Klarinet Archive - Posting 000048.txt from 2007/04

From: "Rommel John Miller" <RommelJMiller@-----.net>
Subj: RE: [kl] Bad joke time
Date: Sat, 07 Apr 2007 00:21:44 -0400

"stockhausen" -- that's cute.

But this obsession with the new and up-to-date is what is wrong and what has
ruined entertainment I think and feel. Look at when entertainment has gone,
and especially what movies and television (and the music in them) have
evolved into. In the genres of Action and horror it is just one trying to
out-do and top the previous blockbuster, and the same is true of Sci-fi.
And look at composers like John Williams who at one time felt that they were
less than "gods" if the score they produced for a film wasn't as great or
greater than the score to the previous film or that of the original "Star
Wars."

We have evolved to a point where music has evolved into redundancy and
borrowing themes and coda from other works is practically given in new
compositions. Look at a recent work premiered by the Baltimore Symphony and
written by post-modern composer Richard Danielpour. It was entitled "Rocking
the Cradle" and had the elements of a Mahler symphony and clearly borrowed
freely from Ravel and Bernstein, and as with all three it was cacophonous,
but it had moments of tonal originality as well.

But how on earth can such a work be transposed for solo piano to be studied
by an up and coming student? Or say, how might the piece be transposed so
that one of us clarinetists might play all or part of it? For all intents
and purposes, without serious reworking, it can't be done.

Whereas, a Mozart piece, or a Chopin piece, Brahms, Beethoven, and anyone up
to and including really Ravel, Poulenc and Satie can be transposed easily to
piano and to other instruments.

But let's look at the "sticks in the mud" who nay-sayed vaudeville into the
dust, and who put a lot of musicians out of work. Vaudeville thrived on the
old material, and added fresh along the way, but people love the old shtick.
Even when a comedian does his routine, the crowd isn't there to hear new
stuff, but rather they want to hear the old, as in Andy Kaufmann's "Latka"
or what he did with "Mighty Mouse" no one understood, got or appreciated
the wrestling with women shtick or even Tony Clifton ruse he and Bob Schumda
did.

The last thing I want to say is this: There is a place for the old
"standards" as there is for the new stuff, but we don't have to rag one
another because we are tired of hearing the old stuff. So what? So our
orchestra or band or symphony wants to play an old polka or standard from
way back? You gonna walk out on the gig back you're sick of that piece?
Nah, you play it, because you know you aren't playing it for YOU, you are
playing it to make other people HAPPY.

And sometimes these silly little jokes need re-telling, just like when I
found them on the Musicians Union Website. I laughed my gut out on some of
them, especially some of the Oboe and Banjo jokes, and there is no harm in
laughing, some say its therapeutic.

We should just try to lighten up a little. And not take ourselves all that
seriously. After all concrete and marble pedestals have been known to crack
and fall apart. Look at Ancient Greece and Rome for crying out loud. And
even Terra Firma has been know to open up and swallow houses and other
things sometimes too. Entropy gets us all.

Rommel John Miller
308 Dale Avenue
Baltimore, MD 21206-1219
410-668-4784
410-967-8994
DoctorX@-----.net
RommelJMiller@-----.net

Clarinetist, Saxiphonist and Pianist
Actor and Magician
Contact me for more information

-----Original Message-----
From: Glenn Kantor [mailto:klarinet@-----.net]
Sent: Friday, April 06, 2007 8:14 PM
To: klarinet@-----.org
Subject: Re: [kl] Bad joke time

Now that's more like it... : ^ }

----- Original Message -----
From: "Kent Krive" <k.krive@-----.net>
To: <klarinet@-----.org>
Sent: Friday, April 06, 2007 7:52 PM
Subject: Re: [kl] Bad joke time

> How about:
>
> 'Have you heard any Stockhausen?' Sir Thomas Beecham was asked. 'No.' he
> replied, 'but I have trodden in some.'
>
> Kent
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Glenn Kantor" <klarinet@-----.net>
> To: <klarinet@-----.org>
> Sent: Friday, April 06, 2007 6:19 PM
> Subject: Re: [kl] Bad joke time
>
>
>> Tim,
>>
>> I'm far from grumpy - in fact, if jokes are to be told I'm the first one
>> volunteering.
>>
>> The problem is, that EVERY TIME some one sends by email or attempts to
>> tell a "musician" joke, all we get are the SAME seventy-five one-liners
>> which by now have not only become tiresome, but rather downright
>> annoying. The teller, of course thinks we've all been living in caves for

>> the past century and have never encountered these before.
>>
>> Your recent "discoveries" of the latest and funniest are hardly that
>>
>> Music jokes? I love them and enjoy a great laugh - but please find some
>> jokes/stories/puns that are new, witty, or at least written within the
>> past decade.
>>
>> Not a lot to ask for.
>>
>>
>> Glenn Kantor (GBK)
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Tim Roberts" <timr@-----.com>
>> To: <klarinet@-----.org>
>> Sent: Friday, April 06, 2007 5:43 PM
>> Subject: Re: [kl] Bad joke time
>>
>>
>>> On Fri, 06 Apr 2007 13:26:04 -0400 Glenn Kantor <klarinet@-----.net>
>>> ranted:
>>>> Memo: To all would be clarinetist "comedians" who think they've
>>>> suddenly
>>>> encountered a clever "joke"...
>>>>
>>>> You haven't.
>>>>
>>>> These SAME instrumental jokes have been traveling around the internet
>>>> ad
>>>> nauseum and are listed on dozens of web sites.
>>>>
>>>> Your "discoveries" of witty material is not as revolutionary as you may
>>>> think.
>>>>
>>>> A better, more worthwhile endeavor - find an original one that hasn't
>>>> been
>>>> traveling the vaudeville circuits for the past 40 years.
>>>>
>>>> End of rant - Now back to your regularly scheduled program...
>>>>
>>>> Glenn Kantor (GBK)
>>>
>>> Oh, come on, Glenn. Nobody said these were new, or original, or
>>> revolutionary. If we can't pause for 5 minutes every once in a while
>>> and wade through a half a dozen "musician joke" messages without
>>> reaching for the grumpy stick, then perhaps we should take our wrinkled
>>> old sourpuss faces back to the rocking chairs and yell at the kids
>>> playing ball in the street.
>>>
>>> --
>>> Tim Roberts, timr@-----.com
>>> Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.
>>>
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>

------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------