The Bear Comes Home is a novel about a talking, saxophone-playing bear. In bringing together fictional characters and real musicians, it takes place in a historical setting that is both specific and nebulous. The Bear’s musical journey speaks to the odd state of jazz in the 1980s and 90s and allows us to consider where jazz goes from here. Continue reading The Bear Comes Home and the Ursine Age of Jazz History
What does the 2012 election mean for arts funding and the future of symphony orchestras in this country? In the wake of the National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba’s first U.S. tour, I look at different approaches to supporting the arts and speculate as to how our orchestras can thrive again. Continue reading American Orchestras, Arts Funding, and International Musical Politics after the Election
In a followup to the last post, this entry picks apart music used by Democrats and how Barack Obama’s playlist summarizes his reelection campaign by providing a soundtrack for marching forward and refusing to look back. Continue reading Obama 2012 and Campaign Music for Marching Forward
Music has been used in Presidential campaigns since the days of Washington, and this year is no different. This post analyzes the music of the Romney/Ryan ticket, the unintentional controversies it has stirred up, and how it tries selling these candidates to voters through nostalgia. Continue reading Romney/Ryan 2012 and the Nostalgia of Republican Campaign Music
Cartoon Network, launched in 1992, has played with the union of new, hip music and animation since the network began creating original content. When the Adult Swim programming block started in 2001, new music that would appeal to the network’s late night fans gained greater prominence in creating an overall aesthetic for the new network. Following the formation of Williams Street Records in 2007, Adult … Continue reading Tunes and Toons: The Music of Adult Swim
The music of Stax Records served as a chief inspiration for how RZA approached production and also formed a primary musical resource he drew from. Here I look at those Stax samples in early Wu-Tang Clan albums and rediscover some great music in the process. Continue reading Hearing the Stax Sound in the 36 Chambers
American musicians were unable to record the music for one of The Avengers’ best scenes that combined preexisting art music with shocking violence, giving insight into the film’s villain and placing it into an emerging cinematic tradition. Continue reading Loki, Schubert, and the Art of Accompanying Ultraviolence
The differences between the love songs of today’s squeaky clean boy bands and the slightly more complicated pop of the ’90s is nothing new. This tension (and others) can be traced back to when the modern teen idol emerged in the guise of Ricky Nelson in the late 1950s. Continue reading Ricky Nelson and the Tensions in Male Teen Pop Songs
Timothy Storhoff 