If you like running… and running to music, you’re in for a treat. CIMB is bringing back The Music Run after a three-year hiatus, and it will take place on Saturday, 3 December 2022 at Technology Park Malaysia, Bukit Jalil.
If you aren’t familiar with The Music Run yet, it’s described as a “music-infused ‘Sound Track’ running event”. Previous editions, which took place from 2017 to 2019, saw 18,000 participants each year. Participants would also be able to stay on after the run with the renowned Live The Beat show—which showcases local bands and contagiously energetic performances.
This year will feature a showcase of local bands, and guest DJs alongside DJ Sam Withers and DJ Jesse Lawrence from Australia. Looking at the photos from previous events, it sure seems like hell of a party.
All participants will receive a Run Pack containing a limited-edition finisher medal, a unisex micro-dry T-Shirt, a car sticker, temporary tattoos, and a re-usable drawstring bag along with brand partner goodies. You can collect your Run Pack from 25 to 27 November 2022 at Starling Mall—before the event day.
How do I get free tickets?
We’re giving out 5 pairs of tickets for free! Here’s how you can win the tickets:
Step 1: Follow SoyaCincau and The Music Run on Facebook Step 2: In the comment section of this Instagram post, tell us your favourite workout song and tag your running buddy followed with the hashtags #TheMusicRunbyCIMB #LivetheBeat
For a bonus entry, you can also share the post on your Instagram Stories and tag @mysoyacincau.
The contest period will run from today, 11 November, until Monday, 14 November 2022. We’ll announce the giveaway winners on Tuesday, 15 November 2022! Best of luck!
T&Cs apply. Valid for residents of Malaysia only. 1 winner gets one pair of tickets.
Music can really make or break a movie, especially classical music. It has the inherent ability to transport us to another realm, taking us on a journey and evoking an emotional response. Imagine watching the opening scene of 2001: A Space Odyssey without the film score. It was Richard Strauss’s Also sprachZarathustra (performed by the Vienna Philharmonic under Herbert von Karajan) that went on to live in our heads rent-free, defining the film forever.
Studies have even demonstrated the positive effect classical music can have on the brain, from boosting memory to enhancing relaxation, so it really is a no-brainer as to why so many people harness its power.
From Verdi’s La traviata in Pretty Woman, to Mozart in The Shawshank Redemption, here are some of our favourite scene-stealing scores.
The Shawshank Redemption
It’s the wonderful scene where The Shawshank Redemption and Mozart coalesce. In an act of rebellion, prison inmate Andy Dufresne (played by Tim Robbins) gains access to the prison warden’s office and his collection of LPs. Flicking through them, Andy proceeds to broadcast The Letter Duet from Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro to his fellow inmates over the prison’s PA system. Centuries after its first performance, The Marriage of Figaro continues to move us. Red (Morgan Freeman), a fellow inmate, provides a voice-over narration that sums it up nicely in the film:
“I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don’t want to know. Some things are better left unsaid. I’d like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can’t be expressed in words, and it makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a grey place dares to dream. It was as if some beautiful bird had flapped into our drab little cage and made these walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free.”
Death in Venice
Based on Thomas Mann’s novella of the same name, the film explores themes including art, beauty, repression, youth and travel, amply using Mahler’s wondrous hymn Adagietto from his Fifth Symphony, in addition to sections of the Third. Its dramatic journey encompasses and unifies nature, man, and God, helping take us on a journey through Venice where composer Gustav von Aschenbach travels due to serious health concerns and becomes obsessed with the stunning beauty of an adolescent Polish boy named Tadzio. In a letter to the soprano, Anna von Mildenburg, Mahler wrote:
“Just imagine a work of such magnitude that it actually mirrors the whole world—one is, so to speak, only an instrument, played on by the universe… My symphony will be something the like of which the world has never yet heard!…In it the whole of nature finds a voice.”
Mahler’s Third Symphony truly does embrace the world of nature in every possible way.
