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Summer Reading - The rest is noise
StoreTags: summer, balls, fundamental, reading
Author: Roshi on July 02 2008 Viewed 2175 times. 25 people liked this blog. You can rate it below if you haven't already.
People who enjoyed reading this: tylth, lowlifi, DrexonField, mlbot, sAMsKi, reehc, Zanf, crabster, Fognozzle, SenorFrio, DongleKong, bodo, yghartsyrt, jp, monty, Unknownforce, Fredo, Analog, Logo, oxymoron, opticecho, eyesnine, mapmap, license, pocketsk
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Hooray for summer! And hooray for reading what you want to read, instead of biochem textbooks!
Right now I'm reading "The Rest is Noise" by Alex Ross. It's a well written survey of a large swath of 20th century composers, including Bartok, Shoenberg, Duke Ellington, Richard Strauss, Debussy, Xenakis, Partch, Schnittke, and mentions of Velvet Underground, Radiohead, IRCAM, and much much more.
For people like me who have large gaps in their knowledge of 20th century composers, it's invaluable, and a great read - Ross manages to give you the historical background, biography, and impact of each composer in a way that's snappy, dishy and eminently readable. At the same time, his descriptive writing about the musical pieces is vivid and illuminating about the theoretical idiosyncrasies of each piece. His writing on the gestation and impact of Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring' alone makes it worth reading. I highly recommend it.
Also, right now I'm working on Bartok's 44 duos with my teacher, which is a set of 44 duets based on folksongs that seem simple on the page, but which are harmonically really strange and wacky. For example, one of the duets I'm playing in G major (1 sharp) and he is playing in Eb major (2 flats). They were written for beginning violinists, but they get rapidly stranger and stranger and harder and harder as they go on.
I'm finding them really inspiring, composition-wise, and it makes me want to write ensemble pieces of beginning musicians, who don't really have a lot of interesting pieces to play. | |
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07/02/08
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tylth
my summer book so far is "no logo!" by naomi klein
it's pretty interesting although i'm already kind of familiar with all the corporate and advertising bs
07/02/08
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tylth
ross's book looks interesting too, although i think all 20th century composers are boring
i'd much rather read a book about 3rd century composers! that's when jesus lived, right
edited: Jul 02 2008
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Roshi
3rd century?
There was a 3rd century?
07/02/08
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tylth
i am not so sure anymore
07/02/08
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lowlifi
I highly recommend any of David Toop's books:
Ocean of Sound
Haunted Weather
Exotica
Rap Attack
He covers a vast range of topics, but the Ocean of Sound, and Haunted Weather deal specifically with ambient, noise and other genre and artists with alot of really good insite. Highly recommended.
07/02/08
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Roshi
Oooh, looks good, lowleefy.
I'll put them on my library hold list.
Other music books I've been reading:
Psychology of Sound by Carl Seashore
Music, Sound, and Sensation by Fritz Winckel
Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks
07/02/08
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RogerRoger
Is there mention of Varese,Cage,Ligeti,Stockhausen,Eno and Zappa in Ross's book? I'd like to read more than web articles on these without going too in depth.
edited: Jul 02 2008
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Roshi
Yes.
Eno and Zappa mostly get mentions, though, but there's sections on Varese, Cage, Ligeti and Stockhausen
07/02/08
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Roshi
Other highlights from the index:
homosexuality, classical music and, 413-5
"cluster chord", 136
Barnum's Original Skeleton Dude, 25
micropolyphony, 467, 468, 469
Psycho (Hitchcock), 293
07/02/08
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sAMsKi
cluster chord = our man cowell?
07/02/08
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sAMsKi
hmmmm...i'm rubbish at finishing books. by the time i got to university the only book i had read from cover to cover was The Twits by Roald Dahl. Sad, I know.
I once read some of this - link -- good stuff!
07/02/08
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electrodan
My brother got me 'The Rest is Noise' last December... I've read parts.
good stuff tho
edited: Jul 02 2008
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Roshi
sAMsKi said: "cluster chord = our man cowell?"
Yah, although evidently he invented it with Leo Orenstein
07/02/08
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sAMsKi
good to know 
07/02/08
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ricemutt
my fave music book over is "the soundscape" by r.murray schaffer
which isn't specifically about music, but is really great
also "the land where the blues began" by alan lomax is fantastic
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