StreetcredMusic: Sinatra Documentary, Cient'anni

I watched the documentary on Frank Sinatra, all four hours of, "All or Nothing At All".
It was good.

I didn't need the history lesson it provided. I was a Sinatra fan, saw him live many times, and knew most of it, but still enjoyed the footage and the quotes from his peers. I met Sinatra on three occasions, Atlantic City, Vegas and at the United Nations. Had a conversation with him for several minutes at the UN, while waiting for the Secretary General, Kurt Waldheim, to arrive for a photo op.

I though the most insightful comments in the film came from Mia Farrow. She was open about him and her, and from what I know of her that's what I expected.

Sinatra & Mia Farrow

I want to caution all the young independent musicians/vocalists out there about viewing this film.
Some of you may think it science fiction, while others may take it as a devastating blow to your dreams.
You see this documents how back in the day, if you had talent, the powers to be would seek you out.
Producers, movie people actually went out looking for talent. The film tells of Harry James the #1 band leader of the time driving to New Jersey to see Sinatra, and signing him on the spot.
He didn't ask how many 'likes' do you have.. are you on twitter.. make an EP and then call me.

Today the people in power have to be sure you are a merchandise machine that they can profit from,  from day one. Nobody sticks their neck out for you.

Sinatra 99 years ago.

It also showed that you could at one time, actually get access to the people in power just by knocking on doors...and you could speak out about issues, inequality, politics, unfair labor practices, AND
people would like you for it. That's something that is so missing in artists today.
Most artists seem to be content with the corporate conveyor belt to get them, well nowhere ...Sooo
This film may not be 4U.

This is the tune Sinatra told me was his favorite:: 'Don't Worry Bout Me'
      ...after saying there were many.

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Pete Carma

StreetcredMusic: Op Ed By Tessa Lena..About,Tidal

 My friend Tessa Lena, a wonderful artist, musician, creator and thinker, has a blog.
.....I steal from her on occasion, this is one of those occasions. ENJOY! 

A very jumpy essay. So I got Tidal trial the other day. All politics and "future of the music industry" aside, I liked it on a sensory level. I have boycotted all other streaming services, so when I got Tidal, I got mega greedy and started listening to everything I could get my hands on. As Russians say, no bread, please. But the irony is, after trying a million things, I ended up listening to the old bands I already like, and old bands and performers that I wanted to catch up on. I think it has mostly to do with the changed standards of audio processing, or maybe new mainstream music is really that much lamer… I don't know. 
 

Her band is:: 'Tessa Makes Love'

 >>Check out my experiment.
Me. I don't like Popsicle music. I don't have the time for it. Even more than Popsicle music, I dislike Popsicle music that pretends to be rebellious. That's the worst kind of sonic cheating. And my body is super sensitive to what sound does physically (and also, to what happens when ideology interferes with pure nature - but that's a separate topic so for now, just check out my experiment).

 My first experiment was to give another chance to the artists who I've put on my contempt list based on a few of their Youtube videos. Number one was Kanye since the (perfectly logical!) gap between his screaming–subjectively to me–lack of genuine depth and his chest-beating pretense of having magic doesn't cease to amaze me. I understand how intelligence messes with confidence while lack of thereof… anyway. So I thought, fine. Maybe in the past, I didn't understand. So I put him on, and after about thirty minutes, his music started impacting my concentration and ability to be myself. He really makes followers. It's a weapon. [On a complete tangent… His last production I saw on Youtube (now I am going off Tidal… don't remember which award show it was done at) was very moving, I am dying to know which part of it he actually created. If you know, please PM me…. my scientific hunger is killing me].

 Then I listened to a bunch of Beyonce. I like her as a human being, to the degree it's possible to like one as a human being without knowing somebody in life. What I sense from her, I understand. I like one song she sings, I think it's brilliant. So I listened to that song, a couple of times, and then moved on to others… since I cannot think of anything witty worth mentioning here, sounds like the rest was a blur.


