Any man for Nyman?

 

    Harriet and I often swap music - I put her on to songs I think she will like and she does the same for me. Today she steered me towards The Cinematic Orchestra and To Build a Home, the chorus of which is lovely, I think (go from 1.39 in this abbreviated version), and which reminded me of Regina Spektor.

    Listening again, I caught something of Michael Nyman about it, and he's getting an airing just now being composer of the week on Radio 3 - he's also getting a roasting from Michael White on the Telegraph culture blog, and so I wondered whether he was a Marmite composer: do you love him or hate him? I've been a fan since watching Peter Greenaway films in my student years; Nyman's scores were marvellous (I've yet to hear properly his music for The Piano, though).

    "Happiness consists in frequent repetition of pleasure" said Schopenhauer, and be that as it may, a harmonically pleasing and frequently repeated musical motif (as you find often in Michael Nyman's work) does the trick for me. By way of illustration I'll offer you Time Lapse from A Zed and Two Noughts (the score described by Alex Ross in The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century as giving "a courtly Baroque air to chugging minimalist patterns") or Chasing Sheep is best left to Shepherds from The Draughtsman's Contract.

Comments

[Freda]

I don't exactly hate Michael Nyman...the reason I think his music is good film music is that it doesn't quite stand on it's own. Thanks for another good book recommendation (clever title The Rest is Just Noise!)

[Lindsay]

I too enjoy Nyman, but I always wonder slightly if I'm being conned, and I don't know enough to really understand what he's doing. But hearing This Week's Composer has been interesting (and a rare treat for we worker bees) but hearing it twice yesterday while doing 3 years' filing was un peu de trop, if that 5th form phrase conveys any real meaning to those who actually do speak the language across the Channel / La Manche!

I hope you also enjoy Glass, then, and Adams. If not try The Chairman Dances and A Short Ride in a Fast machine.

[Cornflower]

A very interesting book!

[Cornflower]

I'm very keen on Glass (though family members have been known to flee with hands over ears when I play him), and I like Adams, too.
Re. Nyman, his music does tend to wear a groove in the brain (that repetitive/progressive style again), and that is something that appeals to me because if I like a piece I like to 'embed' it and feel I've grasped its shape and intricacies. Equally, I can see how one might crave respite after a while!

[Sandy]

Music is a personal pleasure and I dont think my (or anyone else's) taste should define a level of artistic merit.

In the beginning music is composed because it gives pleasure to the composer. This pleasure is felt by other listeners to a greater or lesser extent and if high status members of society like it, you will find it on Radio 3, whereas if a large number of low status citizens enjoy it, you will find it on Radio 1.

Maybe Radio 3 could rattle Michael White's cage more forcibly by broadcasting the excellent Regina Spektor.

OK I will admit Nyman does not give me goosebumps. :)

[Cornflower]

Speaking of Radio 3, even I as a keen listener and a lover of Schubert's music found their 8-day "Spirit of Schubert" season earlier this year a bit unrelieved.

[Dark Puss]

Both of Ross's books are absolutely excellent; I strongly recommend them. I certainly like most of Nyman's music and Glass and Spektor, though I think her earlier work, more clearly in the anti-folk vein, is better than her more recent compositions. The fabulous Morgana is also a Nyman fan; you can see a photograph of him by her here.

[Mr Cornflower]

I know exactly what you mean! Could this all be an elaborate hoax? On another tack your mention of 5th form French reminds me of a game invented by a friend of mine involving exact translations which were exactly wrong eg 'are you going to see the house match?' comes out as 'etes vous allant voir la maison allumette?'. His supreme triumph came when he ended an argument by saying 'je repose ma valise'!
Back to music: yes, "A Short Ride in a Fast Machine" is good, but what about Steve Reich's "Nagoya Marimba"?

[Sandy]

I am smiling because you have caught me instantly with the mention of Schubert whose chamber music & symphonies do indeed create goosebumps for me. However the lieder for which he is acclaimed dont have that effect, so I would imagine 8 days of someone else's choices would be de trop !

It's hard to imagine the creative drive behind the hundreds of compositions by the time of his death at 31 years. I believe he did not hear many of them performed, though I cant at the moment find a reference to substantiate that.

[Dark Puss]

Nagoya Marimbas is great, I really love that repetitive but evolving canon played out of phase on the two instruments.

[Anna B]

well i never - forgot that Nyman wrote music for ZOO and Draughtsman's Contract. When the Piano came out in 1993 I instantly bought the vidoe so's I could rewatch again and again. Then when my piano came to live with me I bought the score so's I could try and recreate the music for myself. Best to do that when I have the house to myself... The music for the Piano is on a different plane to the earlier works - beautiful and movingly poignant, whereas the earlier pieces are more Glass'esque as pointed out.

[Cornflower]

Ah, another member of the 'playing when no-one's around' brigade!

[Dark Puss]

How do you and Anna B get enough practice time in? If I had to play when no one else was around I'd play only a few times each year!