Pretty Woman
We all remember it: Julia Roberts (Vivan Ward) in that pretty red dress at the opera. But did you know it was Verdi’s La traviata that made her tear up? Richard Gere as Edward Lewis, a rich corporate raider from New York, flew Viven to go see La traviata at the San Francisco Opera. While he watches her reactions, she watches the story of the tragic love of the courtesan Violetta and the romantic Alfredo Germont. The tears illuminate the connection between these two characters. Verdi was known to see art as a source of comfort for the human spirit. Pretty Woman also felt like comfort for the human spirit. Although a myriad of criticisms followed the movie, what’s certain is Julia’s performance, and the music that came with it, put an unforgettable magic spell on us all.
The Big Lebowski
Although this Coen brothers’ neo-noir comedy has an array of different genres and artists like Bob Dylan, Yma Sumac and Gipsy Kings (just to name a few), we can’t forget the “What makes a man” scene which uses Mozart’s Requiem, a famous music piece of grief. It sets the tone perfectly, pairing with the tragic atmosphere, and contrasted with “The Dude” asking to roll a J in front of the fire. The film also uses composer Modest Mussorgsky’s second movement Gnomus from Pictures at an Exhibition. Mussorgsky translated ten of Viktor Gartman’s artworks into ten individual musical pieces. Each movement carries the same title as a painting
Babe
How could we forget the little farm pig (or sheepdog) that lifted all our spirits? The 1995 Oscar-winning classic had a spirit lifting soundtrack too. Camille Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No.3, well-known specifically for the fourth movement, creates an upbeat, joyful mood which weaves itself throughout the film. Its unorthodox structure, using an organ and two pianos, (often called the “Organ Symphony”), is described as original and innovative in nature for freeing itself from the constraints of classical form. There are other brilliant orchestral pieces featured in the film, from West Australian composer Nigel Westlake, ToreadorSong from Carmen by Georges Bizet, and Cantique de Jean Racine by Gabriel Fauré.
Classical music and movies, when done right, truly are magical.
There is nothing quite like the energy of live performance, and there are many thrilling experiences to be had right here in WA. The West Australian Symphony Orchestra will be performing some of the greatest classical music of all time, including the Organ Symphony and Mahler’s Third Symphony in the next month. Enjoy a classic night out and the world-class acoustics of the iconic Perth Concert Hall (the finest in the southern hemisphere). For more information, visit the website.
Horses have always played a central role in country music. It’s impossible to think of cowboys and the vast, dusty lands of the South without imagining horse-back riders, rickety old wagons and ranches that spread far and wide across the burning horizon.
Our list of songs about horses collects some of the best country songs, about the animal which gave so much to Southern culture.
Country Songs About Horses
1. Reuben Brock – Black Horse Through Hell
We love it when old-school musicians blow their younger counterparts out of the water. Reuben Brock’s Black Horse To Hell carries a distinct and captivating chorus melody that blends the essence of his generation’s country rock with a compelling modern twist.
This track is completely hypnotic, laced with fiddle riffs and loaded with fiery crimson imagery.
Black Horse To Hell tells the story of running away from the coming storm on a black horse through hell, using stunning scenery to illustrate a man’s wild escape, “Cold wind blows before the rain, but I can’t stay here any more … With a dark red sky the clouds roll by, no way to tell if the path is clear for my escape.”
Underlying Brock’s horse metaphor is the hinting of an apathetic break up which summoned the narrator’s need to bound through the wreckage and back into peace, “Always at war, don’t want to fight you any more.”
This is a song for anyone wanting to travel far and free from a life streaked with disaster.
2. Justin McBride – Good Saddles Ain’t Cheap
Justin McBride’s song holds a wealth of classic country storytelling techniques within its lyrics.
He sets his scene with a spoken-word intro, before propelling into the character of a shop-keeper who imparts his life-long learned horse-riding advice to a seven year old boy.
The love for horses and life on the ranch are often a generational thing, passed down from father to son to grandson; a sentiment Good Saddles Ain’t Cheap holds close to its heart.
