FZ fans also Varese fans?
BERTRAND NICOLAS
Does Frank Zappa fans also like Edgard Varese music?
I, for myself, love Varese and discovered him because of Uncle Frank.
I read in the paper Frank Zappa ranked Varese high among the composers
he used to listen.
Listening to Arcana, composed in 1925, I can perceive some very *a la Zappa*
rythms and sonic textures (it well (I think) could be argued Varese music
is not exactly music). Have you heard this critic regarding FZ music,
coming from ignorant listeners?
What do you think?
To the curious, I would recommand Pierre Boulez recording of Varese,
on Sony with the New York Philarmonic and Ensemble Interconteporain.
The only thing TRULY missing in Varese music, is some inspired lirics, the ones we are used to listening FZ.
Nicolas Bertrand
Dave Black
including musicians who inspired him and come from his vein of
creativity. Edgard Varese, Webern, John Cage (FZ performed 4'33"
on A Tribute to John Cage" which for those of you not familiar,
is 4 mins 33 sec of total complete silence. Intensely
listenable!). Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Huun-Huur-Tu (the Tuvan
Throat Singers), both of whom were pictured in the A&E Biography
that ran a few months ago in FZ's Laurel Canyon UMRK Dwelling.
Got Eric Dolphy "Out To Lunch" (remember the Memorial Barbecue?).
I could go on and on, but I need some sleep now. Gonna have
spinal surgery soon for a slipped CD - looking forward to that!
Enuf o' my bullshit! Begone! Good night, GOOD NIGHT BOYS &
GIRLS, G O O D N I G H T B O Y S A N D G I R L S S S S !
(From FILLMORE EAST '71)
--
Whizzing & pasting & pooting through the day...
(Ronnie helping Kenny helping burn his poots away...)
And all the while on a shelf in the shed:
KENNY'S LITTLE CREATURES ON DISPLAY!
Sternodox
Boulez is a good place to start. Music for strings, percussion and celestia
is great also. Any other Bartok/Zappa fans here?
Rev. Sternodox, CotSB
Sternodox
by Varese. Many of the early Mothers' percussion madness can be traced
to this number. Especially, check out all the "banging weirdness" on
WOIIFTM.
Rev. Sternodox
David Ocker
>
>And don't forget Bela Bartok. His Concierto for Orchestra, conducted by
>Boulez is a good place to start. Music for strings, percussion and
>celestia is great also. Any other Bartok/Zappa fans here?
Of course - my favorite: ALL 6 string quartets.
Which reminds me of this...
While I was working for Frank a recording of the music of George Antheil
performed by the Netherlands Wind Ensemble was released - making many
people aware for the first time how insanely great his early works are.
These include the Ballet Mechanique (for percussion, pianos, airplane
propeller, various buzzers etc), a Jazz Symphony and several sonatas for
violin and piano.
Frank liked Antheil's music too. Once, in a discussion with Frank and
someone else, I mentioned that I thought the Jazz Symphony was the best
piece on the album. Frank disagreed and chose one of the violin sonatas
as his favorite (I believe it was the one with the drum bit at the end).
I was suprised by this but also pleased that he chose a small-scale
chamber work instead of a large, colorful orchestra piece. (I've spent
a lot of my life playing chamber music and regretted that Frank showed so
little interest in small acoustic instrumental pieces. At that time he
was writing many large, colorful orchestra pieces. I had assumed -
wrongly - that he'd be more interested in Antheil's orchestra work.)
Another time: I was working on something at the house and Frank was
nearby. I was whistling while I worked - as I often do - not really
aware of what the tune was. Frank said "Oh, Antheil's greatest hits."
and I realized that I was whistling the Ballet Mechanique theme.
Highly recommended. I wonder if that album has been reissued on CD.
--
/////////////////////---------\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
David Ocker, Los Angeles, CA --- doc...@netcom.com
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\=========//////////////////////
Todd Poynor
: I've spent
: a lot of my life playing chamber music and regretted that Frank showed so
: little interest in small acoustic instrumental pieces. At that time he
: was writing many large, colorful orchestra pieces.
Agreed -- pieces such as his quartet "None of the Above" and the trio version
of "Bogus Pomp" (I guess it was "Music for the Queen's Circus" back then) are
among my favorites. I usually prefer chamber music over larger
instrumentations, and wish he had written more.
: Highly recommended. I wonder if that album has been reissued on CD.
