Sonic Revelations, Sonic Revolutions

I’m moving back in time to Alice’s piece, “I Was a Lover” by TV on the Radio. I’m an avid fan of TV on the Radio and in my opinion, this is one of their best works. The piece is so powerful, using evocative and complex language enhanced by the pounding, almost dragging beat. The lyrics are full of conflict and resonate deep within the listener. Many interpret them as the deterioration of a relationship, but they are clearly portraying a political message from the band in a poetic, beautifully haunting way. The music reminds me of a melancholy blues singer in the bowels of Chicago’s clubs, lamenting the woes of today’s society, while the horn loop in the background is like crying of a dying elephant–not very elegant, but it’s something powerful, heavy, and full of grief. This song continues to capture my ears and I haven’t been able to stop listening to it.

I really love John Luther Adams’ work. Each piece is this great expansive sonic painting, huge and beautiful like the landscapes that he draws inspiration from. It’s easy to imagine what those landscapes might look like; while listening to “Dream in White on White,” I was constantly visualizing broad stretches of tundra/forest and looming snow-capped mountains, all possessing that wild desolate beauty only found in nature that Adams communicates so well in his music. I think part of that ability comes from how well he weaves tone and texture together, as well as his usage of tone/harmony itself. Kyle Gann describes this ability appropriately:  “Adams has returned to tonality in a nontraditional, unsentimental way. There is no nostalgia here, there are no ‘chord progressions,’ no references to ‘great music of the past.’ The seven-tone scale is recreated anew in all its innocence, freed to create color fields, no longer burdened by the syntax of the tonal ‘language.’” I definitely agree, especially with the “innocence” part. Adams brings out the core essence and simplicity of tonality in his music, unbridled by any fancy flourishes, expressing the natural purity of the wild environment. In that sense, his pieces are like his own Walden–his version of a Thoreauesque return to nature.

I also agree with Matt G’s and Jackson’s visualizations of a slow sunrise or a time-lapse image; Adams’ compositions do possess this sense of timelessness and infinite stillness/movement. I guess time is also a significant aspect of nature; mountains that seem older than history itself, or the ever-flowing cycle of the seasons, or simply small pockets in time where a person might stop everything just for a moment to simply appreciate nature’s beauty.

I’m currently taking an astronomy class and all I could think of/envision while listening to “Why Patterns?” was outer space and its seeming infinity. This came to me on different levels; as the song began, I initially saw stars twinkling into existence against the dark vacuum of space, appearing as sparsely and distantly from each other as the notes of the song. However, I later considered the title of the song and it made me think of the astronomers of the ancient past, looking up at the sky and wondering why the stars and planets were arranged the way they were. Why patterns, indeed? But in the modern times, we know that the constellations aren’t really definitive patterns, but only seem so. They’re not truly manifestations of Greek myths or the zodiac–they’re just stars, billions and billions of light-years away from us. Why “patterns”? Because that’s simply the way they are. This brought me back to Feldman’s piece, which retains this same feeling of distance, almost randomness. When you try to focus on any one point, it fades away. You can only truly register them when you view the piece as a whole. And yet, each note has a special resonance of its own, glowing with its own ringing sound/purpose and reaching out with all the other notes to create this broad, textural expanse scattered with “stars.” But then, I’m also studying for an astronomy quiz at the same time, so that might have something to do with it…

If you couldn’t tell from the title, last night’s pieces were pretty intense for me. Both had so much activity within and it was often hard to concentrate on any specific element.

I did enjoy “Q” because of that reason, though. It never got boring; my ear was constantly shifting from tone to overtone and beat to beat. The summary of “Q” notes that “the oscillators spatially contain the instrumentalists while at the same time the instrumentalists tonally contain the oscillators….The oscillators operate as fixed gravitational centers around which the instrumental sounds constantly orbit.” I definitely agree with that image, although it didn’t really seem like the oscillators were being contained as much as they were battering against the instrumentalists’ “orbit”. The beating patterns were so many and so strong that they felt like giant waves covered with sonic spikes, breaking past the reedy instrumental tones and blasting all this pressure in your face. I had this weird sense of multiple-dimension-like hearing; my ears (and body) picked up both the physical vibrations of the beating patterns and the sonic dissonance and overtones stemming from the instrumentalists and pure tones. Occasionally one “dimension” would overpower the other, but I didn’t try to find the other side again–”Q” is such a powerful piece that it would be like trying to cross a flooding river. If that makes any sense.

“Triadic Iteration Lattices” was a lot harder for me to appreciate. I’m slightly phobic of tornadoes, so whenever I hear a siren, sprinting to the basement is all I can think of. Compounded to that was the classic association with air raids and bomb shelters. Thus, listening to this piece was kind of terrifying. It was a much more visual experience than “Q,” and it was hard to disconnect from those visuals and pay attention to the sound itself. Still, the synchronization between the sirens was fascinating–hearing the rise and decay of each siren and then all the caterwauling combined was a pretty breathtaking (and gutwrenching) experience. My ears!

(Pardon my French.)

“Puisque bele dame m’eime” was quite the breath of fresh (or at least, different) air after the tension of our other listenings. It’s a gorgeous and delicate piece, made even better by the Anonymous 4’s excellent technique and expression.