McBride’s chorus says it perfectly; “Good saddles ain’t cheap but they’re worth every dime, you’ll be glad you’ve got one when you’re on a long ride, you know a deal and a bargain are often misunderstood, good saddles ain’t cheap, cheap saddles ain’t good.”
McBride bravely highlights the subtle risk of animal cruelty that comes with downgrading your gear; “You might save yourself a few dollars, feel pretty smart at the time, but there’s nothing that hurts any smarter than a galled raw blistered behind.. not to mention your poor horse’s back.”
3. Dave Stamey – Come Ride With Me
Come Ride With Me is a sweet country song that embraces the freedom of horse-back adventures through the broad and endless country.
Dave Stamey asks his parter to ride with him as he leads through the winding trails that compose his home away from home.
He douses his track in sweeping scenery, crafting his song like the words of a cowboy tour-guide showing his wide-eyed crowd America’s natural wonders for the first time.
From the “smell of leather, the sunlight on your skin.. the dust in your hair, the light in your eyes…” to “camping near the meadow, we’ll love the night away and saddle up again, when the dawn in turnin’ grey.”
Come Ride With Me is wonderfully evocative of the life of the natural beauty a horseman will get to experience and adore, day after day.
4. Brenn Hill – Monster On Your Back
Brenn Hill’s track harnesses a sound as powerful as a wild stampede, twisting traditional elements into a gripping contemporary country anthem.
Monster On Your Back captures a tough-guy attitude, opening on the compellingly hilarious line, “I’ve rode this mountain seventy years I’ve been alive, choked on rocks and rattlesnakes, a wonder I’ve survived,” setting the scene for his old-school manly track about being the most fearsome creature of the wild.
Brenn addresses his song to his horse, fleshing out his dominance over the animal and highlighting how age will never dull a cowboy’s inner drive;
“You think that if you buck me off that I won’t get back on… You think that this old man ain’t tough like he once used to be, try me one more time and you will see.”
5. Red Steagall – About Horses And War
Red Steagall masterfully uses the storytelling inherent to good, old fashioned country music to tell the magnetic tale of a young cowboy riding by horse to the next town across, where he “dances till morning with the prettiest ladies and tells ‘em stories about horses and war.”
Steagall twists the story into one of nostalgia and wishing for your golden days to return, illustrating the cowboy’s life with compelling, character-building details;
“He’s seen in his lifetime a gas-powered jeepney, then a picture they sent back from Mars, but all that he prays for is to ride off to glory on the back of that ol’ piebald horse.”
6. Brooks Dunn ft. Reba McEntire – Cowgirls Don’t Cry
Brooks Dunn dedicated his song to the strength of cowgirls in a male-dominated world.
He shows how vital life lessons can be learnt through horse-riding, his chorus speaking like a father to his little cowgirl, “Cowgirls don’t cry, ride, baby, ride, lessons in life are going to show you… It’s gonna hurt every now and then, if you fall, get back on again, cowgirls don’t cry.”
The narrator follows the cowgirl throughout every turn of her life, showing how the endurance and willpower learned from her horse-riding childhood gives her the honest strength to carry her through every devastating experience that tries to knock her down.
7. Geogre Strait – If Heartbreaks Were Horses
George Strait captures the melancholic nostalgia of being heartbroken under the hues of sunset.
If Heartbreaks Were Horses is about a ranch-man who embarks on his horse for his long day’s work, knowing that as he travels, his wife has been “packing her things since I put the coffee on.”
Strait threads together his track by constantly alluding to the animal he’s been raised to love, as if attempting to distract himself and hopelessly fill the chasm of loneliness left by his disappearing partner;
“Damn this ol’ girth, worn right in two, but a spare length of leather and I’ll make it do, just when I think I’ve got life by the reins, home ain’t sweet home out on the range.”
VijayAnand’s first official song was released on november 6th, Sunday at Orion mall Bengaluru.
