AN INCOMPLETE LOOK AT TRADITIONAL MUSIC.Byline: David Kronke TV Critic 'TRADITION is an awesome thing,'' enthuses Chris Thiel, a performer in the contemporary bluegrass bluegrass, any species of the large and widely distributed genus Poa, chiefly range and pasture grasses of economic importance in temperate and cool regions. In general, bluegrasses are perennial with fine-leaved foliage that is bluish green in some species. group Nickel Creek Nickel Creek is an American acoustic music trio. Although the group's music has roots in bluegrass, the trio now describes itself as "progressive acoustic". [1] Nickel Creek consists of three permanent members: Chris Thile (mandolin), Sara Watkins (fiddle), and her . That seems to be as far as the thinking has gone for ``Keeping Time: New Music From America's Roots,'' a four-part documentary series on recent manifestations of traditional music beginning tonight on the Sundance Channel. ``Keeping Time'' is a seemingly rudderless hodgepodge of the boundless, potentially fascinating spectrum of non-mainstream music. Gillian Grisman and Alicia Sams have selected a handful of trends and artists that by no means represent the whole of the neo-traditional music movement and pieced together a series of pastiches that leave viewers hungry for more coherent information The coherent information is an entropy measure used in quantum information theory. It is a property of a quantum state ρ and a quantum channel  write_ads(2,1) The series' best episode, ``Buy This Record,'' airing Aug. 21, remains engaging despite pointing out the flaws to their approach. It concerns the struggles of small, independent music labels that release CDs against the torrent of big-label product, focusing, a little, on labels peddling their wares at the annual South by Southwest music event (itself worthy of an episode or two) in Austin, Texas. The episode also features an 82-year-old bluesman recording albums in a living room under the moniker (1) A name, title or alias. See alias.(2) A COM object that is used to create instances of other objects. Monikers save programmers time when coding various types of COM-based functions such as linking one document to another (OLE). See COM and OLE. of T Model Ford, and a small label that manages to land an artist on both ``The Late Show With David Letterman'' and ``Last Call With Carson Daly Last Call with Carson Daly is a late night NBC talk show, hosted by former MTV VJ Carson Daly. Last Call, occupying the time slot previously held by Later .'' But there's no follow-through: We don't learn what kind of modest sales classify their releases as successes, nor do we learn of the increasing practice of artists releasing their own recordings, often to greater profit than if they had worked with a major label. Other episodes are similarly scattershot scat·ter·shot adj. Covering a wide range in a random way; indiscriminate: "his habit of scattershot comment on whatever issue catches his eye" Howell Raines. . Tonight's installment, ``Pickin' My Religion,'' examines artists who record and perform (vaguely) religious music. Gillian Welch Gillian Welch (born October 2 1967 in New York City)[1] is a singer-songwriter whose musical style combines elements of bluegrass, neotraditional country, Americana, old time string band music and folk into a rustic style that she dubs "American Primitive". , who is featured tonight (and records music that is decidedly not just spiritual in nature), offers the following observation: ``Gospel music is anything that deals with simply making the journey through life and what ultimately awaits anybody.'' A fairly broad definition, anyone would agree. Episode two is titled ``Acoustic Innovators,'' but focuses only on one purported innovator, the bluegrass ensemble Nickel Creek, which can transform anything from Bach's Goldberg Variations to Nirvana tunes into bluegrass numbers. The suggestion that the group lures its fans into exploring the music of their numerous antecedents goes unproved. The final show, premiering Aug. 28, purports to examine the songwriting process, but its only value lies in introducing viewers to the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players describe themselves as an "indie-vaudeville conceptual art-rock pop band", from the United States. Originally from Seattle, Washington, they are now based in New York, New York. , a neo-Vaudeville group that incorporates old family slide photographs purchased at estate sales into bizarre song cycles. The creative process itself remains elusively ephemeral. ``Keeping Time'' offers an ants-on-the-canvas purview The part of a statute or a law that delineates its purpose and scope. Purview refers to the enacting part of a statute. It generally begins with the words be it enacted and continues as far as the repealing clause. of the traditional-music scene: You'll get an idea of small, often obscure trends, but no tantalizing tan·ta·lize tr.v. tan·ta·lized, tan·ta·liz·ing, tan·ta·liz·es To excite (another) by exposing something desirable while keeping it out of reach. overview of this rich, underexplored movement. David Kronke, (818) 713-3638 david.kronke(at)dailynews.com KEEPING TIME: NEW MUSIC FROM AMERICA'S ROOTS - Two and one half stars What: Four-part documentary series on new approaches to traditional music. Where: Sundance Channel. When: 7:30 tonight, and each Thursday through Aug. 28. In a nutshell: For hard-core fans - or complete neophytes - only. |
|
||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion