Author: bhenderson

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Ariana Grande’s Image

Ariana Grande‘s thank u, next first piqued my interest because of a harmonic progression that initially contains bass movement of an augmented second. Upon closer inspection, I found this song to be very enjoyable as its message can seem to be pushy toward exes as to their poor treatment of her, creating a terrible environment to which she has an extreme desire to move on or a sincere thankfulness for these experiences that she has taken part in.

There are many references to an overall sense of power and comfort. First, we see her on a bed that is very elegant and surrounded by items of non-necessity. After that, we switch to her walking down a high school hallway, with what could be assumed to be a clique. She takes over the whole hallway and is not afraid to push people around, literally. Later on we see her getting out of an expensive car and wearing what would seem to be an expensive outfit. All these extravagant and luxurious items could be a way of visualizing that she has come out of the relationships with values, such as wisdom and personal emotional strength.

I-Sorta-Exist comments:

“Omg Mean Girls, 13 Going On 30, Legally Blonde…the best movies bihhh”

This comment is in support of the whole concept for the visual aid to give added context to her situation. Mean Girls (2004) is a movie that is involving a girl coming to a new high school. After a short period of time, she is accepted into one of the most popular cliques in the school. Her appearance to most everyone in the school is a sudden popular girl who gets her way because of her new found popularity. 13 Going On 30 (2004) is about a girl longing to be popular and proceeds to wish she was 30 years old in an attempt to get away from the constant incentive to be a popular person that she was trying so hard and failing to achieve. (IMDB) Lastly, Legally Blonde (2001) describes the near perfect life of an extremely popular college student who is (the president of her sorority, a Hawaiian Tropic girl, [and] Miss June in her campus calendar.” (IMDB) All of these movies would be known by most people born around Grande’s time, 1993. So these references could very well be a simple act of communication through known stories of her age group. This gives a sense of reliability to feelings that many have experienced through these romantic comedies .

Chainy MyKala comments:

“This is really everything, I’ll be honest I’ve never really been a huge fan of her, but more and more I’m finding myself drawn to her, she’s just really seems like such a good person, like her kindness in everything she does just like shines through. Ugh yep, definitely a fan now. “

This comment made me re-think my initial thoughts of what the lyrics were meaning. My interpretation, in the beginning, was that of sarcasm. Her lyrics made me think that she was thanking all of these people as a way of regretting those people in her life. With this comment, I am starting to think that there is actual gratuity to the people that, through her knowing them, taught her love, patience, pain. I also began to take the time to really think about all the lyrics instead of listening for just aural aesthetic. These lyrics upon good inspection reflect this pleasant attitude, compared to this bratty attitude I got from it through a few listens.

Manya Barot comments:

“Guys the beginning when they’re speaking…7 rings is playing

SIS WAS GIVING US A TEASER”

This comment brought an interesting idea to the table. The music video’s length is 5:30, while the single release is only 3:27. There is quite a bit of extra material in the video and I find it interesting that Grande included her song 7 Rings, because it happened to become the top single for the week of March 19th, 2019. She could not have known that this would be the case for the song, but this encourages the “popularity/success” idea. I find it highly interesting that she would include this song in the intro to the video since 7 Rings‘ content is about primarily “conspicuous consumption.” The fact that she left it out of the single is to preemptively avoid problems of copyright, as 7 Rings‘ melodic content is a blatant copy of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s and this is why when “Concord requested 90 percent of Ms. Grande’s song, and her representatives accepted without further negotiation.” (NYTimes)

I think this video is depicting how great her life is now that she has had all these experiences to better her attitude, outlook, and demeanor. Grande’s video conveys exactly what she means by her lyrics, “thank u, next.”

Photo Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_Girls

https://www.directv.com/movies/13-Going-on-30-SXh6cGFtL2l5SmpIVll6OG1nUlh1UT09

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legally_Blonde

https://www.billboard.com/photos/8488625/ariana-grande-2018-woman-of-the-year-photo-shoot

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Messiaen’s Celestial Ambiance

Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps (1941) (Quartet for the End of Time) is a piece that is filled with pictorial representations of the text upon which he drew inspiration and speaks to a hopeful view of his capture by the Germans in World War II and imprisonment at Stalag VIII-A.

Messiaen was born in Avignon, France on 10 December 1908 into a highly cultured family, his father a literary scholar and his mother a poetess.  At a young age he taught himself to play the piano and began composing.  After the end of World War I, the family moved to Nantes, where Messiaen received his first formal music lessons, and in 1919 he entered the Paris conservatory, where he was a highly successful student until his graduation in 1930. (http://holocaustmusic.ort.org/places/camps/western-europe/messiaenolivier/)


https://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/music/olivier-messiaen.html

He was drafted for the war as an auxiliary nurse because of his poor eyesight. During his time in the war he was brought to a prisoner of war camp, Stalag VIII-A. There he met a clarinetist (Henri Akoka), violinist (Jean le Boulaire), and cellist (Étienne Pasquier). These were musicians caught in the same turmoil as he and he had decided to write this quartet for them and himself to play. (http://classicalfm.ca/station-blog/2018/12/06/war-prison-music-loving-nazi-guard-yet-stunning-quartet-emerged/)

The Quartet for the End of Time is related to, as Messiaen notes in the preface, an excerpt from the book of Revelation; 10:1–2, 5–7:

And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire … and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth …. And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven, and sware by him that liveth for ever and ever … that there should be time no longer: But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished …

The movement I am focusing on is Fouillis d’arcs-en-ciel, pour l’Ange qui annonce la fin du Temps (Tangle of Rainbows, for the Angel who Announces the End of Time). This movement is considered to be one of the most musically multihued movements in the quartet by Messiaen as he was a synesthete. This movement is described by Messiaen as using the “angel” theme from movement 2, but now the angel arrives in full force, especially the rainbow that covers him. Messiaen feels this movement as though “passing through the unreal and suffer, with ecstasy, a tournament; a roundabout compenetration of superhuman sounds and colors.” (http://www.princetonuniversityconcerts.org/docs/1819_Messiaen_Up_Close_Program.pdf) I interpret his preface as expressing an aural way of escaping the real and political world; to have something purely beautiful and beyond comprehension.