The Managing Director and Promoter of the acclaimed VRL Group of Companies, Dr. Anand Sankeshwar, has now launched his own film production firm, “VRL Film Productions,” as a division of VRL Media Pvt Ltd. The biopic VIJAYANAND, based on the legendary Vijay Sankeshwar, has been announced by our production company. It will tell the amazing and thrilling tale of Vijay Sankeshwar, who began his journey with a single truck in 1976 and is currently the owner of India’s largest logistics company.
The story follows Vijay Sankeshwar and his son Dr. Anand Sankeshwar, who are renowned in the media and logistics industries, on their remarkable, successful journey. The Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, and Malayalam dubs of this movie will be the first official and commercial biopic from the Kannada cinema industry. On November 6, Sunday at Orion Mall Bengaluru, the group debuted their first official song from the movie VIJAYANAND, which was made by Dr. Anand Sankeshwar under the auspices of VRL Film productions.
Now directing VIJAYANAND is Rishika Sharma, who previously directed the horror-thriller “Trunk.” In this biopic, Nihal, who was a leading man in the movie “Trunk,” takes on the character of Vijay Sankeshwar. The main characters are played by Bharat Bopanna as Dr. Anand Sankeshwar, Anant Nag as B.G. Sankeshwar, Vinaya Prasad, V Ravichandran, Prakash Belawadi, Anish Kuruvilla, and Siri Prahlad.
Famous South Indian music director Gopi Sundar (Bangalore Days, Ustad Hotel, Geetha Govindam, Most Eligible bachelor) has joined hands for background score and music composition. Raghu Niduvalli (Anjaniputra, Seetharama Kalyana) has penned the dialogues for this movie while stunts are directed by Ravi Verma (Vakeel Saab, Oopiri, Sketch, Raees, Rajkumara), Keertan Poojary (Mahira, Kadala Teerada Bhargava, 0-41*) has taken lead for cinematography, Choreography is done by Imran Sardhariya (Raavan, Avane Srimannarayana), Hemanth Kumar D (TRUNK fame) is the editor of this film Prakash Gokak (Bichugatti, Rajadhani, Vedha) has played a prominent role as Makeup and Styling artist, Art and Costume by Rishika Sharma and Production Head Prabhu Metimath.
Most great artists tend to be put in a box from the minute they hit the big time. No matter how much potential you might have to give at the start of your career, the commitment to the bottom line has led to countless artists putting out the same type of song over and over again. You might be scared that your original audience will leave, but if you’re willing to go outside your comfort zone, sometimes your fans will want to come along for the ride.
As much as these bands may have already been kings of their niche, they got a whole lot more interesting when they decided to toy with different styles, either stripping things back in the mix or layering different instruments that had no business being there in the first place. Even if you were to put some of their biggest songs next to each other, you would swear it was a completely different band playing every one of these songs.
It might be a little inconsistent, but it doesn’t matter if you still have your same knack for songwriting. For all of the genres that these acts have gone through, each of them have held up as fairly decent to some degree, almost like wearing these songs like musical costumes whenever they perform. You can spend years trying to refine your sound until you get in just right, but it looks like these guys were a lot more concerned with what else was out there.
At the turn of the decade, the ’90s were about to give way to a sea change in rock music. As hair metal started to go way out of style, bands like Nirvana and Pearl Jam began to pioneer a different aesthetic in rock and roll, where you didn’t have to worry about being a towering rock god to become famous. So in the thick of bands with guitars making authentic music out of Seattle, one of the biggest names of the time turned out to be a guy with a piano tearing you to pieces.
Over the course of Trent Reznor’s career, Nine Inch Nails has turned into one of the most forward thinking outfits in the world of music, never being afraid to combine the artificial sounds of Pro Tools with the rock aesthetic and actually pulling it off on albums like The Downward Spiral or the Fragile. Before Seattle had even blown up, Trent was already hitting the ground running with Pretty Hate Machine, making the first waves of industrial rock on songs like Head Like a Hole.
