Letter from Tanglewood (Elliott Carter)

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

As Wallace Stevens said in Notes toward a Supreme Fiction: It Must Be Abstract

Now I know why.



Edit: Which was my 'amusing' take on "I realize this might have been a great week for music and ideas, but it was lousy for phsycial objects. First the bike, then the car, then that damned camera."

[Joe Barron]

Many of the concerts were filmed, I'm told, and they may be seen here.

I haven't watched them, since I've  been home only a day, and I'm still recuperating.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

Thanks for this link!

[Wendell_E]

Thanks for this link!

Yes, and for all the posts on the festival. 

Oooh.  I knew that the performance of What Next? from 2006 had been filmed, but I didn't realise they had a DVD of it for sale.  Sold!

[Joe Barron]

I don't understand this board. I did a spell check on very post, and they're still full of errors.

[bhodges]

OMG, Joe, thanks for posting that link!  I probably would have never known they had made these performances available.  Right now listening to Call.  Just checked the menu and will have to check out the Variations for Orchestra next--how totally great that they filmed these.

--Bruce

[Joe Barron]

OMG, Joe, thanks for posting that link!  I probably would have never known they had made these performances available.  Right now listening to Call.  Just checked the menu and will have to check out the Variations for Orchestra next--how totally great that they filmed these.--Bruce

Yeah, now I wonder why I bothered going. 

[bhodges]

Yeah, now I wonder why I bothered going. 

 

Nyah...although the sound is excellent, I'm sure it was much better in person.  And the video isn't all that great.  (The audio is fine.)  I'm listening to the Variations now and it looks like an incredible performance.

--Bruce

[karlhenning]

Yeah, now I wonder why I bothered going. 

Two words: Phil Lesh

[Joe Barron]

Two words: Phil Lesh

Yes, you're right. That is two words.

[Guido]

Thankyou Joe! Now, there must be some way of extracting the audio from online videos...

[(poco) Sforzando]

Thankyou Joe! Now, there must be some way of extracting the audio from online videos...

Is there any way to download both audio and video to burn a DVD?

[Guido]

Yes... I would love to do that too.

[Joe Barron]

Since returning from Massachusetts I have wanted to do two things: read more poetry and brush up on my French. The poetry because Carter has written many great songs using the work of great poets: Ashbery, Bishop, Stevens, Lowell and Dickinson. He is now working on a new song cycle on Pound's Pisan Cantos. I have read some poetry, but certainly not as much as Mr. Carter has. My problem is I don't understand much of it. It requires slow reading and many rereadings, and I don't have the patience to linger over a single page for an hour trying to absorb meaning. And when I do, I'm usually unsuccessful, anyway. In any event, though, over the past couple of weeks I've been reading the comp[lete poems of Kennth Fearing, and I've memorized Fearing's poem Pay-off.

It is well known that Carter speaks French fluently, but my desire to study the language has nothing to do with that. It comes from a little French Candadian girl who annoyed the hell out of me at the Lenox library. (YOu hear a lot of French in western Massachusetts.) She was sitting between me and her mother at the computer station while I was trying to post on this board, and she got into some kind of quarrel with her little sister, who was standing behind her and was also being antsy. She swiveled her chair petulantly, and the back of the chair kept hitting me in the elbow. I wanted to turn to her and say, "Arrete! Sois calme. Je ne peut pas taper quand tu ce fais."   Or something like that. In the event, all I could say was "Please!" Her mother got the message and said something to her that quieted her down. But the kid still gave me the dirtiest look.

[karlhenning]

. . . But the kid still gave me the dirtiest look.

No obstacle to comprehension there, Joe . . . .

[Al Moritz]

Joe, thank you very much for your vivid concert reports. I enjoyed them all immensely.