New CDs for October 2018
Chamber Music & Concertos
American Wild Ensemble – Music In The American Wild
Lisa Bielawa – In Medias Res
Lisa Bielawa – The Lay of the Love
Glenn Kotche – Adventureland
David Lang – Peirced
David Lang – Writing On Water
Brad Mehldau – After Bach
Salvadore Spina – Robert Lombardo + M. William Karlins – Piano Works, 1961-1993
Jazz
Brad Mehldau Trio – Seymour Reads The Constitution!
Charles Lloyd & the Marvels + Lucinda Williams – Vanished Gardens
Opera, Art Songs, Vocal Music
Kati Agocs – The Debrecen Passion
Lisa Bielawa – Chance Encounter
Gavin Bryars – The Fifth Century
Hildegurls – Electric Ordo Virtutum
David Lang – The National Anthems
Musicals
Joe Iconis – Be More Chill
Kevin Murphy – Heathers The Musical
Benj Pasek – Dear Evan Hansen
Richard Rodgers & Oscar Hammerstein – Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Carousel
Popular Music
Ben Folds Five – Whatever and Ever Amen
Ben Folds Five – The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner
Hills and Home – High Fidelity
Schlong – Punk Side Story
Shovels & Rope – Busted Jukebox Volume 1
Shovels & Rope – Busted Jukebox Volume 2
Shovels & Rope – Little Seeds
Arachnophonia: Steely Dan “Citizen”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Jane (class of 2022) and features Citizen a CD box set by the 1970s rock band Steely Dan. Thanks, Jane!
It’s the summer of 2006, and you’re sitting in the back of a 15 year-old Subaru with the windows down and your whole family is harmonizing to the chorus of “Rose Darling” by Steely Dan. Or, at least, that’s what I was doing. My parents listened to that whole cornucopia of 70’s classic rock, so I grew up with artists like Crosby Stills & Nash, Joni Mitchell, and Paul Simon. I was always particularly drawn to Steely Dan, but I wouldn’t be able to explain why until I revisited their music in 2016.
Simply put, I’m a sucker for interesting harmonies, and no one does it better than Steely Dan. All of their songs highlight different instruments or musical motifs. For example, if you want a strong bass line, songs like “Rikki Don’t Lose that Number” and “Babylon Sisters” might suit your fancy. If you’re looking for a more melodic, wistful sound, check out “Everyone’s Gone to the Movies” (it has some great, unexpected xylophone chords) or “Doctor Wu”.
My favorite though, which I had never heard until after I moved to Richmond, is “Fire in the Hole”. It starts with a rhythmic and intense piano riff that makes way for sliding electric guitar and, of course, a chorus you’ll never get out of your head, sung by none other than Donald Fagen.
People my age don’t really know Steely Dan, but I swear, more should! If you want to give them a listen, check out the “Citizen” CD set at the Music Library with over 60 of their best songs. You won’t regret it.
Arachnophonia: Vampire Weekend “Modern Vampires of the City”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Griffin (class of 2019) and features Vampire Weekend’s 2013 album Modern Vampires of the City. Thanks, Griffin!
Vampire Weekend’s most recent, ableit already five years old, album entitled Modern Vampires of the City takes a leap away from the band’s quirky, Africa-inspired rhythmic playfulness. The album feels more emotionally powerful than the band’s previous work, but it hasn’t completely abandoned the playfulness that may have been the key draw to past listeners. Songs like “Step” and “Don’t Lie” both fit into more mainstream-sounding emotional pop tunes, while the band rekindles old sounds with new twists in “Diane Young”, “Worship You”, and “Unbelievers.”
2013 promotional photo of the band members
L-R Ezra Koenig, Rostam Batmanglij, Chris Baio, and Chris Tomson
Deeper cuts into the album get into some of the songs which bring out the band’s famous unique sounds even more. Each song on this 12-track album is worth a listen, as each one provides a brand new experience for the listener. I come back to it time and time again because each time I listen to it, I end up interpreting stanzas or choruses or the entire song in a different way. Whether you want rhythmic, wild, and carefree or if you are looking for something to listen to as a break from studying, this may be your ticket.
