JacobTV on the Radio ; Episode: Vox Boombox: Pop Icons in Sound

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

 

JacobTV: You're listening to Q2, New York's new home for new music. This is JacobTV on the Radio. Hi, I'm JacobTV. Able to Be is a piece about Marilyn Monroe. I'm always inspired by these kind of persons, where there's a kind of drama in their life. Of course, Marilyn Monroe, there's a lot of drama to her, too. She was such an icon that she herself probably didn't know anymore who she was. She struggled with that for many years. Once she said in an interview that she would love to go out on the street and able to be just able to be.

[MUSIC - JacobTV: Able to Be]

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to a piece called Able to Be by JacobTV or Jacob ter Veldhuis, the Dutch avant pop composer and the focus of our JacobTV on the Radio festival, which kicks off today. My name is Nadia Sirota, and you're listening to Nadia Sirota on Q2. The show airs every weekday from 12:00 to 4:00, both AM and PM. Really excited about this JacobTV on the Radio festival. There's also an incredible amount of awesome online content, some exclusive downloads, fabulous videos, wonderful interviews, all at q2live.org. The website is really teeming with content this week. I hope you get a chance to check it out.

This is day one of our JacobTV on the Radio festival, and the focus today is Vox Boombox: Pop Icons in Sound. JacobTV is really, really adept at taking pop elements and turning them into some form of music, whether that's video or pre-recorded sound. The previous tape part, boombox part, included samples from Marilyn Monroe, and we're going to have some great samples from Chet Baker and Billie Holiday coming up soon. I thought I'd play a couple of pieces that fall into a similar boomboxy category as JacobTV.

We're about to hear the soliloquy from How It Happens by Scott Johnson as performed by the Kronos Quartet with I.F. Stone sampled, and then a very short version of Gavin Bryars' Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet. It's the single remix performed by the Gavin Bryars ensemble with a cameo by none other than Tom Waits. Here's music by Scott Johnson and Gavin Bryars on Q2.

[MUSIC - Kronos Quartet: Scott Johnson: Soliloquy from How It Happens (1991) [The Voice of I.F. Stone]]

[MUSIC - Gavin Bryars and Tom Waits: Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet]

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to really the breakout piece by the composer Gavin Bryars. The full form of that work is much, much longer, Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet. This is the "single remix," which features a cameo by the vocalist Tom Waits along with a performance by the Gavin Bryars ensemble. Before that, we heard the soliloquy from a piece called How It Happens by the composer Scott Johnson, performed by the Kronos Quartet with pre-taped action by I.F. Stone.

We're in the first day of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. Today's focus is Vox Boombox: Pop Icons in Sound. We're going to have two more selections from JacobTV next, and we were lucky enough to have the composer in the studio to introduce a whole bunch of his pieces. I will let JacobTV introduce the next two works.

JacobTV: I grew up with blues and jazz myself, and Billie Holiday was one of my great inspirations. I was wondering, "Who was this woman?" Then I thought, "Well, would there be any radio interviews?" Then I discovered there are quite a few radio interviews. The audio quality is not that good. It's been recorded in the '40s and '50s, but it's very touching. I mean, she led a very tragic life, picked the wrong man, but she was also addicted to drugs. She was put in prison and so on. Anyway, she was a great, great singer. There's also a great tragedy behind her.

[MUSIC - Billie: PRISM Quartet]

JacobTV: You're listening to Q2, New York's new home for new music. This is JacobTV on the Radio. Hi, I'm JacobTV. May This Bliss Never End is about the lives and times of Chet Baker, who spent the last years of his life in Amsterdam, probably because it's easy to get narcotics over there. He was addicted to it. This tragedy is all part of May This Bliss Never End, where you hear his voice not so long before he fell out of an Amsterdam hotel room window.

[MUSIC - JacobTV: May This Bliss Never End]

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to a beautiful work by the Dutch composer Jacob ter Veldhuis, AKA JacobTV, called May This Bliss Never End. One of his boombox pieces, this one featuring Chet Baker, and we heard the tenor saxophone player Arno Bornkamp with the pianist Ivo Janssen. This is day one of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. You can check out so much info online at q2live.org. We have exclusive downloads. We have a streaming concert. We have composer introductions to something like 28 pieces or something absurd. Great editorials, just so much great content at q2live.org.

