A Question For Poetry Geeks

[JSngry]

Ok, so I'm listening to this Kenneth Patchen in Canada disc last night, him reciting his own stuff in front of a Candian jazz group, and I hear it again - the sound of poets reading their own work with this kind on beatific, dramatic drone.

Why do they do that?

I mean, the stuff as written is full of nuance, rhythm, shading, all that good stuff, but it seems that so many times, when the poet reads their own work, they sink off into that drone thing. I don't get it.

Patchen's not the only one I've heard do it, and it's not exclusive to the Beat poets either. And not all poets do it either. But I hear traces of it in damn near all of them.

I get used to it after a while, but what's the deal with the drone, anyway? Patchen's actual words on this thing are a groove, but it wasn't until about halfway through the second listen that I realized that. All I could hear until then was the drone.

Somebody help me out on this. What am I missing?

Edited January 14, 2005 by JSngry

[maren]

Yeah, I don't care for that drone. Even when the poem's good, the drone surrounds it with the aura of a mocking send-up of "the Beats" (a la Maynard G. Krebs -- I'm sure you remember him, JS ).

But Allen Ginsberg didn't read like that!

I guess the rationale for the drone is to minimize the normal inflections (pitch, rhythm, accent) of speech in order to reveal other rhythms or allow words to be highlighted that usually aren't? To allow for poly-meters and rhymes to be heard, to avoid tyranny of the most obvious meters and rhymes that are also present in the poem (beyond normal speech)?

Kind of reminds me of being instructed to practice Bach keyboard passages (in preludes, fugues, suites, etc.) with shifting accents (the second note of every group of triplets or four 16th notes, the third, etc.) and then with no accent at all -- aiming to develop a fluid even tone and the ability to suggest internal voices, counter-rhythms -- an important practice technique, but ultimately you want it to sound fluid, not stilted. Some poets get there -- melding the weirdness of the drone with the familiarity of speech, able to trade off between the expected and unexpected and thus surprise and move the listener -- but too many just sound like the drone is the be-all and end-all.

Edited January 14, 2005 by maren

[couw]

imagine the Ursonate being read with such a drone...

[JSngry]

Yeah, I don't care for that drone. Even when the poem's good, the drone surrounds it with the aura of a mocking send-up of "the Beats" (a la Maynard G. Krebs -- I'm sure you remember him, JS ).

But Allen Ginsberg didn't read like that!

I guess the rationale for the drone is to minimize the normal inflections (pitch, rhythm, accent) of speech in order to reveal other rhythms or allow words to be highlighted that usually aren't? To allow for poly-meters and rhymes to be heard, to avoid tyranny of the most obvious meters and rhymes that are also present in the poem (beyond normal speech)?

Kind of reminds me of being instructed to practice Bach keyboard passages (in preludes, fugues, suites, etc.) with shifting accents (the second note of every group of triplets or four 16th notes, the third, etc.) and then with no accent at all -- aiming to develop a fluid even tone and the ability to suggest internal voices, counter-rhythms -- an important practice technique, but ultimately you want it to sound fluid, not stilted. Some poets get there -- melding the weirdness of the drone with the familiarity of speech, able to trade off between the expected and unexpected and thus surprise and move the listener -- but too many just sound like the drone is the be-all and end-all.

Krebs? Do you REALLY think I'm that old?

Well...

Yeah, Ginsberg was different, but he still had vestigal drone. Still, the difference is palpable.

If that's the rationale (and it seems like it might be), all I can say is that it doesn't woork for me. It does the opposite, actually. But I'm not "inside" poetry like I am music, so I'll freely admit tht maybe there's a point to it that I'm missing.

But I know that you're a lot more in there with it than I am, maren, and if you don't get it either...

(and yeah - "Miscellaneous Music" was the intended/desired forum for this. Poetry, especially this type of poetry, is so intrinsically musical in so many ways that I figured "why not?")

The Patchen disc is recommended, btw, in spite of the drone.

Dem' Bastahds, Dey got it: http://www.dustygroove.com/vocalscd.htm#354333

[Leeway]

I think the style is designed to suggest the oracular nature of the material being read, and harkens back to the concept of the Aeolian harp, where the poet's reading is a sort of god-inspired affair.

[Spontooneous]

You think THAT'S a drone -- you should hear the recordings of Yeats reading his poetry.

[Larry Kart]

I recall Robert Creeley's reading of his poems being exactly what I thought they should be, suitably intimate and especially spot on (as you'd expect or hope) rhythmically.

T.S. Eliot was just about right, Marianne Moore, I dimly recall, was impossible (perhaps just petrified with fear). I know what Jim means about the pervasive drone, but the last thing you want instead is too ripe and fruity, a la our former poet laureate, Robert Pinsky. One of the best readings of anything I've ever heard (all these except Creeley and Pinsky were on recordings, though I've heard Creeley in person and on record too) was Allen Tate reading his long poem "The Swimmers." The reading may have been better than the poem, and it's a damn good poem.

[Jazzmoose]

Krebs? Do you REALLY think I'm that old?

I'm certainly not. Who is he?

On the other hand, Tuesday Weld I remember!

Ahem. Excuse me...

[danasgoodstuff]

Maybe stage fright has a little something to do with it too sometimes? Another exception is Gary Synder who reads quite nicely (disclaimer: Snyer is a friend of my father's).