So. I'm capturing James' journal again & editing it, on account of the MEAN & BITCHY post he made recently.

Feel free to bombard him with hate mail if he does it again.

This is a meme, which I found on Idealisme's journal; to pass on the meme, if I understand correctly, you leave a comment, and I give you a letter. You then repost this on your own journal page. Presumably they needn't be songs as such; Symphonies or concerti or whatever probably work just as well. And this was originally five pieces, not my four, but I don't have a fifth that I know (or like) well enough to merit being put up here as an example of what I listen to.

I suspect V will be quite difficult. I may have to open up my media library and look through it.

Steve Reich: Vermont Counterpoint

Perhaps not his finest piece? It's been a while since I've listened to it; I mainly only remember being quite unimpressed by the fact that it's normally played on a MIDI marimba (or rather, a number of them, recorded over each other) because the sustain on a normal marimba is too long. But I think I liked it, all this notwithstanding.

Slipknot: Vermillion and Vermillion, Pt. 2

Slipknot? Yes indeed. I, when younger, listened to their second album (Iowa), and didn't like it, despite wanting to. But when their third album, Vol. 3: The Subliminal Verses was released, I bought it straight away. Allured by the promise of fast guitar solos, I think. But whatever my motives for pushing my twenty euro across the counter, the album is often superb; and the latter of the above songs is acoustic! The songs are wonderfully dark and heavy. Really fantastic.

Dream Theater: Voices

(Does this count? It's arguably the second part of the tripartite 'A Mind Beside Itself.') I used to love this song when I was smaller. John Petrucci's guitar solo exhibits perhaps the finest use of a wah pedal I've ever heard - and Petrucci's guitar playing often lacks that sort of finesse. I started trying to arrange it for string quartet one time. Nothing happening.

Steve Vai: Voodoo Acid

Anyone who groups Vai alongside Yngwie Malmsteem; who regards him as an amusical wanker; needs to listen to this bizarre song. I think he tries to make the guitar talk (or squeak or cry or something) a few times, but I don't think there's even a solo. ...Well, maybe a small one.

The end of Metal Gear Solid 4 is awful. Absolutely awful. It just goes on, and on. The writer can't finish it, he can't keep the plot simple enough to fit in your mind, and the human relations and all that is riddled with clichés, unconvincing, and trite. One of my housemates was playing it, so I saw the last three hours (almost entirely conclusion/epilogue/debriefing) of it one day.

I was thus very pleasantly surprised by the ending to Grand Theft Auto IV. This game is absolutely massive; the characters are competently drawn; the plot is interesting. But most of all, I was impressed by the ending. It was bloody amazing, so much so that it left me feeling that there was a minor masterpiece in there. That's probably an exaggeration, but you get the idea.

-James Camien

I got my BA results yesterday. I got a double first, and am correspondingly pleased.

( Results' breakdown and explanation. )

(For non-Irishfolk - The EU wants to update its constitution, because its current constitution is the same as it was when the EU was created forty years ago, which then was comprised of about a third of the countries it now is, and the nature of these countries was rather different to the nature of the countries now. But this 'Lisbon treaty,' as the change is called, if accepted will involve a change to the Irish constitution (a very small change, as it happens; the change is to allow the Lisbon treaty to take effect), and every change to the Irish constitution must be agreed upon by popular vote; so today, there is a referendum. Although it is common-sense that the constitution of a body such as the EU must be updated when its make-up is substantially changed, a lot of Irish people are unhappy with the particular changes that are involved. As such, whether or not the treaty will be accepted is something of a toss-of-the-coin.)

I know almost nothing of the particulars of the Lisbon treaty. Although I am inclined to one side at the moment, I know that, given a couple hours to sit down with it, or the impartial guide we've all been given in the post, or with some newspapers, etc., I would change my mind, probably five times over. I have not, despite the best efforts of the government, Libertas, and the media to make life easy for me, taken the time to inform myself about the treaty. If I were to vote, I would be voting out of what I've managed to glean from rhetoric and soundbites; I would be voting by what 'seems' right; I would be voting from an emotional response to the polemic of advocates of either side. I do not feel that I would be voting; I would be expressing the opinion of the person who is the best orator, and who has been the most recent to shout his or her case at me. Such does not give me an informed opinion, such that I ought to change the balance of the outcome of the referendum.

The roots of democracy, if my history is right, is interesting. It started, of course, in Athens. There, the franchise was anything but universal: only Athens-born male landowners over the age of thirty could vote. When democracy became popular in the West a few thousand years later, the franchise had a similarly narrow scope. I don't want to defend this, or even many of its justifying reasons, but one reason I do want to defend, and lament that it is lost.

