Good Morning

This Can Soon Go Again

Yes, it is snowing and it can stop, thank you.

Sunday Slouching, Fate and WandaVision

Well, it has stopped snowing with just a thin layer on the ground and yet more is expected - apparently.


I have been listening to the almost three hours of Shostakovich's 24 Preludes and Fugues.



Lunch was bangers and mash with a twist of meatballs in red wine gravy.



Washed down with a pinotage red wine.

Last night I watched the complete six episodes of Fate - The Winx Saga on Onion Play as well as the fifth episode of WandaVision. Has anybody else with watching WandaVsion either on Disney or Onion Play? I think it is a brilliant series.

Afternoon and after some more of Dmitri - I will head towards Poland and Karol Szymanowski. I played the two violin concertos yesterday and will listen to the opera King Roger today. I recently acquired a four-CD set of this underrated 20th-century post-Romantic composer and according to David Hurwitz of Classics Today, the best recording are the Simon Rattle ones.




I might even start a re-read of this book.





I rate the 24 preludes and fugues as high as any of the J.S. Bach ones.

Sunday Experimental Music Selection #1

Time for some music -

VA ‎- Experimental Music Of Japan (1957-1967) FULL ALBUM

00:00​ A1. Toshiro Mayuzumi + Makoto Moroi - Variations Sur
14:52​ A2. Toru Takemitsu - Sky, Horse And Death (Concrete-Music)
18:18​ A3. Joji Yuasa - Projection Esemplastic (For White-Noise)
26:00​ B1. Toshiro Mayuzumi - Campanology (For Multi-Piano)
34:04​ B2. Toshi Ichiyanagi - Situation (For Biwa, Koto, Violin, Double Bass, Piano And Multiplier)
40:45​ B3. Maki Ishii - Hamon-Ripples (For Chamber Ensemble, Violin And Taped Music)

Enjoy

Sunday Experimental Music Selection #2

More bleeps and noises -

John Cage - Williams Mix (1952/1953)

This is a work for eight tracks of ¼ inch magnetic tape. The score is a pattern for the cutting and splicing of the sounds recorded on the tape.
The rhythmic structure is 5-6-16-3-11-5.
The sounds are in 6 categories: A (city sounds), B (country sounds), C (electronic sounds), D (manually produced sounds), E (wind produced sounds) and F ("small" sounds, which need to be ampified). Pitch, timbre and loudness are notated as well.
Approximately 600 recordings are necessary to make a version of the piece.
The compositional means were I Ching chance operations.
Cage made a realization of the work in 1952/53 (starting in May 1952) with the assistance of Earle Brown, Louis and Bebe Barron, David Tudor, Ben Johnston and others, but it also possible to create other versions, using the score.

Iannis Xenakis - Concret PH

Concret PH, the title being a reference to the architectural design and construction material, is a crackling two minutes of pointillistic sounds. Xenakis recorded the sound of burning charcoal, then layered and transposed the recordings to create evolving densities and ranges of snaps, crackles, and pops. This piece, along with Varèse's Poème électronique, remains a classic of the electroacoustic genre.

ENJOY