Interesting edition of GompArts, Will Gompertz’s column for the BBC, on a recreation of Martin Creed’s Work No 409 at the Southbank Center in London. The setting is an elevator and the work is a piece for vocalists whose voices rise as the elevator ascends and descends as it falls.
Creed became well-known after winning the Turner Prize in 2001 for his Work No 227: The Lights Going on and Off. He says his art is a way of countering our visually overloaded, choice-saturated culture. I like Creed’s work. I asked him for a line on this piece and got this: “I don’t know what to say. I don’t know which notes are best. I don’t know if I’m coming or going.” Up and down maybe, Martin?
Asterios Polyp (Pantheon), the latest graphic novel by David Mazzucchelli is garnering excellent reviews and plaudits for taking the graphic novel into more firmly literary and adult territory. AND it just won the inaugural award in the graphic novel category of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize:
Mazzucchelli’s monolith is a beautifully executed love story, a smart and playful treatise on aesthetics, a perfectly unified work whose every formal element, down to the stitching on its spine, serves its themes. No wonder the main character is an architect finding his way back to his Ithaca and his Penelope: “Asterios Polyp” is an odyssey of design as well as writing and art and cartooning. Steeped in classicism and wholly modern, it’s a pleasure to read, and maybe even more of a pleasure to contemplate and discuss.
Asterios Polyp is a follow-up work to Mazzucchelli collaboration with Paul Auster and Paul Karasik to turn Auster’s
into a graphic novel (Faber 2005) — interesting review in The Guardian.
Late night in the Mission, the class begins with the sound of kirtans accompanied by slowly pumped chords on the harmonium. The class members respond hesitantly, repeating back the unfamiliar sounds chanted by the teacher. The call-and-response chanting subsides and the teacher announces the first asana as tinkling sounds from a kora replace the languid chords of the harmonium. For the next two hours, the class moves forward with the musical accompaniment of the kora and manipulations of its sounds through a small array of electronic devices. It’s not the background music typically heard in an American yoga studio, but it’s not quite foreground either. Solidly in the middle, it works sometimes, fitting perfectly with the slow movements; other times, it seems distracting, an extraneous element unconnected to the physical activity.
Every Friday night since October 2007, the Midnight Yoga class at Laughing Lotus Yoga Center in San Francisco’s Mission district has offered live music as accompaniment to yoga. Developed by the yoga center’s parent studio in New York City, the class features various genres and musical configurations: kora and electronics; freestyle guitar, bass, and keys; cello, voice, loops, and percussion toys. Yael Kievsky, who has taught the class since December, says that live music to accompany yoga is simply an extension of the use of taped music as background that has been a part of yoga classes in the United States for decades.
For centuries, Somalis used poetry and songs to pass protest messages to powerful rulers they were too afraid to confront directly. Now, some young Somalis are using rap to speak out against Islamists who they say are using religion to wage war in their country. The 11-member Waayaha Cusub band, currently in exile in neighbouring Kenya, wants its rap lyrics to encourage fellow Somalis to stand up to Islamist rebels known as al Shabaab.
They have handed out at least 7,000 free copies of their newly-released album titled “No To Al Shabaab” to residents in Nairobi’s Eastleigh neighbourhood, home to many Somali migrants. “We will wipe out the fear of our people that no one can speak out against al Shabaab. We will show our people that we can challenge them,” said Shine Abdullahi, the group’s founder… “They are unkind, teach terrorism, and worthless lessons, they blindfold, and cause pain, inject drugs, that lead to actions, force them to kill their fathers and relatives,” one of the group’s raps goes.
The group’s only female member, Falis Abdi Mohamud, is a rebel in her own right. In one video, the 23-year-old is not covering her head as most Somali women do, and is wearing tight jeans. “They criticise me and say ‘she is not Muslim because of wearing a trouser’. I am Muslim,” she said. “I want to reach my people. I will not stop my mission because of fear or other people’s desires. History will tell who is right and wrong.”
Mohamud was born in the southern town of Kismayu that is now an al Shabaab stronghold. The insurgents have banned music in areas that they control and allow only Arabic Koranic chanting. Waayaha Cusub toured the semi-autonomous northern region of Puntland in July but Mohamud hopes to perform in her hometown one day. “The trip to Somalia was great. That is when I realised people like our music, and it really gave us confidence not to stop our campaign because a few people who dislike us.” The group’s youngest member is 15-year-old Suleqa Mohamed, who is a student at an Eastleigh school.
Most of them want to return to Somalia and live off their music when peace returns but currently survive on sponsorships by businessmen and Somalis in the diaspora. Their songs have angered some people. Even in the relative stability and security of Kenya they have been attacked. Gunmen shot and wounded Abdullahi in 2007. He believes the attack was because the group released a series of songs criticising Ethiopia’s incursion into Somalia and suicide bombings by the insurgents. Even mobile phone text message threats from al Shabaab sympathisers in Kenya and Somalia have failed to intimidate Abdullahi.
