge flash in the pan revival with Royal Crown Revue, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Brian Setzer and his Orchestra, Lee Press-on and the Nails (which a friend of mine from college ended up playing for), and the Cherry Poppin' Daddies (who did other songs as well, and while I'm biased I think they best embodied the idea of a modern jump-jive band in that they didn't just do 'revival swing' but modern influenced music with horn and swing elements added as well).

I thought my ship had come in, that the music I liked was going to be popular and therefore available. But the revival went from popular to comical faster than pogs (famously at the store there was a 12 hour pogs fad where from opening people started playing pogs, people spent their lunches getting pogs, employees were throwing down in the aisles...and by closing time the fad was over and no one had pogs the next day. If you didn't work that day, and I didn't, you were not part of that flash in the pan.)

So I never got the benefit of the revival. I got a few early albums on the up-swing (ha!), but the digging out of classics of the genre didn't happen with the exception of Louis Prima because the fade had come and gone before people could make it to their back catalog.

But I did get this. While not as 'hot' as Jordan or Calloway, it's still a pretty good sample of a genre that I tend to think of as only having two people in it at times.


The Canadian Brass
Super Hits

Let me just state right off the bat, I love Canadians. So far, every Canadian I've met has been kind of awesome.

This doesn't of course mean that I like all things Canadian. I mean, there's no Celine Dion in this collection no matter how free it would be.

But I do like the Canadian Brass. It's the kind of appreciation that comes from getting free CDs, however, because I don't know that I would have come across them otherwise. I think I recall being amused at a classical album being titled "Super Hits".

It does have a brass rendition of Scarborough Fair by Paul Simon with an odd assortment of acoustic and electric guitar and harpsichord. And the ubiquitous Canon in D by whom I once heard referred to as the original one hit wonder, Pachelbel.

Essentially that's what this album promises and delivers, the stuff you know but don't know you know in brass form. Since the saxophone wasn't invented until 1846 and no composers really took to it save a small handful, I'm free from my normal biases to be able to say that my preferred instrumentation for 'Classical' music. (Note for pedants: I use the commonly recognized term because no other term has come up that isn't also clumsy as well as not commonly recognized. Yes, 'classical' is actually a relatively short period covering only certain composers. You get an 'A' on your music appreciation quiz. But it's also a term that everyone, even you, recognize to cover the rest of it and stomping up and down about it just annoys everyone but yourself, like clicking a pen in a quiet room...)

These are relatively short selections making the overall album not very long itself, only 43 minutes. The longest track is 5'30", most are around three minutes or less.

This also makes it more 'shuffle friendly.' One of the frustrations I have with iTunes is the inability to embed a play list, so that when I hit 'random' I don't have to, say, break up the Kronos Quartet/Allen Ginsberg recording of Howl, or a concept album like the earlier Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking can stay together. CDs were able to have their tracks run smoothly together but I haven't been able to adjust the settings on iTunes to either not have a brief pause between tracks or cross-fade them so that I lose the beginning and end of each track. And if I do manage to find that sweet spot, something will eventually happen to re-adjust my settings. Very frustrating.

Not a problem with this classical CD because all the tracks are short stand-alones.

There's something dignified about brass. I think maybe because I associate it with Charles Koralt and the news magazine show Sunday Morning. Certainly makes me feel a little more dignified than sitting in a worn In 'n Out Burger t-shirt with old Hanna-Barbera cartoons playing in the background actually is. By the way, classical brass arrangements kind of make an awesome soundtrack to The Huckleberry Hound Show.

There's a nice departure with a New Orleans flavored rendition to Amazing Grace.

It's easy to get hypnotized by this music, which is exactly what just happened to me. I kind of spaced out to it until it came to an end. Rather nice, glad it's on the hard drive and not languishing in obscurity...

Day 12: Let's Go Bowling "Mr. Twist" and the Olympia 1994 Preview Disc

I've mentioned before that the Albatross is full of lies and disappointment. Today it dished up a particular kind of lie and disappointment with a Fake Out. What I thought I was preparing to ingest today was the debut album from The New York Ska-Jazz Ensemble, but the Albatross had other plans. Instead, it dealt up Let's Go Bowling's Mr. Twist. I should at least be thankful that it kept in in genre. Must have been during one of those heady moments where I tried to organize the Albatross and it didn't take.

Without further ado...

Let's Go Bowling
Mr. Twist

This is the second instance of music I bought on purpose, and strangely enough it can be linked back to the same uncle, which honestly didn't occur to me until I started to write this.

This doesn't trace all the way back to Junior High School, however, this happened when I was already an adult. I was visiting my uncle and he showed me a few tracks of the California Ska-Quake compilation of third wave ska. Sure, it was catchy, it was upbeat beat, but deep down the truth of it more than likely is that if you put horns in something, I'm in. A genre of music with saxophones? Sold.