Ever since the ’00s though, Trent has been looking to defy the traditional rock and roll hangups, from using saxophones on the most recent NIN albums to continuing his streak of ambient albums with the Ghost series, where he puts music in the public domain and lets his fans do what they want with the tracks. Along with his hand in different scores for movies, Trent seems to want to do absolutely everything he can with music from the moment he wakes up in the morning.
In the K-Pop industry, having a sub-unit within the group is pretty ubiquitous. There are many subunits formed by both big and small groups. A sub-unit helps in showcasing more individual colors and talents of the members. Rap line units, rap/vocal units, dance line units, and vocal line units are some of the common units that can be found in K-Pop. But even after their popularity peaked, several well-known groups still do not have a sub-unit. Here are eight of these groups where fans want to see sub-units.
BLACKPINK
BLACKPINK earned the title of “The biggest girl group in the world.” It’s been six years since their debut, but still, BLACKPINK doesn’t have a sub-unit. Fans think this is the right time to form a sub-unit, and there is a high demand from fans for Chaelisa, Jenlisa, Chaennie, Chaesoo, and Jensoo sub-units. Blinks are disappointed with BLACKPINK’s agency YG Entertainment for not yet creating a sub-unit for the group.
BTS
Despite being the most popular K-Pop group, BTS hasn’t formed a sub-unit yet. Debuted in 2013, BTS has been in the industry for nine years. There are plenty of unit songs like “Luv In Skool,” “Zero O’clock” by the vocal line, “Intro: Skool Luv Affair,” “UGH!” by the rap line, etc. However, BigHit Entertainment hasn’t officially labeled those works as sub-units.
TWICE
Although TWICE is the largest group of JYP Entertainment, there is still no sub-unit. Recently all nine members of the girl group renewed their contract with the agency and made a comeback. There are rumors circulating around the web that TWICE is set to debut their first official sub-unit with the Japanese members of the group Mina, Sana, and Momo.
SHINee
The only male K-Pop group from SM Entertainment without a sub-unit is SHINee. A quartet, SHINee made their debut in 2008 and has spent fourteen years working with SM Entertainment. Even though SHINee members have been in groups like “SM The Performance,” “SuperM,” “Younique,” “Toheart,” and “SM The Ballad,” there is no sub-unit formed within the group to date.
iKON
Presently composed of six members, YG Entertainment’s third-generation boy group iKON debuted in 2015. It’s been seven years of their debut, but they still haven’t formed a sub-unit. Although the main rapper of the group Bobby used to be a part of YG Entertainment’s hip-hop duo unit “MOBB” along with labelmate Mino, there is no sub-unit within the group to date.
WINNER
WINNER is a four members group that debuted in 2014. Composed of two vocalists and two rappers, WINNER is another group from YG Entertainment without a sub-unit. Rapper Song Mino from the group was in “MOBB,” the hip-hop duo unit of YGE, along with iKON’s Bobby. Though members of the group featured each other in their solo releases, there is no official sub-unit in WINNER yet.
2PM
The second-generation masculine group from JYP Entertainment, 2PM is a boy group with six members. The group debuted in 2008, and 2PM returned to the music industry as a whole group after four years of hiatus in 2021. Although being a veteran K-Pop band, 2PM never formed an official sub-unit. Instead, 2PM together with 2AM known as a unit group named “One Day,” recorded the theme song of their documentary film.
MONSTA X
Six-piece South Korean boy band Monsta X is managed by Starship Entertainment. In 2015, the group made their official debut. With the exception of I.M, every member of the group renewed their contract with the agency this year. Though all Monsta X members were a part of Y-Teen, a project group of Monsta X and WJSN, the group hasn’t yet formed a sub-unit within the group. They’re one of the most popular grounders under Starship entertainment.
Is it necessary to have sub-units within a group? Which is your favorite sub-unit? Which K-Pop groups and members do you want to go for a sub-unit?
On Wednesday night at the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theatre, the PostClassical Ensemble led a quick and beguiling expedition 100 years into the past and about 4,000 miles to the east.