The focus of today, Wednesday, is Vox Boombox: Pop Icons in Sound. Exploring JacobTV's boombox pieces and boombox pieces or recorded sampled speech pieces by a whole bunch of other composers. Right now, we will listen to Steve Reich's Different Trains, just the first movement called America-Before the War, as performed by the Kronos Quartet.

[MUSIC - Steve Reich: Different Trains - America-Before the War] [music]

Speaker 1: Trains every day. There's like trains different trains. With trains [crosstalk]. Different trains. every day. From Chicago. From Chicago. From Chicago to New York. From Chicago to New York. From Chicago. From Chicago. From Chicago. From Chicag-- From Chicago to New York. From Chicago to New York, from Chicago. From Chicago to New York, from Chicago. In 1939. In 1939. In 1939. In 1939. In 1939. In 1939, 39. In 1939, 39. In 1939, 39. In 1939, 39. In 1939, 39, In 1939, 39. In 1939, 30, in 1939, in 1939, 30. In 1939.

Speaker 2: 1939. 1939. 1939, 39. 1939, 39. 1939, 39, 1939. 1939, 39, 1939, 1939, 39, 1939, 1939, 1939, 1939, 39, 1939. 1940. 1940. 1940, 40. 1940. 1940, 40. 1940. 1940, 40. 1940, 40. 1940, 40, 1940, 1940, 40, 1940, 1940, 40, 1940. 1941. 1941. 1941, 41. 1941. 1941, 41, 1941, 1941, 1941, 41. 1941, 1941, 1941.

Speaker 1: 1941, I guess it must have been. 1941, 41 I guess it must have been. 1941, 41, I guess it must have been. 1941, I guess it must have been. 1941, 41, I guess it must have been. 1941, I guess it must have been.

 

 

JacobTV on the Radio ; Episode: String Theory: From Versailles to Bob Dylan

Thursday, March 18, 2010

 

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to a piece called, Viola, by the Dutch avant-pop composer Jacob ter Veldhuis, better known as JacobTV. My name is Nadia Sirota. You're listening to New York's Q2, and we are in Day 2 of our JacobTV on the Radio, a really exciting festival with a whole bunch of online content. Check out q2live.org. We have exclusive downloads, composer introductions, a great series of narratives. This piece, Viola, is one example of all of the amazing non-released exclusive recordings we have as part of this festival. I hope you check out q2live.org.

Today's focus for JacobTV on the Radio is called String Theory. We're going to be listening to his string pieces and string quartets, all sorts of wonderful stuff. We have another great exclusive recording next of the First Movement of JacobTV's fourth String Quartet. The first movement is called, Once. This is another private recording. Here's more music by Dutch composer JacobTV, part of our JacobTV on the Radio on Q2.

[MUSIC - Once: Jacob ter Veldhuis]

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to an exclusive recording of the First Movement of JacobTV's String Quartet Number 4 called, Once. This is part of our JacobTV on the Radio, which we kicked off yesterday, which will be airing through Sunday of this week. My name is Nadia Sirota, and there's lots more JacobTV to come. Today's focus is called String Theory. We're exploring a lot of JacobTV's works for Solo Strings and String Quartet, all kinds of stuff in that vein.

We have a solo violin piece next called, Capriccio. Pretty short work, we'll hear that performed by the Violinist Benjamin Schmidt. That'll be followed by Jacob ter Veldhuis' first String Quartet, which is subtitled, Versailles, that'll be performed by the Netherlands Quartet. Just a reminder to check out all of the great exclusive content we have about JacobTV on the Radio at q2live.org.

[MUSIC - Capriccio: Jacob ter Veldhuis]

[MUSIC - Versailles: Jacob ter Veldhuis]

JacobTV: You're listening to Q2, New York's new home for new music. This is JacobTV on the Radio. Hi, I'm JacobTV. My third String Quartet has a subtitle. It's called, There Must Be Some Way Out of Here. I wrote that piece in 1994, and to me, it's a milestone in my career. I was still looking for a musical language, especially a harmonic language. When I started composing my third String Quartet, I had the feeling that I was locked up in this idiom of contemporary music. It's a coming out also, combining the rock element that I grew up with because I played in rock bands when I was young, and the classical tradition.