One of the piece’s elements that struck me the most was its “imperfect perfection”, for lack of a better term. Don’t get me wrong; by “imperfect,” I don’t mean flawed or badly performed; instead, not only is the piece graced by purity of tone, but also imbued with this deep, spine-tingling sense of humanity. The basic structure of the song shows this, especially at the beginning; the lilting, haunting melody, ringing with emotion, weaves itself with the ethereally, almost inhumanly pure note consistent throughout the piece.

I’m loath to describe that constant tone as a drone, since I tend to associate the word “drone” with machine-like sounds, or the lovely drone that we grind our teeth to in “Kounterdictionaries” (no bias there, of course not!). This piece’s “drone” is so radically different and pristine. It evokes different and deep emotions too; yet from a distance, as if the listener were standing alone in a vast and ancient cathedral, observing the gorgeous but fading fresco on the vaulted ceiling high above.

I completely agree with Matt G.’s image of the melodious voice as a soaring bird, rising and falling through the divine heavens created by the other voices. The usage of Dorian mode and the mystery surrounding the piece’s creation also adds so much to its ethereal beauty. Definitely a favorite.

After reading up on some Ligeti biography from the ever-trusty Wikipedia, I found myself visualizing a background story to Atmospheres as I listened. I envisioned a time-traveling journey spanning the history and demise of some dystopic and ravaged land, with the listener alternately speeding past faint, quickly occurring events or seemingly entering and becoming part of the events (or the aftereffects of the events) him/herself. The traveler begins at the present time, where anxiety reigns and the fate of the entire country is balanced precariously on the edge. Tensions rise and fall in waves throughout the first two minutes, where life is marked both by uneasiness and sporadic hope, eventually cresting with some glorious event heralded by the brass (from 1:50 to 2:05) as a sign of optimism for a better future. But afterwards (2:07), confusion and disorder seep in; society begins to decay, industries crumble. A new powerful party forces its way towards the ruling position, and the tension and chaos begin rising again. The listener is brought up, up, through the turbulent “atmosphere” of the nation’s fast-paced history (the screeching flutes at 3:15), so close to the sunlight of a new and better time to come…and suddenly the new authority brings down the hammer with a totalitarian, resilient, unforgiving power (3:44). The listener falls back through the grey despair below, passing hints and memories of the past when art and music were gifts to be treasured and used (4:02), not qualities to be censored and exterminated (4:38). An era of machinery arrives, with a complete absence of romanticism or creativity, marked by the grating, blaring horns of cars and trains and sirens (5:14).

Fast forward to the far future: only faint, distorted memories of music remain (5:54), and the nation has deteriorated into a barren wasteland haunted by stragglers and wandering creatures (6:38 onwards).

I realize that this interpretation is pretty wacked out and a bit far-fetched, but like I said–especially after studying a bit of Ligeti’s history, it was only too easy to correlate Atmospheres with some of the experiences he went through and the creative stifling he suffered as a composer in Hungary. It was much easier to visualize the piece rather than analyze it with words.

As for a “cool spot,” the one moment that always leaves goosebumps down my spine is 1:48-2:03, where the brass come in with a huge swelling chord that sweeps over you like the sun breaking through dark thunderclouds and spreading its light across a giant plain. In my opinion, it’s a section that seems different from the rest of the piece, and could almost be described as more traditionally “musical” then many of the other elements. It also has this sense of utter desperation/pride and sort of a last-man-standing feeling that lends it an extra dimension of power, besides its sheer dynamic range and volume.

I totally fail at blogging, but I hope I’ll do some justice to the amazingness [sic] that I’ve been listening to for the past hour.

I’ll be honest; having been deafened by a lot of experimental electronic noise/music in previous sound classes, I had kind of lost my faith in the contemporary realm for a while. Then I listened to Lontano. I think I can say that Ligeti has brought back my appreciation for the avant-garde in full force.

I’m not one to analyze a piece, since I have no experience in composition techniques/theory, but Lontano feels so honest–almost brutally so. Being a classical musician, it was easier for me to relate to the piece and truly get into the rise and fall of the music than some other experimental artists I’ve heard. Lontano reminded me of Medea’s Dance of Vengeance, Op. 23a by Barber, in a minimalized way. They both share similar emotions; despair, ecstasy, tension everywhere at every second, and many points where the sound becomes an absolute tsunami that crashes over you and makes you want to shout or scream or just curl up into a ball on the floor.

The many layers of discord and harmony were so hauntingly beautiful (I also got goosebumps, Matt!), almost beyond words. Every once in a while (in both Lontano and Atmosphere), you hear the singing vibrato of one single violin above all the other instruments, eventually joined by other violins, and it’s absolutely gorgeous. I keep thinking that this would be great music for a horror movie, but at the same time I’m trying not to imagine what it would be like, because these pieces need to stand by themselves. They are amazing works in their own right, and I think any other component would either weigh it down or erode the raw power sent through the music. Depends on the circumstances, though, I expect.

Sorry if this makes no sense, I’m mad tired at the moment. Possibly more elaboration tomorrow. Moral of the story: Ligeti is the new awesome!

-Caroline