Arachnophonia : Brahms “Ein deutsches Requiem”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Emma R. (class of 2021) and features Johannes Brahms’ “Ein deutsches Requiem” which was composed between 1857 and 1868. Thanks, Emma!
For some strange reason, ever since I was a child I was drawn to classical music. It wasn’t forced on me by my parents through piano lessons or anything similar – in fact, my dad used to, and occasionally still does bemoan my lack of interest in his “oldies” (considering mine are centuries older, I question the use of this term) and acoustic singer-songwriter favorites. A memorable (and embarrassing) moment when I was entering sixth grade illustrates this complete disconnect from reality and a lack of common sense – I asked the 20-something DJ at the 6th grade ice-cream social/dance party to “please play some Mozart so I could hear myself think.” Yes, this actually happened, and no, it did not go over very well (clearly). I’ve grown somewhat over the years; my Spotify account tells me that in 2017, Sia’s “Chandelier” edged out the “Dies Irae” from Mozart’s Requiem, coming in at 46 and 47 most commonly played, respectively, but there’s still something about a good “Kyrie” or a sumptuous aria or an intriguing overture that synthesizers just can’t match.
In recent months, I’ve been listening to the Brahms Requiem more than any other album or song (I fully expect to find each movement on Spotify’s analysis of my 2018 habits). I walk across campus humming the key motives and it plays on my speakers as I do my hair or study for an exam. I’m sad to say I hadn’t discovered this piece before this year. The reason for this sudden infatuation? This piece will be the first I will perform as a member of the Richmond Symphony Chorus, with performances in the middle of November. From the night of the first rehearsal – a complete read through of the piece – cover to cover – in August, I was hooked.
Unlike the typical Latin text of the classical requiem, Brahms wrote entirely in German, and as such was free to abandon the standard movements and sections dictated by the traditional text. While I might bemoan the loss of a Brahmsian rendition of the “Dies Irae,” this gave him the ability to craft a framework of his own. My personal favorite moment of the Brahms is the second, though after a particularly intense rehearsal on the sixth I was about ready to shift my allegiances. I’m still loyal to the second though, for the reason of a specific 20 second section occurring at 9:34 – 9:54 of the second track of this recording. This moment, for me, captures the glorious beauty of wonderful music that truly stands the test of time, and let’s be honest, that soprano part is just so fun to sing!
Johannes Brahms c. 1866
Arachnophonia: U2 “All That You Can’t Leave Behind”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Cole (class of 2021) and features U2’s album All That You Can’t Leave Behind. Thanks, Cole!
All That You Can’t Leave Behind
U2’s 10th studio album All That You Can’t Leave Behind was released on October 30th, 2000. It is their fourth-highest selling album, with over 12 million copies sold.
“Let’s be frank.” I feel like any discussion regarding U2 in 2018 has to, for whatever reason, be prefaced by those three words. The fabled Irish rock band present a somewhat curious case in the canon of The Great Rock And Roll acts; few bands achieved such a breadth of critical and commercial success without famously disbanding (see: The Beatles, The Smiths, and, to a lesser extent, Pink Floyd.) or cycling through members to the point of near-unrecognition (The Rolling Stones). No, U2 are still here, still plucking away through a slew of pedal effects. From Boy (1980) to Songs of Experience (2017), co-founders Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton, and Larry Mullen Jr. have experienced everything that a modern musical career could promise. Eight number one albums in the United States. 22 Grammy awards (more than any other group). A PR misstep that has forever associated their name with “how do I get this off of my iPhone?” Induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Multiple collaborations with Kendrick Lamar that can at best be described as “uncomfortable.” The Dublin boys have done it all.
So, let’s be frank: the U2 of today is not the U2 of How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, just as that U2 isn’t the U2 of Achtung Baby, just as that U2… etc., etc., ad nauseam. Nor should they be. A discography spanning such a great length ought to be varied, especially if the band in question is as experimental and flippant with their sound as U2. For this reason, I chose to write about their tenth studio album.