[MUSIC - There Must Be Some Way Out of Here: Jacob ter Veldhuis]

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to String Quartet Number 3, There Must Be Some Way Out of Here, by JacobTV or Jacob ter Veldhuis as performed by the Netherlands Quartet that is part of our String Theory feature. This is Day 2 of JacobTV on the Radio, which is a festival that started yesterday, will end on Sunday. We're exploring all kinds of different music by the Dutch avant-pop composer JacobTV. We have an incredible amount of information online at q2live.org, including an exclusive download, a whole bunch of composer introductions. It's like over 25 something ridiculous and great writings, et cetera. Please check out q2live.org for a whole bunch of JacobTV-related content.

 

  

JacobTV on the Radio ; Episode: Paradiso (An Oratorio)

Friday, March 19, 2010

 

Nadia Sirota: You're listening to New York's Q2. You can check us out online at q2live.org. My name is Nadia Sirota, and you're listening to Nadia Sirota on Q2. You're also listening to day three of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. In honor of both festivals, in honor of our Week of Passions and our JacobTV on the Radio festival, we're going to play a passion by JacobTV. His Paradiso, which is an oratorio, a video oratorio. We're going to listen to a performance by the North Netherlands Orchestra led by Alexander Liebreich. The vocal soloists are Claron McFadden and Tom Allen. Here is JacobTV to introduce Paradiso.

Jacob ter Veldhuis: Paradiso is my magnum opus so far. It's an evening-length piece for female choir, symphony orchestra, two soloists, a sampler, and videos live. I decided to write a piece about the third book of the Divina Commedia. Not many artists are interested in that third book because nothing is going on there. Paradise is a very boring place. There's no suffering. I decided to dive into that beautiful world. I decided that instead of using the original story of Dante, I decided to compose heavens myself. 16 heavens. I wanted to translate the medieval paradise to our modern world.

I was touched by man's attempt to find happiness, to find bliss. We humans are trying to find happiness and bliss in many ways. We try to find it through religion, or through love, or through materialism, or even through war, or through drugs. There's a heaven of narcotics, too. All these attempts of man to become happy and to find his bliss are present in my Paradiso.

[MUSIC - North Netherlands Orchestra: Jacob ter Veldhuis's Paradiso]

Jacob ter Veldhuis: I wrote a nice lullaby

Kinda put myself in a trance

Kinda high that scares other people to death

Kinda put myself in a trance

Kinda high that scares other people to death.

Oh, or I guess they call it a speed bowl

Kinda put myself in a trance

It was a bright blue color

It was a bright blue color

When I say blue, I mean blue

When I say blue, I mean blue

It was a dream, you know

Things like that don’t happen

There’s pain in my heart

Every memory I’ll keep

May this bliss never end

It was a dream, you know.

Things like that don't happen.

There's pain in my heart

Every memory I'll keep

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end

Every memory I'll keep

There's pain in my heart

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end

May this bliss never end.

[MUSIC - Paradiso: XV. Primo Mobile]

[01:15:17] [END OF AUDIO]

 

 

JacobTV on the Radio ; Episode: Concertos reImagined

Saturday, March 20, 2010

 

Nadia Sirota: My name is Nadia Sirota, and you are listening to JacobTV on the Radio, our five-day-long festival devoted to the music of the Dutch avant-pop composer Jacob ter Veldhuis. Today's theme is the concerto reimagined, and in this hour, we're going to listen to three concertos by this composer. We actually have these wonderful intros that he recorded for us that tell a little bit of background behind each of these pieces, but we're only playing abbreviated versions of them on the radio. We have complete, fully fleshed-out intros for over 25 pieces online. There's a lot of amazing stuff online, actually, including a free download and some wonderful blog entries. It's all at q2live.org/JacobTV, and now here is Jacob ter Veldhuis to introduce Goldrush.

Jacob ter Veldhuis: I wrote Goldrush, I think, in 1994. The title refers to the way man explores land and searching for gold. There's a greed in that piece and the sound of gold, so to speak, the sound of metal elements, chimes, et cetera, is very obvious. There's a lot of struggle going on in that piece, and the gold cannot be found. In the end, when you least expect it, certainly, there it is.

