Everything Old Is New Again

When I was a kid (we're talking five years old here), my sister and I used to make our own "soundtracks" by holding a tape recorder up to our television set while we watched a movie. Using this method, we created "albums" for The Sound of Music, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, Heidi's Song, and all of our other childhood favorites.

We didn't just record the songs; we actually recorded every bit of underscoring throughout the film. Sometimes, we recorded our voices as well, arguing over who got to turn the tape recorder off.

(When I was older and found out that record companies actually produced professional-grade movie soundtracks, which included not only songs but also underscoring, I was more than a bit miffed that someone had already thought of this concept which, previously, I believed I had invented.)

Anyway. Two decades later, after CDs and mp3s and Napster and iTunes and the fact that I can have any song in the world I want for just 99 cents, I'm doing the exact same thing.

I'm making myself an album by going to YouTube, finding fanvideos of songs I'd like copies of, and holding a microphone up to my laptop speakers.

The audio quality is fairly poor, but then again... so am I.

And necessity is the mother of invention.

(I could write another post, at another time, about how when I was a kid we had rabbit ears taped to the top of our television and my sister and I watched hour after hour of fuzzy PBS; and now, after flat-screen and high-def and TiVO and everything else, I've still got rabbit ears taped to the top of my television and actually watch most of the things I'm interested in seeing on tiny, fuzzy YouTube screens. The technology keeps getting better, but somehow I never catch up with it. Meh.)

My New Year's Dream

I'm not making a New Year's resolution this year.

There are too many things that have to happen on their own merits (mostly dealing with graduation and post-graduation) for me to have any extra time for additional projects.

I already exercise (nearly) every day, and my food intake seems reasonable. I've also already planned my budget for the next six months, thus negating the need to make a resolution to "save more money."

(Before you all go "ooh, isn't she Little Blue Perfect," consider that I spent New Year's Eve not being kissed. Correlation does not equal causation, of course, but... am not perfect.)

But I do have a New Year's dream.

I'd like to sing somewhere. Jazz standards and Cole Porter. Decent accompanist, pretty dress.

I'd do it for free, and I'm not expecting to be "discovered" by the experience. It's just something I've wanted to do for a long time.

Unfortunately, there aren't any open mic nights at any of the bars in my current location (nor are the bars well-equipped to handle Cole Porter). There are pretty good odds that I will find myself relocating this summer, however. Perhaps in different environs the opportunity will find a way to present itself.

If all else fails, I could try the whole Secret thing again. "I will sing at an open mic night. I am singing at open mic night. I love singing at open mic night!"

('ll keep you posted on how that one turns out.)

But, as they say, stating the dream aloud is the first step. So... now it's stated, and we'll see what happens.

What Would *You* Sing For Simon?

So I was doing my yoga today, like I do (almost) every day, and American Idol: Rewind was on in the background.

It made me think, like it does every time I happen to catch it (while doing the dishes or folding clothes): given the chance, what would I sing in front of Simon Cowell?

I'm not a bad singer. I've got a BA in music, so I know a bit about pitch, tone, and rhythm. But the question stymies me, every time. What song could I sing that would be good enough to impress Simon?

Or, rephrased: what song could I sing that would make me sound like an American Idol?

That, after all, seems to be the thing that trips up 50% of the contestants. (The other 45% can't match pitch, and the remaining 5% get picked for the show.)

If I were going to pick something that I could sing well, under pressure, I might choose "Not a Day Goes By" or something from the Cole Porter oeuvre. But one does not become an American Idol by singing showtunes.

So it would have to be a... sigh... popular song.

Madonna? Christina? Britney?

Couldn't I become the first American Idol to win by singing "Jam Tomorrow, Jam Yesterday?"

In the end I'd probably pick something like Jewel's "You Were Meant For Me" or Anna Nalick's "Breathe (2 a.m.)," though neither of those seem like they would inspire American idolatry.

Or I could channel my inner nerd (inner? what inner?) and sing Jason Mraz's "Wordplay." With the combination of sexy glasses and articulate diction, I might be able to garner the xkcd demographic vote.

Sigh. Josh Cohen had it easy.

What would *you* sing for Simon?



Editor's Note: If Blue doesn't ever actually look at the TV, it means she can truthfully say that she doesn't watch American Idol: Rewind. Which, of course, she doesn't.

