Introducing the first female signee to OVO Sound: Naomi Sharon.
In an Instagram post, Drake formally announced the signing. “I been waiting for this day for too long now where the world finally gets to digest the insane amount of work you have put in since we met,” Drake said. “My dear friend just dropped her single ‘Another Life’ on OVO SOUND.”
Sharon has been releasing music over the past few years, with highlights including “Daughter of the Sun” and “Hills.” It was also rumored that she was to contribute to Drake’s Certified Lover Boy album as well, but nothing really materialized.
Hear “Another Life” below.
Drake Reveals New OVO Sound Signee Naomi Sharon, Shares “Another Life” Single was last modified: January 20th, 2023 by Meka
David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars will receive a reggae makeover on a forthcoming tribute album titled Ziggy Stardub, courtesy of the Easy Star All-Stars collective.
Helmed by producer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist and Easy Star Records co-founder Michael Goldwasser, Ziggy Stardub will feature a wide range of guests, including Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson and Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid. It follows Easy Star All-Stars’ previous reggae takes on Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon, Radiohead’s OK Computer and the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
Lead single “Starman,” led by British vocalist Maxi Priest, can be heard below.
“I listened to Ziggy Stardust as a teenager but once we decided to do it as the tribute album, I listened to it like crazy,” Goldwasser told Rolling Stone. “I thought about elements from the original songs, the little details that would be cool to interpolate or just copy into the new versions because I want people to listen many times over and hear different things every time. David Bowie was a genius but in order to do what I do, it takes a certain level of craziness to execute every detail of every arrangement, and then keep track of the big picture.”
Goldwasser added that “Starman” was “the song most pivotal to the loose storyline of the original album,” and he knew it would require an adept vocalist. “The chorus of ‘Starman’ has this lift that really draws people in because it jumps an entire octave from the ‘star’ to ‘man,’” he explained. “We needed an accomplished singer who could do something like that. It’s not easy, and I suspected Maxi could pull that off, and, of course, he did.”
Easy Star All-Stars will release Ziggy Stardub on April 21. More details about the album are available on Bandcamp.
David Bowie Albums Ranked
David Bowie is not just rock’s greatest chameleon; he’s also one of music’s most imaginative conceptual artists.
Mysore/Mysuru: Sri Krishna Gana Sabha, Gokulam 3rd Stage, has organised a music competition on Jan. 29 (Sunday) from 10 am at its premises.
Events are Classical Music (Vocal only): Bhavageethe or Bhaktigeethe for those aged 6 to 10 years (Sub-Junior); 11 to 15 years (Junior) and 16 to 25 years (Senior).
Classical Music for Sub-Juniors — Devotional Song or Devaranama; For Juniors (11-15 years) — Keerthane composed by one of the Trinities — Thyagaraja or Deekshitar or Shyama Sastrigal (Duration: not more than 5 minutes); For Seniors (16-25 years) – Composition by any one of the Trinities with Raaga and Swaraprastara (not more than 10 minutes).
First prize winners will get Rs.500, Second – Rs. 400 and Third – Rs. 300 with a memento and certificate. All the participants will be given certificates and a memento besides consolation prizes for the deserving.
Special cash prize of Rs. 3,000 for the winner and Rs. 2,000 for Runner-up in Senior Classical Music (Vocal) will be given and their concert will be held on Jan.30 at 6 pm.
Those interested may register their names in the Temple Office from 9 am to 11 am and from 6 pm to 8 pm between Jan.20 and 27. For details call Ph: 2411148 or 2510495 or Mob:82965-42363 or 98807-07190. Prizes will be distributed on Jan. 30 at 6 pm. Winners along with other selected youngsters will exhibit their talents. The event is sponsored by Dr. N. Chandrashekar, Managing Trustee, Aditya Hospital, Gokulam, according to a press release from B.S. Sridhara Raje Urs, Sabha President and J. Mahesh Secretary.
As we sit in a Zamalek café, maestro Nader Abbassi’s mind is preoccupied with many commitments: two upcoming concerts, one featuring Egyptian soprano Fatma Said at the Grand Egyptian Museum (20 January), and the other with the Cairo Symphony Orchestra. They follow in the footsteps of a busy few weeks that recently included the Abdel-Wahab Symphonic project’s premiere in Riyadh and the Nutcracker ballet at the Cairo Opera, among others.
A musician who has been awarded numerous recognitions and whose name resonates with a large public, Abbassi is the force behind the United Philharmonic Orchestra, of which he is the founding director, and which he conducted during two grand globally broadcast national events in 2021: the Pharaohs Golden Parade and the reopening of the 3000-year-old Avenue of the Sphinxes in Luxor.