Here's another recording on CD:
Ballet Mecanique; MusicMasters 01612-67094-2 \CD
A Jazz Symphony
Second Sonata for Violin, Piano, and Drum
String Quartet #1
Ballet for Mechanical Instruments and Percussion
New Palais Royale Orchestra & Percussion Ensemble, Maurice
Peress, Mendelssohn String Quartet, Castleman/Hodgkinson
Violin & Piano Duo, Ivan Davis, Rex Lawson; ~1989
The piece that got me interested in Antheil was the Second Piano Sonata
("Airplane"), available in a cheap 3-CD VoxBox CD3X 3027.
Todd
Sternodox
me toward OTHER similar artists? What do you think of Boulez?
Rev. Sternodox
Rob Sweet
BERTRAND NICOLAS <r13...@nobel.si.uqam.ca> wrote:
>
>Does Frank Zappa fans also like Edgard Varese music?
>
>on Sony with the New York Philarmonic and Ensemble Interconteporain.
>
To the patient:
I highly recommend The Rage and The Fury, Zappa's production of Varese music,
as performed by the Ensemble Moderne. It's currently in the Zappa vaults
awaiting release. The mixes I heard might be rough mixes only, but they sound
great. If Gail or any other UMRK people are listening: I am anxiously waiting
for this to be released, as well as "Dance Me This", "Lost Episodes", and
"Did I Offend Anyone?".
\ | /
/ Rob Sweet | "Who are the brain police?" \
\ sw...@skat.usc.edu | /
/ | - FZ \
David Ocker
(Peter Mulderry) says...
>No flame intended, but was FZ really totally unexcited by Boulez' music?
>Comparing 'Naval Aviation in Art' (conducted by Boulez, admittedly) with
>Boulez' own 'Repons', I think I can hear certain similarities and I'd
>always assumed that Boulez was one of the composers that influenced FZ.
If the subject is "what 20th-century composers did Frank like?" - I think
we can all agree Varese is top of the list in a class by himself. After
that I remember Frank showing *real* excitement about Stravinsky,
Nancarrow and Antheil at various times. Other people might want to add
to that list. I personally would not put Boulez on such a list. I would
not say Frank was "totally unexcited" - how 'bout "familiar and
respectful"?
Naval Aviation is an interesting point. Once, when Frank had returned
from Europe (possibly from the recording session of Perfect Stranger in
Paris) he mentioned that someone had made a connection between Naval
Aviation and one of Schoenberg's Five Orchestral Pieces - I don't
remember which number it is but it has the "jumping fish" motive in it
(you'll have to check with someone who's studied such things recently -
but it's a well know music-history factoid.) The two pieces have
theoretically similar textures - drawn out backgrounds with occasional
sparse movements on top. Frank was totally mystified by this - he didn't
hear the connection at all. Who knows what he would have said had you
asked him to compare "Naval Aviation" and "Repons".
>What lets FZ's orchestral music off the hook of being "old-fashioned,
>atonal neo-impressionism", apart from the disclaimer that it's for
>"entertainment purposes only..."?
Nothing - except the totally subjective responses of each of our ears and
brains. If you wanted to put Franks music down you might well call it
"old-fashioned atonal etc." - it's gotten much worse reviews from
classical critics. I do believe that Boulez lives much more conciously
in the shadow of the great French composers of the last 100 years -
Debussy, Messiaen for example - than Frank lived in the shadow of Varese.
BTW - the full title of Naval Aviation is "Naval Aviation in Art?" - note
the question mark. Gail once showed me a clipping from Life (?) Magazine
ca 1945 which had inspired the title - it was an article about a
gallery showing of artists during WWII who had used scenes from the U.S.
Navy's aviation squadrons as themes for their artworks. One of the
artists was the photographer Steiglitz as I remember. I think Frank
found the juxtapostion of "naval aviation" and "art" strange enough for
further comment - or maybe he just appropriated a bizarre title for a
nameless piece of music. Franks notes on the record jacket say:
"NAVAL AVIATION IN ART? shows a sailor-artist, standing before his easel,
squinting through a porthole for inspiration, while wiser men sleep in
hammocks all around him."
Todd Poynor
: In article <D440L...@cup.hp.com>, to...@cup.hp.com (Todd Poynor) says...
: >Agreed -- pieces such as his quartet "None of the Above" and the trio version
: >of "Bogus Pomp" (I guess it was "Music for the Queen's Circus" back then) are
: >among my favorites.
: I'm curious - where are these recorded?
"None of the Above" is a title on "The Yellow Shark". It wasn't clear to me
whether it's the entire quartet, or a movement from it (and another track --
"III Revised"? -- was a quintet orchestration of another movement?).
Supposedly, the Kronos Quartet (for whom it was written, I think) has played
this, but I haven't seen a recording.
