Stop the Genre Defiance

I came across an album on Bandcamp yesterday that described itself as “genre-defiant.” Most musicians are not quite so militant about their dislike of labels, but the vibe is familiar. If they’re not playing something recognizably x, y, or z, they must be busting down the restrictive walls of genre, transcending traditional boundaries, at least if their own press is to be believed.

I get it–mainstream outlets want art that’s easy to define. Once upon a time, there was lots of territory to explore under the label of “rock” or “soul” or “jazz,” and a creative band might be comfortable with one of those labels. Now, if you’re doing something original, you probably don’t like any of those boxes or the baggage that come with them. There’s an element of rebelliousness that comes with the territory.

I think this is particularly true of the whole range of (mostly) instrumental, (partly) improvised music, what used to be called jazz. Or, by the late 1960s, was often hyphenated as jazz-rock, jazz-funk, latin jazz, or whatever. “Jazz” sounds old-fashioned and stodgy; most musicians today aren’t doing anything like Benny Goodman or even Dexter Gordon. As they drift further from something that can be easily hyphenated, they give up on genre distinctions entirely.

As a listener, I want people to make music that defies genre–it’s as good a description as any of much of what I like. But I also want to know what it is! I want to be able to search for it, I want to be able to talk about it, I want to tell my friends about it. Genre “transcendence” or “defiance” is worthless for any of those purposes. It’s PR-speak, like saying a drink is “refreshing.”

Until a few decades ago, people who wanted this kind of music would find the most out-there record shop in town and ask for the weird stuff. Now there are (approximately) no record shops yet orders of magnitude more weird stuff. The only ways to find your way through the sea of genre defiance are trusted recommenders or algorithms of the if-you-like-this-you’ll-also-like-that variety.

So please, artists, help me find you, and help me know I might like you when I find you! You don’t have to describe yourself with traditional labels, but you do have to describe yourself. Declaring your music to be beyond genre is only saying what you aren’t. Who do you sound like? What are the elements you mix together in the final product? What do those sound like? If you’ve rejected a genre, what did you keep? How did you replace the rest? Representing music with words is not easy, but for the browser–and a whole lot of your prospective listeners start as browsers–it’s all you’ve got.

The Ethics of High-Volume Streaming

I get nearly all of my music through Spotify or Bandcamp. I pay about $20/month on a family plan for Spotify, and most albums on Bandcamp are free. I spend less on music than I did 20 years ago, and I listen to probably ten times the number of new albums.

The biggest losers in this arrangement are labels, distributors, and retailers. We all used to buy physical discs; now we don’t. Some labels still manage to do ok. Artists lose, too; they make a fraction of a penny for every stream, which for many artists adds up to a fraction of a penny, total. Recorded music has essentially become advertising for live performances, merchandise (including vinyl, much of which never touches a turntable), and other revenue streams.

As listeners, should we care about this? Should we take it upon ourselves to reward creators even though Spotify–as our representative–does not?

My answer is yes, at least to some extent. I’m not going to start paying for every album I listen to; if I were required to do so, I’d choose more carefully, listen to more radio, and pay for fewer. But recorded music is clearly worth more to me than $20/month plus the cost of the occasional album I have to pay for.

The problem is, I have no idea how to put a number on it. And if I did, how would I divide that number among the artists I listened to, even if I had a way to put money directly in their pockets?

What I’ve done for the last few years is to buy physical albums (or occasionally downloads) as gifts whenever possible. Then, buy Bandcamp downloads–often for more than the suggested amount–of my favorite recordings. The whole thing comes to a few multiples of the Spotify subscription, probably still less than I paid for CDs when I was in college. Some of the artists I love get some of my money; the rest are stuck with the infinitesimal streaming royalty.

Apart from what feels like an ethical responsibility to pay for what I consume, the incentive here is that paying artists makes it more likely that they’ll keep creating. My marginal dollar isn’t going to influence whether Richard Powers writes another novel, but it might move the needle on an indie group’s next trip to the recording studio. Many of my favorite artists understand that they’ll never make a good living purely from record sales, so it’s crucial to vote in favor of more releases. They might do it anyway, out of compulsion or as marketing for live dates, but it seems worthwhile to register a direct interest.

In a perfect world, everyone would find a way to support the artists they love. Many do; most won’t. It’s still valuable to figure out the best approach at the individual level.