Visiting Kolu

When I was young, I always wanted to celebrate the holidays I read about in books. (Okay, I always wanted to do anything I read about in a book -- and still do.)

After I read All-Of-A-Kind Family, for example, I told my mother that we were going to celebrate Purim, and -- with all the costume and ceremony I could derive from the book's chapter on the subject -- we did.

There weren't many books about South Asian children in our local library, unfortunately; the closest I got to India was through Burnett and Kipling. So I had no chance to read about Navarati or the Kolu celebration.

Which is too bad, because if I had, I most assuredly would have spent one afternoon building nine steps out of cardboard and chairs and arranging my stuffed animals and Barbie dolls into my own interpretation of a Kolu display.

I probably would not have been able to keep them there for nine days, however; wouldn't have been able to handle the delayed gratification. But arranging them, and then standing in front of them and singing.... oh, I would have been all over that.

I've been taken to see several Kolu displays in neighboring flats, and all of them have been very charming and thoroughly impressive. After I admired the sand painting of Saraswati that I saw in one home, I was given a small pot of sand and invited to try and make my own design in front of the kolu. Suffice to say I failed disastrously. I managed to make a pile of sand, and then when I tried to spread it around with my finger into a kind of arrangement, I ended up with a messy pile of sand. ^__^

They did, however, also invite me to stand in front of the kolu display and sing; and at that I was much more successful. It was probably the only time, ever, in history, in which Charles Kingsford has been performed in front of a Kolu; I can only hope that Saraswati approved.

Folk Songs

The theatre students take music classes as part of their curriculum. I’ve been attending them, because as an “apostate musician” (BA in music, 17-odd years piano lessons, former piano teacher and choral accompanist), they fascinate me.

The music teacher is currently working on rhythm. Only about half of the students have any kind of sense of rhythm; some students have trouble marching to a steady beat.

In my past history as a piano teacher, I might have done something like the whole… um, hard to explain without the visuals, but there’s this technique where you clap your hands for each quarter note, and then clap your hands and clasp them together and do this circle thing for a half note (so it takes twice as long), etc.

But the Hyderabadi music teacher had a different approach. He asked the students to sing a folk song.

Immediately one student launched into this fast-paced Telugu song, with all kinds of syncopated rhythms, and the entire class joined in. They had no trouble with the rhythms when they were singing, and the song clipped by at a very steady pace.

So the teacher stopped them, and started them clapping again in quarter notes (crotchets, if we want to be particular). Then he asked them to start the song again and keep clapping. It fell apart.

The teacher continued this exercise, asking the students in turn to march to the song, to dance to the song, etc. and by the end of the two-hour session they were beginning to see how the steady beat fit with what they were singing.

The teacher said that every day they would continue this practice, using different folk songs. Everyone, including me, was requested to bring a folk song to class.

Of course I was swarmed by the students afterwards and asked to sing “a U.S. folk song.” And, despite all my music training, my mind went blank. Finally I remembered that old Dan Tucker had once been too late to get his supper, and I dug up the chorus to sing to them, although I couldn’t for the life of me remember any of the verses.

But I am still puzzled by what constitutes a U.S. folk song. The problem, I think, is that the United States is both too stratified and too amnesiac. That is, the U.S. has so many cultural influences and diverse groups that there is no one category of “folk” songs that an entire population might know; and, of course, that the U.S. rarely bothers hanging on to memories of old songs, as we are always trying to sell new ones.

Yes, there is a category of European-American “folk music” which includes songs like Old Dan Tucker and Polly Wolly Doodle, but nobody ever sings those songs. If I were sitting in a classroom full of American college students and asked to sing something that everyone would know and could join in on, I would have to go with something like “Hit Me Baby One More Time.”

And that’s just sad.

So… what will I sing for these students, when it is my turn? I thought about a spiritual, since that is an authentically American musical form, but I don’t want to bring religion into the mix. It has to be something simple, with very few lyrics, that is easy to pick up and easy to clap to.

And then I had an inspiration, from what is perhaps another sub-genre of American “folk music:” camp songs.

I’m going to teach them “The Song That Doesn’t End.”

Yes, I’m evil. ^__^

Shorty #1: Hair

Quoth Daniel, upon reading my last post, "wow, that was long!"