The trio "Bogus Pomp" was recorded in a live performance from about 1968, on
a release called "Ahead of Their Time". The music makes up roughly the first
half of the LSO version (the better half, IMHO, before the "200
Motels"-derived material).
If I remember correctly, it features Ian Underwood on piano, Art Tripp on
percussion, and a rather out-of-tune Bunk Gardner on clarinet (maybe we on
the net can chip in and hire you to do it right). Later segments of the
music feature a small orchestra. The music is interspersed with dialog from
the stage show.
Todd
Peter Mulderry
doc...@netcom.com (David Ocker) wrote:
>Naval Aviation is an interesting point. Once, when Frank had returned
>from Europe (possibly from the recording session of Perfect Stranger in
>Paris) he mentioned that someone had made a connection between Naval
>Aviation and one of Schoenberg's Five Orchestral Pieces - I don't
>remember which number it is but it has the "jumping fish" motive in it
>(you'll have to check with someone who's studied such things recently -
>but it's a well know music-history factoid.) The two pieces have
>theoretically similar textures - drawn out backgrounds with occasional
>sparse movements on top. Frank was totally mystified by this - he didn't
>hear the connection at all. Who knows what he would have said had you
>asked him to compare "Naval Aviation" and "Repons".
The similarities I detect in Repons actually fit very well with the
description you give, so maybe Zappa had just absorbed the idioms of modern
orchestral music to such a degree that he could use some of the same
devices employed by Schoenberg or Boulez without conciously trying to mimic
any specific piece.
This leads me to soe more questions that I would like to ask you since you
obviously knew Zappa quite well and even tried to influence the direction
of his compositions: Do you think he was composing in accordance with some
theory or was he just writing down the sounds that came into his head? I
know that he always insisted that he wrote music only for his own
amusement, but that doesnUt seem to square with taking a man like Pierre
Boulez seriously. Also, how do you think his orchestral compositions fit in
with his more song-oriented output? Did he really hear music so abstractly
as to perceive both Varese and doo-wop as mere sound patterns, or were the
orchestral composing and the song-writing two different activities?
p
Peter Mulderry
Edinburgh, Scotland
David Ocker
>Jeff Rocca
>j...@allegra.att.com says...
>
> +----------------------------------------------------------------------+
> | "The present-day composer refuses to die!" Edgard Varese, July 1921 |
> +----------------------------------------------------------------------+
Watson (in Poodle Play, p45-46) quotes Varese's entire Manifesto and points
out that Frank changed the quote **slightly**. So, to be completely accurate
- either your .sig should read:
"The present-day composers refuse to die." Edgard Varese, July 1921
or
" 'The present-day composer refuses to die.' Edgard Varese, July 1921" Frank
Zappa, 1966
I've found the ramifications of this little transposition of one ess are quite
interesting to me. Varese continued "They (the composers) have realized the
necessity of banding together and fighting for the right of the individual..."
He was trumpeting the start of the "International Composers Guild"
In this century, many serious, unknown composers have seen the need to form
composers collectives which attempt group action to further the careers of the
individual members (I started such an egalitarian group myself - the
Independent Composers Association). Most of these composers (like me)
remained unknown as composers.
Frank, however, even from the very beginning of Freak Out!, must have realized
(conciously? sub-conciously?) that such composers groups would not get him
what he wanted. And he certainly didn't remain unknown.
Either that, or the change was just a typo.
Jeff Rocca
liked. He mentioned Varese, Stravinsky, Webern, and Penderecki.
Jeff Rocca
j...@allegra.att.com
NAURIN, JON
>If the subject is "what 20th-century composers did Frank like?" - I think
>we can all agree Varese is top of the list in a class by himself. After
>that I remember Frank showing *real* excitement about Stravinsky,
>Nancarrow and Antheil at various times. Other people might want to add
>to that list. I personally would not put Boulez on such a list. I would
>not say Frank was "totally unexcited" - how 'bout "familiar and
>respectful"?
In a radio interview (on side 4 of Leatherette) from 1972, Frank speaks about
20th-century "serious" composers, and mentions especially Anton Webern and
Stravinsky, but also Penderecki (sp?) and Charles Ives, I think.
- Jon
Steven M. Hill
: Haven't listened to Antheil. But will. Thanks for the info. Can you guide
: me toward OTHER similar artists? What do you think of Boulez?
: Rev. Sternodox
I love Boulez. Some think him too rigidly 12th tone but it's not always
true. My faveourite is the Sonata No.1 for Piano. Very Zappa a la Nlite.
Rituel and Eclat are also frequently played, these are larger scale works,
one orchestral and the other almost like gamelan crossed with Harry Partch.
