Since I got back from New York, I’ve been listening to Piano and String Quartet by Morton Feldman. It’s been like coming home. When I first listened to Feldman back in the summer of 1999, it was transformative - all that stillness that was still beautiful and evocative and completely gripping - but somehow I’ve gone pretty much from then until now with just one CD of his music. (that I could get rich off of if I decided to sell it?????)

I found this Feldman quotation about the nature of his super-long pieces:

As soon as you leave the 20-25 minute piece behind, in a one-movement work, different problems arise. Up to one hour you think about form, but after an hour and a half it’s scale.

Piano and String Quartet is only an hour and twenty minutes, so it doesn’t quite reach the proportions he’s talking about, but it has such form. It’s a microscopic form, a form of gestures. (more…)

I neither endorse nor repudiate Mr. f.m’s music. It’s an interesting idea - pop music with string quartet backing instead of electric bass. I’m not a fan of his approach to Blondie (too cold and scientific), but his original music sounds pretty neat, and sometimes has some really nifty, crunchy harmonies.

But this guy is not entirely unrelated to my post about post-rock.

But am I the guy on the couch, or the strange man with a French horn head?