Then I started randomly clicking on various featured content, it was boring and over processed.
And then I went to old bands and old songs that at the very least were not trying to split my brain with too much unnecessary sonic fuss.
The end.

Follow :: Tessa on twitter HERE

StreetcredMusic: She Said~~He Said, Lara Bello, Frank Sinatra, and The Moon

 She Said~~He Said, is a fun thing I like to do, because in reality music has no gender.

She Said:
Lara Bello

  
            
                Video here, Enjoy: 'Fly Me To The Moon'
 My first experiment musical recorded was this: Here in 2003 I was trying to look for different colors within the standards of jazz, and I inventaba melodies and spontaneous letrillas.
To my father, great photographer, he loved " Fly Me To The Moon " and so he wanted to record this experiment with the bassist granadino Guillermo Morente. I remember the rain brutal that fell after this recording, with the water coming in the whole house and I with the hairstyle and make-up running to get buckets of water and to save the plugs and electronic equipment from the floor. :)

 He Said:
 Frank Sinatra

                   
               Video here, Enjoy:Sinatra, Fly Me To The Moon

 The tune was originally called 'In Other Words'
In 1954, when writing the song which would become famous as "Fly Me to the Moon", Bart Howard had been pursuing a career in music for more than 20 years. He played piano to accompany cabaret singers but also wrote songs with Cole Porter, his idol, in mind. In response to a publisher's request for a simpler song, Bart Howard wrote a cabaret ballad in waltz time which he titled "In Other Words". A publisher tried to make him change some lyrics from "fly me to the moon" to "take me to the moon" but Howard refused to do this. Many years later Howard commented that “... it took me 20 years to find out how to write a song in 20 minutes"
He used his position as a piano accompanist and presenter at the Blue Angel cabaret venue to promote the song and it was soon introduced in cabaret performances by Felicia Sanders.


Follow me:: Pete Carma

StreetcredMusic: Laure Porche, Creator, Artist, New York City.

I recently met a wonderful 'creator' relativity new to New York City. Arriving from France 2 years ago, and I'd like to tell you about the amazing contribution she is making in just that short time.

Laure Porche
                            

Actress/Choreographer

 I met Laure through one of my favorite communities of the Arts in NYC, TheHiveNYC
.....a non profit, very special cultural events happening, in Brooklyn.
She is on the verge of several new projects that will enhance the culture of the city.
She has made a difference already by 'giving back' as an instructor of dance.

Here's a video sample of what you will see from this young talent!!
         Video::Dance reel from Laure Porche

Here's a conversation I had with Laure:
Hi Pete...
"I'm an actress, dancer, choreographer and writer from France. My background spans many different styles of dance (hip hop, belly dance, jazz, Afro) which allows me to adapt to the energy required in any piece, and also to mix styles together to create a unique aesthetic of movement.

While in France, I worked a lot on the fusion belly dance scene, and also did a lot of TV work in Lebanon as a co-choreographer and dance captain on several TV shows.

Laure Porche

 I came to New York to deepen my training as an actress as I was aware American acting is way beyond the kind of technique I could get in France. My experience here as a "displaced person" sparked a reflection about exile, and this reflection is being embodied in the one woman show I'm currently creating.

The show uses theater, dance and movement to explore the idea of being permanently separated from where one is coming from. Through it, I try to give a voice to my Russian great grand mother, who emigrated to France with my great grand father and ended up losing her mind. I also speak and express parts of my own experience and the nostalgia I have always carried, of not being able to go back to where I came from before Earth.

I explore my relationship with God throughout my childhood, as well as the impact my parents' divorce had on me, and the new brand of homesickness I've discovered since coming to the US.

It's a very personal piece, but I've had a chance to workshop it earlier this month and people were wonderfully receptive. Since working on this piece, I've talked to several people who expressed the same feeling of being "strangers on Earth", and thanked me for expressing something they could never quite put into words. It will premiere at the Emerging Artists Theater New Work Series in May.
 