He says he will never be cowered by what he calls “religious warlords” who present an awful image of Islam to the world. “The attack was aimed at silencing the group, but that did not work,” he said, showing scars on his stomach from a bullet and the surgery that followed. “We will not allow anyone to silence us. They misread our religion and kill people. They are cursed,” he said…
(Here’s one of their tracks – this one is not really hip hop, but a great slice of hypnotic dance music . There’s lots more stuff at their youtube channel)
‘Gangsta rappers have been known to boast about how mean their hometown streets are, but none of them comes from a more violent ‘hood than K’naan. Born Keinan Abdi Warsame in 1978, K’naan grew up in Mogadishu, Somalia, amid one the most brutal civil wars in history.When he was 13, K’naan and his family fled Somalia and took refuge in New York and finally Toronto, where they still live. Coming from a family of performers and poets, K’naan naturally gravitated toward the arts to make sense of his new home and to process the trauma that nearly overwhelmed him in Africa (three of his friends were killed in the conflict). A poet, spoken-word artist and rapper, he has spoken out about his home country’s plight at the United Nations and recorded two albums, the latest of which is “Troubadour” (A&M), released last year. The album blurs the boundaries between spoken word and hip-hop, and incorporates everything from heavy metal to reggae.
Q: What were your memories of growing up in Mogadishu? What about the music there? Did it have an impact on you as a child?
A: I grew up in the Mogadishu of dreams. During an idyllic and optimistic time, and music [was] almost its Siamese soundtrack. I remember realizing very early how music could so seamlessly go from being fun in one moment, to deadly serious in the other. A song would play in the record player at home, and you could sing along loudly and then another would come, and mom would turn it down swiftly, as the song might be considered what they called “anti” – usually music with subliminal poetic messages against the government’ (full interview here)
‘Radio stations broadcasting out of Somalia face a dilemma this month after a powerful Islamist militant group ordered them to stop playing music. Saying that the playing of music was un-Islamic, Hizbul-Islam announced on Saturday that stations had 10 days to take it off air. The punishment for failing to comply was not specified but 11 radio stations based in the capital, Mogadishu, are thought to be directly affected. If they drop music, they stand to lose listeners. If they ignore the warning, they face the wrath of the militants.
Music-lovers in the war-torn country are indignant at the idea they will not be able to tune into their favourite pop, which is largely recorded abroad, in North America and the UK. However, there appear to be limits to Hizbul-Islam’s ability to make good on any threat. Somali pop music, ranging from the plaintive songs of Abdi Shirre Jama (aka Jooqle) to the hip hop and rap of K’Naan, is widely on sale in Mogadishu.
It can be heard playing in the tea shops of the government-controlled area, which amounts to about a third of the capital, says local BBC reporter Mohammed Olad Hassan. Somalis have to be more discreet about music in non-government areas. Al-Shabab, the country’s other big militant group, are known for their own strict interpretation of Islam, frowning on music and cinema.
“You can see drivers on passenger buses playing music inside the government-controlled area, then turning it off when they cross into non-government territory,” our reporter says. Pop music is genuinely popular in Mogadishu and many people resent being “bullied” into what they can hear on the radio, he adds. Hizbul-Islam would have all music, right down to the jingles, taken off air, he says. “Deny a Somali his music and his poetry, and you deny him his voice,” says Christophe Farah, a journalist of Somali descent in London…’
‘Roars, growls and galloping hooves replaced music Tuesday on some of Mogadishu’s radio stations in a protest of a ban on music imposed by Islamic extremists. Radio Shabelle, along with the stations Tusmo and Hornafrik, were responding to threats from Muslim militant groups that believe music is un-Islamic and want it prohibited. Mogadishu’s 14 private radio stations stopped playing music Tuesday after Hizbul al-Islam, an Islamic extremist group, issued a 10-day ultimatum. The threat was backed by the main militant group al-Shabaab, which has been linked to al Qaeda. A statement from the National Union of Somali Journalists said several stations received calls, warning them that there would be consequences if they failed to comply with the ban within 10 days.
But the three stations decided to broadcast the noises instead of music. Radio Shabelle announcers could be heard speaking on air, backed by the sounds of hooves, ocean waves, gunfire – even the roars and growls of big cats’.
As part of the nine-month Identity exhibition at London’s Wellcome Collection (Identity: Eight rooms, nine lives – 26 November 2009 – 06 April 2010) Billy Bragg and his band are performing Pressure Drop, a play ‘of passion and prejudice” written by Mick Gordon. The play (19 April-12 May, 2010) explores what it means to be English.
