Archive for April, 2008
April 18, 2008 – 10:48 pm
The Canon Symposium begins. Great discussions about canon formation and preservation as well as canon “busting”. Ethnomusicologists are in the vanguard here - they cut through the nonsense whereby academics and other elites create canons purely to preserve their own narrowly focussed power bases. It has nothing to do with musical quality or the widening […]
April 17, 2008 – 10:46 pm
My 61st birthday begins with an earthquake - a “birthquake” I suppose! It shakes me out of bed at 6 in the morning and I prepare to run out into the street in my pyjamas. But then it fades and Kaz comes out of his room, cool as anything and tells me to sleep on. […]
April 16, 2008 – 10:46 pm
Kaz was booked to play a gig with a band called “The Mannheim Steamroller”. The music is awful - chunks of fast food prepared with too much salt and little substance. It sounds like Richard Clayderman dressed up in New Age rock clothes.The accompanying video is tacky and saccharine. It is billed as “Open Aire […]
April 15, 2008 – 10:39 pm
Visiting my friend of 40 years, Kazimir Machala (”Kaz”) who is now Professor of horn at the University of Illionois. I run an improvisation workshop with brass and wind players. The American students are very courteous and polite but also very forthright - open. They respond very well to the Lifemusic methods and some […]