From: "Michael Jackson mjackso...@yahoo.com [FairfieldLife]"
<FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>
To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2014 4:28 PM
Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: FFL Hating Turq and Belief in God is a form of
mental illness
Ha ha ha ha! Certified Arts Integration performer!!! That's better than being a
RE-certified Governor!!!
Pays better, too.
And, there is the added benefit that when you tell people what you do for a
living, when you walk away as an artist they're not snickering at you behind
your back, saying, "Could you *believe* that idiot? He actually believes that
he's a 'Certified Governor' of something he calls the 'Age of Enlightenment'.
What a nut job."
Then again, even being snickered at as a 'Certified Governor' is better than
the uncontrollable laughter you'd hear behind you if you had told them you were
a 'Raja' of the 'Global Country of Enlightenment." Possibly the ONLY thing
Maharishi excelled at was creating the dumbest job titles in human history. :-)
________________________________
From: "anartax...@yahoo.com [FairfieldLife]" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>
To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2014 10:59 AM
Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: FFL Hating Turq and Belief in God is a form of
mental illness
Might as well eat your heart out Nabby, your limited opinion about the nature
of art does not count:
Curtis Blues
Curtis Blues
Curtis Blues, a certified Arts Integration performer, was named the Blues
Artist of the Year by the Washington DC Blues Society. His musical programs
integrat...
View on artsfairfax.org Preview by Yahoo
Curtis Blues, a certified Arts Integration performer, was named the Blues
Artist of the Year by the Washington DC Blues Society.
Note that the link goes to the Arts Council of Fairfax County, Virginia. Curtis
is a recognised artist, and you just have a bee in your bonnet. Wake up. I do
not see why Curtis needs to change his view to support your myopic view of the
world. I think Curtis is an artist, and I normally do not listen to blues
music, though I have a certain fondness for Billie Holiday.
==============
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote :
You claim you produce art. I claim you produce noise and that your ego is out
of control. It's not complicated.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <curtisdeltablues@...> wrote :
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote :
It's obvious by now that you won't change
M: You mean adapt a non native English speakers' misuse of the word for my job
title in every organizations that books my shows? That was never on the table.
What you need to do if you want to use English is to brush up on the
adjectives. That let's you apply whatever personal standards you want to
personalize a generic word like "art." For example you could say that is
groundbreaking art or shitty art, or even life changing, mind boggling,
awesomenest ever art. But you don't get to miss-appropriate a generic term for
a human activity as if your taste is the definition of the word. Again, that is
where adjectives allow you to personalize your feelings about the activity.
N:will continue to try to convince yourself by saying, dammit: "I'm an artist,
I'm an artist, I'm an artist, I'm an artist" forever till you pop.
M: Actually, just like Maharishi claimed, I didn't name myself that, this is
how the arts groups refer to me as so people know what I do when they want to
hire me.
N: Good luck with that.
M: Having excellent luck with that, thanks.
N: This "discussion" has hereby ended from my side.
M: This discussion was never open from YOUR side. We both know that.
---In
FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <curtisdeltablues@...> wrote :
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote :
What is art and what isn't always is a hot theme and will probably never end.
M: Popular among people who don't produce any. Most of my social life is with
artists and the topic has never come up.
N: And there will always be greedy persons who try to capitalize on that word
to make a living, happens everywhere.
M: I know those artists raking in the cash, big problem. I share your disdain
for people trying to make a
living. I mean why aren't they just eating brioche?
I think the problem is a lack of a central control over the use of the term to
describe this human activity. I'm thinking something along the lines of a
re-certification course that they can pay for to use the word "art." (Patent
Pending)
N: My statement about your music is my personal and passionate opinion after
having seen the videos you posted.
M: Gosh Nabs, I don't know how to tell you this but... inspiring people to
personal passionate feelings IS the goal of my art. Just say'n...
♫ Well Worn Blues - Curtis Blues. Listen @cdbaby
Click to listen at CDBaby
View on www.cdbaby.com Preview by Yahoo
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <curtisdeltablues@...> wrote :
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote :
That's what Cartier-Bresson said of his work during numerous interviews.