Speaking of Partch, I heard Frank didn't care for him too much.
--
_________________________________________________________________________
Steven M. Hill Mostly Aardvark Media Lab
ste...@cadenza.demon.co.uk
David Ocker
Mulderry) says...
>The similarities I detect in Repons actually fit very well with the
>description you give, so maybe Zappa had just absorbed the idioms of modern
>orchestral music to such a degree that he could use some of the same
>devices employed by Schoenberg or Boulez without conciously trying to mimic
>any specific piece.
I think he tended to stop doing something if he thought he was following someone
elses rules or example. He had no trouble making up new rules for each
situation. And mutating them so fast no one else could hope to keep up. Gail
told me once that Frank had expressed this philosphy: "Always give them what they
don't expect". I think that fits all his music.
I betcha that if Frank had known Repons or the Schoenberg Orchestral Piece when
he wrote Naval Aviation, NAIA? would have been a completely different piece. We
can point out similarities between his music and other well-known composers from
here to eternity, and we can speculate on how familiar Frank was with their music
- but I'm unwilling to award the "Was Influenced By" title to anyone but the most
obvious choices. Varese anyone?
>This leads me to soe more questions that I would like to ask you since you
>obviously knew Zappa quite well and even tried to influence the direction
>of his compositions:
<<TILT>> - My job as copyist for 6 of my 7 years with Frank involved *technical*
musical matters - mostly notational, sometimes orchestrational. I was the guy who
had to remember what the bottom note on the piccolo or English Horn is, for
example. However, when it came to the actual music he made all the decisions.
He might play tapes for people and measure their reactions - but the music wasn't
finished till HE liked it. In fact, to do my job (which I still do for other
composers) I've learned not to make suggestions about how the music sounds.
Here's a example - early on I suggested that a certain cello line in (what
became) the 2nd movement of Mo 'n Herb be pizzicato instead of arco. Frank asked
me why and I had some reason for it. He actually okayed it and these two
particular measures were marked "pizz." When I heard the piece played (by the
LSO) those two measures immediately jumped out at me and I thought "That
shouldn't have been pizz - they should have remained arco". I never mentioned
this to Frank again however so I don't know if he was aware of it.
If you think that two bars of cello in one humongous orchestra piece is pretty
insignificant = then you can get some idea of how much I (or anyone) might have
been able to influence the direction of his music.
>Do you think he was composing in accordance with some
>theory or was he just writing down the sounds that came into his head?
To be perfectly honest I'd have to answer "yes" and "yes". However, if by
"theory" you mean a life-long, all-encompassing theory (like "serialism" or
"12-tone") then the answers are "no" and "yes".
There were some theoretical things that I saw him do - mostly to do with
harmonies. He told me once that he had gotten his sense of harmony from playing
the guitar - and I lamented that I never got much sense of harmony from playing
the clarinet. For all the time I worked for him I never really understood all
the nuances of his chord symbols. Of course I didn't have to - I just copied
them for the guitarists to figure out.
Eventually some of his favorite chords got written down and categorized into what
he called "the chord bible" - chords would get added to each note of a melody and
the final result would be five to seven parallel voices with the melody on top.
This was used for most of the large orchestra pieces I worked on. That's why
Sinister Footwear has such huge wind sections - so he could have these thick
chords played by individual instrumental colors. When the Synclavier arrived
this system was soon forgotten.
He did have some special Synclavier software created which combined music files
in various ways. Steve DeFuria wrote it. Can this be considered theory? I
think not - it was more of a "Lets try this and see what happens" - musical
experimentations where he kept what he liked and tossed the rest of the tapes
into the vault. Don't forget - he called his studio "Utility Muffin RESEARCH
Kitchen". I believe he did that sort of stuff throughout his career.
>I know that he always insisted that he wrote music only for his own
>amusement, but that doesnÕt seem to square with taking a man like Pierre
>Boulez seriously.
I think of Boulez (and lots of other serious composers) as writing in some
tradition - Pierre probably thinks of himself as the continuation of a long line
of French composers: Debussey, Messiaen, Boulez ... Another composer I once
heard speak said that he wrote super-difficult music in order to "help human
evolution along". Frank would have witheringly scorned such notions. He was a
guy who wrote music for a living and because it gave him a thrill - and you could
see that from the way he reacted to something that was coming out well. His
attitude about why he composed might have changed somewhat after he learned of
the cancer, but I wasn't around enough then to say exactly how.
>Also, how do you think his orchestral compositions fit in
>with his more song-oriented output? Did he really hear music so abstractly
>as to perceive both Varese and doo-wop as mere sound patterns, or were the
>orchestral composing and the song-writing two different activities?
