A recent item on BBC Breakfast looked at how our tastes in music reflect our personality. The guest, who was promoting his book, had asked the four presenters (two on the sofa, the weather and the business) to make a list of their top 10 favourite tracks. He then commented on their personalities, based on the songs chosen, without knowing who had given which list. The presenters didn't seem unhappy about it.
Now, it may just be me, but I would have thought that one's taste in music must obviously reflect one's personality to some extent, so the initial premise was not of much interest to me. The harder thing to contemplate was my top 10 favourite tracks. So much depends on my mood! However, I've given it some thought, and I present, in no particular order and sometimes with illuminating comment, my current top 10 (ask me again when it's cold and pouring with rain and the list will probably be different)....
1. Eurythmics - Right By Your Side. Upbeat song, almost impossible not to sing along with it, and the steel drum instrumentation just brings in a warm Caribbean feeling as well.
2. Pharrell Williams - Happy. Daft lyrics, but almost contagious upbeat rhythm; waiting at traffic lights, I'm pretty certain adjacent drivers have wondered what on earth I'm doing as I clap and click along with it in addition to the singing. Sedentary dancing almost (and you all know I don't dance).
3. Peter Gabriel - Signal to Noise. The first part, with the lyrics, is fairly unremarkable, but once the instrumental starts, with the strings gradually getting higher, the volume needs to be turned up full so that the sound can completely envelop you. Just fabulous!
4. Arvo Part - Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten. This is grief in an audible form, physically heart-wrenching. The funereal bell, the slow cascading strings, this is another one for full volume, though possibly not appropriate party music....
5. Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody. The first Queen song I got to know was 'Killer Queen', which I also love, but this one has great lyrics *and* some musical complexity.
6. Genesis - Mad Man Moon. It was around when I discovered this song that I realised that for me, good lyrics were important as well as good music.
7. Durufle - Agnus Dei. This was first time I had come across a really good alto solo line in a requiem, so much so that I've already told people I want it playing at my funeral. Planning ahead, folks!
8. Stephen Schwarz - For Good. This duet from Wicked is not only a beautiful song, but has achieved a personal resonance for me, listening to it on the way back from the funeral of an old friend and hearing the lyric "you'll be with me, like a handprint on my heart." I've got past the tears now, but I think of him every time I hear the song still, with one of those good pains.
9. Fats Waller (and others) - Ain't Misbehavin'. Another song with personal resonance, I surprise- serenaded Rod at our renewal of vows with this song, complete with harp accompaniment (kudos to the harpist, all those accidentals were a pain for her!). He's away again at the moment, so check out those lyrics, dear: No one to talk with, all by myself, No one to walk with, I'm happy on the shelf, Ain't misbehavin', savin' my love for you. (I'm not including the cats in this.)
10. David Bowie - Life on Mars. Nearly anything by David Bowie would make the list, and some days I could easily compile a list entirely of David Bowie, but today, I'm picking this one.
So that's the current list. What does that say about my personality, I wonder. Probably that I should be on medication, but maybe tomorrow's list would be ok....
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Saturday, 7 May 2016
Monday, 29 October 2012
What makes a performance?
This week has had rather a lot of music in it, one way or another.
Partly, this has been the composition of it, inasmuch as we had a meeting with the director and producer of the next Launton Village Players pantomime (oh yes we did!) in which the script as written by the OH with occasional help from yours truly was read and the songs listened to. LVP pride themselves on having all original music for our pantomimes and we are extraordinarily lucky to have Steve Webber there to write that original music, quite apart from enough talented musicians in the group to then play the music in the shows (apologies to anyone offended by the split infinitive). Listening to the first drafts, as it were, of the songs is interesting, because a pantomime song has to be more than just musical, it has to match the mood, the lyrics and the ability of the singers, so we're trying to tick all those different boxes as we listen.
But music also featured when we went to 229 The Venue in London on Sunday evening, in support of our friend Judy Dyble, original lead-singer of Fairport Convention, who was rather anxious about her first solo live performance in she-didn't-say how long. It was an evening promoted by a record label that featured three other bands, all presumably with the same label. I can't really comment on the first band, as we arrived while they were performing their last number, but it sounded tuneful enough just before it ended. And then the next band set up. I say 'band' because they were billed as such, but it was two guys with guitars and an awful lot of electronic gizmos, and during their set, one of them appeared to spend more time fiddling with the knobs on one of his gizmos than he did pressing the strings of his guitar. With so much gadgetry to monitor, perhaps it was not surprising that they made no eye contact with the audience, but it felt very strange. According to the notes put out by the record label, they were creating a soundscape, but to me it would have made better film music with the players in a studio somewhere. The two performances after them did a much better job of engaging with the audience, whatever one's opinion of the music might have been. Heck, the band I was in at university did a better job of engaging with the audience and we didn't have sound and lighting technicians to keep us on the straight and narrow!
All of which made me wonder about the nature of performance, not least because I will reading at the end of November at a poetry evening in Oxford (part of the the Poet's House group on 25th November, 5pm, includes cake!). Does the quality of what is being performed matter as much as the quality of the performance itself? I have a suspicion that there is some real rubbish out there being received with great acclaim largely because of its superb delivery. And when we go along to these performances, be they music, poetry or performance, to what extent are we influenced by the skill of the performers rather than the sublimity of their material?
Oh, and Judy Dyble was sublime in both material and performance skills. :-)
Partly, this has been the composition of it, inasmuch as we had a meeting with the director and producer of the next Launton Village Players pantomime (oh yes we did!) in which the script as written by the OH with occasional help from yours truly was read and the songs listened to. LVP pride themselves on having all original music for our pantomimes and we are extraordinarily lucky to have Steve Webber there to write that original music, quite apart from enough talented musicians in the group to then play the music in the shows (apologies to anyone offended by the split infinitive). Listening to the first drafts, as it were, of the songs is interesting, because a pantomime song has to be more than just musical, it has to match the mood, the lyrics and the ability of the singers, so we're trying to tick all those different boxes as we listen.
But music also featured when we went to 229 The Venue in London on Sunday evening, in support of our friend Judy Dyble, original lead-singer of Fairport Convention, who was rather anxious about her first solo live performance in she-didn't-say how long. It was an evening promoted by a record label that featured three other bands, all presumably with the same label. I can't really comment on the first band, as we arrived while they were performing their last number, but it sounded tuneful enough just before it ended. And then the next band set up. I say 'band' because they were billed as such, but it was two guys with guitars and an awful lot of electronic gizmos, and during their set, one of them appeared to spend more time fiddling with the knobs on one of his gizmos than he did pressing the strings of his guitar. With so much gadgetry to monitor, perhaps it was not surprising that they made no eye contact with the audience, but it felt very strange. According to the notes put out by the record label, they were creating a soundscape, but to me it would have made better film music with the players in a studio somewhere. The two performances after them did a much better job of engaging with the audience, whatever one's opinion of the music might have been. Heck, the band I was in at university did a better job of engaging with the audience and we didn't have sound and lighting technicians to keep us on the straight and narrow!
All of which made me wonder about the nature of performance, not least because I will reading at the end of November at a poetry evening in Oxford (part of the the Poet's House group on 25th November, 5pm, includes cake!). Does the quality of what is being performed matter as much as the quality of the performance itself? I have a suspicion that there is some real rubbish out there being received with great acclaim largely because of its superb delivery. And when we go along to these performances, be they music, poetry or performance, to what extent are we influenced by the skill of the performers rather than the sublimity of their material?
Oh, and Judy Dyble was sublime in both material and performance skills. :-)
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