[MUSIC - Jacob ter Veldhuis: Goldrush Concerto]

Jacob ter Veldhuis: This is JacobTV on the Radio on Q2, New York's new home for new music. Hi, I'm JacobTV. My Goldrush concerto was written in 1996, I believe. It has not one single note in common with Goldrush, the duo piece, but still, the theme of men destroying landscapes in search of gold, that element is still very obvious.

[MUSIC - Jacob ter Veldhuis: Goldrush Concerto]

Nadia Sirota: We've been listening to music by Jacob ter Veldhuis, better known as JacobTV. That was his Goldrush concerto, and we heard that performed by the Arnhem Philharmonic led by Michel Tilkin. The percussion soloists were Lorenzo Ferrándiz and Gustavo Gimeno. This is day four of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. The theme all day today is the concerto reimagined. Just wanted to remind you there's an incredible amount of stuff online at q2live.org/JacobTV, including an exclusive limited-time download and over 25 introductions that Jacob ter Veldhuis has recorded for, again, over 25 of his pieces.

We'd also love to know what you think. JacobTV is a somewhat of a controversial composer, especially in that he tends to write about American culture, although he's Dutch. I'd love to know what you think about that particular fact. About anything else, you can let us know at q2live.org/JacobTV. Here's the composer to introduce this next work.

Jacob ter Veldhuis: Concerto for Piano and Strings. When I wrote it in the early '90s, I was still very insecure. I was about 40 years at that time, but I was still looking for my musical language, studying composition. They had taught me to compose in a certain way, which I didn't want to compose in that way. Complex music, music more of the brains than of the heart. It was not really my cup of tea. I hear myself looking for a way out, so to speak, for a solution. How do I compose? What do I want to say? It's a kind of diary.

[MUSIC - Jacob ter Veldhuis: Concerto for Piano and Strings] [01:11:26] [END OF AUDIO]

 

 

JacobTV on the Radio ; Episode: Avant-Pop Radio: Politics and Advertising

Sunday, March 21, 2010

 

Nadia Sirota: You're listening to New York's Q2. I'm Nadia Sirota and this is day five of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. A festival devoted to the Dutch avant-pop composer Jacob ter Veldhuis. Today's theme is, Avant-Pop Radio: Politics and Advertising. JacobTV, who's a Dutch composer, has always sort of written music with America in mind, and not just America, but the sort of in your face advertising pop cultural elements of America specifically. So we're going to listen to a lot of pieces of his today that kind of exploit or work out that idea. Starting with two pieces right now called, Gulf War and The Shining City. We'll hear the composer introduce them in just a minute, but I just wanted to remind you that we have an incredible amount of stuff online, at q2live.org/JacobTV. Including free downloads and further fleshed out intros for over 25 pieces. We'd also love to know what you think. You can let us know and check out the content at q2live.org/JacobTV. Now, here is JacobTV, to introduce a couple pieces.

JacobTV: Gulf War, it speaks for itself, because it's a kind of collage of sound bites from soldiers to the president telling the story, this crazy story of this war that was going on.

[MUSIC - JacobTV: Gulf War]

JacobTV: You're listening to Q2, New York's new home for new music. This is JacobTV on the Radio. Hi, I'm JacobTV. The Shining City was originally scored for grand organ, five percussionists and soundtrack. Ronald Reagan, he called his country a shining city upon a hill. You can hear voices by Reverend Jesse Jackson, New York Governor Mario Cuomo, and TV evangelist Donnie Swaggart. They're all combined into one speech about our world. A Western consumer society. It's cynical, of course, because this shining city is not that shining at all.

[MUSIC - JacobTV: The Shining City]

Nadia Sirota: Music by Q2 man of the hour, JacobTV, also known as Jacob ter Veldhuis. That was The Shining City, and we heard that performed by the composer on what he calls grand organ. This is the final day of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. We have a whole bunch of information online, at q2live.org/JacobTV. I'd love to know what you think. Today's theme is the Avant-Pop Radio: Politics and Advertising. This is a Dutch composer who spent a lot of time thinking about American culture and reimagining American culture through his eyes.