Embracing the Firehose

Several ago I realized that I wasn’t discovering much new music. I would listen to new releases from artists I liked and occasionally get a good recommendation from a friend. But without listening to the radio or spending a lot of time around musicians, the number of new ideas was steadily decreasing.

It’s difficult to find new music that is excellent and challenging while still falling in line with your personal taste. It’s virtually impossible to do that without listening a lot. Unless your taste is very predictable, you’ll probably end up checking out ten recordings for every one that you really like. The other nine aren’t wastes of time, but you might not ever feel the need to listen to them again.

The key problem, I’ve discovered, is coming up with the ten albums in the first place. No matter how much I ask for recommendations, I’m not going to get that many, and I’m not going to stumble on enough other things to fill the gap. Instead, I’ve sought out as many resources as possible to identify new music as it is released. The result is what I think of as a “firehose”–a steady deluge of ideas that I couldn’t keep up with even if I tried.

The best sources are monthly lists from magazines. (Bonus points if there’s an RSS feed.) I check perhaps a dozen of those each month. For the true firehose experience, the All Music Guide publishes lists of everything that comes out. Here, for example, are the 67 albums on their October classical list. This is a complement, not an alternative, to other methods of finding music. When I discover something I like, I check out the artist, the label, and sometimes contributing artists. On occasion, a new find will even lead me to a new genre, and the search space widens further.

(Another tip: If you find a really great album, especially if it’s obscure, search the web for sites that list or review it. This will sometimes turn up a personal site or something like an old-fashioned webzine. At the very least, it’ll have a few other ideas. Sometimes it will be a steady new source. This is the non-commercial version of the “If you like X, you’ll also like…” recommendation algorithms.)

The idea isn’t to listen to everything on every list–that isn’t possible. If you wanted to be a completist, you could probably keep yourself busy for the entire year just by listening to every item from a pile of last year’s best-of compilations. The goal is that there’s always something to queue up, preferably several things that might fit the mood at the moment. As I find things, I just copy URLs (of lists, artists, labels, etc) to a text file. I tend to listen on a last-in, first-out basis, which is another way to keep things simple.

As with the infinite scrolls of Instagram and Twitter, it’s important to recognize that the list is inexhaustible by design. There’s no shame in leaving something there for months, years, forever. If something is truly worth listening to, it will probably come to your attention via multiple sources.

I’ve found that this framework is useful for much more than music. It’s changed my approach to my to-read list (both books and online articles), and it has made me more comfortable with to-do lists (such as ideas for website features) that I’ll probably never complete. It can be frustrating to have too much to do (or read, or listen to), but it’s far worse to have too little.

DALL-E thinks I’m talking about vinyl:

Great Music From 2023

Apparently I skipped last year. I aim to write more here in 2024 … then again, I’ve said that before.

In alphabetical order by artist; links to Bandcamp where possible.