Obviously Messiaen was caught in all the troubles of WWII; casualties, war crimes, genocide, concentration camps, and slave labor, so I believe him to have written this piece as a musical expression of the beauty of his devotion to Catholicism. He wrote this piece to express all the thoughts of the time at the end of time and I interpret that to mean the time after your life has ended. Toward the end of this movement, the piano is arpegiating complex chords and giving a shimiering “rainbow” as a kaleidoscope of color to show a glimpse of his perception of heaven.(http://www.marthasumma.com/pdf/4tet_for_the_end_of_time.pdf) This could definitely be a reason to believe that he wanted something to sound like an out of this world experience and something “beyond.”


Pianist: Matthew Schellhorn
Soloists of the Philharmonia Orchestra: James Clark (violin), Barnaby Robson (clarinet), David Cohen (cello)

I have found mixed interpretations of its premiere:

from Messiaen: “Never was I listened to with such rapt attention and comprehension.” (Joseph Stevenson, All Music Guide to Classical Music: The Definitive Guide to Classical Music (All Media Guide, 2005), 843)

and

from the premiere performers: “The audience, as far as I remember, was overwhelmed at the time.  They wondered what had happened.  Everyone.  We too.  We asked ourselves: ‘What are we doing?  What are we playing?'”
(http://holocaustmusic.ort.org/places/camps/western-europe/messiaenolivier/)

Lamell argued that music and politics “are two entirely different worlds: Political discourse is one realm, and music is another realm.” (http://musicologynow.ams-net.org/2017/09/does-music-trump-politics-dennis-prager.html) I agree with this point and that is a main argument for why I believe this piece to be a morale booster and a heavenly separation from the political struggle during WWII. I believe that music should not be affected by political movements as pieces that are specifically apolitical can be just as beautiful, if not more. The Quartet was meant to be part of Messiaen’s “commitment to apolitical art” (http://holocaustmusic.ort.org/places/camps/western-europe/messiaenolivier/) and I think his separation is very well accomplished.

Featured photo credit:
https://www.androidcentral.com/get-lost-space-out-world-wallpaper-wednesday

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Electrically Live Organs!

Electricity in Organs is one of the most innovative technologies to ever happen to organists in the modern day. It allows the organist many opportunities for improvement in both the ability to practice and in the ability to perform.

There are a few terms that the reader should know. An organ’s ”bellows” are similar to that of a bellow with which you would fan a flame in a fireplace. These bellows produce wind to follow through the wind trunks, which are pipes for the air to go through, to arrive at the pipes to produce the sound we hear. The next term is ”stops” which are the individual sounds that can be combined to make the ”normal” sound of an organ. The keyboards of an organ have a ”pluck” which is a slight resistance in the movement of the key from the normal position to the depressed position. This resistance is the opening of a passageway that the air follows to reach the intended pipe to make the harmony or melodic line desired.

Diagram of organ bellow and its route to the pipes

Before electricity’s use in organs, an organist would practice by use of one of 2 methods. First is hiring a person or two (or as required) to pump the bellows of the organ to supply wind for the pipes to speak/make a sound. This method of practice was not the most desirable as you would have to pay the so-called, bellow treader(s) to pump the bellows and also as a result of practicing in the Church during this time, the organist would have to work in a cold environment or pay for some system of heating in the building. The other style of practice was to use an instrument that did not require winding, such as a harpsichord or clavichord, or could supply wind of its own, such as a harmonium. This style of practicing was better for two reasons; it did not require the hiring of bellow treaders and also would not require additional heating beyond what the home’s normal livable temperature would have been.

Pedal Clavichord

While these two styles of practicing allowed for excellent music making during that time and a way for the organist to develop his/her technique, both had their disadvantages: the cost of practice time or not hearing the intended instrument’s sound. With the use of electricity in organs, Organists are now allowed to practice without the aid of bellow treaders by application of electric blowers/heavy duty fans or missing out on the sounds of the organ on which they intend to play.

Just as important is the use of electricity to recall combinations of stops at any point in time to accomplish a specific sound to assist the expression of the music and the organist. The sounds can be anything the organist desires to hear in regards to pitch level and dynamics. Olivier Messiaen used this feature of organs to employ intriguing and distinct colors in his pieces that would have been near impossible to accomplish on an organ that did not have electricity to execute these drastic and pertinent sound changes.

Changes of sound could not be as drastic without the aid of electricity

In addition to these improvements with electricity, because of this advancement there allowed enablement of a higher technical facility for organists. The development of direct electric action was the cause of the progress. This action allowed for ease of overcoming the pluck of the palette, allowing the pipe to speak. With this available ease, there was an increase in virtuoso writing for the organ. The ability of the organist before this technology was stunted as the key pressure would have to be overcome with more weight and would, therefore, slow the speed at which organists would tend to play because of physical limitations of the instrument.