DEATH MUSIC

So we've all heard the sweet soundtrack for Requiem for a Dream, but what is a requiem anyway??  A requiem originated as a catholic mass specifically dedicated to the passing of a particular person's soul to the next life (or whatever it is that Catholics believe).  The term is more widely used to describe any piece dedicated to a person's passing. 

Requiems are often the most bad-ass piece that a composer ever makes.  It's not hard to understand why a composer might put an extra amount of creative energy into such a serious piece, and usually Requiems are written late in a composer's life so the composer has had time to develop and mature stylistically.

Let's look at two examples of note:

1. Verdi's Requiem.  You may have seen this small section of the requiem posted the other day:



Written to commemorate painter Alessandro Manzoni.  The full work is definitely worth a listen but it's not exactly over in the blink of an eye.

2.Mozart's Requiem!  Mozart's Requiem is one of my favorite pieces of music, certainly my favorite piece by Mozart.  It's emotive force and heavy orchestration outmatch not only his other compositions, but any other work of the era (1791).  Mozart wrote the piece on his deathbed for an anonymous commision so part of the lore is that from the composer's perspective he was writing his own death piece (and in fact he expired before it was finished).  A few of the parts...

Intro:


Kyrie:


Lacrimosa


I could go on, but the truth is each section is equally gripping - if you ever have the opportunity to see this piece live, spare no expense to do so. 

Stay tuned for movie music!

DON'T ASK QUESTIONS, JUST TURN UP THE VOLUME AND LISTEN

DON'T ASK QUESTIONS, JUST TURN UP THE VOLUME AND LISTEN:

That was the Dies Irae from Verdi's Requiem premiered in 1874.  And now that I have your attention let's talk about hallucinations...

Auditory hallucinations are an interesting and well-documented phenomenon.  The question is: what's the line between vivid musical creativity and hallucinations?  Is it that one is within the mind's control?  Those of you who have written your own music may have experienced the sensation of original sound spontaneously entering your imagination.  There are those, however, who would do anything to silence the muses in their minds.  Tchaikovsky for example was found weeping as a young child, grieving about the loud music he was hearing which would not cease.  Another example comes from the end of Schumann's life when he gradually went deaf and all real auditory input was replaced by sounds of his brain's own design:

"Schumann spent the end of his life experiencing auditory hallucinations. Schumann’s diaries state that he suffered perpetually from imagining that he had the note A5 sounding in his ears. The musical hallucinations became increasingly complex. One night he claimed to have been visited by the ghost of Schubert and wrote down the music that he was hearing. Thereafter, he began making claims that he could hear an angelic choir singing to him. As his condition worsened, the angelic voices transmogrified into demonic voices." Laqueur, Thomas (2007-09-03). "Spirited Away". pp. 36–42.

 Even Beethoven was seen in his last years dancing and jumping around in fields to the music  coming from between his ears.

     Before we get away from the topic of Schumann though, I'll just throw in a note about his wife Clara for good measure.  Clara was also an extremely talented musician and composer and by some accounts her accomplishments in composition eclipsed those of her husband.  Unfortunately for her, getting your music published as a woman in the 19th century was quite difficult so a lot (though not all) of her compositions ended up being published under her husband's name and even to this day there is some ambiguity about which pieces are hers.
     Robert Schumann was jealous his whole life of his wife's relationship with the composer Johannes Brahms.  The two were extremely good friends (plus Mrs. Brahms was known to rip Johannes' compositions to pieces if she found flaws in them so I could see why he might need a breath of fresh air...).  I'm also kinda into Brahms because he made this:



and also this:



Stay tuned for death music...

Humans Are Insane!

First of all, this is totally insane!!!



This is a piece by contemporary composer Steve Reich, written for two pianists.  It's called a phase shift meaning it's the exact same thing played over and over again at two very slightly different tempos.  The fact that one human is able to do it is insane.  This video is a little abridged, but you can see the effect of the phase shift.

Now on to Satie...



That is the soothing, soothing sound of Erik Satie's Gymnopedie No. 1 from his Trois Gymnopedies.  Satie was another composer from the turn of the twentieth century.  He was french and although he composed around the same time as Ives and Scriabin, he was known for the simplicity of his melodies and his adherence to common tonalities.  He was friends with (and a great influence on) his much more well known contemporary Claude Debussy.  Debussy arranged a number of Satie's piano works for orchestra - here is a stunning orchestration by Debussy of Gymnopedie No 1:



Satie preferred the title of 'phonometrician' (someone who measures sounds) to that of musician.  If you enjoyed the Gymnopedie, I strongly encourage you to check out the music of contemporary Estonian composer Arvo Part, particularly his Spiegel Im Spiegel.

Stay Tuned Next Week for Some Schooling in the Classics and a Look at the Modern Traditions...

Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb?

     

     As continued from yesterday, we are looking at the strange music from the beginning of the twentieth century.  Charles Ives is an interesting case of someone whose upbringing was the quintessence of boring perfection but whose music stretches the sonic limits.

     Ives' early musical exposure came from his father who was a bandleader in the civil war.  The theory instruction Ives received from his father was anything but standard and experimentation was encouraged.  Ives also gained exposure to hymns while serving as a church organist. He attended Yale and as a top athlete was chided because his passion for music got in the way of his athletic career.  His senior project was his first symphony, a masterful mixture timbres and dynamics.  Ives' creative license quickly spiraled out of control and he eventually began writing songs in which the voice and the accompaniment have little or nothing to do with one another.  Many speculate that his preference for such music came from listening simultaneously to his father's band and other bands perform simultaneously from across town square while growing up.

