Those Who Dig's contribution to the Paper Crane Collective this week come's from Digster Dave. He lays down the law for all you squares who don't like jazz. It's the All Time Top 5: Jazz Records For People Who Don't Like Jazz. Check it out, and feed your brain.
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While scrolling through my itunes library it occurred to me that I have 25 different recordings of the eternal jazz standard Autumn Leaves. This is a most likely the most recorded song in my collection, but I'd have to take a real inventory to say this conclusively.
What is most interesting to me about having so many takes on the same song is cataloging the myriad of ways artists fracture, obscure, orchestrate, interpret, and perform the tune.
Is there a point in which the song is no longer its original self? Is performance precedent the be all end all to interpretation, or is there merit in belligerent originality? If I played you 25 different recordings of the same song without telling you it was the same song, how many repetitions would it take before you noticed?
Today I would like to examine three recordings of Autumn Leaves from the most straight forward to the most far out.
Bill Evans: Autumn Leaves
Oscar Peterson: Autumn Leaves
Gonzalo Rubalcaba: Autumn Leaves
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Weekly Roundup is back with a few tunes and a video for you to enjoy.
Today we are happy to share the playlist we made from your suggestions for Songs of Spring. Check it out!
Hezekiah Jones – Borrowed Heart (Shaking Through Session)
Hezekiah Jones recently recorded a Shaking Through session with the good people at Weathervane Music and WXPN in Philadelphia. It also features guest curation from fellow PCC member Bruce Warren (WXPN and Some Velvet Blog). The feature spotlights the songwriting and recording process of independent musicmaking.
"Volume 2 Episode 4 features Hezekiah Jones, a collection of Philadelphia-area artists orbiting around the songwriting talents of one Raphael Cutrufello. Raph and company recorded "Borrowed Heart" over the course of a two-day recording session-a timeless and hauntingly beautiful song that syncs exactly with a scene from the 1935 classic, Bride of Frankenstein."
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This is a video of world renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma performing "The Swan" by Camille Saint-Saëns while LA dancer Charles Lil' Buck Riley interprets sound into movement. His liquid movements are a perfect response to Yo-Yo Ma's music and prove to be an immensely engaging few moments between an unlikely duo.
The interaction of these two improbable artists was lucky enough to be caught on camera by Spike Jonze and furthermore, Yo-Yo Ma has an unexpected sense of humor at the end of the clip.
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Fort Frances has released a video for their slow-burning jam "Cities In Dust". It's a great song and the video features some mirror trickery and seizure-inducing montage quick cuts. Good stuff. Their album The Atlas is still available for free at their website.
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I love music videos. I used to watch them frequently and discovered a lot of great music doing so. I have decided that every now and then I will post about an interesting video to recall those times. Tonight's entry comes from the Foo Fighters.
Tonight I'm posting the first installment in a series of three devoted to the music-based films of Christopher Guest: This Is Spinal Tap (1980s heavy metal), Waiting for Guffman (stage musical), and A Mighty Wind (1950s/1960s folk).They are some of my favorite movies and with music so funny and so well done, I thought they'd be great for further discussion as part of the Scenes & Songs feature. We'll kick things off with A Mighty Wind.
Here's a track I've been digging lately that I'd like to share with you. It's called "America's Son" by the band Air Review.