snow yay! and a capella love

[ilanarama]

It's such a beautiful day today. It snowed overnight, but the day dawned all sunny and bright and sparkly and yay. Lots of meltage from the sun, but the view out of our front windows is south to the north face of Smelter Mountain, which is all snowy and pretty. The hogback to the west has stripes of snow on it. Mmm pretty.

I have some great photos of our Thanksgiving hiking trip but have as of yet been too lazy to pick through and smallify and flickr them. So for now, you get music. I really love a capella music, particularly male voices, and lately I've been addicted to these two rather different songs:

Northwest Passage by Stan Rogers - a Canadian song that I got from a posting of the soundtrack for the TV show Due South. I like a lot of Stan Rogers's other songs as well; I know his work because some of them were covered by Clam Chowder, a group that friends of mine were in in the 80s.

Projdi Vilo by Klapa Cambi - a Croatian song I got from jereeza. The tune is so nice, and I'm happy the words are in a language I don't speak, since according to jereeza they mean something on the order of, "Come here, gorgeous, and let me impregnate you."

Have any favorite a capella music you'd like to share with me?

Comments

[littleamerica.livejournal.com]

Croatian must be more compact than I realized. If you were to say that in Tagalog you'd need about a half-hour.

I'm not a big fan of a capella music; about the only thing I've heard recently that came close was Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians' version of "Kung Fu Fighting," and strictly speaking I suspect bird noises don't qualify. Anyway, here are links to the two Coverville shows that might contain something you'd like: [1 (http://www.coverville.com/archives/2005/09/coverville_127.html)] [2 (http://www.coverville.com/archives/2005/02/coverville_53_a.html)]. Brian Ibbott is a big a capella fan, so you never know.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Very cool - thanks for the links.

I have lots, in fact...

[triestine.livejournal.com]

Please let me know if you heard of (or indeed, heard their music) a Corsican band called I Muvrini. If not, I'll YSI a few songs.

Come on, I'm an uncultured American...

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

...and besides, I haven't heard of half the American bands people talk about!

I Muvrini

[triestine.livejournal.com]

These two I uploaded from my laptop aren't a capella (that's on the PC and will follow), but are nonetheless good examples of what the guys sound like. Enjoy, I hope:

http://s62.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3BPGZFJT5GC8I1TMLE97M88ODD
http://s56.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=14HCKYYHYZDWF1WTWFNL79XLKA

[dwenius.livejournal.com]

The King's Singers have always amazed me. Six proper English gentlemen, two singing countertenor, very probably the finest vocalists I have ever seen perform. Amazon has 50 of their recordings for sale (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=classical&field-keywords=king%252527s%252520singers&search-type=ss&bq=1&store-name=classical/ref=xs_ap_sai2_xgl15/102-4294901-8997707); Some of them are over produced elevator music, but if you stick to Madrigals (All At Once Well Met or the Madrigal History Tour series are very good) or folk songs (Watching the White Wheat is the keeper) you should be safe. They have an album "something something Comedian Harmonists" that features fabulous and funny instrument impersonations. Their popular music albums are horrible, although Good Vibrations has an arrangement of "Lonesome Road" that is to die for. I wish there were a live album or video, because 1) the song "New Day" is pristine and perfect live, but drenched in reverb on the otherwise forgettable album of the same name, and 2) I don't think they have ever recorded a version of "Masterpiece", a 12 minute historical overview of classical music in which many famous melodies are sung using the composer's name as the only words. It brings the house down every time I've seen them perform it live.

In the "american classic songbook" vein, The Nylons have been around forever, another group of...6? 5? guys, much of their material is a capella though they will drop in a drum kit or pad every now and then.

[fredfred.livejournal.com]

I've seen both in concert. I should probably get some of their music on the old G4.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the pointers. I prefer folk songs to pop music, anyway, so that's a good lead.

[dawn-guy.livejournal.com]

Stan Rogers wrote some fine songs and I invariably prefer his originals to any covers I've heard. You may also like Connie Kaldor's work: it's in the same folk tradition, acoustic not a capella. One of my favourite Connie Kaldor songs is Wood River.

