Reviews of Two Books on Music: "Music After the Fall" by Tim Rutherford-Johnson, and "From a Broken Bottle Traces of Perfume Still Emanate" by Nathaniel Mackey

I found these two books in the public library and had a lot of time to read them during the coronavirus pandemic. They are both on the topic of experimental music, though experimental in different ways, and the books themselves are quite different. (I also left both of these reviews on the library website.)

"Music After the Fall" by Tim Rutherford-Johnson There has been a change in the zeitgeist of popular music recently. When I was in high school in the 1970’s any music older than the Beatles was taboo (and any newer music that wasn’t rock was equally taboo). All that has changed. With the advent of hip-hop and its sampling and use of the turntable as an instrument, older music is available (and often re-purposed), and kids today are as likely to listen to Led Zeppelin and even Glen Miller as they are to Drake. (My parents’ or grandparents’ music – unthinkable to my generation!) What Mr. Rutherford-Johnson has done in this book is chronicle that same change of culture in the (previously academic) world of contemporary classical music since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Once secluded in the proverbial ivory tower with mostly atonal compositions that could be understood on their own (as music) but seldom were given a chance to be so, “modern” classical has entered (or perhaps infiltrated) the commercial music scene. The borders are porous now. What began with various forms of “tonal” minimalism and ECM’s groundbreaking Arvo Pärt recordings in the 1980’s has continued to the present. The author presents all of the music’s multiple facets (and there are many!) without any preconceptions about what is “commercial” or “academic”. Likewise, he withholds judgement about the integrity of such a blurring (given the hostility of the classical establishment to “pop” music through much of the 20th century). All major movements and trends are covered, including some that were probably invented by the author to classify or at least investigate works that previously seemed orphaned in their own world. Included are Steve Reich’s “Different Trains”, George Rochberg’s Third String Quartet (one of my favorites!), Turnage’s operas, the Wandelweiser Collective (new to me but I’m finding it fascinating), Luigi Nono’s “La Lontonana…” (another one of my favorites), Pamela Z’s “Gaijin”, Ali-Zadeh’s “Mugam Sayagi”, Merzbow, crossovers with electronica, ultra-long pieces like “Longplayer”, “classical” deconstructions of other material such as Isabel Mundry’s “Dufay Bearbeitungen” and Michael Finnissy’s “English Country Tunes”, experimental pieces with videos (music/cinema mashups?) and too many more to list here. The playlist at the end is long enough to keep one listening for months, and (since I haven’t heard ¾ of this material) I’m going to be doing just that.

"From a Broken Bottle Traces of Perfume Still Emanate" by Nathaniel Mackey This collection of fictional letters forms not so much a novel as a vast discussion on the subtleties and usage of language. Concepts are bandied about, words (and even characters' names) become puns (i.e. Penguin, a character, becomes Pen, then Penny, then E Po Pen, then King Pen, with lengthy discussions on the ramifications of each). Likewise, the characters themselves morph and mutate into new forms. Penguin and Penny are originally different people; the narrator "N." may also be Jared Bottle (the "broken bottle" of the title), who may also be Djbot Baghostus, who may also be (again) E Po Pen. All of this is tied together by the occasional third-person narration in the "Creaking of the Word" sections. Ostensibly the "story", what there is of it, is about musicians playing in a free-jazz band, the sessions of which cause surrealism (or at least "magic realism") to break into reality; but the more one reads, the more one realizes that this "story" may all be fragments of a dream (and a dream about language as much as about music). The surrealism may be the setting. As if to emphasize this, two characters remain in the dreams of the others -- at the same time. Perhaps the author is saying that reality and dream-states are indistinguishable while someone is experiencing them. At any rate, it's fascinating stuff; and Mr. Mackey's knowledge of jazz (and other music) is encyclopedic. Not an easy read by any means, but fun to explore.