New Work by UChicago Composer Jacob Bancks

My dear friend Jake recently sent me his most recent composition, Litany of the Sacred Heart, for voices, clarinets, and strings. It's a devoted and imaginative setting of (mostly) sacred texts. I was struck by the soulful spareness of much of the piece—the overall tone if it reminded me of the gentle, understated quality in the chanting of Benedictine monks I recently observed at Conception Abbey in nearby Maryville.

Here are a couple intriguing excerpts from the premiere which featured, among other excellent musicians, Jake's lovely wife, Kara, masterfully on clarinet.


Repetitions of Cor Jesu (“Heart of Jesus”) and miserére nobis (“have mercy on us”) anchor this middle section as pizz vines around. The end of this excerpt begins a harrowing depiction of hell. 


The fragile beginning of a setting of the Thomas Aquinas hymn, O Salutaris Hostia.

GARAGE SALE

Unloading some choice merch at a yard sale today with our friends the Corders and Yusts. We'll be going again tomorrow from 8 to 3. Location: corner of 25th and Folsom. Sold a ton today, but still lots of good stuff left including a steal on a comfy beige couch. (Be sure to ask for the Teleharmonium discount! ;)

Here are some pics. If you see anything you gave us for sale here, please forgive. (You know how it is. ;)

Becky's jewelry board.

Parting, sadly, from the bass amp I got when I was 15 or 16. It's been a good ride, my friend. Hope you find a new home that plays you more and takes you out of the basement now and again. (And preferably one that can get down on some sweet jams from time to time.)

Books that didn't make the cut (or did).

Table with decorative items.

EXCELLENT SUMMER CHILL-OUT POETRY

Two amazing poems by the English Romantic, Algernon Charles Swinburne, both published in the same 1866 collection. The first, "August", I fell in love with over a year ago and made into a song for the forthcoming SLBM album. It's intoxicatingly mysterious. The second, "The Year of Love"—which I stumbled on a couple days ago—provides an illuminating counterpoint. 

In "August", the four continuously-referenced apples seem to represent something. In "The Year of Love", it's made explicit—four loves over four seasons. In "August", the wind "blew and breathed and blew/Too weak to alter it's one word", and I always wondered what that one word was. In "The Year of Love"—"eyes made strong and grave with sleep/And yet too weak to weep–"—it's crying (often code for sex in Romantic poetry, no?—but what isn't...). Many other delicious parallels. (Click on poems above to enlarge.) 

Gratuitous bizarre detail from the biography in the Swinburne Penguin edition:

1868:  Frequented a flagellation brothel...Read a French translation of the Mahabharata, with excessive enthusiasm...

EXCELLENT SUMMER CHILL-OUT MUSIC

Chicago buddy Tommy Slax just posted this gem of a krautrock bedroom recording, "We Can Probably Live on Mars." (You know it's a good tune when you can't understand any of the words but you still sing along.)

ORCHARD IN JUNE

We stopped by the Weston Red Barn Farm yesterday on our way to KC. I've seen the orchard at several different times of the year, but right now it's spectacularly lush—mainly apple trees but a few scraggly old peach trees at the back of the orchard overgrown with vines. Here are a few looks I stole with my flip.

HOUSE PROJECT

We're finishing some of the moulding in our house with quarter round and thresholds on the floors. I've heard my cousin (Gideon, the architecture writer) talk a bit about the ways in which architecture can purposely conceal things and even misrepresent aspects of a space and its construction. In this project, it's pretty clear that the primary purpose of the quarter round is not decorative—it's actually to cover up the rough-looking spaces between the floor boards and the wall, creating an illusion of neatness, exactitude, and clean angles and borders where no such things exist. 

Ugly gaps between floor boards and wall:

Gaps hidden with new quarter round:

 Nasty gap between tile floor and wood floor:

Gap concealed by new threshold:

Air compressor nail gun (Thanks Neil & Sarah!):

 

GENIUS IDEA FOR COUNTRY SONG

"Chicken Fried Chicken"

This Dada-esque song was inspired by the chicken friend chicken I saw in the freezer at the grocery store this morning. Only 2 words in the whole thing! I think it could go on even longer, don't you?



This track uses the free iZotope Vinyl plugin for that old-timey sound. 

Sakura Japanese Steakhouse

Sakura Japanese Steakhouse: the only place in St. Joe with a sushi bar and hibachi grill!!!

If that sounds like a dubious endorsement, it's because the food's only eh. We went for lunch yesterday and had an OK time. This restaurant is located in the building on the Belt where Fuji's Steakhouse used to be. I couldn't quite tell if it's the same restaurant with a different name, or if it's a totally new place. I'd guess that if you liked Fuji's, you'll like Sakura (and vice re-veresa).