The few people that did have the vote then were, at least ostensibly, well-educated; moreover, they were deemed to have the time to educate themselves on political matters. Whether or not this was actually the case is probably controversial but beside my point in any case; the point is that democracy was legitimated by the belief that the ruling demos was not a rabble, voting how they had been made to vote through emotional manipulation; they were a thoughtful, educated and rational demos, who voted, not only with a good knowledge of the issues involved, but of the broader theoretical and philosophical issues that went into the arguments they were hearing from various advocates. I think that this is admirable. To be sure, I still prefer universal democracy, because it carries with it the implicit recognition of every person as of equal worth; and our right to vote is surely an honour and a hard-won privilege; but it doesn't follow from that that we should always use it. We should recognise that sometimes, we are the mob whose rule political philosophers since Plato have rightly feared; and if we share that fear, as certainly I do, it is absurd to help bring it closer to reality by (for all we know) voting it in!

Certainly, we should make the effort to educate ourselves in matters on which we have the privilege to vote; but if, for lack of interest, competence or time, we cannot or will not educate ourselves, then we should know when to be silent. When we do not know how to vote for lack of information, then perhaps spoiling our vote may be in order; but in this instance, at least, we can hardly complain about that. To put all this in another way, with rights come responsibilities; and with the right to vote comes the responsibility to use your vote wisely and - well, responsibly. If you neglect your responsibilities - as I have done - the only decent thing to do is to waive your right.

I am an awful elitist - the best form of democracy seems to me to be weighted universal voting. Every man, woman and child gets a vote, but the well-educated get a disproportionate share of the vote. And this is appalling and all the rest of it; but at least I can't be accused of hypocrisy.

-James Camien

Today, I drank potato.

I saw Bobby McFerrin yesterday. This is the second time I've seen him (last time was around this time last year in the Barbican in London), and I can't tell you enough how absolutely stunningly amazing it was. The tickets cost €65 (second most expensive in the house), and they were actually worth every penny, and I would've paid €100 and still say that I got my money's worth out of it. For some sense of magnitude; a normal concert is between €20 and €30. (This concert would probably've been about $100-$150, for my American friends.)

It's hard to say how it was so amazing - I can say how it was completely improvised, apart from the solo rendition of Bach's 'Air on a G String' (not that Bach ever gave it that name) and when he got the audience to sing the melody to Gounod's 'Ave Maria,' while he sang Bach's arpeggios underneath it - I can say how he got a dancer up from the audience, and she sang to him singing, and he sang to her dancing - or how he got an impromptu choir up from the audience - how he brought two tradtional Irish musicians with him as surprise guests and improvised in a traditional Irish idiom with them - how some of his music was extraordinarily beautiful and delicate and immensely alive - how he started singing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" to finish his concert, but then got carried away, and very quickly went through the entire 'Wizard of Oz,' finishing by throwing a glass of water on himself and melting into the floor of the stage - but I can say all this, and completely fail to communicate how it is that Bobby McFerrin, to me at least, is the most superb musician alive, and that his shows are not to be missed at any cost, so long as you physically have the money in your pocket. He reminds us what it is that makes us love music, what it is that makes music so unspeakably enriching. I implore you all to see him next time he's performing in your or an adjacent country.

--

After that concert, a very nice Polish girl accosted me in the lobby. We talked for about five, perhaps ten, minutes, and then, because I suspected that she was interested me for potentially romantic reasons, I legged it as politely as I could. If, in the off-chance said Polish girl comes to this site - rather unlikely, to put it mildly, as she doesn't have any personal information about me at all, not even my name - then I have a girlfriend, so I'm not interested, but I'm regretting running off so hastily now, because perhaps you just wanted to make a friend, and you do seem interesting, and I'd quite like you as a friend.

--

I take no responsibility for the last few posts, and am probably as confused as you. It was loving vandalism on Kate's part. May it never end. Apparently, they're all birds, and so stand for the B of BA. Nothing stood out at her as an expansion of the 'A', and I hereby issue an official request: Go on... Go on!... You do such superb vandalism.

--

Dinner beckons. Toodles.

-James

Hoorah for James!

At the risk of being pointless, I want to point out that I have just completed the first of my summer exams. I have three more, after which I will have completed by BA degree, and after which I will never have to do another exam ever (excepting, perhaps, first-aid exams, or MA exams if I don't get a research postgrad).

That's really, really bizarre.

Hello, new kitten!

James took this, ergo James is responsible for it. Honest.

James, learn to work a camera.