 Aside from that show, I'm also working on The Hive production's of the Tempest in the role of Stephano, and on an experimental movement/theater piece set to happen at Dixon Place, in which I play the French writer Georges Sand." 

                            ***************************************************

I'm looking forward to see Laure in several productions this summer and lucky for New York she is 'displaced' here. A bright future is ahead, I'm sure.

Twitter: follow Laure @Laureiginale

Follow me::  Pete Carma

StreetcredMusic: Tessa Lena, Chosen: Taking Music Listening to a New Level of Stupid

A piece from one of my favorite people, who has a wonderful blog::
        ...Tessa Lena

Chosen: Taking Music Listening to a New Level of Stupid

I am happy to bring on my punchline in the opening sentence: The only thing that this new gamified music listening service is taking to a new level, is “stupid”.
Now, the long form.
Does everything have to be about the finance game? Everything-everything? Even love and magical things?
I am thinking, one day in the distant future, the majority of people are probably going to be forced to remember that the purpose of adult life is not distraction, and not trying to never grow up, but enjoying adulthood. Adulthood is a very happy thing.

Music is otherworldly. It can soothe, and bring out the pain and then heal it, it can inspire one through a difficult task. But when people of a certain psychological type get a hold of it, all they know to do is how to use it to play finance games and sell shit. All they know to do is how to sell shit, period. There is nothing wrong with selling when it’s done in the context of respect and general decency. During the darkest times, there are always people who manage to sneak in amazing, beautiful things, and sell them to others without too much evil. But when it’s about sucking the soul out of you, like a spider from a sci-fi cartoon, it not good. When people dealing music don’t have the organ to understand its power, it’s tragic.

Tessa Lena, her band is Tessa Makes Love

Enter Chosen, “an experiment in the gamification of music listening.”
This morning’s press-release, masked as a cheery Medium article, starts with nonsense about “our genetic fabric” (a drop of determinism that is designed to create a subliminal tie to the advertised product… yawn).

And then it goes into the dark web of meaningless macaroni: “Chosen turns the genre on its head, where not just performers compete, but the 99% of us, who are fairly talentless as performers, compete to prove our expertise as judges…

Our game ‘Judge the Judge’ has you watch a 15 second performance clip followed by two video reviews. You pick the better judge.Ultimately, your rank as a judge is based on an algorithm that includes your historical performance picking winners, the number of followers you’ve built, and the quality of your critiques determined from winning ‘Judge the Judge’ rounds.”
And it goes on, and on, and on.


A tangent: There are many interesting books that talk about how shifting the focus from learning to “entertainment” in education and business practices has been used–sometimes intentionally and sometimes accidentally–by powers in politics and commerce, to create a helpless mass of followers who need a pacifier, at all times. Unfortunately, there are side effects for the followers. They never grow up, and that’s one of the most horrible things that can happen to a human. Neuronal connections don’t develop, misery entails.
Predators are allowed to prey and blow smoke. But listening to them creates pain. Gamification is just a way to corrupt people a bit more, and recycle their beautiful, vibrant souls for a quick profit.

David Hyman, I hope you read it. I don’t know you and I don’t hold any personal grudge–desprite the blunt tone of my words–but have you ever thought of music (and yourself) as a power to make the world better, vs. a power that is guaranteed to make the world more stupid? Do you want to leave the legacy of stupid behind you?

Do you have kids? Do you want them to use your service?
Monetizing the sacred is a two-sided sword. Think about it…
I am a musician, and you are fucking up my sacred.

 Tessa Lena is a musician living in New York. Her background is in classical piano, linguistics, ethnomusicology, and computers. She fronts the band Tessa Makes Love. Robots are on her $hit list.

Follow her on Twitter: @tessamakeslove or subscribe to her newsletter here.

 Follow me:: Pete Carma