Sorrowful Songs, More ...

Last month, we marked Henryk Gorecki's passing with this remembrance. Today, I came upon a worthy addendum to that piece, this done by the blog of the ASC (American Society of Cinematographers.)

A New Joy

I have mentioned this before. I just finished a hearing of the Estonian Chamber Orchestra Choir's A New Joy - Orthodox Christmas, a collection of Orthodox Russian church music that had been suppressed by the Communist government in the past. This CD is just about "perfect" on all counts: wonderful source material, spellbinding performance and exquisite recording. We found it about four years ago; I think it might have been cited by David Stabler of The Oregonian. Still is the go-to Christmas music I recommend to anyone who asks. You can get a lo-fi preview here.

Captain Beefheart, Gone For Now

I remember when I brought my first Don Van Vliet (aka Captain Beefheart) album, Trout Mask Replica, home to my late 60s Hollywood apartment, where a co-worker had stopped by to drop off some papers and asked how I could possibly listen to that stuff. I wondered how he couldn't. I came upon Beefheart through his association with the wonderful Frank Zappa. When I hear people like Dr. John and Tom Waits, the Captain often comes to mind. Beefheart was a sort of psychedelic blues musician and an avant-garde precursor to punk. He was a poet, sculptor and painter (one of my treasures would be his Doc At The Radar Station album that features cover art that Beefheart painted himself). Captain Beefheart died today, but let's see if we can find some Captain Beefheart for you now:



More ...



Here's a piece from the LA Weekly blog today: "Top 14 Reasons Why Captain Beefheart Was a True American Genius".

Hallelujah

Wednesday night, Leonard Cohen performed at the Rose Garden in Portland, a performance that I missed, even though it greatly pained me to do so. (Check out The Oregonian's run-up piece and review.) Nevertheless ...

Last night, winding down on a Friday from a week of intense work, I sat back for a bit of my kind of luxurious living -- five hours of uninterrupted music. Earlier in the day, friend Jamesa brought me a surprise in the form of a new DVD documenting a 1972 tour of Leonard Cohen. Entitled, Bird On A Wire, the film is said to have languished in storage by Cohen's manager, Marty Marchat, until Marchat's death when Cohen acquired and hid it away, only recently turning it over to the original director, Tony Palmer, for re-edit and completion. Now released, Kim and I starting watching at about 7pm, followed by a hearing of just about every Leonard Cohen album that I have so far committed and converted to my FLAC library, finally slipping off to bed around 1am.

The film, while ragged in places and including some unneeded VietNam footage, does show Cohen in very human form, and is undoubtedly a must-see for any serious Cohen fan.

Arising at 6am with Leonard still resonating in my head, I started prowling the Web for more backstory on the film while listening to still more that we had not heard by bedtime. Then, at the National Film Board of Canada website, I discovered this 1964 documentary, "Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen":




This early film is quite intriguing and even shows Cohen's youthful skills as a stand-up comic. Another must-see, but be warned: this 44-minute online experience needs pretty decent bandwidth Internet connection.

More on Leonard Cohen: http://eyeavenue.blogspot.com/2009/09/happy-birthday-leonard.html

London Calling

The Clash, with frontman Joe Strummer, was probably at the top of my most-listen band of the 70-80s punk era. Now I find that the Clash Radio blog has for awhile made available for download podcasts (in MP3 and Ogg) of the late/great Strummer's half-hour BBC radio show done between 1998 and 2002. Here and maybe here. Mixed audio quality, but great, great content. In the meantime, if you haven't seen the posthumous 2006 film tribute, The Future Is Unwritten, here is a preview:

Song of the Day: I Want To Sing That Rock And Roll

By Giilian Welch from her 2001 Time (The Revelator) album

Check out this perfornamce on YouTube.

Here's another of my favorites, from the 2004 Cambridge Folk Festival a few years ago.

Here, Gillian works with The Decemberists -- one of our favorite "local" indie folk rock groups out of Portland -- Friday night:

Henryk Gorecki Leaves Us

Today we learn of the passing of Polish composer Henryk Gorecki, undoubtedly best known for his "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" for soprano and orchestra. I remember well my first listen nearly twenty years ago, staring out into a rainy Los Angeles night from my darkened downtown loft, hearing Dawn Upshaw and the London Sinfonietta.

Here is a different performance (in Auschwitz) of the music, but one which conveys the feeling from that night. The text of this movement is said to be taken from a prayer inscribed on a cell wall by a 17-year-old Polish girl who was imprisoned and tortured by the Gestapo in 1944.

Soprano: Isabel Bayrakdaraian, Sinfonietta Cracovia, conducted by John Axelrod.
Taken from "HOLOCAUST - A Music Memorial Film from Auschwitz". For the first time since its liberation, permission was granted for music to be heard in Auschwitz and a number of leading musicians were brought there to perform music for the film.

I have to wonder how many people across the planet are listening to Gorecki's symphony now, tonight ...

Happily, my music collection also includes the Gorecki string quartets commissioned by the Kronos Quartet. A remembrance is posted here by Kronos' David Harrington.

Some background on Gorecki if you are not familiar is here and many other places on the Web, like Wikipedia.