To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu
This is NOT in order...
1. CRI -> Harry Partch "Vol #1" (11 Intrusions & Others)
2. CRI -> Harry Partch "Vol #3" (Dreamer & Others)
3. Innova -> Harry Partch "Enclosure #4" (Delusion of the Fury video)
4. Freenote Records -> Catler Bros. "Crash Landing"
5. Neil Haverstick -> "Acoustic Stick"
6. Nitelife -> "Basin Street Blues"
7. Cedille -> Easley Blackwood "12 Microtonal Etudes"
8. New Albion -> Michael Harrison "From Ancient Worlds"
9. Flying Fish -> Other Music "Incidents out of Context"
10. Jules Siegel -> "New Experiences in Music"
Notes...
1-2. Composers Recordings Inc.
http://www.composersrecordings.com/partch.html
3. Or dub from LP in some Library. I am suggesting that the copyright on
the audio-only recording of Delusion be blatantly violated. Copyright is an
agreement made with the goal of getting a work distributed. The publisher
has sole right to reproduce a work, *if* they will produce it. Columbia
Sony is not doing this, although they will probably either start doing it,
or sell the rights to somebody who will soon, since there is a sizable
demand for this recording.
4. 13-limit tonality-diamond Jazz.
http://home.earthlink.net/~freenote/catalog.htm
5. Music in 19 and 34 tone equal temperament.
Call: (303) 477-3268
6. Barbershop Quartet, SPEBSQSA 1996 International Champions.
http://www.harmonize.com/Nightlife/
7. All equal temperaments 13-24 notes/octave, plus Fanfare for 19-tone Equal
Tuning, and Suite for Guitar in 15-note Equal Tuning.
Call: (888)749-9998
8. Some of the best minimalism there is in any tuning. Played on the
Harmonic Piano, an instrument of the composer's invention (24-tone 7-limit
Just).
9. Polyrhythmic good stuff in JI.
10. New age music in a 33 note/octave 13-limit Just tuning. No longer
available. Gary! This spot is yours, if you'd only make an album!
>Did you ever hear the La Monte Young Forever
>Bad Blues Band "Just Stompin'" cd? I didn't get "it"
>until I heard them live. Woooah!
I tried to get this album from the JI Network store, but they said they
could no longer get it.
Carl
From: Dandemutan@aol.com
To: jstarret@tiger.cudenver.edu
Subject: -- to John Starrett -- Re: Mbira music
Dear John,
For starters, here are some discs that are easy to find (I carry these in my
web site mail order catalog but you can also probably find them at Tower
etc.):
Zimbabwe: The Soul of Mbira (Elektra/Nonesuch)
Compiled by Paul Berliner, the author of the classic tome The Soul of
Mbira
(1981: Univ. Chicago Press) and most recently a book on improvisation
(Thinking About Jazz, I think). This recording contains classical ensemble
mbira playing from Zimbabwe from the 1970s, featuring some of the great Shona
players of the latter half of the 20th century. There's quite a bit of buzz
in the mix -- the recordings are good and clear, it's the buzzers on the
mbira themselves and on the deze, the calabash gourd resonators in which the
mbira are played. This shimmer fills out the sound and is considered
essential to the African ear, but makes the music slightly less
accessible to
folks in the northern hemisphere who are more accustomed to pure, clear
tones. I figure you can probably handle it... The tracks on this recording,
and also on the yet-to-be-rereleased Shona Mbira Music album, are examples
referred to in the Soul of Mbira book, so if you're curious about a
musicological perspective on what you're hearing you can get it easily.
Mbira Dreams (Relaxation/Ellipsis Arts) by Erica Kundidzora Azim
Erica's one of my teachers; she lives in Berkeley but I
take workshops
from
her a few times a year. She's been playing mbira dzavadzimu for 25 years and
is an excellent musician & teacher. On this disc she plays the traditional
(c. 17th-18th century) repertoire and sings in Shona. She's playing solo
here, which is a little unusual (Shona mbira is primarily a duet instrument
to get those great interlocking rhythms & melodic lines), though there is one
duet on the album. Her playing style here is quiet & meditative. I think
she's playing outside of a deze (just the mbira in front of the mic) so while
you can still hear the shimmer of the mbira's own buzzers it's pretty
low-key; meanwhile the rich resonance of her mbira comes across wonderfully.
She's playing two different tunings of mbira made by Fradreck Mujuru, who's
become my favorite mbira maker.