Okay, fine. ^__^ Today you get three shorties.

There are certain pieces of art that demarcate a "before and after;" there was a moment, after all, before I heard Bernstein's Candide or saw Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood or opened the Mahabharata.

And there was a time before I ever heard the soundtrack to Hair.

(Ennis, don't laugh!)

I may be the only person of my generation currently rocking out to the 1960s American Tribal Love-Rock Musical, but it's so intricate and tricksy and travels just along the edge of harmonic predictability.

Here's a clip of that old favorite "Age of Aquarius." Note how the composer creates tension by combining a syncopated bass line against a rapid, arrythmic electric guitar against an almost-behind-the-beat hi-hat. (It's a little fuzzy in the clip and sounds much better on my own sound system.)

Also yay Twyla Tharp.

It also occurs to me that I am, at the moment, surrounded by members of the Age of Aquarius. (No, not you guys... the people in the cubes next to me.) And I wonder, just a bit.

More Alice Fun!

Here's another clip from the 1985 Irwin Allen/Steve Allen tv version of Alice in Wonderland.

I'm including it for your amusement, primarily because it features "the incomparable" Jayne Meadows.

As she was married to songwriter Steve Allen, it's no surprise that she gets the best song in the show.

But what fascinates me is her delivery. Listen to her pull and distort those words -- count the number of sounds she pushes through on the word "Squirm."

Also note the sex.

And, since I've given you the job of noticing things, do be aware of Steve Allen's masterful use of the post-bridge modulation. Except this time, it's not a leading tone modulation; it's a modulation where the tonic of the first key becomes the dominant of the second... and I can't remember what it's formally called!

Aural Memory

What kind of music did you teach the choir in Our Town? he asked.
Church music, I said. The singers in the play are part of a church choir.
Sing it for me, he asked.
Oh, no -- it's over the phone -- it will sound terrible, I said.
Sing it for me, he asked again.
So I began singing the hymns in the play, and when he requested more (as I had, once, been a church organist and knew all the hymns), I sang through the Doxology.

Well, halfway through. Halfway, until I suddenly shrieked with laughter and recognition.

It's the same tune, I told him.
What? he said.
The same melody -- isn't that amazing?

And, to prove it, I sang it for him.

Om jai jagdish.


(From the editor: No, it's not the same "note-for-note." Check the comments section for a better explanation of the music theory involved. I'm not sure how to post audio files on Blogger; run an audio search through your favorite search engine for "Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow" -- don't search "Doxology;" you'll get a bunch of songs by the Christian band of the same name -- and for "Om Jai Jagdish" to hear the two melodies.)

A Brief Detour: Back to the Lion and the Unicorn

While searching for a YouTube video of "If He Walked Into My Life" as performed by, say, Angela Lansbury or Lucille Ball or Eydie Gorme, I found this.

Consider it "Alice, Part Six: One Film Representation of the Lion and the Unicorn Scene."

My favorite part is where Harvey Korman and John Stamos jump in time to the timpani. I find myself itching to recreate a similar moment with tabla.

(Half) Step Up to the Plate, Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy

Today was the first day in a long time when I was able to drive with the windows down. Just because the windows are down, of course, doesn't mean the music stops -- or that I stop singing. Which makes me one of those people, I know, but as I can carry a tune, it probably isn't that bad to get stuck next to me at a stoplight.

Anyway. So I was rocking out to "Maahive" (from Kal Ho Naa Ho), and in the middle of it I suddenly realized that there was no post-bridge leading tone modulation.

I stopped the stereo. (The people in the cars around me sighed with relief.)

In all the Bollywood songs I could think of, were there any leading tone modulations? In fact, were there any modulations at all?

For the uninitiated, here's what I'm talking about: the vast majority of musical theatre songs (and "top 40" songs as well) follow a standard formula: ABABC(A)B. Or: verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, (optional verse), chorus.

In musical theatre, there is nearly always a phrase modulation after the bridge (or between the optional verse and the final chorus), which turns the tonic of the original key into the leading tone of the new key. In other words, everything shifts a half step up.

Top 40 used to do these modulations but they have fallen out of favor in the past few years, even in cases where their absence is glaringly noticed (Natasha Bedingfield, I'm talking to you).

Bollywood seems never to do this. And I'm fascinated to find out why.