I know one of the people in the Pittsburgh-based group In Acchord and have their first CD, which draws an a variety of sources. I've been meaning to get their second CD and should have arranged for Dan to get a copy to one of my cow orkers last week at LISA, but I did not have my shit together. Well, there's always the post.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the pointers! And I agree, I prefer Stan Rogers's originals.

[goldispikes.livejournal.com]

Anonymous 4 (french 14th cen.) - gorgeous women's voices
5 O'Clock Shadow - very nice boys from Boston who I once met
ME - singing 18th cen. Irish song!

Let me know if any of these interest you and I'll share mp3s.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Well, I like the male voices better, so I'd pick them. But I'm curious to hear YOU!

[meri-oddities.livejournal.com]

I adore Stan Rogers. But him singing, rather than anyone else. I can't think of anyone else who does a capella music that I have off hand, but I'll ask the musician when he gets home. I'm sure he's got cool stuff. ;-)

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I like Stan Rogers as well. But had you ever heard Clam Chowder at DC area cons? They covered some lovely music (I didn't care for their originals much) and had quite a following. One of the members, Don Stallone, was a very good friend of mine.

[meri-oddities.livejournal.com]

The group name does sound familar, but I don't think I've ever seen them. I don't get out to clubs a lot. :-)

[fredfred.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the awesome MP3s, ilanarama!

Without ever having known the name of the song or that it was Stan Rogers, I'm familiar with 'Northwest Passage'; it was probably used in a variety of Canadian contexts (tv? radio? etc.) where I absorbed it like a red and white sponge.

Prodji Vilo is so groving.

I assume you know of Ladysmith Black Mobazo? They're great on their own or with Paul Simon. Let me know and I'll upload something.

I tend to like my a capella with female voices (maybe this is a gendered thing), so I'm very fond of the Roches.

I'll upload my favorite and completely a capella Manhattan Transfer track. It makes me swoon. A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square (http://s62.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=0OYGQDNTPFLTH3M5PG9BZ596VF). Mostly they're jazzy and have lots of instrumentation plus four voices; this is one of their few a capella tunes.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much for the song, woo!

I have Paul Simon's CD on which LBM sing, and I think I've heard them separately once but I don't know if I actually have any of those songs. Upload something, and if they have more than one album perhaps you could rec me one to buy.

[saramwrap.livejournal.com]

Awesome! I used to sing in an a capella ensemble, so it's near and dear to my heart.

For my part, I recommend La Mule by Malicorne (http://kocharhook.com/nick/sow/?p=14) (mp3 link on that page).

[saramwrap.livejournal.com]

And now I also recommend Gulf War Song by Moxy Früvous (http://kocharhook.com/nick/sow/?p=25) (mp3 there, too).

So current, even if it is 10+ years old.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Wow, thanks so much. Is the Nick your Nick, or a different Nick?

[saramwrap.livejournal.com]

Different Nick! :)

I do like a lot of this Nick's picks, though... I downloaded all of the available mp3s and really only ditched a couple.

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

I had to come back to find out who recced La Mule, because I've been listening to it a lot lately. I really like it!

[saramwrap.livejournal.com]

Yay! :)

I love it, but Malicorne is so obscure that I can't find more.

[malnpudl.livejournal.com]

Howdy. Just surfing through your LJ and found this post.

Since I never miss a chance to promote Great Big Sea (http://www.greatbigsea.com) to anyone who doesn't run away screaming, here are a few a capella tracks for you. (In a couple of them, Sèan McCann is playing bodhran, but it's simple percussion so I still count this as a capella.)

Old Brown's Daughter (http://s24.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3QUAO0HYAW2FS3LQPHTM6QN8FS)

River Driver (http://s24.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2G3FTVMVPBI7O1AOOOQJK1NDEM)

General Taylor (studio) (http://s24.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1S8A1BSDEEBVA1NTI5IJ6T9E2H)

General Taylor (live) (http://s24.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1QAGQ212HRQE62R5HU161NMEMW) (So you'll get an idea of what they're like in concert: "A Great Big Sea concert isn't something you see or hear; it's something you do." - lead singer Alan Doyle)