Barack Obama - Victory Speech (2008)

Yes, We Can't.

Performed live in Chicago, 5.11.2008

link@128

Ornette Coleman - Skies of America (1972)

"The history of attempts to fuse jazz and classical music has been long and ignominious. From the plasticizing efforts of George Gershwin and Paul Whiteman, through the rarefied preciousness of much of the "Third Stream," right on up to today's proliferating concertos for "jazz band and chamber orchestra," the tendency has been to abandon the strengths of both species for the weakness of a mutant. The first thing that needs to be said about Skies of America is that it transcends these previous attempts to such a degree that it has nothing whatever to do with them. It stands on its own as a work worthy of the most serious consideration, and it translates its composer's individuality as an improviser into orchestral terms.

Coleman's sound and style is one of a handful of truly distinctive contributions to the history of jazz. Bix, Louis, Bird, and Trane have all had their legions of copyists, but few players have been able to recreate the peculiar Coleman timbre, or to reproduce Coleman licks. Skies of America demonstrates that Coleman's uniqueness as a player is a facet of a highly personal musical conception; he manages to make the London Symphony Orchestra into an extension of his unique sensibility Coleman calls the theory that underlies his compositional endeavors "harmolodic." His modulations have a fresh, sometimes abrupt sound which seems to be a result of subordinating the chordal underpinning on which most music is based to the movement of melody. A certain melodic interval thus suggests a number of different chord changes, any one of which is "correct."

Because the piece represents America's skies, the parts are written in the higher ranges of the instruments. This unity of range and intent holds the piece together as much as the few themes which reappear. Coleman's alto enters halfway through the first side and his improvisations, some of which are pristinely clear a cappella statements, also help cement the work. Certain sections are optional or interchangeable, and the piece is designed to accommodate additional soloists. While a great deal of variety is present, from the openended, long-lined melodies of the opening and closing movements to the bright, tumbling parade sounds of some of the middle sections, the personal dimension permeates Skies on all levels, as one can discern quote after quote from Ornette's previous work. Certain heavy densities are reminiscent of the Greek composer Xenakis, and occasionally a jumble of melodies brings Charles Ives to mind, but the densities and jumbles all break down into individual lines that could only have been written by Ornette Coleman.

The most impressive quality of Skies of America is its emotional weight. The blues quality of much jazz playing is almost impossible to render into symphonic writing, but Coleman has long been known as a player of blues feeling rather than blues form, and he employs in Skies certain intervals that have "a human quality," intervals he originally discovered on his horn. This music will leave few listeners unmoved, and it leaves room for a multitude of personal reactions to the negative and positive qualities of life under America's skies. (RS 115)"

BOB PALMER, in rolling stone magazine, RS115

---------------------------------------------------------------------
ORNETTE COLEMAN - SKIES OF AMERICA (1972)

1. "Skies of America" — 2:49
2. "Native Americans" — 1:10
3. "The Good Life" — 1:33
4. "Birthdays and Funerals" — 3:13
5. "Dreams" — 0:51
6. "Sounds of Sculpture" — 1:20
7. "Holiday for Heroes" — 1:10
8. "All of My Life" — 3:08
9. "Dancers" — 1:17
10. "The Soul Within Woman" — 0:47
11. "The Artists in America" — 3:54
12. "The New Anthem" — 0:31
13. "Place in Space" — 2:44
14. "Foreigner in a Free Land" — 1:19
15. "Silver Screen" — 1:10
16. "Poetry" — 1:15
17. "The Men Who Live in the White House" — 2:48
18. "Love Life" — 4:34
19. "The Military" — 0:32
20. "Jam Session" — 0:39
21. "Sunday in America" — 4:29

link@320

Harry Partch - The Wayward + And on the Seventh Day Petals Fell in Petaluma

The second volume of CRI's series of Partch works includes several major pieces and a couple of exquisite jewels. The first four compositions are grouped under the general heading, "The Wayward," all of which deal, in part, with the musical rendering of everyday American speech, particularly the slang employed by migrant workers and hobos in the Depression era of the 1930s. "U.S. Highball" is a string of such exclamations, asides, and dispirited remarks set to a nonet of Partch's idiosyncratic instruments, including various percussion, strings, and justly tuned organs. The exoticism of the instrumental sound contrasts squarely with the everyday patterns of the speech (both sung and spoken), creating a unique kind of tension rarely encountered elsewhere.

Next, who but Partch would have though of orchestrating the cries of newsboys selling their wares on a foggy San Francisco night? Or setting the text of a letter from a friend to music, sometimes chatty, sometimes carping on personal matters? The result is hugely affecting, as the composer is able to ferret out the deep humanity beneath the superficial observations and provide precisely the right accompaniment, not quite sentimental but extremely sympathetic. For "Barstow," Partch went to an even more basic text source: the inscriptions and graffiti found on a highway railing in the remote California town, left over the years by itinerant travelers, not all of it "respectable" by any means (the piece ends with the shout, "Why in hell did you come, anyway?").

The final work, "And on the Seventh Day Petals Fell in Petaluma," is sheer bliss, a showpiece for his invented instruments arranged in a series of 34 one-minute-long sections, gradually increasing from duos to a concluding septet. Many of the themes were working models for those employed in his soon-to-be-written masterwork Delusion of the Fury. They are scrumptious lines full of otherworldly melodies and infectious rhythms, both serving as wonderful illustrations of his instruments' capabilities and utterly delightful miniatures in their own right. A superb recording, The Harry Partch Collection, Vol. 2 is a must-have for any self-respecting fan and a reasonable introduction to the composer's work for the intrigued listener. Brian Olewnick, All Music Guide

[01-04: The Wayward]
01. U.S. Highball - A Musical Account of a Transcontinental Hobo Trip (1943, rev. 1955; recorded 1958)
02. San Francisco - A Setting of the Cries of Two Newsboys on a Foggy Night in the Twenties (1943, rev. 1955; recorded 1958)
03. The Letter (1943, rev. 1972; recorded 1972)
04. Barstow - Eight Hitchhiker Inscriptions from a Highway Railing at Barstow, California (1941, rev. 1968; recorded 1982)

05. And on The Seventh Day Petals Fell in Petaluma (1963-64, rev. 1966; recorded 1964)


link@320 [The Wayward]
link@320 [Petaluma]