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The 50 Worst Artists In Music History

November 30, 2006 in Articles

Blender.com, a great music music site, published a great list in 2003 of “The 50 Worst Artists In Music History“. While I don’t agree about #16, Oingo Boingo, I do agree with #4, Kenny G.

"Hated equally by jazz and rock fans, Kenny Gorelick's limpid instrumentals and obsequious cameos helped turn the soprano sax solo into pop music's most feared cliche. He started his career with fusion hack Jeff Lorber, and his 1986 album, Duotones, established a steady market for anodyne, minimal background music, an aesthetic that reached its zenith in 1997 when "The G" set a world record by holding a single note for 45 minutes.
Appalling fact He graduated magna cum laude from the University of Washington with a degree in accounting.
Worst CD Classics in the Key of G (Arista, 1999)"

They also have some interesting comments about Jazz Fusion

"It's a rule of thumb that any music that uses jazz as a prefix will make you want to saw your head off in boredom (see also: jazz-funk, jazz rap, jazz house). But none is as wearying as the genre that thought what rock really needed was month-long bass solos and time signatures Stephen Hawking wouldn't understand.

Cut them some slack, they did publish a fairly good jazz list a while ago. They did nail the Kenny G thing though, I’d have put him as #2. And a newer list would have Paris Hilton and Ashlee Simpson I’m sure….

Steve Jobs’ Commencement Speach

June 15, 2005 in Articles

This is perhaps the best thing I have read in a while. It is the commencement speech given to Stanford graduates by Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

Great words to live by.

Update: 06/20 01:27 GMT by E :Found the actual speech.

Enclosed is a PDF of the speech.
Steve Job’s Commencement Speech at Stanford

Jazz Auction

February 20, 2005 in News

From an AP Article:

John Coltrane's saxophone. Dizzy Gillespie's bent trumpet. Lionel Hampton's vibraphone. These were among a treasure trove of 450 pieces of jazz memorabilia that will be auctioned Sunday.

Sunday's auction -- with a public preview Saturday -- is being held at the new home of Jazz at Lincoln Center, in the Time Warner complex in Manhattan. Bidders can participate by telephone, eBay or in person.

Some pictures are found here.

Personally, I think they shouldn’t auction the items. They have history, and should be kept for the public.

Louis Armstrong’s House

October 12, 2003 in News

Someone sent me a cool link saying that a 1.6 million renovation of Louis Armstrong’s house has been completed. If you haven’t seen the Official Site of the Louis Armstrong House and Archives, you should. Take a tour, or a video tour and make sure you check out the bathroom that is all mirrors!

Preamps, Capsules and Range

January 12, 2003 in Articles

Digital Prosound is an interesting website that sometimes has articles worth reading.

The first is a brief but informative article about “Capsule Technology and Types“. A good read about what microphones are made of.

The second is about PreAmps. This again pertains to microphones. The general opinion in various books and articles I have read seems to be that the preamp really has more to do with how a recording (vocal or instrumental or whatever) sounds than the microphone. I’ve read A/B comparison articles that guys swear a Shure 57 ($79 mic) and a kick ass preamp sounds better than a $500+ microphone. This article is an excerpt Dan Richards forthcoming book “The Project Studio Handbook“.

The last article entitled “Now Hear This” is an interesting read about using sample rates higher than 44.1Khz to record and listen to music.

Happy Birthday CD

October 25, 2002 in Articles

When the CD was launched twenty years ago many people believed the format wouldn’t last. Audiophiles lamented the introduction of digital recordings, protesting that they did not capture the complete sound wave. Initially, CD players were expensive when compared with turntables of a comparative quality.

However the CD was a success, largely because it was more convenient and longer lasting than conventional vinyl records. The CD didn’t skip, it was easy to clean, and you didn’t have to worry about dust getting into the tracks or track wear. CD’s didn’t buckle when you left them on the back seat of your car on a sunny day. We didn’t have to back up our CD’s onto tape to ensure that the sound quality did not degrade over time.

One interesting item from the article:

"Billy Joel's 52nd Street was the first CD to go on sale in Japan. Six classical discs from the Philips/Decca/DG catalogue were released in Australia on day one. They cost $18, more than an average LP but a lot less than the super-vinyl LPs that the buffs were buying."

Funny that, 20 years ago, albums were at $18. Isn’t that what they still are?

Art of The Fugue

September 19, 2002 in Articles

From a Metafilter article.

"An unfinished work representing a centuries-old mystery and containing an encrypted signature, Pythagorean philosophy and celestial numbers... Could it be the new Neal Stephenson novel? Actually, it's Johann Sebastian Bach's "Art of Fugue", believed by some to have been conceived as "absolute music" never intended to be played at all. Artist Elizabeth Harington has created a lovely and loving visual interpretation of the work in the form of 14 folded sculptures (nicely presented by Colophon)."

Stan Getz’s Tenor Sax

August 27, 2002 in Articles

BIABfsg writes “Someone was asking about Trane’s horn awhile back. Though I do not have idea where it is, but I do know what happens to Stan Getz’s Tenor Sax. That beautiful horn is now in Berklee College of Music’s Media Center. Though we can not touch that horn, but it looks like a new horn ’cause they cleaned the horn before they put it to Media Center.”

Very interesting. Perhaps Stan’s more recent death allowed someone to have the foresight to save his horn. I still would like to know what happened to Coltrane’s Tenor, and maybe Cannonball’s Alto…..

Gary Giddins Guide To Post WWII Jazz

June 12, 2002 in Articles

Gary Giddins, arguably our greatest contemporary jazz critic just spent five months going through his record collection to come up with a terrific and deliciously debatable list for The Village Voice. His idea was to pick ONE track per year as the defining track.

An interview with the critic can be found here.

Where Music Will Be Coming From

March 16, 2002 in Articles

The New York Times has an excellent article about entitled Where Music Will Be Coming From. Very well done. Gives a little history, where we are now, and where we are going.

Update: 03/17 23:48 GMT by E :Here are two more interesting articles, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” and
“The Work of Art in the Age of Digital Reproduction”