From the Wellcome Collection website:
Pressure Drop’ is the latest work from On Theatre and Mick Gordon. Asking a central question – what makes me who I am? – it explores the individual, familial, social and political reference points that make a person definable and recognisable to themselves and others.
Part play, part gig, part installation, the event presents three generations of a white, working-class English family struggling to define themselves both in relation to one another and within a changing social landscape. At the heart of the work lies a paradox. Our identities are continually in flux, but at the same time we need a firm sense of rootedness, of belonging to something stable.
‘Pressure Drop’ sees Gordon join forces with legendary singer-songwriter Billy Bragg. In his book ‘The Progressive Patriot’, Bragg explores what it means to be English in contemporary Britain. Reflecting on his family, their history and revisiting the music that originally inspired him, Bragg challenges versions of patriotism proposed by the far right. For the production he will write and perform new work.
Few artists cross genre boundaries as freely and seemingly effortlessly as Tanya Tagaq. Labeling what she does as Inuit throat singing inadequately describes what she does. Never easy listening, Tanya takes the listener “outside the box” of her or his expectations. In an interview in January 2010, Tanya discussed her work and her hope that her music can help wake people up to the “the potential of what we’ve lost and what we can gain.” (To read more go to PopMatters).
Living Outside the Box: An Interview with Tanya Tagaq
By Jeffrey Callen 16 April 2010
My introduction to Inuit throat singing was a lecture by musicologist Jean-Jacques Nattiez on the semiology of katajjaq, the vocal game played by pairs of Inuit women standing close together, holding each other’s arms as they sing into each other’s mouths. I remember some striking video and audio clips, a lot of charts detailing Nattiez’s semiotic analysis and a feeling that something human and vital was being elided.
A decade later, when I first saw Tanya Tagaq on a podcast from the London International Festival of Exploratory Music, I didn’t think once of katajjaq or semiology. She isn’t that kind of Inuit throat singer and that kind of analysis would not get to the questions that I was interested in pursuing.
Born in the Nunavut Territory in the northernmost reaches of Canada, Tagaq taught herself Inuit throat singing during college in Halifax when she longed for the sounds of home. In the decade since, she has taken Inuit throat singing into previously unimagined musical arenas, working in hip-hop, hard rock and classical settings.
She has also worked with a diverse set of collaborators including Bjork, Mike Patton (of Faith No More) and the Kronos Quartet. In late January 2010, I interviewed Tanya Tagaq as she was about to begin a six-month tour of North America and Europe. During our conversation, Tagaq illuminated her approach to her craft, the sources of her inspiration, the relationship of her art to the Nunavut landscape/soundscape, and her ambitions.
On the last point—her ambitions—she eloquently stated what may be an underlying reason people are drawn to the experience of art: “…(to wake up to) the potential of what we’ve lost and what we can gain.” (To read more go to PopMatters).
In 2002, I spent the year researching the emergence of an alternative music movement in Morocco. Made up of a collection of genres that lie on the periphery of mainstream culture — hip-hop, electronica, rock/metal, fusion — alternative music had yet to break through. 2002 was its year on the cusp. In 2003, it would make its move to center stage and, within a few years, hip-hop and fusion bands would become major players in Moroccan pop culture.
My dissertation, French Fries in the Tagine: Re-imagining Moroccan Popular Music (UCLA, Department of Ethnomusicology, 2006), which focused on fusion, examined this change in the musical playing field, how it happened and what it meant. I’m posting this link to share the work and ask for feedback. I’m currently writing a book on Moroccan alternative music that will hopefully bring this fascinating story to a wider audience.
In Noise: The Political Economy of Music (1985), Jacque Attali wrote about the socially constructed and historically changing boundaries between music and noise. Brilliant, provocative but I think there is one missing component in Attali’s approach: the distinction between music and sound. It is outside the frame of the questions Attali was exploring at the time but it raises a bunch of interesting questions because there is on easy equivalence between sound and noise — a piece of sound art or an everyday sound can be pleasant, even musical but not fall into the category of music. In the next few months, I’m going to be exploring the boundary between music and sound and the uncertain ground upon which the very definition of the terms resides. As a beginning, let’s consider the field recordings of Andres Bick of the Dispersion of Sound Waves in Ice Sheets — sound? noise? music? Click on the link then you be the judge and let me know what you think and why.
The Sixth Annual Art of Record Production Conference will be hosted by Bob Davis and Justin Morey at Leeds Metropolitan University on December 3rd – 5th 2010
The theme of the conference is centred around the idea of change and continuity – the idea that music and music production can look backwards or it can look forwards. The way our ‘art’ changes through technology and the use of technology is an example of where people make choices between, for instance, old technology and new technology – between old sounds and new sounds, while continually exploring the space in between these two theoretical poles.