On paper, “Paris at Midnight: Jazz and Surrealism in the 1920s” sounded like something lifted from my undergrad course load; in practice, this immersive history lesson felt like a model for how classical music — and the other sounds that swirl around it — can be engagingly presented.
Music director Angel Gil-Ordóñez has recently taken the reins of PostClassical following the departure last year of longtime executive producer and historian Joseph Horowitz. Their combined forces created an impressive legacy over the past decade, a collaboration that cracked open various musical niches the way you might open a window in a stuffy room, allowing in a gust of contextual fresh air.
Gil-Ordóñez teamed up with the National Gallery of Art’s senior curator of modern art, Harry Cooper, to devise Wednesday’s program. And while the selections were bound by time and place — the percolating center of interwar artistic culture that was Paris in the 1920s — the real connective threads went deeper.
Accordionist Simone Baron opened the program with a seamlessly scene-setting medley of old tunes: Mistinguett’s “Il m’a vue nue,” “C’est mon gigolo” (a French version of the 1924 tango by Leonello Casucci and Julius Brammer, and a forerunner to Irving Caesar’s 1929 foxtrotter), and Damia’s “Tu ne sais pas aimer” and “C’est Paris.” It was music you may be more accustomed to strolling past, but Baron’s expressive performance lent them living, breathing vitality and exquisite nuance.
Baron’s performance was a prelude to a screening of René Clair’s 1924 film “Entr’acte,” which first premiered at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées as an intermission to “Relâche,” the final performance staged by Jean Börlin’s avant-garde Ballets Suédois. (In the program, Cooper points out this was, “the last gasp of Paris Dada.”) Below the screen, Gil-Ordóñez led the orchestra in Erik Satie’s “Cinéma,” the first-ever film score composed shot-for-shot.
You’d never take “Cinéma” for Satie, especially if you consider the composer’s name synonymous with the ennui-steeped piano reflections of his “Gymnopédies” and “Gnossiennes.” Here, Satie revels in repetition and propulsion, employing patterning techniques later made trademarks of Steve Reich or Terry Riley. He creates melodic tessellations that over time suggest larger designs (but in the moment come off like prototypical ringtones).
The orchestra attacked it with a brisk and bright approach, moving through Satie’s 10 “scenes” with crispness and wit — the latter crucial for any earnest engagement with this particular period. It can be hard to remember through the sepia-tinting of our cultural memory that these folks were extreme goofballs and that taking them seriously meant not, quite.
The dialogue between Satie’s music and Clair’s film packed the uncanny thrill of a seance, not least of all because at one point Börlin comes back from the dead. It was also fun to watch “Entr’acte,” employ every available bell and whistle in Clair’s experimental toolbox. His use of slow dissolves, jump cuts and handcrafted special effects (e.g. a spinning ballerina becomes a fanciful floral bloom when filmed from below) capture a world in the throes of transition. Not for nothing did this program open with an intermission.
The Satie was followed by a screening of a dance scene from Josephine Baker’s lacking-but-landmark 1934 film “Zouzou,” the first major motion picture with a Black leading woman.
Baker made her Paris debut in 1925 with her group La Revue Nègre at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées. New Yorker writer Janet Flanner described it thus: “The two specific elements had been established and were unforgettable — [Baker’s] magnificent dark body, a new model that to the French proved for the first time that black was beautiful, and the acute response of the white masculine public in the capital of hedonism of all Europe — Paris.”
Baker’s star continued to rise, shifting from the Revue to her own show at the Folies Bergère in 1926, and rising to icon status among the Parisian cognoscenti — Hemingway, Stein, Picasso, all big fans.
From our contemporary perspective, it’s perhaps impossible not to view the Parisian fascination with African culture —le tumulte noir — as a collision of both genuine appreciation and racist exoticization. But in just a minute or two of “Zouzou,” it’s equally hard not to see how Baker transcended and capitalized on those expectations and stereotypes. Baker was, more than most, an artist who embodied an era of sweeping transition, her performances a busy intersection of jazz, dance and sculpture, even painting if you can parse the impossible lines of her body (including her double-jointed fingers) — a kind of living cubism.
