THE SOUL AND THE SYSTEM: WHY WRITE?

A long thought provoking post from Kris Tiner on writing about art. I quoted one paragraph. Click the link and read it all.

THE SOUL AND THE SYSTEM: WHY WRITE?:

“I DON’T DOUBT THE ROLE OF THE CRITIC, I don’t challenge the importance of interpretation. Interpretation is the right of any critic or writer, any audience member to compare the experience of art against their own personal experience. This is what is granted by the artist in the sharing of art. I don’t question that. But I do question the submissiveness of an artist in this relationship when that artist doesn’t draw a line between interpretation of their work and representation of their work. An artist who does not place importance on the representation of their work becomes simply a practitioner, a tradesman. It should be the responsibility of the creative artist to use every technique, every technology, every means at their fingertips to communicate the purpose of their art, including the medium of the art itself.”

Classic and rock

Last night was one of those special nights when I get to take part in two completely inspiring and seemingly opposite musical experiences.

The first performance was Haydn’s oratorio, The Creation, with the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra. I must admit that I have previously dismissed much of the classical period repertoire as “good, but not all that interesting to me.” I guess it was due to combinations of being a trombone player that is into jazz and new music, and just being foolish. Anyway, the bass trombone part to The Creation is pretty involved, so I spent a good bit of time with the piece before we got into rehearsals this week. That, combined with the spirit and joy that Carlos brings to this piece have really made it come alive for me.

After the LPO concert, I headed to dba to play with one of my longest tenured musical friends, Clint Maedgen. Clint and I went to high school together, and have started playing together again recently and it has been a blast. Clint does a wide variety of things, but the show last night consisted of one set of Clint’s tunes, and a set of Beatles tunes. It was a real gas.

It’s funny how two seemingly different musical worlds can get you to the same beautiful place.

Taylor Ho Bynum on brass playing via Lester Bowie

This is a great thought on the possibilities of brass playing. I agree whole-heartedly.

SpiderMonkey Stories » Blog Archive » Lester:

“Patterns are for saxophones…brass should be about blowing down the walls of Jericho, or sounding like a hippopotamus giving birth, or the aural equivalent of a Groucho Marx joke, or in Lester’s case, all of the above. He opened up a whole new world for me as player, a world of squeezes and shapes rather than scales and structures.”

Read the whole post and dig the sounds.