Ofcourse his work is artistic, he simply had other and higher ideas about what
art is, ideas he tried to fulfill late in life, nothing of which came close to
much of what he produced with a camera.
The work of Edward Steichen is wonderful and is reaching astronomical prices
these days.
"Calling Curtis an amateur musician is just like calling yourself a
non-professional photographer."
If he makes a living from it he obviously is a professional, is's his claim
that he creates art that piss me off. In my ears it's mostly noise and believe
me, I like much music that by many is considered "noise" or weird Collection of
sounds.
Again, and for the last time; Claiming to be an artist just because others are
willing to pay for it is just foolish and comes from an ego out of control.
M: No Nabbie, I don't say I am an artist because I make my total living from
it, that is what makes me a professional musician. The word artist is my job
description in the agencies who get me business as an artist on their roster of
artists who offer serves in the arts to people who want to hire artists to
perform art in artistic venues.
The ego out of control is the person who believes that his subjective opinion
about what art he prefers should be the deciding factor in using a word that
relates to the product created by people in the arts. You are imposing
subjective snob standards because no one told you that you are not in charge of
what is and is not, art.
Consider this your notice.
Karlheinz Stockhausen - Mittwochs-Gruß
Karlheinz Stockhausen - Mittwochs-Gruß
Mittwoch aus Licht - Mittwochs-Gruß The greeting of the opera WEDNESDAY from
LIGHT. The Wednesday Greeting consists of the electronic music from the fourth
s...
View on www.youtube.com Preview by Yahoo
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <anartaxius@...> wrote :
Interesting that Cartier-Bresson spent a lot of time drawing and painting,
especially after he retired from photography, so calling himself not an artist
is rather peculiar. There are lots of photographers that think photography can
be an art. I have always thought of it this way. Take this atmospheric
photograph of the Flatiron Building in New York City made in 1904 by Edward
Steichen. Just like music, painting, sculpture, photographic images can have
compositional and tonal integrity.
Calling Curtis an amateur musician is just like calling yourself a
non-professional photographer. In photography as well as music there are
amateurs who are more capable artistically than professionals, but they do not
make their living that way. A professional has to produce consistent results
day in and day out, they have to be reliable. Bad musicians sing and often play
out of tune, so it is less likely they could survive professionally.
Photography is so common place, and cameras ubiquitous today, that it is
probably difficult for photographers with the run-of-the-mill stuff that just
about any idiot can produce photographically today. Most people can tell the
difference between a good musician and a bad one, but most of them cannot tell
a good photograph from a bad one, in part because photography is a very
mechanical profession compared to playing an instrument, which requires some
considerable skill to be even barely competent.
I think your criticisms of Curtis's ability is far off the mark. Perhaps you
are discombobulated by his intellect, which is certainly more powerful than
yours or mine. This can be very annoying if you have a strong emotional
attachment to TM.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <curtisdeltablues@...> wrote :
--In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote :
You are right, different instruments obviously need different approaches to
training. My suggestion was a hint only, to sit down and listen to one note at
the time which should be done regardless of instrument and would benefit any
amateur who often tries to accomplish too much too soon.
M: This is called every day of my life Nabbie. Check out Well Worn Blues and
Love in Vain even in preview on CDBABY on my Well Worn Blues CD and you will
see an example of what
you are talking about. The start of Well Worn Blues is being played on a
single string diddley bow on a board I made to preserve the tradition of single
string instruments from the history of blues.
Wont cost you a penny!
♫ Well Worn Blues - Curtis Blues. Listen @cdbaby
♫ Well Worn Blues - Curtis Blues. Listen @cdbaby
Click to listen at CDBaby
View on www.cdbaby.com Preview by Yahoo
Regarding your last question. I'm certainly producing "soulless pictures for
money". There is no artistic merit in this whatsoever, though I do try to make
every picture "sing", if not able to do that to some extent I would have no
clients.
Art in photography ? There are many but I like to mention Cartier-Bresson for
many reasons, one being that he strongly denied that he was an artist :-)
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <anartaxius@...> wrote :
Okay Nabbie, I listened to the Robert Johnson recording and to some of Curtis's
recordings on YouTube.