In addition, we see innovation all around us but we might also reflect on what is new. There are also tensions in our field between technology, artistry, craftsmanship, aesthetics, and commerce. We hope that the strands will allow the conference to consider change and continuity in the art of record production.We invite submissions for papers on the following themes and any other related topics:
1. Alternative realities: (re)presenting sound
The recorded performance is often not the performance heard in the studio, which brings into question aspects of reality and the construction of what might be conceptualised as alternative realities. The creation of virtual spaces, the use of virtual instruments and the construction of virtual performances raise a number of issues for those concerned with the study of recordings and the production process. This stream welcomes papers that explore the relationship between the actual and the virtual, which may include theoretical issues such as authenticity, agency and creativity, transparency and realism but may also involve practical concerns such as loudness, technical ‘perfection’ and the homogenising effect of ubiquitous software platforms and plug-ins.
2. Song writing and the studio: crafting an art
Song writing has a long tradition, and the advent of recording technology began a process which brings not only the song but the sound of the artist within reach of international audiences. However, song writing is an umbrella term encompassing a wide range of technological practices ranging from singer songwriters recording at home to large scale commercial productions involving a team of experienced professionals. This stream welcomes papers on all aspects of the relationship between song writing and production including demo production, writing in the studio, the influence of software design, song writing and performance, self production, deals and splits.
3. Music production and education – a site of resistance?
Music Technology has now become firmly embedded in educational institutions both in the UK and abroad. With many institutions having over 20 years experience in developing courses in music technology it may be time to reflect on our achievements and our challenges. For many, the initial introduction of courses in record production and music technology was met with resistance in institutions with many courses springing not from music departments but from schools of technology. From a different perspective, traditional genres of engagement with music technology such as rock and dance have an ideological perspective characterised by resistance to authority, and the embodiment of the ‘underground’. Papers in this stream may also consider issues such as the way that creating a curriculum contributes to creating a canon, ethnicity, sexuality and gender in music technology programmes, learning strategies and methodologies and the various tensions and relationships that exist between education, academic research and industry.
4. Electronic technology and the production of music
Alongside the history of research and development in electronic technology for audio production runs a parallel history of subversion and ‘creative abuse’. Many of the techniques used in commercial and popular music production started life in university departments or in the world of art music. And there is also the history of DJ technology in the studio. This stream welcomes papers that explore the range of creative methods used in electronic and electroacoustic music. This may also include the use of older technology, internet performance, virtual scenes, democratisation and audio fidelity, the inside / outside the box debate, the commodification of production technology and the modular DIY construction of DSP and plug-ins.
Workshops, Presentations and Performances
The conference panel would like to invite delegates to submit ideas for presentations exploring aspects of music production, performances and practical demonstrations on any topic relating to the Art of Record Production.
We welcome work from any relevant academic perspective, including but not limited to popular music studies, ethnomusicology, the study of performance practice, communication studies, historical musicology, the history of technology, ergonomics, acoustics and psychoacoustics, music theory, music cognition, music and music technology education, and the philosophies of music, mediation and technology. Please include a note on methodology where appropriate, and an indication of the theme your work is intending to address.
Papers or demonstrations that require recording / studio / 5.1 playback facilities are also encouraged but selection will be subject to a feasibility study by the conference panel at Leeds Metropolitan University.
Proposals for individual papers and poster presentations should not exceed 500 words and should be in Word Document, Rich Text File or Text file formats (doc, docx, rtf or txt files). Submissions by email to simonzt@artofrecordproduction.com
The deadline for proposals is Friday 14th May 2010.
Karl Hagstrom Miller’s new book Segregating Sound: Inventing Folk and Pop Music in the Age of Jim Crow (Duke University Press, March 2010) examines the effect of Jim Crow on the perception of American musical styles. PopMatters excerpted a section on W.C. Handy’s role in redefining blues as a folk music.
[9 April 2010]
How the Blues Became Folk Song
Prior to the mid-twenties, practically every commentator, with some minor exceptions, understood the blues as a commercial style. The blues were a successful, almost viral, product of the music industry and professional songwriters. Academic collectors were particularly slow to associate the blues with folklore. Between 1888 and 1930 the “blues” were only mentioned in eleven articles in the Journal of American Folklore. E. C. Perrow’s landmark collection of southern folk songs (1912) never used the word except in the middle of one song lyric: “I’ve got the blues; I’m too damn mean to talk.” Howard Odum’s important collection of black secular songs (1911) printed the word twice, again in lyrics: “I got the blues, but too damn mean to cry” and “I got de blues an’ can’t be satisfied.’ Perrow and Odum published their collections before the blues craze had taken hold, and they probably remained unaware that such lines might belong to a new genus of southern folk song. Neither provided any commentary on the subject. (to read more click here)
