Cool jazz in the hot weather...

At the moment - everything seems to be very stressful for most people. I'm coming to the end of school and therefore revising for my a-levels, applying for university and student loans and even trying to find a job - I really am growing up! I thought I would take this opportunity to create a post about (who I believe) to be one of the most influencial musicians of the twentieth century, as well as one of the greatest musicians who ever lived: Miles Davis. As nearly all of my posts are about classical music, I thought it would be appropriate to explore jazz - especially as it is one of the most popular genres of music today. I've been listening to Miles Davis lately, as it really is instantly calming and always puts a smile on my face (especially in the hot weather at the moment). Unfortunately, I don't know as much about jazz as I would like to. Despite playing the saxophone and piano, I wouldn't dare try it as I would be afraid that I wouldn't do it justice. Listening to it on the other hand is one of my musical therapeutic techniques.

Miles Davis
1926 - 1991

Not only was Davis an incredibly talented jazz trumpeter - he also worked as a bandleader and composer. At the time, jazz was being developed into something new and exciting. Just as Charlie Parker was the pioneer of bebop, Davis was the pioneer of the genre called 'cool jazz'. This was developed because of his relationship with composer and arranger Gil Evans, who Davis worked with regularly. Cool jazz was formed by a group of musicians who were fed up with the virtuosic and complex styles of bebop, and wanted to create a more relaxed and mellow type of jazz. The name of the genre came from the first album developed by the group, called: 'Birth of Cool'. 

Miles Davis with composer
and arranger: Gil Evans

Davis' playing style was something original in the jazz scene. Before, audiences were used to the loud and brash sounds of musicians such as Louis Armstrong, who is probably now, more famous for the way he sang. However, as a trumpeter, he is a good example of the complete contrast of styles. Armstrong played with a heavy vibrato, often remastering great jazz tunes and decorating them with elaborate improvisation. Davis, however played with a smooth, controlled tone that fit perfectly with the relaxed atmosphere of cool jazz. After Armstrong came Charlie Parker - the king of bebop, whose playing style was virtuosic, harmonically experimental and rhythmically complex - another contrast to Davis' style. For me, listening to Miles Davis is similar to listening to Frank Sinatra. 

One of my favourites of Davis' is 'Kind of Blue' from the album of the same name. The entire album was composed as a series of modal sketches that gave each of the players the scales and harmonies needed for the track, therefore allowing them to create something entirely improvised. The feel of the piece is achieved immediately by the cool tones of the piano (Bill Evans) and the gentle plucking of the double bass (Paul Chambers). The muted trumpet solo, followed by the saxophone solo almost feel as if they could go on forever - if only they did!

Charles Ives

Charles Ives was one of the pioneers of modern classical music, as well as one of the first major American composers of his time. Ives combined American popular music with church songs with an inventive and experimental approach to music. He was one of the first composers to start using experimental techniques such as polyrhythm, tone clusters and bitonality. This is why he was such a major influence on composers after him, and on composers today.

Charles Ives
1874 - 1954

I came across his name while studying film music, and found many film composers (Bernard Herrmann in particular) to be highly influenced by his work. Some of his most interesting works include his pieces written for typical American bands - some instances even having them playing two different pieces at the same time to achieve the bitonal effect that made him so famous. When looking at his earlier works, I came across his first Symphony, which rather than proving how he may have influenced other composers, actually shows how other composers had influenced him. The symphony was written between 1898 and 1902, and is composed in a late Romantic style with many influences from the great European composers before him such as Tchaikovsky and Schubert.

The melody - alternating mostly between wind and  strings - is a series of unexpected twists and turns. As well as this, the tonality of the piece is constantly shifting between major and minor, giving the piece a very uncertain feeling. This feeling of suspense is cleverly resolved in the second subject as the strings journey to the major, and are accompanied by the confident sounds of trumpets and horns. Personally, I can hear influences of European waltzes in the second subject as the harmonic progressions seem to mimic the dance-like nature of the songs written before him. 

As well as the first movement of his first symphony, I also came across one of his most famous pieces: 'The Unanswered Question', which is paired with another of his works: 'Central Park in the Dark'. Similarly to a lot of his works, the two were practically ignored until after his death (despite being composed in 1940) and are now appreciated today as two major works of modern classical music. The original title of the pieces was in fact: 'The Unanswered Perennial Question'. Ives himself described the work as a 'cosmic landscape' in which the strings represent silence, the trumpet then asks the 'question of existence' whilst the woodwind seeks the 'invisible answer'. The end of the piece returns to only the strings, indicating that the wind have given up, and - left with 'silence' - the question goes forever unanswered.

Korngold - Piano Quintet Op 115

Erich Wolfgang Korngold
1897 - 1957

Erich Korngold was a post-romantic film and music composer. Like many unappreciated geniuses, in his time Korngold's compositional style was not particularly well-recieved. However, today he is known by many musicians as 'the last prodigy' - after Mozart of course! (Korngold's father even gave him the middle name Wolfgang to pay tribute to the man himself). Along with Max Steiner, Korngold is now considered to be one of the pioneers of film music, as his time was between the first silent movies, and the introduction of the 'talkies'.