Forthcoming -- Shanachie has just recorded an album by Forward Kwenda and
Erica Azim that will be appearing this fall. Forward is an INCREDIBLE mbira
player from Harare. He's currently in the US for eight months. This guy is
brilliant. He stands with one foot in our universe and the other in some
other realm. The perspective he brings to the traditional Shona repertoire
and the transformations he makes are beautiful and very exciting. Forward
and Erica are supposedly going to be performing & teaching in Boulder
sometime this summer, so if I read your email address right you may get a
chance to hear them. If so, jump at it. Erica calls Forward the
Coltrane of
mbira which is a tag I don't care for much -- it might set people up to
expect western jazz, which this highly improvisational music is not --
but it
does indicate her respect for his musicality.
I've got a number of other recordings of Zimbabwean mbira if you're
interested. From other African cultures I most strongly recommend these:
Empire Centrafricaine: Musique G'Baya: Chants a Penser (Ocora/Radio France)
This striking album of sanza mbira songs was produced by
Ocora, the
record
label of Radio France that has made so many incredible recordings over the
past decades. The excellent technical sound quality puts these GBaya
musicians right in front of you, with their beautiful sanza playing, their
low, sonorous singing, and their complex hand percussion. This is one of the
most amazing albums of non-Zimbabwean mbira music I have ever heard.
Art of Hukwe Ubi Zawose (JVC) (or any other album by Hukwe Ubi Zawose)
The Tanzanian ilimba is an mbira with about fifty keys,
half of them
sympathetic drones. The music billows and swirls, very colorful and
expressive. I really need to watch someone play this instrument someday to
make the connection between the sound and the instrument itself, which
although impressive with all its keys doesn't seem capable of producing such
a rich sound. (People say this about all sorts of mbira.)
By the way, John, you've got a hotbed of Shona mbira and marimba players in
your back yard (if you regard Boulder as your back yard). You might want to
contact these folks to get their gig schedules:
Chimanimani c/o Mary Ellen Cuthbertson -- mecmail@aol.com
Ukama c/o Chris Zorn -- zornc@ucsu.colorado.edu
Low-Flying Knobs c/o Chris Zorn (his students)
In addition to those marimba ensembles, Mary Ellen plays mbira publicly quite
a bit, and both Chimanimani and Ukama probably incorporate mbira into their
marimba performances, either amplified to accompany the marimbas or
played by
themselves between sets.
Let me know if you want to subscribe to the Dandemutande email list. It
generates three or four messages a week, announcements of performances &
workshops and of the availability of various recordings through my catalog.
All for now,
Paul
Dandemutande
A resource for Zimbabwean music & culture
722 28th Avenue South
Seattle WA 98144 USA
phone 1 (206) 323-6592
fax 1 (206) 329-9355
email Dandemutan@aol.com
web site http://www.rootsworld.com/rw/dandemutande/
Carl listed some favourite albums with intentional tunings_ Just
wanted to contribute some of mine -
Luigi Nono, Prometeo - Tragedia dell'ascolto, (Ingo Metzmacher et al.,
EMI 7243 5 55209 2 0 ) (2 CDs)
(To me, one of the greatest
works of
the 20th Century).
Luigi Nono, A Carlo Scarpa architetto; No hay camonos, hay que
caminar; (Micheal Gielen, Sinfonieorchester des Sudwestfunks, Astree
E8741) (CD)
Giacinto Scelsi, (1905-88) Anahit (Carmen Fournier Violin, Jurg
Wyttenbach Cond., Orchestre de la Radio-Television Polonaise de
Cracovie. Accord 200612) (CD)
Bill Hopkins, (1943-81) (Alison Wells soprano, Richard Bernas cond.,
Music Projects/London, NMC D014) (CD) (Hopkins was pupil of Jean
Barraque, and he was my own composition teacher). (Not all
microtonal).
Harry Partch, Study on Archytas' Enharmonic (John Schneider Guitar,
Amy Shulman Harp, Bridge BCD 9041) (CD). (I'm not a huge Partch
fan, and I suspect this is not an `authentic' performance - but I love
this rendition.)
Lastly, I wouldn't call this a favourite - but I add it as a
curiosity :
Pierre Barbaud, French Gagaku, (Orchestre Radio Television de
Strasbourg, cond_?) (LP)) (Sorry, haven't got any more details on
this - I only have a tape of it. But I know the LP exists. Does
anyone on the list know much about Barbaud's music? This is the only
thing I've heard. I think he was an early-microtonal-computer-
algorithm-composer_)
The tunings of all these (except Partch and Hopkins) are 1/4 tone
(I think Prometeo is notated in smaller divisions also, but the score
is not available to purchase). The Hopkins is notated with
arrow-heads attached to conventional accidentals. They are described
as 'quarter-tones' but it is fairly clear he didn't mean strict
24-ET. In the solo violin piece on the disk (which is 'post-serial')
the tunings aspire to a kind of bird song.
Patrick Ozzard-Low
