A Lark Ascending

I love The Singers Unlimited. I love harmony - don't understand how it works but I know it when I hear it. In the rock world you'd find it hard to beat: But if you want to challenge your idea of what harmony vocals are try this:

I read Copland's book back in the 70s as I was starting to listen to classical music. I think it gave me a guilt complex if I wasn't sitting up straight and paying attention. I don't doubt for a minute what he is saying about the increased understanding and ultimately pleasure that can come from close attention. BUt music has a way of getting at you that is different from speech or the written word. It's amazing what can be absorbed with only partial attention. I often play new recordings whilst doing other things as a way of getting a general feel; then I'll sit and do a 'proper' listen at another time. As someone who only listens to music - I don't have to study it, write about it, prepare it for recordings etc - I find just listening quite difficult. What do you do with your hands? (No rude comments please). It's as if the act of sitting and listening only engages part of your brain and you have to put other elements into suspended animation. Maybe I should take up something automatic like knitting. I suspect this is why - outside the concert hall experience - most music is enjoyed whilst doing other things - dancing, socialising etc; or becomes particularly popular when accompanied by visuals - opera, musicals, pop videos etc. I think this is also why the 'live' experience can be so involving. Even with something as relatively staid as a classical concert, if you are in the right seat and don't have a tall bloke in front of you you can get to visualise the way the different elements of the orchestra are working. I remember a performance of Beethoven 3 a few years back that had me gripped. I'm not sure it was so much the power of the performance as being able to see how the different sections of the strings were used in the musical architecture. Agree with MG on his comment about Copland putting over his approach as 'THE recipe'.

This is a marvellous record of vocalise treatments of jazz instrumentals: 1. Moanin' 2. Watermelon Man 3. Autumn Leaves 4. Night and Day 5. Lonely Woman 6. Doodlin' 7. The Sidewinder 8. Blues On the Corner 9. Wonderful, Wonderful 10. And What If I Don't Tierney Sutton is another female vocalist I really enjoy from the current generation.

That sounds like a great album! Thank you for pointing it out! Very, very independent minded singer from Dublin though she lives in London. Has strong connections with some front rank Brit jazzers (her partner is a guitarist called Phil Robson). Has done some standards recordings and made a recording of Carole King's 'Tapestry' a while back and has a Leonard Cohen album due. But usually she does her own material. I've really taken to Kate McGarry over the last couple of years. Oh, and I love Stacey Kent's voice. And then there's Norma Winstone...no use if you need things rooted in the blues, but I've always loved her voice and, again, her relentless pursuit of her own agenda. And and another very independent minded singer - Maria Pia de Vito. Every thing from Neopolitan folk songs and baroque opera through Welsh hymns to standards and flirting with electronica.

Long time since I played it - I seem to recall that it starts ok but what was the second side sounded very poor. I'm normally pretty accepting of transfers but this one really grated on me. Might lie in the originals.

The strongest jazz vocal album I've heard in recent years: Doesn't even try to take on the tradition. It's an all original programme of songs using Yeats poems as its basis.

Given that many of the Loose Tubes chaps are now front-rank creative players on the UK domestic scene we can hope for more than just a visit down memory lane. There's mention there of a newly commissioned piece from the BBC. Yes, it would be nice to see a strong Bath return - the last one I went to allowed me to mix up a strong jazz core with some classical and Scottish folk! Sadly the jazz element got really reduced. Given that the recession and funding cuts are still biting in the 'arts' world, I can't see a return to anywhere near to the glory days. But you never know.

Cheltenham has, after a couple of weak years, a strong draw for next year: Loose Tubes: 30th Reunion http://www.jazzwisemagazine.com/news-mainmenu-139/70-2013/12896-jazz-breaking-news-loose-tubes-30th-anniversary-reunion-for-cheltenham-jazz-festival-2014 And Paul Dunmall also. See how it all pans out but this might well get me back there...I've missed it. Loose Tubes are also doing Ronnie's around that time.