The orchestral music started with Frank sitting by himself in a room for hours
and hours plunking things out on the piano and writing them down with a sharp
felt-tip pen on manuscript paper. Some of the more difficult band-parts might
start off the same way, but most of the songs seemed to evolve from simple ideas
that he'd formulate in his mind and bring into a rehearsal. He'd keep trying
things - if he liked them they were in, if he didn't he changed them.
When he got his first drum box - Frank was mesmerized by it and started turning
out rhythm tracks by the dozens. He spoke of each track as a future song - I
asked him "what about the melodies" - his response was to the effect of "I'll
have them." which I took to mean "Don't worry - they're inside of me but I'm not
exactly sure what they are yet."
He never had any problems coming up with new ideas. They must have been burning
inside him - because he worked so hard and so enthusiastically to get them out.
I can't imagine ever meeting a more remarkable human being.
Colin Gateley
>In article <Z277McG...@delphi.com>, Sternodox <gla...@delphi.com> wrote:
>> And don't forget Bela Bartok. His Concierto for Orchestra, conducted by
>> Boulez is a good place to start. Music for strings, percussion and celestia
>> is great also. Any other Bartok/Zappa fans here?
>Yes. And don't forget Bartok's 5th & 6th String Quartets.
And 4th!
--
Peter Mulderry
qf...@insane.apana.org.au (Colin Gateley) wrote:
>Peter Mulderry writes:
>
>>In article <Z277McG...@delphi.com>, Sternodox <gla...@delphi.com> wrote:
>
>>> And don't forget Bela Bartok. His Concierto for Orchestra, conducted by
>>> Boulez is a good place to start. Music for strings, percussion and celestia
>>> is great also. Any other Bartok/Zappa fans here?
>
>>Yes. And don't forget Bartok's 5th & 6th String Quartets.
>
>And 4th!
yeahyeahyeahyeah!
And someone else (Mr Ocker?) said all six. Well, sure. Eventually. I
suspect that someone well-versed in Zappa but approaching Bartok for the
first time might not be too well encouraged if they start with the first
two quartets. Otherwise why not tell Ôem to start with Haydn?
Anyways, hereŐs another Bartok recommendation for FZ fans: Sonata for two
pianos and percussion.
p
Peter Mulderry cri...@dircon.co.uk
Edinburgh, Scotland
David Ocker
[Bartok's string quartets]
>And someone else (Mr Ocker?) said all six. Well, sure. Eventually. I
>suspect that someone well-versed in Zappa but approaching Bartok for the
>first time might not be too well encouraged if they start with the first
>two quartets. Otherwise why not tell ‘em to start with Haydn?
You know, except for the Korean gentleman who runs the dry-cleaning place I go to,
a.f.f-z is the only place in the world - real or cyber - where anyone calls me MR
Ocker. I'm always embarassed when I'm called that - but maybe Mr. Mulderry doesn't
mind the extra formality. 8-)
I believe I said that *my* current favorite piece by Bartok was "all six" quartets -
and I'm continually amazed at how strong each of those pieces is - a six-way tie for
first place IMO. And since I often listen to more than one of them at a time they
sort of blend in my conciousness into one very large, very important piece. I have
the Emerson Quartet recording - it's great!!. I was re-introduced to the quartets
when I heard an excellent live performance of the Fifth by the Arditti Quartet a few
years ago - so that might be my sentimental favorite.
I think the First Quartet would be a suitable introduction to Bartok - maybe not as
good as the 4th or 5th, but better than the 2nd or 6th. If you're looking for other
string quartets besides Bartok - Haydn would be fine. Don't forget Mozart and Brahms
(I also recommend their various string quintets) but I can't imagine Frank having any
interest in those composers. If you're a "20th century type of guy" then I recommend
the Schoenberg and Shostakovich quartets. And Debussy and Ravel each wrote one
totally wonderful quartet.
>Anyways, here’s another Bartok recommendation for FZ fans: Sonata for two
>pianos and percussion.
Good suggestion, good music. Has anyone mentioned the Bartok piano concerto that
Frank recorded a bit of - I think it was the Third.
Hank Knox
: I hear that Beethoven had a fair crack at the quartet format too ;-)
: But like you said, FZ probably did not much like the music of these
: composers. Was it just that they were old or did he specifically dislike
: the classical tradition. Did he ever express enthusiasm for any pre-20th c.
: music? (Apart from Francesco Zappa's, that is).
I have a recollection that in a late interview, which I might have browsed
at one of the Zappa Web sites, he mentioned that he had been listening to
Purcell.
hank