Popular Music - August 2017

Tori Amos

• Little Earthquakes
• Under the Pink
• Boys for Pele
• From the Choirgirl Hotel
• To Venus and Back (studio and live)
• Strange Little Girls
• The Beekeeper
• American Doll Posse
• Abnormally Attracted to Sin
• Midwinter Graces
• Night of Hunters
• Unrepentant Geraldines
• Gold Dust

Kate Bush - The Dreaming
Tim Corley - Like Stars
Wendy Matthews - Beautiful View
No Doubt - The Singles (1992-2003)
Katie Noonan's Vanguard - Transmutant
Radiohead - A Moon Shaped Pool
Talk Talk - The Colour of Spring
K T Tunstall - Eye to the Telescope

Yes, there was a little bit of a Tori Amos festival going on. As a sort of preparation for what was then her upcoming album.

However, it's worth mentioning that the "festivities" were a bit sporadic and spread across the month, which means that I did listen to other albums in between rather than being 100% committed. Sometimes I went as many as 5 days without a Tori Amos album!

And of course there was classical music as well.  Mind you, the end result is still a pop music list that is over 50% Tori Amos.

So am I a creature of habit, and is this blog inevitably boring? Well... one thing that still doesn't show up here is the exploration I do with streaming services. My rule still is that one-off listens to music that I don't own does not qualify for these blog lists. But what it does do is create the shopping list. And I think the next significant binge purchase is more likely to be popular music than classical.

Classical Music - July 2017

Bach, J.S. - Geist und Seele wird verwirret (Spirit and soul become confused)
Bach, J.S. - Gott soll allein mein Herze haben (God alone shall have my heart)
Barber - Serenade (for strings), op.1
Barber - Three Songs, op.2
Beethoven - Music to a Ritter ballet
Beethoven - 12 Minuets for orchestra, WoO 7
Bridge

• Berceuse (instrumental work, orchestral version)
• Berceuse (song)
• The Hag

Dvorak - String Quartet No.1
Dvorak - Polka in E for piano 
Haydn - Symphony No.59
Holmboe - Symphony No.7
Holmboe - Fanfare 
Mozart - Symphony No.27
Nielsen - Symphony No.2
Nielsen - Piano Trio
Rachmaninov - Etudes-Tableaux, op.39
Schoenberg - Transfigured Night
Schumann

• Violin Sonata No.3
• Papillons
• Early songs, including WoO 19 and 21 

Scriabin - Piano Sonata No.1
Scriabin - 6 Preludes, op.13 
Sibelius - Segelfahrt
Sibelius - Souda, souda, sinisorsa
Villa-Lobos - Choros 5 and 7

Most of this list represents at least one of two ideas.

The first idea is, as always, to try and listen to new purchases and so justify making the purchase. I picked up quite a few things during my overseas travel. I am one of those dinosaurs who still prefers CDs. The Beethoven and Scriabin works were bought, as were the Schumann songs.

Of course, I'm still working through the previous batch or two of purchases (such as Villa-Lobos, and Schumann violin sonatas, and Sibelius songs), but trips to other destinations are something of an exception to my general prohibition against buying more when there's already a pile of music not listened to.

The second idea is my penchant for planned surveys, particularly chronological ones. And so after I got home I started on new surveys of Barber, Bridge, Dvorak, Mozart, Nielsen, Schoenberg and Schumann. The Mozart one I am limiting to works I own, whereas for the others I am taking advantage of online services to hear works that aren't part of my collection.

The inspiration in most cases is in fact the growth of my own collection, primarily the large set of purchases I made around November 2016, as I wanted to put those works in more context. And so I will hear Barber's orchestral works, Bridge's chamber works, and Dvorak's piano works for a second time. Some of the Mozart is relatively new as well. For Schumann I will integrate my first hearing of many of the songs into this exercise (which started with very early songs most listeners are not familiar with, from before his focus on solo piano works for the whole of the 1830s). In the case of Schoenberg this is sheer curiosity because I only know 2 of his opuses.

It's all very "planned", I know, but personally I find this useful. I don't want to just listen to music, but to understand it better. This method helps me do that.

Popular Music - July 2017

Tori Amos

• From the Choirgirl Hotel
• Unrepentant Geraldines
• Scarlet's Hidden Treasures

Fiona Apple - When the Pawn...
Gomez - In Our Gun
Patty Griffin - Living With Ghosts
Sarah Harmer - All Of Our Names

There's not much to say here (despite it taking over a month to say it). The travel that weirdly stopped me listening to music in June continued to have that effect in July. So it was only later in the month that I got back into the habit of listening.

And of course it's not much of a surprise that Tori Amos was a part of my "rehabilitation", if that's an appropriate word for returning to my usual addiction after a period of withdrawal.

The most startling thing about this month, though, was that apparently this was the first time I'd listened to the whole of Living With Ghosts for about 5 years. That seems an extraordinarily long time for an album from an artist I deeply admire. Though I wouldn't say this is my favourite Patty Griffin album, it's still a good one.

Actually, I'm not entirely sure I know which is my favourite album. And I still haven't fully come to grips with the last couple...

I think a Patty Griffin focus is long overdue.