Of course, those huge concerts did not happen by chance. Abbassi’s history as a musician includes playing bassoon, singing, composing and conducting, generating enough momentum to keep his name almost permanently in the headlines. As we begin to talk, I discover that I am in the presence not only of an internationally renowned musician, but also of a captivating storyteller. He begins by taking me to his childhood marked by his first steps in the performing arts, a story that is extremely entertaining when told with his sense of humor, which reveals a lot about his boundless dedication to music and explains the formation of an artist we know today.
“As a child, during family gatherings, I would prepare a stage and set chairs for the audience. I would then take a broomstick and pretend it was a microphone for the children who, as I saw it, all had to participate. I would be the last one to take the stage,” Abbassi laughs, recalling how that final appearance got the most applause.
Many years later, he was conducting the orchestra with those same, now grown-up family members in the audience. “After the concert, my family members congratulated me, not without reminding me of those great times we had as kids and how I used to ‘torture them’ with our performances.” He swiftly adds, in a more serious tone, that one can recognise a musician from a very young age, especially when home performances take all sorts of creative formats.
Photo: Ahmed Hassan
Although Abbassi’s first performances featured the Arabic repertoire, there was a strong presence of Western music in his household. “My father was from Alexandria, educated in French schools and fond of Western music, especially musicals. He had a very European mind. My mother was originally from Fayoum and more steeped in Arab culture, yet she followed my dad’s ideals and music tastes.”
Stressing his father’s “modernity”, Abbassi says he followed his choices, experimenting with many instruments, at first with darbouka and keyboard. “I was around 14 years old, when a friend from the Higher Institute of Ballet encouraged me to take up music in a professional way and join the Cairo Conservatory,” an institution which at the time had many renowned foreign teachers.
Abbassi’s entry to conservatory was yet another saga of self-realisation. “I remember the first day… I walked through the corridors, hearing the voices of practicing singers and instrumentalists coming from the closed rooms. I was mesmerised. I didn’t feel there was anything odd about this. On the contrary, I recognised this as my life, my home.”
The maestro started his formal music education with bassoon (also called fagot). “The music professors at the Conservatory believed that my physicality – height, long fingers, etc – justified this choice. I was told ‘either bassoon, or bye bye’. It was awkward for me to hold the instrument and hear its deep sound. I wanted to play music, I wanted piano.” Abbassi incorporated composition into his studies, and that made the piano an important part of his course of study.
“Of course, I loved piano more, dedicating a lot of time to it, until my bassoon teacher, a strict Russian musician, brought me back to my senses. ‘Either you become the best at your main instrument, win the competitions, or you end up no one,’ he told me, making me study at least eight hours a day.”
Abbassi listened to his teacher and his dedication to bassoon paid off, eventually granting him the first bassoon player position at the Cairo Symphony Orchestra. While on that road, Abbassi’s interest in singing was yet to find its own path. “It was more imitating other singers, I’d say,” he explains, recalling how he always experimented with vocals, imitating the various textures of other singers. His talents were noticed by a voice teacher, Violette Makkar who invited him to vocalise lessons, only to discover his unique basso profondo, the lowest bass voice type and a unique timbre in the operatic repertoire. As his vocal lessons progressed, preparations for Verdi’s La Traviata were underway, and he was perfect for the role of Barone Douphol.
Photo: Ahmed Hassan
Though this encounter with singing on stage took place shortly before Abbassi left to continue his studies in Switzerland, it left an unforgettable mark on his formation, a fact that bore fruit many years later.
Over three years in Geneva, Abbasi established himself as a renowned bassoon player, joining numerous orchestras and becoming first bassoon at the Geneva Chamber Orchestra. Yet, as Egypt was calling him back to resume his obligations to work as a bassoon teacher at the Cairo Conservatory, Abbassi wanted to remain in Switzerland. “I want to sing,” he told one of the professors who, understandably, was not thrilled with the idea. While pointing to Abbassi’s lack of formal education in operatic singing, due to the rarity of his bass the teacher agreed to let the young man audition for the singing classes. A perfectionist by definition, Abbassi was bound to succeed. “Long story short, I stopped playing bassoon and began singing. In the following five years, I landed numerous roles at the Opera House in Zurich.”
Of course, when speaking of Abbassi’s life, nothing ever stays as it is. As his singing career began to flourish in Switzerland, the late Egyptian musicologist Samha El-Khouly (1925-2006) insisted that Abbassi should have a go at the Egyptian composing competition. And so he did. Between Dusk and Dawn, a symphonic poem inspired by the story of Raya and Sekina, brought him the first prize. When the news reached Switzerland, he was offered to expand the composition into a ballet, the recording of which he also conducted. “This was my first experience in conducting a big work, a challenge for which I took a few months conducting studies with a German conductor based in France,” he reveals. This led to an invitation to take the baton of the Cairo Symphony Orchestra in one of its concerts.