All That You Can’t Leave Behind constitutes the best of U2’s ever-changing sound. After a mixed reception to their industrial and electronic dance-inspired efforts of the ‘90s (Zooropa and Pop), the group set out to record a ‘return to form.’ Melding the electronic drums of the group’s Pop-era sound with the Edge’s signature effect-driven guitar playing, more reminiscent of The Joshua Tree than ever, the lead single “Beautiful Day” proved an instant success, charting at #1 in the U.K, the Netherlands, and Australia, and #21 in the U.S. In keeping with their tradition of social conscience, the fourth and final single, “Walk On” was inspired by and dedicated to Burmese democratic activist Aung San Suu Kyi, who was at the time placed under house arrest. “Walk On” is widely regarded as U2’s greatest ode to hope, due to both the instrumentation, centered on one of the Edge’s most gratifying riffs, and the heartening lyrics:
Walk on, walk on
What you got they can’t steal it
No they can’t even feel it
Walk on, walk on…
Stay safe tonight
“Walk On” was attributed even greater significance after the September 11th attacks, as it was performed on the September 21st television benefit concert America: A Tribute to Heroes. Subsequently, the single was interpreted as a message of hope to a nation grappling with the world changing before them. The song won the Grammy for Record of the Year in 2002, contributing to the total seven Grammys awarded to the album. Interestingly, “Beautiful Day” had previously won Record of the Year in 2001, making All That You Can’t Leave Behind the only album to receive two Record of the Year awards consecutively.
All That You Can’t Leave Behind is the album that forced U2 into the very core of my musical tastes. I fully accept that The Joshua Tree is the band’s best output (and indeed, one of the greatest rock records ever), but there’s an elusive quality to this one that demands it be at the forefront in my mind. Maybe it’s just because it happened to be one of the three U2 albums forever interred in the CD player of my dad’s Oldsmobile. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the 50 minute nostalgia injection it provides. Or maybe it’s because not a great many albums are so blatantly and unabashedly a product of the moment they were created in. From the millennium-era instrumentation and lyrical inspiration, to the life the songs took post-release, All That You Can’t Leave Behind is the musical embodiment of how Bono & co. saw the world in 2000. Even for the majority of people who didn’t grow up hearing snippets of this album every time that got in their family’s car, I think we can all appreciate the power of an album that can transport us, if only for a short while, to its moment.
New CDs added – September 2018
New CDs for September 2018
Concertos and Chamber Music
Jane Antonia Cornish – Constellations
Jane Antonia Cornish – Continuum
Jazz
John Coltrane – Both Directions At Once : The Lost Album
Mary Halvorson – The Maid with the Flaxen Hair
Takaaki – New Kid In Town
Musicals
David Hein – Come From Away
Jeanine Tesori – Caroline, Or Change
Various Artists – Spongebob Squarepants, The New Musical
David Yazbeck – The Band’s Visit: Original Broadway Cast Recording
New CDs added – Summer 2018
New CDs for Summer 2018
Concertos & Chamber Music
Lou Harrison – Works for Percussion, Violin, and Piano
Steve Reich + SO Percussion – Drumming Live
Various Artists – Kaleidoscopic
Piano Music
William Appling – Scott Joplin: The complete rags, waltzes and marches
Beth Levin – Inward Voice
Jazz
Hector Barez – El Laberinto del Coco
Masayoshi Fujita – Book of Life
Danny Green Trio plus Strings – One Day It Will
Maria Schneider Orchestra – The Thompson Fields
Woody Shaw – Tokyo ’81
Cantatas & Choral Music
Eighth Blackbird – Olagon : A Cantata in doublespeak
Tigran Mansurian – Requiem
Musicals
Sara Bareilles – Waitress: Original Broadway Cast Recording
Stephen Flaherty – Once On This Island: The Musical: New Broadway Cast Recording
Electronic Music
Jaan Raats – Marginalia
Various Artists – Electronic Chamber Music
Popular Music
Art of Time Ensemble with Steven Page – A Singer Must Die
Kendrick Lamar – Damn
Arachnophonia: Green Day “American Idiot”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Duncan (class of 2018) and features American rock band Green Day’s 2004 album American Idiot. Thanks, Duncan!