Wishing him well - a musician I've enjoyed in many contexts over the years.

And now another: Due in January.

I saw Richard Cook do a talk at the Cheltenham Festival some years before he died. When asked which current jazz player really impressed him he talked enthusiastically about Eric Alexander.

The earlier cd version had an atrocious transfer. Let's hope this is better.

I briefly had Shadows and Light around 1979. Sounded fine but, as far as I can recall, didn't seem that different from the albums the songs were drawn from. One I sold off. Be interesting to hear it now - I might think differently. On the band tracks of 'Miles of of Aisles' the songs get some interesting changes of arrangement.

There was a live bootleg LP that had (I think) fairly wide distribution titled "Lennie and Dom Songs (Early On)." There's no recording date listed on the album, but the Net seems to think it was 1969 or 1970. Sound quality is OK. Songs are: Chelsea Morning, Cactus Tree, Night In The City, Marcie/Nathan La Franeer, Rainy Night House/Blue Boy, For Free, Get Together (The Youngbloods' song; great version), The Fiddle And The Drum, I Think I Understand, Both Sides Now. Sounds good. She must have some of her stuff recorded. Given what Neil Young is bringing up from the well, you'd hope Joni could do something similar. I'll not hold my breath. It must be ten years since we were promised some major reissues of the mid-70s albums.

I remember borrowing those LPs from friends. Before video that was how you got to know things like this. The 'What have the Romans done for us?' segment of 'Brian' is a staple of history teaching these days! I always liked the Spanish Inquisition sketch.

There's something in the production being the problem idea on the Geffen's. I quite warmed to some of those songs when redone on those retrospective albums. The one song from latter days that I thing is brilliant is her working of Yeats' 'The Second Coming'. As good as anything from her heyday. As for her pontifications, she's never been slow to wave the knife. I suppose if you've been told your a genius for decades.. I also really like... Tends to get overlooked as a halfway house between the albums with limited support and the ones with a cast of thousands. I've always found the song about Beethoven very moving.

I really like Don Juan (apart from Paprika Plains - way too over the top for me). It came out before 'Mingus' The way she sings and plays Silky Veils is a highlight. The lyrics seem to be an agglomeration of various folk songs - the traditional process evolving as ever. The C&S, Hissing, Hekira trilogy are the apex for me. I initially found earlier Joni too heart on sleeve confessional (not quite cricket for we Brits). But I learned to love them too. As I mentioned in some other thread, I'd love to hear a live recording of her around 1970. They must exist - all I know is a 30 minute BBC show from that time. Miles of Aisles is a great record but its well into her 'grown up' stage.

Exactly my reaction to 'Mingus'. Found it interesting at the time but didn't quite get it - the melodies are very hard to trace. But over time I've really warmed to it. For me it's the last of the great Joni albums. Apart from the odd track what came after never connected. Although I do quite like the lush, smokey revisiting/standards records of a decade or so back.

Think they shaped the way of thinking of many Brits who were young in the very early 70s. The sending up of British social and cultural pretension.

-1 when I got in the car this morning at 6.30. Seemed much colder this evening but the car thermometer said +1.

Thanks for bringing that up. Checked online blurb and it looks right up my street - put an order in. Just finished the last but one David Downing novel which is set in late '45 in Berlin and across southern and eastern Europe against the backdrop of the mass migrations and the Jewish routes to Palestine. I teach the Cold War to 17-18 year olds so books like this provide constant new information and anecdotes. Can recommend this one I read last year that overlaps though covers a longer time period:

I was relying on the BBC. They always tell the truth.

"Benjamin Britten on Camera" Programme about Benjy and the Beeb over the years, Included a contribution from Michael Crawford of 'Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em' and 'Phantom of the Opera' fame who was in the original production of 'Noye's Fludde'. Came across as very knowledgeable about the technicalities of the music.

Last day of a mild autumn. Apparently the woolly mammoths are coming tomorrow:

Hurrah! Scandi-Saturdays are back: Borgen Series III.