The push and pull involving Switzerland and Egypt, led to his home country offering Abbassi the position of a principal conductor of the Cairo Opera Orchestra performing opera and ballet works. “At first I was very reluctant, yet eventually I accepted the position in 2002, the year I conducted Verdi’s Aida, the mega production staged at the Pyramids in Giza and featuring numerous international singers.” Abbassi remained the principal conductor of Cairo Opera Orchestra until 2010, a role which in the last years overlapped with being in charge of the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra (2009-2012) too.
During his time as an opera conductor In Cairo, Abbassi’s baton led orchestras in countless works in Egypt and internationally, at the Marseille Opera House, Opéra de Bordeaux, Ireland, Russia, during the Glimmerglass Festival New York, in Greece and China, among others. The list includes operas such as Maria Golovine, Dialogues des Carmelites, Hamlet, Un Ballo in Maschera, La Belle Helene, countless takes on Aida, Carmen, La Traviata, La Bohème, Madama Butterfly, Barbe Bleue, and the musical Kiss Me Kate, to name but a few.
As with almost everything in Abbassi’s life, the musician says that he found himself conducting “by pure chance, and working with operas gives me a particular joy. Opera is a marvelous form of art. What helped me progress in it is simply my background as a singer. It is important for a conductor to understand the tiniest intricacies of a voice.” Indeed, it takes a skillful and experienced musician to understand the internal acoustics of a singer’s vocal apparatus, their internal resonance, and the covering that they use. Those details of which many audience members are not even aware, are in the mind of a conductor as he supports or even guides the singer through the many arias interlaced with mise-en-scene. “In my career, I lost my voice once. I had to go through a reeducation, a process which has additionally helped me to understand the many layers of voice, challenges and ways of overcoming them.”
Numerous Egyptian ballet dancers see Abbassi as the conductor of their choice, bringing us to his experience as a ballet composer. “The ballet story is a bit different. It relies on strong communication between the conductor and the dancers, their tempo and movement. I admire ballet too, and maybe this allowed me to find a special language with this art form.”
From bassoon and singing to composing and conducting, Abbassi’s multilayered experiences have only enriched his musical vision while allowing him to master many aspects of music. When asked what he loves the most, he takes a minute before saying, “Undeniably, I love opera. It is a full art. The operas have everything in them: music, words, singing, drama, the whole mise-en-scene… Yet, if the opera is not done properly, it pains me. However there are other musical forms that I appreciate a lot as well. Some works are wonderful as symphonic works, with all their phrasings and musical depths.”
As he plunges into the classical repertoire, structured by centuries of great Western composers, or touches on Arab repertoires, Abbassi never forgets the audience. He points to a concert in which he conducted Omar Khairat’s orchestra a decade ago. In the video that was shared by many YouTube users, shortly after Khairat’s solo on piano, Abbassi reintroduces the orchestra while turning to the audience and leading them to clap to the music. The concert and video saw mixed reactions, with some critics calling the maestro’s actions an unnecessary show and others applauding the interactive initiative. “I saw it as an opportunity,” the maestro comments. “This very concert and this video brought me closer to the public. I see it as a simple gesture that resonated with new listeners flocking to the concerts. It prompted me to think about tailoring the classical music concerts so they can resonate with the listeners, interlacing the heavier works with lighter compositions.” Here Abbassi reminds us of countless Western music compositions which are engraved in Egyptian listeners’ minds, often without them being aware of the fact. Numerous old Egyptian movies as well as countless animated movies use classical music in their soundtracks.
Following this concert, the very first he conducted with the Cairo Symphony Orchestra saw a high attendance with Abbassi’s name filling the halls. For regular music attendees, the figure of a conductor is not always well understood; the maestro simplifies it in a few sentences: “The conductor is simply a music director controlling the tempo, phrasings, dynamics. However the role of a conductor is to conduct, not to count. Even listeners who are least aware of those technical components are still fully aware when the maestro is musically honest. I always think about the musicians, the composer, but also about the listeners who need to feel their importance. We need to introduce listeners to music without terrifying them. This process begins with programming, through studies of the compositions, vision applied to them, to the honesty in presenting one’s thoughts at the hands of the orchestra.” Abbassi explains that when setting a programme, the audience is his first parameter. A concert presented to students will be very different to one performed for experienced classical music listeners, the audience coming to the Cairo Opera House differs from European listeners attending a summer concert in an open air setting for instance.