• Brian Blade & The Fellowship Band, Kings Highway. Blade’s writing is always a bit off-kilter, in a good way. Migration and the title track clock in at 15 and 13 minutes respectively, and this band can stretch out with the best of them. The unexpected highlight is the closer, a cover of the hymn God Be With You.
• Brìghde Chaimbeul, Carry Them With Us. Somehow Chaimbeul elevates the bagpipes to high art. With Colin Stetson contributing saxophone and electronics, this is her best yet.
• Le Cri du Caire, Le Cri du Caire. Egyptian poet/vocalist Abdullah Miniawy and a French ensemble, mixing Middle Eastern sounds with electronics and jazz.
• Anthony Davis: X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X. Released in late 2022 by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, I’m putting it here anyway. I rarely like opera, yet I listened to this straight through. (And then again.) Davis dispenses with both the recitative and the pyrotechnics that detract from the music itself; this would be a strong collection of songs even it didn’t come together as a single work.
• Arnold Dreyblatt, Resolve. No one else makes microtonal minimalism so likeable.
• GEORGE, Letters to George. Master arranger/orchestrator John Hollenbeck has a fresh configuration to explore with this new group. The cover of Grey Funnel Line is one of my two or three favorite tracks of the year, with stunning percussion work from the leader himself.
• Katawa Singers, Digital Indigenous 05: Katula. Vocal and keyboard gospel from Malawi.
• Nikolai Kapustin, Piano Concerto No. 5. Jazz-tinged Russian composer.
• Vusi Mahlasela, Norman Zulu and Jive Connection, Face to Face. A “lost recording” of meeting between South African folk singer Mahlasela and a Swedish soul group.
• Donny McCaslin, I Want More. The best “jazz” these days happens when a great jazz player makes something else entirely. This one is synth-driven, verging on EDM. Yet there’s still plenty of room for McCaslin to blow.
• Hedvig Mollestad Weejuns, Weejuns. Captivating electric guitar trio, tilting between free improv and rock hooks.
• Meshell Ndegeocello, The Omnichord Real Book. A rare record where every track feels like the leader has something entirely original to say. It all sounds great, of course, because Ndegeocello functions as an entire rhythm section, commanding the outermost back of the beat. Clear Water is, for me, the track of the year.
• Nickel Creek, Celebrants. First release from the acoustic trio since 2014. Chris Thile can do no wrong.
• Penguin Cafe, Rain Before Seven…. Arthur Jeffes continues to capture the spirit of his father’s Penguin Cafe Orchestra by creating something that is more than a tribute band.
• Playing for the Man at the Door: Field Recordings from the Collection of Mack McCormick 1958​-​1971. Some gems among the 66 tracks on this collection from Texas.
• Joshua Redman, Where Are We. The highlight here is a stripped-down cover of Springsteen’s Streets of Philadelphia. The whole album is vocal jazz for people who don’t like vocal jazz (and probably most who do).
• Terry Riley, In C Irish. I’ve yet to hear a version of In C that I don’t like. This one, on Irish instruments, is both well executed and brings out elements of the piece that I hadn’t heard before.

What did I miss?

Oy Christina Big Band Scores, Part 2

From 2002 to 2006, I led a 15-piece jazz orchestra.  I wrote charts for the top 40 pop hits of the day, which ranged from swing to funk to outright satire.  You can listen to the full studio album here.  I shared the charts for those songs in an earlier blog post.

I also created an album of “bootlegs” — live versions of songs that didn’t make the cut for the studio album.  You can listen to that album here.  The charts for most of those tunes are below.

I created the individual parts in Lime, a very friendly music notation program available from the Cerl Sound Group.  (You can download it for a free trial.)  I worked from handwritten score sketches; unfortunately I no longer have those to make available.  (And if I did, I’m not sure they’d be usable by anyone but me.)

Most of the charts are scored for 15 pieces: 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, 4 saxes (2 altos, tenor, bari), and rhythm (usually 2 guitars, bass, drums).  Sometimes I only created a single rhythm section part.  Some of the charts were scored multiple times for different size groups; in those cases, the filenames should make that clear.

I can’t speak for the original composers and lyricists of these songs, but you have my permission to use these scores for whatever purposes you want.  If you perform any of them, I want to hear about it–and I want to hear a recording!

Click the links to download a .zip file with the full parts for each chart:

• Hot in Herre
• Complicated
• Lose Yourself
• All the Things You Said
• Girlfriend
• Crush
• What a Girl Wants
• Die Another Day [no chart for this one — it’s a very unorthodox arrangement and my instructions for musicians seem to be lost]
• Survivor

Oy Christina! Big Band Scores

From 2002 to 2006, I led a 15-piece jazz orchestra.  I wrote charts for the top 40 pop hits of the day, which ranged from swing to funk to outright satire.  You can listen to the full studio album here.

I created the individual parts in Lime, a very friendly music notation program available from the Cerl Sound Group.  (You can download it for a free trial.)  I worked from handwritten score sketches; unfortunately I no longer have those to make available.  (And if I did, I’m not sure they’d be usable by anyone but me.)

Most of the charts are scored for 15 pieces: 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, 4 saxes (2 altos, tenor, bari), and rhythm (usually 2 guitars, bass, drums).  Sometimes I only created a single rhythm section part.  Some of the charts were scored multiple times for different size groups; in those cases, the filenames should make that clear.

I can’t speak for the original composers and lyricists of these songs, but you have my permission to use these scores for whatever purposes you want.  If you perform any of them, I want to hear about it–and I want to hear a recording!

Click the links to download a .zip file with the full parts for each chart:

• A Thousand Miles
• Dirrty
• Beautiful
• Lose Yourself
• Jenny From the Block
• Cry Me a River
• Oops! I Did It Again
• Can’t Get You Out of My Head
• No More Drama
• Ignition Remix