Following “Zouzou,” clarinetist David Jones led the quartet of guitarist Jim Roberts, double bassist Aaron Clay and drummer Joseph Connell in a short jazz set in tribute to the music of another American export (and soon after, French deport) Sidney Bechet. Jones toggled between clarinet and some chill-inducing soprano saxophone for searing runs through “Si tu vois ma mère” (joined by concertmaster Netanel Draiblate), “Sheik of Araby,” and “12th St. Rag.” Jones tore through skyrocket solos, his horn here a balm, there a blade, and all over the theater knees helplessly bounced.
This sweet sidestep was a fine primer for “Piano Concerto in G Major,” which Ravel composed between 1929 and 1931, and which pianist Drew Petersen embraced with equal parts intimacy and intensity.
In many ways, this concerto sounds like a souvenir from Ravel’s four-month tour of the United States in 1928, and his impactful encounter in New York City with George Gershwin (who famously asked Ravel for composition lessons). It satisfies structural presumptions of a conventional concerto, but bristles with newness from the jump.
Gil-Ordóñez led the 37-piece ensemble with attentive precision and a lively sense of humor that Petersen carried over to the keyboard. Many players can get carried away in the pyrotechnics of the first movement (“Allegramente”), but Peterson brought a wonderfully soft touch and bejeweled articulation that made for enchanting dialogue with harpist Eric Sabatino.
Petersen’s pace through the second movement (“Adagio assai”) may have leaned a touch too tranquil, but the orchestra’s entrance seemed to reconnect him. Flutist Kimberly Valerio and clarinetists Jones and Amanda Eich also gave gorgeous contributions. And Gil-Ordóñez took a lean and mean approach to the Presto finale — its racing piano, dipping trombones, percussive snaps and goofy adieu all tightly managed and keenly balanced.
As a concert, “Paris at Midnight” was a sweet, sentimental and musically energizing guided tour through a particularly roaring decade of music. But PostClassical also excels at playing professor — demonstrating not just how the music of a given time and place sounds but why. Come with open ears, and you leave with a new picture of history in your mind — and probably an old clarinet lick looping in your head.
Country superstar Alan Jackson has sold more than 60 million albums, and his latest, “Angels and Alcohol,” comes a quarter-century after he first topped the charts
Alan Jackson: Timid about fame
08:06
Alan Jackson was presented with the Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award at the 56th Annual Country Music Association Awards on Wednesday.
In his acceptance speech, the country music legend told the crowd at the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee, that “Country music has been real good to me and I fell in love with it when I was a young man.”
“I really love the instruments, the steel guitars and the fiddles and things like that that gave it such a unique character to me and made it its own,” the musician said. “And I love the lyrics and the songs and the artists and the melodies and the harmonies. It’s just a real American music to me.”
Jackson, known for several hits including “It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere,” also thanked his wife Denise saying, “We started out as teenagers and she’s been on this roller coaster ride with me for 40 something years now.”
He added that he’s “not always the easiest person to love, but she’s hung in there and helped me through hard times and we share great times. The good and the bad, the happy and the sad. We’ve survived a lot.”
The Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes artists who have contributed to country music in a significant way and have positively impacted the music genre.
Jackson has also been named CMA entertainer of the year three times.
Advent Carolndar Will Offer Holiday Shows at Chelsea Music Hall
The show includes new songs written by Julia Mattison and Joel Waggoner.
Joel Waggoner and Julia Mattison in Advent Carolndar Live!
Advent Carolndar, a previously digital initiative where Broadway veterans Julia Mattison and Joel Waggoner wrote a new holiday song every day in the 25 days leading to Christmas, has announced their first live shows.
Featuring songs from the three previous years of Advent Carolndar, as well as one-time-only improvised carols, Mattison and Waggoner will stir up holiday cheer at Chelsea Music Hall December 12 at 7 PM and 9:30 PM.