With this huge baggage of experience, thoughts and achievements, founding of the United Philharmonic Orchestra was a natural step in Abbassi’s musical development. The large ensemble has given a number of concerts since 2017, accompanying singers such as Fatma Said, Gala El Hadidi, Elhamy Amin in one concert, followed by The Three Egyptian Tenors concert (2018), performing music by Amar El Sheraie (2018), then a concert featuring the Lebanese soprano Majida El Roumi on several occasions included in Cairo Opera House (2018), in the mega concert at the Pyramids’ Sound and Light Theatre (2019) and at the Cairo Royal Al Qubba Palace (2021), all the way to the Pharaohs Golden Parade (April 2021), which celebrated the transport of mummies from the Egyptian Museum of Cairo in Tahrir Square to the National Museum of Egyptian Civilisation (NMEC) in Old Cairo. The orchestra also participated in the grand concert during the reopening of the 3000-year-old Avenue of the Sphinxes in Luxor (November 2021). The latter two events shed international light on the orchestra and Abbassi himself.
As the conductor explains, the United Philharmonic Orchestra is a melting pot of musicians from all walks of life, comprising those who work at the Cairo Symphony, Cairo Opera, Alexandria Opera Orchestras, Arabic Music Orchestra, in addition to independent formations. “It is united in terms of musicians and their generations, religions, musical genres and cultures, styles of performances,” Abbassi explains, adding that the orchestra allows him to perform on all occasions and out of every repertoire, be it Western classical, symphonic, operatic, Oriental, film music, or mixed compositions, often featuring unique instruments. “The orchestra also fills gaps separating many artists, musicians and singers, who otherwise keep competing with each another. In the United Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir they all stand for one cause, one concert, one performance.”
Music to the Pharaoh’s Golden Parade – one of Abbassi’s biggest sources of pride – was composed by an Egyptian composer, Hesham Nazih. The work included chants in the Ancient Egyptian language sung by an Egyptian soprano, Amira Selim, with lyrics of the hymn “A Reverence for Isis” taken from inscriptions on the walls of the Deir Al-Shelwit temple in Luxor. Other lyrics were taken from the Book of the Dead and the Pyramid Texts, topped with songs in Classical Arabic and Egyptian Arabic performed by Reham Abdel Hakim and Nesma Mahgoub, respectively.
“Nazih presented a truly great work. If you focus on music, you will find a lot of classical components fused with American-style grandiosity, very Star Wars-like. The choral part adds the power of Carmina Burana to old Egyptian lyrics. The Isis aria has an Egyptian scent yet if you listen well, you will find that its choral, symphonic music is not easy by all means.”
Abbassi underlines the joy he experienced while conducting the piece. What astonished him even more than the impact it made internationally was the way it resonated with locals who had never attended a large symphonic or choral event. “I met simple people who were humming the melodies drawn from the parade. What more can one wish for? The parade music is truly international, a term that cannot be limited to differences in languages or simple melodies interconnected in music. It is the depth and intelligent composition that created this cultural blend, one that speaks of the depth of our history.”
Abbassi’s baton in both the Golden Parade and reopening of the Avenue of the Sphinxes – with the latter also featuring several of his own original compositions – has opened many new doors to the conductor. One of the most recent great endeavors is the Abdel-Wahab Symphonic, a project that saw the light on 10 December at the grand Abu Bakr Salem Stage in Boulevard Riyadh City, followed by performances at the Cairo University concert hall. Performed by the United Philharmonic Orchestra, the concerts featured singers Reham Abdel-Hakim and Loai. The project presents works composed by Mohamed Abdel-Wahab (1902-1991), the prominent Egyptian singer, actor and composer – with a new arrangement for the big orchestra written by Ahmed El-Mougi, Amir Gado and Mohamed El-Ashy. “The musicians embroidered Abdel-Wahab’s compositions – many of which we did not have notations for – with a new musical concept, one that testifies to Abdel-Wahab’s progressive mind,” Abbassi says. The Abdel-Wahab Symphonic is the result of an idea presented to Abbassi by Abdel-Wahab’s grandchildren. As everyone involved hopes, the project will yet tour many European and Arab countries.
As we conclude our conversation, the maestro is about to begin rehearsals for the concert of the internationally renowned Egyptian soprano Fatma Said who will be the first female singer to perform at the new Grand Egyptian Museum on 20 January. Immediately after this concert, on 21 January, Abbassi will move to the Cairo Opera House to conduct the Cairo Symphony Orchestra in a concert including works by Rossini, Shostakovich and Liszt, and featuring solo violinist Salma Sorour. Abbassi will then return to the Cairo Symphony in April, yet even prior to that we will definitely see him in numerous other concerts, details of which will be revealed in a due time.
