"Go With the Flow" Music

In my review of "Acoustic Stick", Neil Haverstick felt that I didn't
make clear what I meant by recommending that we listen to the last two
tracks as "go with the flow music".

Ah, of course! I just now remembered a prime example of excellent music
that doesn't make much of any statement at the big-picture level, but is
nevertheless a fine piece of music: Bolero.

At the formal level, about the most complex structure in Bolero is a
gradual crescendo. Beyond that, it's just many many repetitions of a
single theme. So then why is it nevertheless a fine work of music?
Because the musical statements it makes are very strong in a different
vein: Color. Bolero is a superb exploration and exposition of orchestral
tone color. In that case, Ravel wasn't interested in saying much formally.


The last two tracks, "34 Steps" and "From the West" struck me as of that
general nature: They are musically interesting from perspectives of their
Indianish tone color, from their texture, in their improvised melodies, in
the interactions between the two guitar tracks (in 34 Steps). But I found
them less interesting from the perspective of an overall "story" of the
composition itself. Or to put it another way, their packaging wasn't their
biggest strength, on my opinion. And as with any opinion, some of you
might disagree.

But again, as I said in my review, I view this as, at the worst, a minor
weakness of Neil's new CD. If I didn't make it amply clear in my review,
this is fundamentally a marvelous CD, and I recommend it strongly.


SMTPOriginator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu
From: Carl Lumma
Subject: Stick's Shtick
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