On Mar 30, 2006, at 8:59 AM, Andrew Stiller wrote:
Chuck Israels noted the poor quality of songbooks post 1960 (I
mistakenly deleted his posting so I can't quote it).
I realize that he was talking about recent publications of old
standards, not of recent music,
Yes, that's what I meant, but even some old ones vary in quality.
I've heard pretty poor piano accompaniments to Cole Porter songs used
by Ben Heppner's accompanist (for one example). I'm all for people
with trained voices singing popular songs, as long as the rendition
at least approaches the accepted standards set by the better
performers of that material, just as I'm happy that Rufus Wainwright
sings L'Invitation au Voyage. (Not the best I've heard, of course,
but pretty decent, and it introduces his audience to that wonderful
song at what I consider to be an acceptable, and certainly heartfelt,
level.) I just don't enjoy ignorant performances - where "classical"
singers go slumming. Ugh!
I'm always surprised that people who are supposedly trained in the
nuances of interpretation can be so far off that it's embarrassing
when they sing popular material. The result sounds as if they've
either never heard it, or that they mistakenly believe they are
elevating the material by performing it in grossly pretentious and
bizarre ways. When I hear that kind of thing, it casts doubt, in my
mind, on the integrity of all of their other work. Makes me think
they have no more understanding of the stuff they normally perform
than they do of the pop stuff.
End of OT rant.
but I thought it would be worth mentioning that piano-vocal
publications of rock music, of which I have many, vary tremendously
in quality, and some of them are very good. The best, not
surprisingly, tend to be those in which the original accompaniment
is keyboard-based: The Doors, for example, and Joni Mitchell.
Good to know this.
Chuck
Andrew Stiller
Kallisti Music Press
http://home.netcom.com/~kallisti/
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Chuck Israels
230 North Garden Terrace
Bellingham, WA 98225-5836
phone (360) 671-3402
fax (360) 676-6055
www.chuckisraels.com
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