Columbus GA

Academy Award Best Music (Score)

My pick was Thomas Newman for Wall-E.  Just for the quirky oboe tune and the beautiful space ballet music.  I think it's Thomas Newman's best score to date, certainly his best since American Beauty (1999).  And it certainly packed a lot of emotion into a concise, recognizable, distinctive score.

Dubowsky Ensemble Live Music to Experimental Film at ATA Feb 20

JACK CURTIS DUBOWSKY ENSEMBLE
Performs Live Music to Experimental Film
Featuring Jean Genet’s Chant d’Amour, works by Derek Jarman, and contemporary experimental filmmakers.

DATE: Friday February 20, 2009, 8pm

VENUE: Artists’ Television Access (ATA)
992 Valencia Street San Francisco CA 94110
(415) 824-3890
http://www.atasite.org/calendar/?x=3524

COST: $6

HIGH RES PHOTOS: http://www.destijlmusic.com/jcde.html

The Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble, a groundbreaking new music ensemble led by classical and film composer Jack Curtis Dubowsky, performs live musical soundtracks to experimental films including Jean Genet’s underground classic Chant d’Amour (shot by Jean Cocteau), works by Derek Jarman, and new works by Phil Maxwell (UK), Hazuan Hashim (UK), Ben Coopersmith (NYC), and Samara Halperin (SF).

The Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble specializes in abstract, spacious, free form, transcendental, electro-acoustic contemporary music. Dubowsky has scored five feature films including That Man Peter Berlin and Rock Haven. Dubowsky has received grants from Meet the Composer, Zellerbach Family Fund, Friends of the SF Public Library, and this year from the American Composers Forum.

The Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble I album was performed and recorded live with no overdubs; no pre-recorded music is used in concert either.

2009 San Francisco Tape Music Festival, Friday Jan 30

Schaeffer / McKinnon / Mercer / Block / Ussachevsky / Blum performances first half.

beep fffft neenerneener kkspt lslsls!!!

Had been sitting in the studio and working on Redwoods score all day.  

So couldn't really sit and listen to any more loud music and didn't stay for the second half.

Sometimes you just need a break.

But you should go.  Really.  It was packed.  And a young hip crowd too.

Scott Walker 30 Century Man

Opening night at Opera Plaza in San Francisco, featuring a live appearance and QnA with director Stephen Kijak.  

Kijak has lovingly made a music documentary of expatriate American Scott Walker, né Engel, who went from teen idol to iconic British "MOR" pop star to recluse.  Walker went from making four albums in three years in the late 60s to making one album a decade in the 90s and 2000s. Fairly early in his solo career he stopped touring or playing live; the commercial failure of Scott 4 (his first album of all original material) became an insurmountable detriment. Nevertheless, his four early solo albums became highly influential and he became a cult figure homaged by the likes of Marc Almond and Julian Cope in the 1980s when he had all but disappeared.  

This is a Jacques Brel song with English lyrics by Mort Shuman.  They both also performed Brel's signature song, "Ne Me Quitte Pas," in English as "If You Go Away." Walker's own compositions were little stories set to music, much like the "Elinor Rigby" type lyrics of the Beatles or Blur.  He often sang of sad lonely women, tattered lives, the "hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way" viewpoint as once described by Pink Floyd, but with an added veneer of colorfully poetic visual imagery similar to Nick Drake's.  One of many remarkable aspects of Scott Walker which could have been further investigated is how and why did an American become so quintessentially British, while not even faking the accent?  (At the QnA, Kijak brought in new information about the Walkers avoiding Viet Nam by remaining in the UK; this would have been great to address in the film!)

Scott Walker resurfaced again in 1995 with Tilt, but his voice, though still croony, was not the same. 

Walker's best known music is infused with drama and haunting arrangements, performed by live orchestral accompaniment. Sadly we learn little about Walker's personal life from the film; as a recluse, he is a tough nut to crack.  Despite years of courting and cooperating with Walker, labels, management companies, handlers and the like, Kijak could film only one 40 minute interview with the singer.  Does he have kids?  Has he ever been in love?  Who does he have relationships with? How has his personal life influenced his art?  I still don't know.

The film feels bifurcated into an "early Scott" section, with memorabilia, old clips, photographs, and historical anecdotes, and a "making of" section about his most recent album.  There's not much to connect the two, but that's ostensibly because... there isn't much to connect the two.

Like many documentaries of obscure cult musicians (see also my write up of the Arthur Russel documentary), Kijak's film is overly respectful of its subject.  Celebrity interviews (Jarvis Cocker, Sting, Radiohead, David Bowie, Marc Almond) are there largely (but not entirely) to lend legitimacy to the subject matter.  

By far the best part is interviews with old arrangers and musicians, talking about guitar parts and string parts, during which Kijak plays the exact snippets of music they are referring to.  It is a fascinating and informative technique.  Too often documentaries about musicians don't bother to include any real musical information.  By including producers, engineers, arrangers, composers, and musicians in the film, Kijak gives it a truly gratifying depth and insight.  Kijak is also upfront when he acknowledges he doesn't focus on Scott's albums from the 70s which he casts in the light of hackwork done for financial or business obligation.

The DVD should come out this summer, and hopefully there will be some extras to look forward to.  And this film makes me really really really want to see a documentary about Angela Morley, who was born Wally Stott, and who did orchestra arrangements for Shirley Bassey, Dusty Springfield, and the first three Scott Walker solo albums.  Wally had gender reassignment surgery in 1972, the same year as composer Wendy Carlos.   Angela Morley also composed one of my favorite film scores, Watership Down.  (No joke.)  She worked in Hollywood for twenty years.  Here's a bit from a BBC documentary about her.

There ya go. That would be a great documentary. Kijak has some great interviews of her. Sadly she died on January 14, 2009 at the age of 84. I don't know if Stephen Kijak knows. He didn't mention it. She was a truly amazing person. Enjoy some of her music from Watership Down.

"Sisyphus" Video - Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble

Music Video for "Sisyphus" by the Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble.
Available on the CD Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble I.
(c) + (p) 2008 De Stijl Music (BMI)

Jack Curtis Dubowsky: Roland Jupiter 6, Washburn Bantam Headless Electric Bass
Fred Morgan: Drums

Recorded live in studio without overdubs.
This is only two people, playing live!

Order the CD here http://cdbaby.com/cd/jackcurtisdubowsky
Also available on iTunes

Make friends with the JCD Ensemble on Myspace
http://www.myspace.com/jcdensemble

Directed, shot, and edited by Jack Curtis Dubowsky.

Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble at El Rio, Jan 10 2009

Make a Jack Curtis Dubowsky station, free, on Pandora!

Or on Rhapsody!

Upcoming events:

2-20-09 : Jack Curtis Dubowsky Ensemble at ATA. $6
Live music to experimental films including Jean Genet’s Chant D’Amour.

992 Valencia Street SF 94110 (415) 824-3890

Here's some pictures from the concert at El Rio on January 10, 2009.

Photos by Laurence Roberts.  

Jack Curtis Dubowsky: Roland Jupiter 6, Electric Bass, Glock, Percussion

Fred Morgan: Drums, Percussion