The Music Of JC Harris

positively the most intelligent progressive rock on this here planet

positively the most intelligent progressive rock on this here planet

Rants By Topic

Culture

Another Operatic Snippet. With Organs

Another snippet from the new opera, The Boats (Beautiful Boy). Two churches. Two organs. Your organ says a lot about you, heh heh. Deliverance. Guy Deutscher. Language and Culture. Philip Glass as career path? Walter White and the big, big money. The Who. Tommy. The best rhythm guitar ever?

Roger CortonOne last thing about the whole opera thing. We never got round to talking about the organs last week.

Beautiful Boy (Snippet)

RCI can’t decide if it’s really sincere or just really cheesy.

JCHWell don’t sugar coat it. Cheesy you say?

RCThe organ vibrato. Some of the lyrics sound so gushy. ‘Beautiful Boy’. People don’t really talk like that.

JCHOh yes they do. I know what you mean, though. OK, so there were two big churches when I was a kid. The C of I Church of Ireland–Protestant and the RC Roman Catholic. They were both almost across the street from […]

It’s Opera. With Fish. And Manly Men.

First snippet from the new opera, Boats. Nostalgia. Peter Gabriel & San Jacinto. Deadliest Catch. Willy Loman. Death Of A Salesman. Masculinity. Is golf as boring as opera?

Roger CortonGreat news. Another snippet?

JCHAnd the bad news is. It’s about the other opera.

RCI’ve given up trying to tell you to stay focused on one album at a time. So, is there a story in there someplace?

JCHWell that’s the other bad news. It’s a lot like Detroit The Opera. Except that it’s about fishermen. It’s Detroit. With fish. And manly men.

RCManly men?

JCHYeah. Not to digress, but I was listening to Peter Gabriel the other day. And I hadn’t noticed before; he covers this one theme over and over; There’s this ancient way of doing things that gives life–especially men’s lives–real meaning. And then it blows up. For example, “San Jacinto” is a great vignette. I think it’s his best lyric by a mile

[…]

Wallpaper Needs No Copyright

Or, “can it be wrong if everyone does it?” An NPR article on copyright that totally misses the point. Someone is making money on invented language? Peter Hollens and Middle Earth videogame sounds vs. Steve Roach and Ambient Electronica. Cosplay. Piracy. Point Counterpoint. Jane You Ignorant Slut. Fresh vs. Freeze-dried food. Some dark ideas on the future.

JCHOK, so there was this story on NPR:

http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/08/08/487291905/why-taylor-swift-is-asking-congress-to-update-copyright-laws

JCHAnd I wrote a comment, which got deleted for some reason. So, sneak that I am, I re-posted it two days later (and below).

RCHoly Invented Language Batman! That guy is just like what you were ranting on Invent Your Own Language last month!

JCHExcept that he found a way to monetize the thing.

RCHe makes a six figure income! Making D&D sounds?

JCHI mean, who knew there was so much interest in ‘Cosplay’.

RCCosplay?

JCHGoogle it, homes. Apparently, playing dress up is a big deal nowadays. […]

Why Is Progressive Rock So Unpopular?

The question of why Progressive Rock is so universally mocked these days was recently asked on Quora. And hey, I figured it deserved a thoughtful answer.

Letter To The Editor Of Guitar Player On Creativity

After all my ranting about ‘creativity’ recently, I get back from Vancouver (which was great, thanks to all!) and find the latest Guitar Player in the box. And in his August 2016 editorial, Michael Molenda asks why so many guitarists struggle to find a creative voice. Coincidence or conspiracy? Who knows. But I wrote him to give him a piece of what passes for my mind on this.

Dear Mr. Molenda,

With one side trip, I’ve made my living as a musician now for 30+ years. I made the money that put the kids through school and paid the mortgage as a sideman and a teacher. So for the past 15 years I’ve done my own far less lucrative thing in the (cough) genre of progressive rock. I’m boring you with this because when I went down that road I took a serious pay cut to do music I found to be much more ‘creative’. I feel I have some skin in the game of ‘being creative’.

If you haven’t read it, […]

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