I realise that in our short time at the café, this great storyteller had to leave many musical tales untold. Whatever they are, they all contributed to Abbassi’s huge reservoir of experience, fed and shaped his passion. They all made of him the remarkable musician he is today. We are yet to attend many concerts during which the maestro’s unique musical journey will resonate in each music bar of his partitura.
*A version of this article appears in print in the 19 January, 2023 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly.
Daler Mehndi, Punjabi pop artist known for his groovy dance tunes, was the target of a spoof tweet on January 20 that stated Prince Harry featured him in his memoir ‘Spare’.
The post claimed that Prince Harry had said in his most recent memoir, Spare, that he had turned to the Indian musician in his darkest hours. Users had a field day responding to his message because they could not believe Daler had accepted a satirical piece as being genuine.
The Instagram post was captioned as“Prince Harry exposes music artists he listens to in new book ‘Spare’”.
After only one week on the market, Prince Harry’s memoir ‘Spare’ has sold over 3.2 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling memoirs of all time.
Unaware of the post’s satirical nature, Daler Mehndi uploaded a screenshot of it on Twitter with the caption, “I am grateful to the blessings of Guru Nanak, my parents, and my dad”. “I made a unique Pop music style”. “Dear Prince Harry: Thank you for your support of my music, and God bless you”.
Meanwhile, Daler is having a field day on Twitter since he believes the satirical tweet is genuine. While some people speculated on what Prince Harry might look like dancing to the rhythms of Bolo Tara Ra Ra and Daler’s other hits, others wondered if he was aware of the reality.
Daler Mehndi has contributed his voice to a number of popular Punjabi songs, including Dardi Rab Rab Kardi, Bolo Ta Ra Ra, and Ho Jayegi Balle Balle. Among his most renowned cinema songs are Na Na Na Re, Rang De Basanti, Dangal, Jiyo Re Baahubali, and Jagga Jiteya.
FAQs
1-Daler Mehndi was sentenced for what reason? The musician was imprisoned in Patiala after a court sentenced him to two years in prison on July 14, 2022 for unlawfully transferring individuals overseas disguised as members of his troupe.
2-Daler Mehndi and Mika Singh are brothers? Yes, Daler Mehndi and Mika singh are brothers.
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In March 2020, a church choir in Washington state hit the national news for spreading COVID-19 to more than 50 people, resulting in two deaths. That headline put a halt to choir practices across the country and temporarily derailed the St. Simons Sacred Music Festival after its inaugural recital.
“It hit the national news really quick: ‘Whatever you do, don’t sing,’” said Nathaniel Roper, Glynn Academy’s director of choral and orchestral activities and one of the founders of the sacred music festival.
Because of the event, he was unable actually have anyone sing in his program at Glynn Academy for a year and a half, instead having to teach students everything but the actual practice. The festival, which is not affiliated with the school system, got put on ice for two years.
“This will be our third event. It started in 2018 and COVID knocked it out after that,” Roper said.
2022 marked the return of singing in his class — although he’s still rebuilding the program after many left the class in the interregnum — and the St. Simons Island Sacred Music Festival, at which the choir performed the world premiere of a new piece of sacred music — “To Sing Once More,” by Craig Courtney.
The Ropers — Nathaniel and his wife Amanda, who he credits for getting the festival off the ground — believe sacred music is a very powerful means of worshipping God, but it’s also particularly adept when it comes to engendering feelings of peace and community. That’s why they use donations from each event to commission a new piece of sacred music for the next festival. Each festival is also the world premiere of a brand-new piece of sacred music.
In 2018, that was “Awake, My Soul, Awake” by Elaine Hagenberg. This year’s piece is titled “Come, Walk With Me” by Z. Randall Stroope, Roper said.
“It’s gorgeous,” he says. “Dr. Stroope has been one of the world’s foremost composers for a long time. I’m familiar with a lot of his work, and it’s one of the best things I’ve heard in a long time. I’m really excited about this piece, especially coming out of this COVID cloud choirs have been coming out of.”
Amanda Roper adds that it’s not by accident that she and Nathaniel are familiar with Stroope. They both studied at the same time under Stroope at the University of Nebraska. Amanda performed in his concerts, and Nathaniel worked much more closely with him in an assistant role, but both studied his body of work extensively.
“Nathaniel’s entire degree was with Dr. Stroope specifically,” Amanda said. “… To me, it is exceptional we’re able to work with Dr. Stroope in this capacity because of our lifelong love of his music and the experience we had studying from him and helping him premiere several pieces while we were studying under his baton.”
If there’s one thing she hopes people take away from the event, it’s the unifying power of music — specifically choral music. It allows those who may not have proficiency in musical instruments to realize that they can make beautiful music regardless.
“The fact an accountant or a lawyer or a homemaker can all come together and be equally successful in this endeavor, it’s all-encompassing of folks in the community,” Amanda said. “I like to leave people with a sentiment that beauty and beautiful music can happen anywhere.”
One doesn’t have to participate, Amanda added. There are a variety of ways to contribute for more information, visit kappellmeisterproductions.com. Premiere performances are also available on the website after each festival, she said.
Every year, the festival further strengthens the community of musicians and church choirs in the Golden Isles, she added, either forging new connections or reinforcing established ones. As long as the community will continue to support the festival, it will continue in perpetuity, Nathaniel said. He and Amanda are committed to making it so.
Everyone involved is a volunteer, meaning the only costs associated with the concert come from equipment and venue expenses.
“It’s a festival choir. It’s an all-state chorus type thing but there’s not auditions for it,” he said. “It ends up being mostly church choir people. Everybody wears the garb from their church, but it’s not limited to that. Anyone from the community can be involved.”
This year’s concert will take place on Feb. 3 and 4 at St. Simons United Methodist Church. There’s no admission fee, but the church does ask for donations to cover the cost of the event and to commission the next year’s piece. For registration and event information, go to kappellmeisterproductions.com
The last 10 years or so have been boom times for catching up with Laraaji’s extraordinary new age/ambient music. Several labels have reissued his old classics and championed his newer output, while media coverage has been extensive and enlightening. It feels good for an overlooked master to get his due, belatedly as it may be.
Now, the Chicago-based reissue specialists Numero Group are poised to issue a four-album box set titled Segue to Infinity, which unearths Laraaji’s earliest recordings from around the time of his 1978 debut LP, Celestial Vibration (cut under his own name, Edward Larry Gordon). Remarkably, Laraaji’s music emerged fully formed and transporting from the very beginning. The eight sidelong tracks Numero Group collated here reveal his electrified, open-tuned zither and hammered dulcimer cascades in peak health—glistening, soaring, erasing tension, aligning chakras, stimulating neurons, unclogging sinuses, and making short-attention-spanned fools flee. It’s safe to say that you need it in your life.
In a 2017 Stranger article, I wrote of Celestial Vibration: “Whereas much new age music makes you look at your watch (or phone, as the case may be), wondering when something interesting or not teeth-rottingly sugary will happen, Laraaji unerringly ensnares you in a gossamer web of sonic purity, as if he’d put in weeks of rigorous research to pinpoint the most glorious timbres from his zither, keyboards, gongs, and kalimbas.” Segue to Infinity includes this album and expands upon its treasures with six previously unreleased epic outpourings of Laraaji’s exquisite aural tapestries. These works were manifested before Laraaji’s fateful chance meeting with Brian Eno in Manhattan’s Washington Square Park, where the former was playing his zither for spare change. Eno was so impressed that he enlisted Laraaji for his Ambient series, resulting in 1980’s Day of Radiance.
“Koto (Glimpse)” is a mere 1:48 teaser for its nearly 22-minute official version, but it’s enough to tantalize listeners who seek at least temporary peace in their bad-news-ravaged lives. The koto is a Japanese zither that generates spine-tingling timbres (in the right hands), vibrating lushly between a guitar and a harp. Played by a master such as Laraaji, they can produce some of the featheriest gravitas ever put to tape. With various studio effects applied, “Koto” ushers you into rarefied, hall-of-mirrors realms, helping you segue to infinity with ease.
Death Valley Girls, “Sunday” (Suicide Squeeze)
For the first six years of their existence, LA’s Death Valley Girls purveyed scathing garage-rock and Suzi Quatro-esque glam with true-believer monomania, with very few detours into mellower territory. Sure, bands that rock hard and heavy could fill the Grand Canyon, but Death Valley Girls did it with more conviction and skill than 93% of the pack.
The thing is, they’d taken that style as far as they could, and it was time for a paradigm shift. So, beginning with 2020’s Under the Spell of Joy, DVG loosened up a bit, psychedelicized to a degree, and broadened and added depth to their sonic palette (one inspiration was Ethiopian funk), and the changes did them good.
You can hear DVG—Bonnie Bloomgarden (vocals, organ), Larry Schemel (guitar), Rikki Styxx (drums), and Sammy Westervelt (bass, vocals)—inching further away from their garage-rock roots on their forthcoming album, Islands in the Sky (out February 24 via Seattle’s Suicide Squeeze label). “What Are the Odds” flirts with a fuzzy brand of bubblegum pop; “Journey to Dog Star” traffics in the sort of dark psychedelia that Echo & the Bunnymen took to the bank in the ’80s; “Watch the Sky” cruises elegantly down the Autobahn with krautrocking panache. The latter is DVG’s most cosmic moment.
The group’s expansive sound arises partially from auxiliary musicians Gabe Flores (sax), Mark Rains (percussion), Gregg Foreman (synth, Wurlitzer, Hammond organ), and backing vocalists Little Ghost, Pickle, and Kelsey R. And on “Sunday,” the second single from Islands in the Sky, they venture into gospel’s holy caverns and show they got soul to burn. Elevated by Foreman’s Hammond and Flores’s sax, Bloomgarden turns in a show- and time-stopping vocal performance, and the rave-up coda with the backing singers urging, “keep on movin’” perfectly caps off this thrilling, motivational anthem for Death Valley Girls. To quote the last song on Island, “it’s all really kind of amazing.”
After coming in from one of my woodland hikes recently, (and defrosting with hot chocolate), I realized that despite its challenges, winter has its supporters (ok, and its detractors) in music. Here are a few winter themes to listen to while, maybe, your body is wrapped in a thick wool blanket, and a cup of something warm is by your side.
The most famous winter music is probably the “Winter” concerto from Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons. As he did with the other three, Vivaldi wrote a sonnet describing the season, although it is still unclear whether the poems came before or after the music was written. When Etienne Roger published the scores in 1725, markings were included in the sonnets to indicate which part of the music correlated to which part of the sonnets.
L’Inverno(Winter) Op. 8, No. 4, in F minor
I. Allegro non molto
Frozen and trembling in the icy snow, In the severe blast of the horrible wind, As we run, we constantly stamp our feet, And our teeth chatter in the cold.
II. Largo
To spend happy and quiet days near the fire, While, outside, the rain soaks hundreds.
III. Allegro
We walk on the ice with slow steps, And tread carefully, for fear of falling. If we go quickly, we slip and crash and fall to the ground. Again we run on the ice, Until it cracks and opens. We hear, from closed doors, Sirocco, Boreas, and all the winds in battle. This is winter, but it, nonetheless, brings joy.
My favorite rendition of Vivaldi’s “Winter” (and all The Four Seasons) was recorded by violinist Gil Shaham with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.
Sound familiar? If you’ve been watching the Netflix series, “Wednesday,” based on the character Wednesday Addams (from The Addams Family), you heard “Winter” in Episode 3. The emotionless teenager with psychic powers plays it on her cello!
175 years later, Alexander Glazunov wrote the score to a ballet called The Seasons, scripted by the great Russian choreographer Marius Petipa. It was to be an allegorical ballet, with winter being described as “sleepy” before giving way to spring’s rebirth. It’s hard to think of winter as sleepy, and especially when the ballet dancers portray characters called “Frost,” “Hail,” “Ice,” and “Snow.” Here’s Yevgeny Svetlanov conducting the Philharmonia Orchestra.
The celebrated ballerina Anna Pavlova danced the role of “Frost” at the ballet’s premiere in February 1900. The entire Royal Court was in attendance at the Imperial Theatre of the Hermitage, despite having attended another ballet premiere there just three days earlier. Both were acclaimed by the Court.
It seems that snowflakes evoked little dancers in the air for other composers as well. For example, Jacques Offenbach was asked to write a ballet based on Jules Verne’s 1865 novel, From the Earth to the Moon. The fairy-opera (operas based on fairy tales) premiered in 1875 and featured an odd scene where the temperature of the moon drops to -50 degrees and snowflakes begin to dance. Here’s Neeme Järvi leading the Orchestra of the Swiss Romande.
And while Claude Debussy’s “Snow is Dancing,” from his 1908 Children’s Corner Suite, was not written as dance music, you understand what he’s describing. You can just picture a child looking out the nursery window at falling snow and imagining the snow is dancing. It’s played here by Seong-Jin Cho.
While some composers saw winter snowflakes as inspiration, Sergei Prokofiev thought winter was well-represented by a sleigh ride. “Troika,” about a common Russian 3-horse sleigh, was written originally as part of a score for the 1934 movie Lieutenant Kijé. It’s often heard as a stand-alone piece in Christmas holiday concerts. Antal Doráti conducts the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra.
Staying with wintry movie music now, there seems to be some confusion as to which came first: a 1947 movie score, or a symphony inspired by the movie’s story. Ralph Vaughan Williams was asked to write the score for Scott of the Antarctic. His wife Ursula later wrote that he was immediately so taken with the epic of the ill-fated expedition that he envisioned writing a symphony which would be worked into the movie score. Whichever came first, the Sinfonia Antartica’s third movement, subtitled “Landscape,” allows the listener to picture what Ursula described as “great white landscapes, ice floes, the whales and penguins, bitter winds and Nature’s bleak serenity…” André Previn conducts the London Symphony Orchestra.