Before entering the film business, Korngold worked in the world of opera and operetta, which meant that when it came to film music, he had a particularly good skill for creating dramatic musical atmospheres, as well as his knack for scoring historical subjects and his sensitivity to dialogue. His film music fit into the post-romantic style of the Hollywood 'golden age' and was influenced heavily by Wagner, who structured his works thematically with leitmotifs. This soon became the typical style of all film music, and even now there are films that are instantly recognisable by their scores - for example, Tara's theme in Steiner's score for 'Gone With the Wind' (1939) that is heard in the film's overture. However, Korngold went further than the other composers around him, and made his music original with his grand scores for huge orchestras, and his incredible attention to detail. Despite the fact his most famous work is the film score for 'The Adventures of Robin Hood' (1938), my favourite of his works is the Piano Quintet below.

The piece carries a recurring theme of rising sequences that alternate between the violins and the piano, while being accompanied by the deep and warm tones of the lower strings. The piece is a wonderful example of the romantic style that makes Korngold the iconic figure he is today. A link of the video is posted below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvQOHbQUt64

Ivor Gurney - 'Sleep'

This year I am preparing to take my singing diploma. I've been singing since I was about 11, and every Royal College of Music syllabus seems to have had the same repertoire on it for about twenty years, and therefore is quite dated. Of course you can opt for the Musical Drama exam in which you can sing songs from musicals, but I chose classical. After taking my grade 8, I decided I wanted a break from exams so that I could sing something that I really enjoyed - rather than just to pass an exam and to get a certificate! The first thing I looked at was a book of songs by English composer and poet, Ivor Gurney. The collection of songs was immediately appealing to me, as I'd never come across his music before, and found the harmonies in particular to be truly beautiful.

Ivor Gurney
1890 - 1937

Gurney showed early musical ability as a chorister for Gloucester Cathedral, and met composer Herbert Howells - soon to become a life-long friend. Gurney began composing at the age of only 14, and received a scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music. There, he studied with Charles Stanford, also a teacher of other well-known composers such as Ralph Vaughan Williams, John Ireland and Frank Bridge. Unfortunately, Gurney suffered a lot throughout his lifetime. As a teenager, he suffered from bipolar disorder, and found it hard to concentrate on his musical studies. However, his career was interrupted by the outbreak of WWI when he enlisted as a soldier. After being victim to several gas attacks he suffered from shell shock. His mental health was never the same again, as he spent the last fifteen years of his life in mental institutions and hospitals.

Throughout his life, Gurney wrote hundreds of poems and songs, and even some instrumental music. His most well-known compositions are his Five Elizabethan Songs, (or as he called them, 'The Elizas'). Many critics notice the influences of Schubert and Schumann in his work, however note that his music didn't fit in with the popular genre of folk music at the time, and rather had a powerful and intense use of harmony and melody. This is true of one of his songs from The Five Elizabethan Songs: 'Sleep'. The text talks about Gurney's longing to live inside his dreams, as for him, reality was sometimes too much to bare, this is seen particularly in the phrase, 'lock me in delight a while'. The text reads:

Come, sleep, and with thy sweet decieving lock me in delight a while;

Let some pleasing dream beguile all my fancies; that from thence 

I may feel an influence all my powers of care bereaving!

Though but a shadow, but a sliding, let me know some little joy!

We that suffer long annoy are contented with a thought through an idle fancy wrought:

O let my joys have some abiding, o let my joys have some abiding.

The piece starts with the back and forth, longing motions of quavers on the piano, almost as if mimicking the motions of the singers eyes fluttering in and out of sleep. The minor key creates beautiful moments of light and joy when Gurney moves to the major. The simplicity of the piano accompaniment is constant throughout, and never takes away from the text or the singer, only enhancing it with Gurney's typical use of imaginative and yearning harmonies. The piece climaxes on the words, 'O let my joys have some abiding', even repeating the phrase once more before the end of the piece to emphasise the desperation of the singer. The very end of the piece really is the icing on top of the cake, as the piano pauses on a major dominant pedal, resolving onto a major chord - as if to imply that the singer has happily fallen asleep.

Ivor Gurney's 'Sleep' from The Five Elizabethan Songs, performed by Ian Bostridge

Is this a man's world?

Having not posted for a while because of A-level revision and exams, I wanted to post about something that is close to my heart. From my other posts, you'll know that I am a keen composer, and want to pursue this as a career. However, it suddenly occurred to me that there is a significant male domination of the occupation, and I wanted to find out why. At first I asked my parents, friends and teachers if they knew of any female composers, and the only name I was given was Judith Weir, a British composer born in 1954. The only piece of hers that I know is 'Illuminare Jerusalem', something which is not well-known, and not always well-received.

Of course there is the obvious reason for the lack of female composers; in the past women were discouraged and even prohibited from having careers, particularly in the arts - which were considered lowly professions and unsuitable for ladies. Examples of this include Clara Schumann and Gustav Mahler's wife: Alma Mahler, who was made to give up composition by her husband when they were married. However, if the discouragement of women participating in the arts is the reason as to why there are so few known female composers, then why does history carry a long list of successful and famous female artists and actresses such as Frida Kahlo, Georgia O'Keeffe, Vivien Leigh and Elizabeth Taylor?

(From left to right: Vivien Leigh, Elizabeth Taylor and Frida Kahlo)

On Wikipedia, there are lists of composers split up by categories such as experimental, classical, jazz etc. One list is titled: contemporary female composers, on which there are eighteen names. There is no list for contemporary male composers, as there are too many to mention. I still find that my question has not been answered, and I have absolutely no knowledge of any female composers from the past or present.

So I end my post with the question: Is this good news for me as it shows there to be a gap in the market for something I am trying to do, or is something telling me that it is a lost cause? Any information about female composers would be welcome.