As an American, if you are American, how do you feel about that? As a non-American, if you are not American, how do you feel about that? I'd love to know what kind of feelings this sort of cultural appropriation, in a way, is giving rise to. Again, you can let us know at q2live.org. Music now in a similar vein to JacobTV that comes from sampled speech from three generations of a family of American Indians who grew up on the Kaibab Paiute Reservation on the Utah-Arizona border.

After much controversy, their tribe rejected an offer to build a toxic waste incinerator on their ancestral land in 1991. This piece, Dark Winds Rising, from 1992, deals with a lot of text about that particular controversy. It's by the composer Phillip Bimstein, and we're going to listen to a performance by the Equinox Chamber Players. Here's Dark Winds Rising, on Q2.

[MUSIC - Phillip Bimstein: Dark Winds Rising]

Nadia Sirota: Music by the American composer Philip Bimstein. That was his 1992 Dark Winds Rising, as performed by the Equinox Chamber Players. My name is Nadia Sirota and you're listening to day five of our festival, JacobTV on the Radio. We have an amazing amount of information online at q2live.org/JacobTV. Today's theme is, Avant-Pop Radio: Politics and Advertising, and really speaks to the heart of what I perceive JacobTV to be about, which is really looking at American sort of media and advertising and the way that we are sold on different political agendas in a similar way to the way that we're sold products.

How do you feel as an American about that? About a Dutch guy exploiting that idea? How do you feel as a non-American about American culture and the way that politics and advertising are inextricably linked? We'd love to hear what you think. You can let us know at q2live.org. Now, another work by JacobTV. Here he is to introduce Nivea Hair Care Styling Mousse.

JacobTV: Nivea Hair Care Styling Mousse is a piano trio. At our first rehearsal, I didn't even have a title. The piece was just called Piano Trio Number One. We were rehearsing, and while we were rehearsing, some of us had quite long hair at that time. I said to the violinist, "Your hair is so beautiful. You wear your hair so beautifully." He said, "You, too." I said, "Well, I'm using-- actually, I'm using Nivea Hair Care Styling Mousse." "What?" He said, "I'm using the same. Isn't that fantastic?"

So we were laughing about it and I said, "This is very apt title for the piece, because there were all kinds of elements of kitsch in that piece. Writing a piano trio, a piano trio has such a long classical tradition. I thought, "Let's make jokes about it a little bit."

[MUSIC - JacobTV: Nivea Hair Care Styling Mousse]

Nadia Sirota: That was a work called Nivea Hair Care Styling Mousse, by the Dutch avant-pop composer JacobTV, or Jacob ter Veldhuis. The performers were Roeland Gehlen on violin, René Berman on cello, and Frank Peters on piano. This is the final day of our JacobTV on the Radio festival. Today's focus is Avant-Pop Radio: Politics and Advertising. We're listening to a lot of works by JacobTV that explore America's obsession with advertising and also how political agendas are sometimes sold to us via advertising as well. We'd love to know what you think.

There's an incredible amount of information and commenting opportunity at q2live.org/JacobTV, and some free downloads and wonderful introductions to different pieces by the composer. That's all at q2live.org/JacobTV. This next piece is by the composer Osvaldo Golijov and also sort of deals with media in a way. It's a piece that was premiered right here at The Greene Space, which is downstairs at QXR WNYC. This was premiered a little less than a year ago, on April 28th of 2009. The work, again, by Golijov, is called Radio, and he wrote it for the string quartet Ethel, along with Jeremy Flower on laptop, and Michael Ward-Bergeman on hyper-accordion.

[MUSIC - Osvaldo Golijov: Radio]

JacobTV: You're listening to Q2, New York's new home for new music. This is JacobTV On the Radio. Hi, I'm JacobTV. The Body of Your Dreams was written in 2003 and was inspired by an American TV ad about the Optronic Pro. That is something very special. It's a belt that you wear around your waist. This belt produces no less than 3,000 contractions in just 10 minutes. You get a perfect body from wearing that belt without any exercise. You can just wash the dishes, and you get a perfect body. At least that's what the TV ad is saying.

[MUSIC - Jeroen van Veen: The Body of your Dreams]

 

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