In discussions of individuals’ favorite music, it is often noted how certain songs, albums, and artists have a significant amount of “staying power” with those individuals. These works have managed, at numerous stages of people’s lives, to maintain their resonance. For me, the album that has had this degree of prolonged impact is Green Day’s 2004 album, American Idiot.
I was raised on “oldies” music. Throughout my childhood, starting around the age of three or four, I would go to bed each night with the music of The Beatles, The Monkees, or Simon and Garfunkel (among others) quietly playing on the boom box which rested on my bedside table. I distinctly remember my parents burying their heads in their hands in embarrassment as I sang along to The Monkees’ Greatest Hits on a crowded flight. All of this is to say that, for as long as I can remember, I had been primed for an appreciation for rock & roll.
Then, when I was in fourth grade, I came across the song “Holiday” on YouTube, and I was immediately enamored. I am the son of a (progressive, it should be noted) North Carolina pastor, and had not yet been exposed to the bluntness, ruggedness, and vulgarity of punk music. While I certainly did not understand the political significance of the song at the time (the song is a criticism of the invasion of Iraq), I enjoyed the edginess of the track; it seemed charged with angst and sarcasm. One YouTube spiral later, I was begging my parents for the album for months. Eventually, my parents were worn down by my persistence, and bought me the album.
While I initially appreciated the album for its catchiness, it has established new levels of significance for me in the decade since I first listened. The album is what the band describes as a “punk rock opera,” following a character named the Jesus of Suburbia as he faces the trials of an unhealthy home life, disenfranchisement, drug abuse, and lost love. The album is particularly effective in that it personifies the resentment of American society at the time of its conception. If anything, the issues addressed in the album have gained greater significance as our political landscape has grown increasingly polarized.
While a large part of my appreciation of the album is rooted in in nostalgia, I think the album holds up both thematically and musically. I still find myself returning to it and experiencing new levels of appreciation. The album has been incredibly significant for me, and I hope others experience it similarly.
Arachnophonia : Bon Iver “Bon Iver”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Claire (class of 2020) and features indie folk band Bon Iver’s second album. Thanks, Claire!
Last semester, I had the chance to attend a Bon Iver concert, after being an avid fan of the band for more than six years. The concert exceeded my expectations. Since the concert, I have frequently listened to Bon Iver’s second studio album, cleverly titled Bon Iver. This album is a departure from the band’s first album, which was self-recorded in an isolated cabin in the woods of Wisconsin. Bon Iver won the Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album in 2012, and the song “Holocene” was nominated for both Song of the Year and Record of the Year, breaking into the alternative music scene in a bold and recognizable way. My favorite song on this album is, by far, “Holocene.” The name of the song is shared with geological epoch which translates to “The Age of Man.” The album also features titles of tracks with names of places, such as Hinnom, TX and Lisbon, OH, which seem to have little to do with the songs themselves. The experience of listening to this album from start to finish is difficult to describe in words, yet it brings about an intense emotional response, allowing listeners to question their own human condition in this “Holocene” we are currently living in.
Arachnophonia : The Smiths “The Queen Is Dead”
Editor’s note: Arachnophonia is a regular feature on our blog where members of the UR community can share their thoughts about items in the Parsons Music Library‘s collection. All links included in these posts will take you to either the library catalog record for the item in question or to additional relevant information from around the web.
Today’s installment of Arachnophonia is by Music Library student worker, Aly (class of 2018) and features a classic 1986 album by the British group The Smiths. Thanks, Aly!
One of The Smiths’ most well-known albums, The Queen is Dead, is the quintessential album for anyone looking to get into this quirky indie rock band. The album, released in 1986 and re-released as a collector’s edition in 2017, has been unanimously praised, and even considered the “greatest album of all time” by major British music publication NME. The lyrics, sung by the famous now-solo Morrissey, are filled with clever imagery and sharp social commentary. Track 9, “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out,” was featured in the classic rom-com 500 Days of Summer and remains one of the most famous Smiths songs. This album is full of songs that take a few listens to really absorb all of the witty lyric details that often hint at social unrest, emotional struggles, and even anarchy. For someone looking to indulge in some of the best vintage fight-the-power music with hints of satire, this album is definitely worth the listen.