This is regarding you one note theory of music here. Granted some instruments
tone productions can be a thing that must be practised, sounding a note on a
violin is rather complex. But many instruments such as the piano, just about
anyone can strike a note and it sounds the same. It is the relationships
between the notes that make music not just one note. Beauty in a single note is
in the eye of a beholder. Take the saxophone. This was originally intended to
be a classical instrument, but for the most part it ended up in jazz, brass
bands, on the popular side of the tracks. Classical saxophone playing is
generally very smooth and mellow. While jazz players are often rather raspy in
tone. You have to consider the style of music being played. If you consider
'beauty of tone' as a criterion, most jazz saxophonists sound like crap next to
a good classical player. But the classical player probably could never
replicate the style of the jazz players.
YouTube is not the best way to hear music. It is compressed and often recopied
and recompressed many times. Consumer video recorders have microphones that
have distorted frequency response, often boosting the highs, and they are
recorded at the camera location, not with optimum placement.
The Robert Johnson recording is a solo, and 1936 recording technology loses
both deep bass and much of the high frequencies (and an abrasive was added to
the shellac of 78rpm records to keep the needle from wearing them down too
quickly). His sound on the reproduction on YouTube is dead because it has been
processed to remove the noise of that technology. So when you compare the
musical sound of different musicians, you have to account for how the recording
technology, and the recording engineer affect the final sound.
Studio recordings tend to be different than live recordings. The atmosphere is
more relaxed in a studio recording, and the need to project to an audience is
absent so the sound might be more intimate. A completely acoustic performance
without amplification requires projecting to the audience, and such a
performance might sound a bit more intense than one in a more intimate setting.
Comparing solo guitar and voice with what Curtis does with additional
instruments is not a telling comparison. The ability to play slowly is nice,
but a pro has to be able to handle rapid passages with ease, and without making
serious errors. Now I can play slowly, because I am not that skilled, and have
no other choice, lacking technical fluency. Five-year-old children can play the
piano far better than I ever will. I am pretty good with single notes too. I
can play them loud, soft, and in between.
There are kinds of music I like, music I like less, and music I do not like,
but I do not consider those performing music I do not like as crude etc.,
because I have not really investigated their artistry and style; some of these
musicians seem to be fantastic in their technical ability. I mostly listen to
Western European music, Bach, Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven and so forth, so
I have a musical bias, I almost never listen to pop, jazz, musicals, rock, or
blues. Learning something about the style of a particular kind of musics helps
to appreciate more, even if in the end, you do not like it. For example, I do
not like rap, but it takes a tremendous amount of rhythmic and verbal and
literary skill to produce it.
I read somewhere on FFL you were a photographer. Are you an artist or a hack
(just taking soulless pictures for money)? I do not believe you have ever given
us a sample of your work. I am sure there are critics in the audience who would
be glad to evaluate your artistic ability. What do you consider to be art in
the field of photography? If we are discussing art versus non art, there must
be some general criterion or criteria by which to evaluate it.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com,
<no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote :
"If Curtis were as bad as you say, what do you think he should do to improve?"
Good question. First of all I'd recommend practise, practise, practise. He
could start by hitting one note at a time, just one note and listening to it,
how it sounds, vibrates and how the sound slowly disappears. Just that, very
simply and innoscently create one sound, and then listen to it, how pleasing is
that sound, does it sound better doing it in another way ? And again, and
again, and again. By doing this one acquires an understanding of the basics and
a love for the note itself. Without this basics one is lost and will never
achieve anything. One should understand that the ability to play fast on any
instrument is not the same as playing music. To be able to play slowly is the
hallmark of a professional.
Many amateurs, like Curtis, make this mistake; they skip the basics and try to
convey too much.
I recommend you to listen to the video I posted by Robert Johnson. Where is the
showmanship in this ? There isn't any because his heart is in it. When you
listen to this, perhaps you better understand my disgust when fellows like
Curtis comes along claiming to play the blues.
Robert Johnson - Kind Hearted Woman Blues (1936)