It's definitely clean inside and the service was very good. Plus it's always a fun guilty pleasure to watch the hibachi guys do their thing at the grill while you sit in a booth at safe giggling distance. The ice water was plenty cold...and, well...OK, the food...

The food just does not have a very high quality of flavor, freshness, or preparation. (We had chicken teriyaki, miso soup, California rolls, and rice—didn't brave the any actual raw fish on first visit.) Unlike, say, barbecue, or burgers and fries, or even tacos, sushi and Japanese food—for me—has to be sterling quality or there's no point. And that's my own bias—there's definitely nothing wrong with the restaurant. Like I said: only place in St. Joe...

Music in Architecture — Architecture in Music Symposium

My cousin Gideon and I found out yesterday that our proposal, "Dock and Load," was accepted for inclusion in the upcoming Music in Architecture — Architecture in Music Symposium at UT-Austin! The conference brings together architects and musicians for collaborative installations involving sound and concert pieces inspired by architecture. It should be a fascinating and unique event. Our project will transform the Perry Castaneda loading dock into a temporary concert space delivered by truck featuring music for 4 bass trombones and electronic sound!

The above are images from the presentation board designed by Gideon for our proposal (click to en-biggen).

I Just Grabbed A Spoon

A few months ago, Becky and I started making our way through our complete Friends box set from the beginning (don't judge—our tv only gets one channel now, so it's often been either this or Wipeout, which I still can't believe is a prime time show...on a major network...on Thursdays). We're up to season 9 out of 10 now. It's funny! (Aside from the occasional ever-so-slightly-homophobic joke that thankfully wouldn't pass these days.)

A friend of mine once said that Conan O'Brien was a genius because he was able to do the same jokes over and over every night. By that measure, Friends is Mensa. The cast consists of 4 great comic performers and 2 who really try but just can't act. I won't mention who the two are, suffice it to say that they were originally supposed to be featured as the show's main draws, that one actually has a catch phrase and the other often resorts to shouting her lines, and that their characters' names rhyme with Shmoey and Shmonica. The craziest thing is to observe the radical evolutions in Matthew Perry's voice, physical appearance, and personality. That guy must have been on some heavy drugs!

One of the characters, Ross, is a professor at NYU in the "Paleontology Department" (of course no such department exists at NYU...or at any other school as far as I know...?). I'm always fascinated by how academia gets portrayed in sitcoms. I remember one episode of How I Met Your Mother where Ted can't hack it as an architect in the real world, so he "settles" for being a professor at NYU—a job he doesn't even apply for, they just offer it to him. Nice!

When Not to Play the Banjo

Here are a few choice excerpts from Pete Seeger's charming How to play the 5-string Banjo, first published in the 1940s. The 2002 edition still has a few nuggets that are awesomely out of date. The text includes a lot of hand-written music and drawings and plenty of folky wisdom.


WHEN NOT TO PLAY THE BANJO

Obviously, when someone is trying to get the baby to go asleep. Nor when your neighbor, who has to be up at 6 AM to go to work, is trying to catch some much needed shut-eye. 

There are other times as well, in which a sensitive musical ear can tell you to lay aside the instrument. Some types of music, after all, were simply not made for it. This goes especially for certain types of slow songs, whose effect will be spoiled by the sharp punctuation of the banjo strings. 

The people I learned banjo from were mostly old farmers, miners, or working people of one trade or another, who had played the instrument during their courting days, and later kept it hanging on the wall to pass away the time of an evening...what they knew, they knew well, and the simple, rippling rhythm of their banjo had more art in it than many a hectic performance piece by a professional virtuoso. 

What I am aiming at saying is, that it it is better to know a few things well than attempt something flashy which sounds sloppy or grating. The tenor banjo was ruined, really, by exhibitionists who made an athletic exhibition out of each performance; after the piece was over the audience was amazed, of course, as at the circus, but it was not music which moved or delighted one. 

"...can I read notes? Hell, there are no notes to a banjo. You just play it." 

NO HOMEWORK!

I met a really nice woman this week who had taught English in a St. Joe high school for a few years before quitting to become a stay-at-home mom. She mentioned that some of the teaching work hadn't been easy. I mentioned being surprised at the lack of study skills exhibited by many of my freshman (college) students. She mentioned that when she first arrived at the high school here she was surprised to be told that they pretty much don't give homework because "the students are busy with other things" (jobs, sports, etc.).

No homework? Well, that clears things up a bit. (I do remember reading an article by Alfie Kohn that argues that homework doesn't in fact help learning, but I would guess that applies more to young children than college-bound teens. What does the research say about the effectiveness of homework for high schoolers?) Oh well—the issue now is how best to help the students I have, whatever their backgrounds. I have no answers yet—always a good place to start!