     Fun Fact: As with Jean Sibelius, one day Ives walked downstairs weeping one day and told his wife: "Nothing sounds right!" and that he could no longer compose.  He spent the last 30 years of his life without creating any new compositions but if you mention his name around those in the field of insurance you may get an avid response.  Ives was as prolific in the insurance industry as he was in music!

Stay Tuned for the Soothing Sounds of Erik Satie...

Music for the End of the World

First of all, if you are interested in the neuroscience of music I suggest the video on the left about music and the elderly.  This week we'll look at some of the more peculiar people and music from the turn of the 20th century.   

First of all a strange Russian man named Scriabin whose harmonies pushed the envelope of what was acceptable at the time.  Scriabin believed that humanity was like a pregnant storm cloud which was working towards its ultimate lightning-strike goal and that his music was the catalyst.  Later we will get into Charles Ives, a Yale athlete macho-man who was as revolutionary in the insurance industry as he was in music.  Ives had a tendency to put two totally unrelated melodies on top of each other and the result was often unique to say the least.  Also in store we have a French man named Erik Satie who in the midst of all this wild music found the beauty in the soft and the simple.  Satie was a friend of and a huge influence on the wildly famous Claude Debussy.

Alexander Scriabin, the little frail Russian man with a tenuous relationship with god.  In one of his notebooks he actually claims to BE god.  I might also claim that if Rachmaninoff  decided to play my music for a recording.  Antisocial as a child, enamored with self-fashioned mysticism as a man, he had a system of associating certain colors with certain tones.  He is by no means the first person to draw up such a detailed synesthesia:

Scriabin created the "Mystic Chord," a cluster of six tones which is also often seen in Jazz.  Such tone clusters gave both his piano and orchestral music a unique flavor.

"For some time before his death he had planned a multi-media work to be performed in the Himalayan Mountains, that would cause a so-called "Armageddon", "a grandiose religious synthesis of all arts which would herald the birth of a new world"... The Mysterium was, psychologically, a world Scriabin created to sustain its own evolution."

 And on that note I leave you to wonder what Charles Ives holds in store...

Sibelius Goes Hard

"All of the doctors who told me to stop drinking and smoking have long since died." - Jean Sibelius at the age of 91.



Heyo, today we discuss briefly the life, times, and music of Jean Sibelius (1865-1957) musical genius and Finnish national hero.  In fact, the composer is such a point of pride in Finland that his face is on the 100-mark bill, and Finnish flag day is on his birthday.  His most famous piece Finlandia (above) is a brilliant tribute to his beloved homeland.  Yes, he was a reckless alcoholic, and yes he spent the last 30 years of his life in a wild manic-depressive state, unable to compose (arguably insane).

He enjoyed nature walks and the horn part in the last movement of his fifth symphony is based on swan calls which he heard on one of his walks.  If you love good music with a little edge and character I would suggest all of his symphonies and violin concertos.

Fun fact, the Finnish government spends 200 times what the US does (per capita) on the arts.

"You're welcome JRR Tolkien"

     The other day I briefly mentioned "Program Music" but did not give much of an explanation.  Program music is music which represents something as opposed to music whose only meaning is the notes which are heard.  You know, like Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf. I've got some rockin examples for you but first a shameless plug for my new track and a note on Nordic Mythology...

     Recently a friend of mine was talking about JRR Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings" and I started blabbering on about how Tolkien took much of the material for the narrative from Wagner's "Der Ring Des Nibelungen."  There are many obvious parellels both thematic and musical such as a ring which grants its bearer ultimate power and the necessity of its destruction in order to redeem the world.  It would be a lot easier to believe Tolkien if his claim were that Wagner's Ring played only a small part in the conception of LOTR; however, Tolkien claims not to have been influenced by it at all.

     But hold on a minute, what is "Der Ring Des Nibelungen?" Often referred to as The Ring Cycle, it is a work of art which has no parallel.  Wagner believed that no artistic work could reach its full potential unless it incorporated as many different art forms as possible.  So he invented the "Gesamtkunstwerk" (or total-artwork). Gesamtkunstwerk is essentially an epic opera.  Epic meaning 4 hours long with a gigantic chorus and orchestra and deep psychological themes.  The Ring Cycle is a cycle of four operas totaling about 15 hours which took 30 years to create. It is the most written about work of musical art in existence (partally because every character and emotion in the cycle has a specific musical theme called a leitmotif attached to it).

     But we all know opera is boring, right (just kidding)? The important thing is that Wagner was a huge proponent of program music.

And now the important stuff: a few bits of knowledge on program music which will make you sound smart should you find yourself at a fancy dinner party...

1)Beethoven only wrote one opera, it was entitled "Fidelio" and the consensus among music scholars is that it is not very good.  Beethoven's Achilles heal so to speak.

2)In 1916 English composer Gustav Holst wrote "The Planets" - a suite in seven movements with each movement representing the astrological character of one planet from our solar system.  My personal favorite is Saturn - Bringer of Old Age which begins timid and mellow and proceeds to rock your face off...  Sarah you might also like Jupiter - Bringer of Jolity it's probably the most famous of the movements.

3)In 1874 Mussorgsky wrote Pictures at an Exhibition - a suite in ten movements which represents a walk through an exhibition of his friend, painter Viktor Hartmann.  The main theme is the 'promenade' which represents the viewer of the exhibition walking from piece to piece.  Each recurrence of the promenade has a different feeling depending on the mood of the pictures which have just been observed. Though originally composed for piano the suite is so colorful that it has been re-orchestrated time and time again.  The most famous version was done by Maurice Ravel.  Here are The Gnome and The Great Gates of Kiev - two of the movements as orchestrated by Ravel.

Stay tuned this week for fast cars, explosions and sex...