“Advent Carolndar was first born out of a wild caroling party at Julia’s house in 2018 where we sang ‘Why is Sausage Not a Christmas Food’ until 5 AM, and neighbors threatened to call the cops,” said Mattison and Waggoner. “Now, we’re so excited to finally be caroling with friends again, bringing our hijinks to Chelsea Music Hall, and joining our wonderful fans for a night of laughs, booze, and holiday cheer. If the cops are called this time, we will be sure to make them join us in a singalong.”
Advent Carolndar is directed and produced by Tim Drucker, with associate direction by Joyah Spangler.
Exclusive: Black Panther 2 composer Ludwig Göransson explains his extensive research process to create Mayan-inspired music for the MCU’s Talokan.
Composer Ludwig Göransson breaks down the intensive research process he went through to create a score based on what Mayan music could have sounded like for Black Panther 2. While preparing for the first Black Panther, Göransson traveled to Africa to research different instruments and sounds. Goransson has created a truly unique musical identity for Wakanda, balancing the traditional superhero style with a score that draws clear inspiration from authentic African music. Thanks to this, the musical identity of Black Panther and Wakanda has become some of the most recognizable in the MCU.
SCREENRANT VIDEO OF THE DAY
In Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Göransson has a whole new corner of the MCU to play in as he brings Talokan to life musically. During an exclusive interview with Screen Rant, Göransson talked about finding the sound for Namor and the underwater kingdom of Talokan. The composer revealed the influence of Mayan culture and his journey to discovering what Mayan music would sound like, including the heartbreaking truth about what happened to Mayan music many centuries ago.
[When] coming up with the sound for Namor and the Talokans, it’s a completely new world, and we’re spending a lot of time with them. We spend a lot of time seeing their world for the first time. When I read the script, I talked to Ryan, and he told me that the story and people are very heavily inspired by Mayan culture. That was extremely inspiring for me because I was able to travel to Mexico and to Mesoamerica and start working.
I wanted to record Mayan music, but I quickly realized that that music is gone. It was forcibly erased 500 years ago; there’s no traces. They don’t know how the music was performed; there’s no sheet music. There’s no musicians from generation to generation. It’s gone.
So, I started working with some music archeologists in Mexico City that specialize in recreating some of the instruments. They found some of the instruments in some of the graves. They’ve seen the codex, they see what type of instruments they’re [using], like seashells and turtle shells. We started recording and re-imagining what the Mayans’ sound could have been like, so that was the interesting part of [making] the music for Namor.
Related: How Powerful Is Namor Compared To Thanos?
Black Panther: Wakanda’s Music Sheds Light On Mayan Culture
Göansson’s commitment to thorough research has been a major part of his ability to compose such impactful scores. The discovery that he was unable to find or hear any truly authentic Mayan music because all the records were destroyed is a tragedy. Göransson’s work with music-based archeologists is fascinating as they worked together to recreate what the music in Ancient Maya could have sounded like.
This destruction of history and art may have influenced the music and potentially the story itself, however. With Coogler taking inspiration from Indigenous Central and South America when creating Talokan, the history of colonization is likely ingrained in the fictional nation’s DNA. This estimation of what Mayan music sounds like also brings a new layer to Göransson’s score, as he found instruments that were likely used but had to fully re-imagine what the music could be. The inclusion of seashells and turtle shells works twofold by using authentic instruments and incorporating the underwater element of Talokan into the score itself.
Talokan is a nation hidden from the surface world in the MCU, with Namor leading his people and protecting them in part through isolation. Musically, Wakanda is a nation that was never colonized, while Talokan’s history is a bit murkier. Wakanda and Talokan mirror each other in many compelling ways, including isolating themselves to protect their resources and way of life. Whether the nation’s isolation is because it avoided colonization altogether or because the country was targeted in the past, infusing lost music into the theme of a hidden city brings a new depth to the score of Black Panther 2.
Next: Namor’s Mutant Confirmation Means Big Things For His MCU Future