SEASONAL MUSIC

One of my students gave his senior recital last night on piano. The program featured a French set which included the 2nd Gymnopedie by Erik Satie (the above has the audio of an Aldo Cicollini recording). I may have been influenced by the 98-degree heat here yesterday, but the Gymnopedie cycle strikes me as somehow very much hot weather, summertime music. Certain music can suggest a very strong seasonal sense (certain foods do the same kind of thing...). Why is that?

Obviously, if a piece has a direct reference to a time of year (Christmas music, for example, or The Rite of Spring) then that's one thing. But what about music that doesn't make an overt statement one way or the other? Personal associations, like where and when you first heard something, can make a big impact on each subsequent listen. (For example, I would guess a lot of people think of summer when they hear Lady Gaga's "Telephone" b/c that's when the video got big.) But could there also be something in the sound or expressive quality of a piece that makes it more easily associate-able with one season over another?

I think you could make an argument that the Gymnopedie have a stark austerity that's evocative of the scorched, dry, summer earth—a relaxed, still quality that reminds me of how your body feels when the sun has sapped you of all energy or desire to move, and you're just sitting there, roasting, as steam rises up from the ground.

Then again, my clearest early memory of listening to that music was on a cassette tape I had in my no-A/C car one hot summer in North Carolina, so my perspective might be a bit skewed on this one...

Jeff Mauro, Next Food Network Star

A Chicago friend of mine, Jeff Mauro, made his debut on The Next Food Network Star last night. He made it through the first week with an impressive "Que Lime Pie." Jeff is a private chef for a corporate office downtown, an amazing singer/actor/guitarist, and an all around awesome dude. He still plays off and on with The Interociter, the psychedelic garage rock band I played guitar and bass in for four years in Chicago. Once he sang an incendiary version of "Ramblin, Gamblin Man" with us. Good luck, Jeff!

Something is happening here but you don't know what it is...

In the current issue of Tape Op, veteran producer Chris Shaw tells a little story about an exasperating mixing session with the Bob Dylan:

After an hour of waiting, [Dylan] walks to the console and asks, “Chris, what are you doing?” “Mixing, Bob.” “I know you’re mixing, but what are you doing?” “Trying to make it sound better, Bob!” “Better than what?” “Better than it sounded yesterday.” “I understand. You’re the genius here, but let me tell you what I know about mixing…” I’m thinking, “Oh boy, here it comes. Bob Dylan is going to tell me what he knows about mixing. This is really going to be interesting.” “…let me tell you what I know about mixing. I work with these engineers, they put the tape on, they push up the kick drum fader, spend 10 minutes doing whatever it is that they do and that kick drum sounds fantastic. Then they push up the snare drum and they do the same thing. So that kick and snare sound fantastic. They keep working down the line until they get to the end of the song and now everything sounds fantastic, but the song doesn’t sound good.”

 Ultimately Shaw discovers that Dylan is right, that the track sounded best before he started messing with anything.

This kind of thing has happened to me many times while working with audio—a track has an emergent property which can’t be reduced to the qualities of its individual parts. I think this is due, on the one hand, to the complex unpredictability of how different sounds combine with and cancel out one another, and on the other hand, to something even more mysterious having to do with vibes and organicism and stuff like that...

Gratuitous Garden Photos

row of beets we planted from seed

a zucchini plant that popped up quickly after a rain—notice asymmetry of leaves

herb pots (will remember not to over-water this time)

first hydrangea

little pepper

neon roses

volunteer tomato plant

columbine—flower with burdenous name

Mats for New Album

My solo project, Still Lost Bird Music, has a new album coming out, so I'm putting together some promo stuff. Becky did an amazing job designing the website, and it just went up today: www.stilllostbirdmusic.com. (She also designed the above sweet-looking card. It shows the album cover on it, also her design. The photo on the cover, and several other photos on the website, were taken with a special kind of Polaroid film called Chocolate.)

I'm SOOOO excited about the album. (There's a bit of a concept to it that you can read about on the website.) I recorded it almost all myself in my studio—had to learn how to play the banjo first—and my friend Jeff mixed and mastered it and added some very tasty arrangement/production touches too.

The title of the album comes from the first song, "August", about youth, lust, ill-fated love, confusion, clarity, and nostalgia in the late summer. There's a seasonal theme running through much of the rest of the album as well, and a lot of the music has the bittersweet feeling of the late-summer/early-fall too I think. Here's the title track:

GENIUS IDEA FOR NEW BEVERAGE

3 WORDS:
sparkling ice tea

How is this ice-cold, light, yet deliciously refreshing beverage not already on the shelves and in my fridge right now?!?

Legendary Oaks — "One Inch Plantation"

Great track from Legendary Oaks' first eponymous album (love using the word "eponymous") . They have a classic sound—remind me a little of early Son Volt—but a distinctive voice. My friend Justin's on drums. They're back in the studio now, working on what will be their second album. Should be huge...