Vaughan Williams’s Symphony No. 7, Sinfonia Antartica, is a five-movement symphony that ends with the difficult final words written by a dying Robert Scott: “I do not regret this journey; we took risks, we knew we took them, things have come out against us, therefore we have no cause for complaint.”
Vaughan Williams’s Antartica inspired another “Antarctica” 50 years later. In 1997 the British Antarctic Survey commissioned Peter Maxwell Davies to write a new piece to honor the 50th anniversary of Vaughan Williams’s score. Davies, a known conservationist, agreed to the commission, and to the requirement that he travel to Antarctica before composing. He spent three weeks there, which also inspired a book based on his diary, Notes from a Cold Climate. Unlike other symphonies with distinct movements, Davies’s Symphony No. 8, Antarctic, is a single movement with five sections, his way of paying homage to Vaughan Williams’ piece.
This blog post began with a sonnet about winter, so I think it’s appropriate to end with another winter poem from one of my favorite American poets, who coincidentally has a last name that fits with the theme! Robert Frost wrote “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” in 1922 at his home in Vermont. In 1959 Randall Thompson was commissioned by the town of Amherst, Massachusetts, to write music for the town’s bicentennial that year. Thompson chose to set seven of Frost’s poems in a collection he titled Frostiana. Here’s the Turtle Creek Chorale with the Dallas Wind Symphony.
These are just eight different views of winter, (out of 34 that I’ve collected so far), but a tidy little collection to start you on your winter’s journey. And I’ll end this with one of my favorite quotes about the season: “Welcome winter. Your late dawns and chilled breath make me lazy, but I love you nonetheless.” ~Terri Guillemets
CODA: How about a fun mashup to put a smile on during this season of chills and icy spills? Vivaldi’s “Winter” woven in with Disney’s “Let It Go” from . . . Frozen. Of course!
Whitney Miller always starts her day with a brisk walk and a cup of coffee.
“And then I’m off to the races,” Miller, 33, tells PEOPLE. “It’s been like that since I was a kid. I was just always wanting to try new things and experience new things and just challenge myself constantly. I’m not going to lie, it gets tiring sometimes!” She laughs. “But at the end of the day, I really just like chasing fun and happiness.”
It’s this go-getter attitude that has taken the tough Texan far throughout her life, from being crowned Miss USA in 2012 to becoming a kickboxing commentator and MMA fighter, to most recently serving as a popular podcast host. But now, Miller says she is ready to start working on making her country music dreams come true with the release of her new single “15 Minutes of Fame,” premiering exclusively on PEOPLE.
“This is my freedom song,” she says of the song she wrote alongside Kelly Sidel, Hailey VerHaalen, and Chelsey Satterlee. “It spurred from one of my biggest heartbreaks that I went through a couple years ago that was extremely abrupt and out of nowhere. Instead of going through my emotions in a healthy way, I just pretended everything was OK. And now, two and a half years later, I still have some of that pain. But now, I get out that anger through my lyrics.”
However, there was a time that Miller fell silent.
“When I was 10 years old, someone really close to me told me that I couldn’t sing,” remembers Miller, who released her first single “Diamond Country” last year. “I took that to heart, so much so that it actually became like a phobia. I could not sing. So basically, I wouldn’t sing in front of people at all. It was my biggest fear.”
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In fact, Miller says she once believed that the off-handed remark would forever keep her from working up the courage to pursue her ultimate dream of a country music career.
“I always thought to myself, ‘Whitney, you didn’t do the one thing that you wanted to do,'” Miller remembers. “I thought maybe singing would go away, but it never did. It finally got to this point where it was too excruciating to hold it in. I finally just went for it.”
In 2020, Miller walked into the Orb Recording Studio in Austin, Texas and finally allowed her voice to be heard. And when that very voice was heard by the owner of the studio, he encouraged her to follow her dream.
“And now I just keep saying ‘yes’ to it,” says Miller, who listens to the likes of fellow country music firecrackers Elle King and Gretchen Wilson not only for inspiration, but also guidance. “It’s been wild to watch how everything has been unfolding, but I could not be happier, honestly.”
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The former beauty queen says she is especially happy to have the chance to record her own distinctive brand of country music.
“I just have country music running through my veins,” she says with a laugh. “I’d probably be kicked out of my family if I was doing anything else!”
Country music also serves as the genre that, Miller reveals, allows her to say many of the things she wouldn’t dare say out loud.
“Music has let me say the things that I was too afraid to say,” she concludes. “When I see other musicians putting their heart and soul into something, I think it really gives me permission to say, you know what, let’s go for it. Don’t hold yourself back. Put your real truth in that song and see what happens.”
She laughs, then adds: “I feel like I spent far too much time giving a s—.”