So I went exploring. What I found was that I had a definite preference for what seemed to be labeled "third wave" or "California" or "West Coast" or whatever they settled on. But what I learned most of all was that ska was at its best when it was doing covers. I discovered this by buying albums like this and the album like this that the case belonged to. I genuinely like the New York Ska-Jazz Ensemble, another 'super band' of ska players from other big time bands doing jazz standards with reggae influenced dance beats.

And honestly I can get by on this for the most part. I mean, saxophones go a long, long way. But it never really hooked. I bought a few of the albums from the artists on compilations that I seemed to like, but I don't really remember many of these CDs making much of an appearance in whatever kind of regular rotation.

Let's Go Bowling seems to have carried over a lot of 'second wave,' if I understand the distinction. They seem like they could perform some English Beat and be fairly faithful.

It's been so long that I really don't remember what song it is I identified with or liked. I'm hoping I"ll hear it and it will jog some memory and it will all come back to me. But perhaps not.

I haven't been listening to the lyrics as much, but what I have listened to hasn't had that sense of whimsy I usually associate with ska. But their horn parts are a little more involved than just horn blasts here and there, as well as plenty of solos. And an organ.

All good choices, but I don't find myself as into this as I think I should be. I remember having this feeling when I bought it and ended up listening to the Ska-Jazz band instead. All the pieces are here, I'm just not and was not as into it as I would have thought.


Various Artists
Olympia 1994 Preview Disc

Probably the biggest contrast so far in the project, this, obviously, was the yearly preview of all the upcoming classical releases from the Olympia label. I wish I could say I remember much about them, but I don't. The sticker on the back indicates that they were distributed by Allegro, which I seem to remember were a rather small distributor, but had a lot of stuff I like, so maybe some of that came from Olympia.

I guess the part that jumps out to me the most is the date. I can never remember when I started at the record store, but clearly I was there by at least 1994. That was a healthy chunk of my life spent helping people find Usher and Pearl Jam CDs.

I was hired initially because of my knowledge of classical. I'm by no means a total aficionado, but I was a music major, I had just left college with my music history classes fresh in my mind and my newly seeded appreciation for 20th century composition. I was also hired for my knowledge of jazz, which was much more developed, but there was another jazz expert hired at the same time. He would have, by comparison, liked The JazzTimes Superband a little more than the James Carter CD and therefore his tastes were more in line with the commercial interests of the store.

Being the store's 'Classical guy' had some amusing moments. First of all, there were four people with my first name, so we all went by nicknames. Mine was given to me by another friend on a separate occasion and as soon as the staff of the store heard it, I was forever Walrus. In addition to that, I sported (still do) long hair and a narrow three inch long goatee that was at times died green and even experimented with a handlebar mustache that, before I stopped, was done up like Salvador Dali. I worked at a record store, my boss had a purple mohawk, it was the time to try that kind of stuff.
What all of this meant is that, when someone had a classical question, the employee would tell the customer to hold on, then go to the intercom and say, "Walrus to the classical section." And then when this help, apparently named Walrus, would show up, he'd be a green-goateed, handlebar-mustached, long haired guy. The reactions varied between disdain, disappointment, shock...very infrequently a shrug. But ultimately I think stuff like that was part of the record store experience. I mean, again, I am by no means the expert to beat all and there are a lot of cats who know more than me, but I still knew my stuff, and I knew that section pretty well. So if you needed help, chances were pretty good I was going to be able to help you.

What I'm finding sad is that sixteen (Christ...) years on from getting this CD I'm not retaining as much about Classical as I once knew. I think what I liked about Allegro was that they had some of the less accessible stuff, modern composers or under-performed works. In with the Beethoven, Rachmaninov, Liszt, and Shostakovich there is Roussel, Kabalevsky, Vainberg, and Gorecki.

Gorecki had the closest the classical section (before Chant) had to a break out hit. And he is a modern composer, so I was much more happy with that. For a brief time, his Symphony No. 3, a dark and brooding piece of minimalism, was a hot seller. I wasn't sure where people were hearing about it, but it sold at a regular pace. And when people had trouble finding it, I was able to push other modern composers like Arvo Pärt, Gavin Bryars, and John Tavener.

The earliness of this CD I think is the only reason I got it. By the time I left I had gotten the person who eventually ended up managing the store into 20th century compositions and he had a natural inclination towards Eastern European composers. This CD focuses on both rather well, including composers from the 19th century (Glinka) and 20th century (Gorecki and Vainberg (Weinberg)). Had this come in later I never would have gotten it. He might have listened to it a little sooner than I have, but he's one of the people whose "Albatross" was much larger than mine. I remember visiting him a few years back just after he had dumped thousands of CDs in the trash because he just didn't want to deal with it anymore. And he still had a sizable collection. This CD has a piece from the soundtrack for a 1965 Polish movie about a soldier in World War II (Salto by composer Kilar) followed by the Soviet Anthem. He totally would have taken this CD later on.

And hey, that part of the soundtrack is actually pretty cool. A hint of Mancini in it, really. I like this stuff, I just don't know as much about it as I used to. I used to be surrounded by it all the time, absorbing some bit of it on a regular basis. Now I just drag it around from place to place not knowing it's really there...