Has anyone ever read East of Eden? I need some extra opinions on the ending, because I don't know if I fully buy the critics' reviews...

I have to make something up, though. Something with a bit of substance ( - balls, if you will - ), and of a wholesome length, like Sunday's simply astonishing breakfast (you have no idea).

But I have an idea (so I do)! I can at the same time give something of a tip of the hat to another friend, whom I love dearly; and furthermore, to music - and enough said on my opinion of that.

So: on we go.

What do you think (yes, you. I want your opinion in one of the comments) will survive to the Western canon from the twentieth century, or perhaps, if you want more of a challenge, what will survive of living musicians' music?

I think that, of classical/art/serious music, very very little will survive. I think the sort of serial atonality that is so prevalent these days - yes, Andrew, even Webern, but also virtually every Irish composer I know (John Buckley and especially Martin O'Leary being notable exceptions), and even world-famous composers such as James MacMillan, Messaien, Stockhausen, Boulez - is somehow opposed to what we might call human nature, which, in aesthetics, is important. Schoenberg recognised this, I might add: the ear necessarily hears things in terms of the harmonic series, tonal structures, and the whole panoply that has been drilled into our heads since our mothers sang soothing melodies at us in the cradle, or earlier; not to write music with this in mind is not to write music for humans; the music becomes a hobby, akin to making a toy train set. (Schoenberg wrote, of course, with his observations in mind, but whether his music is as tonal as he thought it is a matter of debate.)

Some of you may at this point observe that a lot of art music has not, in fact, abandoned tonality, and cite Steve Reich and Philip Glass as cases in point. And I agree, and think that they'll be remembered. However - and forgive the muddle of my thoughts - there's something missing from them too. Perhaps it's that they're so repetitive. One can only listen to so much Glass before you start feeling murderous towards minor thirds. He, then, will be remembered for, say, Koyaanisqatsi, and Einstein on the Beach, but little else.

But so far, so much pessism - what will survive from this genre? Which composers? I might bet on those such as Osvaldo Golijov, Shostakovich and Stravinsky; I might even bet on the two Irish composers I've mentioned above; and I cannot over-recommend Abel Carlevaro, who might turn out to be the finest guitar composer ever to have lived (known mainly as a teacher, but then, so was Bach in his lifetime - and I do not apologise for the comparison). All these composers write music, which, while often devoid of a key, is nonetheless tonal, and their music has a beauty which is immediate and overwhelming. Atonality, I contest, cannot do this - atonal chords are often stunningly beautiful, but they all seem to occupy a bleak soundworld, and have a very hard time portraying joy or happiness or anything innocent like that. For that, we need triads. Atonality also has a harder time creating a really captivating sense of harmonic movement - a consequence of them all occupying, broadly speaking, the same expressive soundworld.

I'm not advocating a return to tonality, mind you - nothing so simple. But I think that there is a lot of fine music yet to be written in C major, and the fundamental principles I have already mentioned (harmonic series, etc.), must not be forgotten, or hidden beyond recognition out of a paralyzing fear of pastiche. We can incorporate rich atonal chords quite easily into a structure, once we remember that tonality is not the accepted chord progressions of mediocre eighteenth-century composers, but something much more complicated, immediate, and profound.

The canon aside, I feel like classical music is dead. We can all point out wonderful composers, but I feel like there's too much artistic arrogance, too much Ivory Tower-detachment, too little knowledge of, and too much thinking about, what music should be. (This will become clear in the next paragraph.) Like Hegel said, when the philosophy of art is flourishing, art is not.

So: what I think will really survive is popular music. The Beatles, of course; and Queen, and Miles Davis; and I adore many other artists, such as Steve Vai, King Crimson, Iron and Wine, and Radiohead. And even artists that aren't "great" like these are, for example Dream Theater, or Metallica, or most of big band jazz - they all do what art music too often doesn't, and appeal to your gut, and make you bop your head and forget yourself. If King Crimson is Reich, who is Metallica? I think there's a gap - poor pop errs on the side of banality, poor art on the side of abstruseness. Which side would you have your failures fall? the side of the former - youthful foolishness? or the side of the latter - death? And those who are really superb, are as far as I am concerned, far better than such as Stockhausen; and are better to be compared to Haydn and sometimes even Bach. I'm listening to OK Computer now, and I'm responding to it in an entirely immediate and passionate way; I can barely think of a single contemporary composer to whom I would react in a like manner.

Oh; I also think that history will reserve a place for Andrew Lloyd Webber on the same dinner table as it has preserved for Puccini. :)

This is his 'artistic profile pose', apparently.