Mathematical Institute Bulletin: Song of the Week

The Cure are back, looking much as they did in 1979 when they produced this post-punk masterpiece. Lyrics and song meshing to perfection. It's what music is about.

Known as the 'James Bond one' by aficionados, this is one of hundreds of obscure, small label soul tracks from sixties America that were adopted by the Northern Soul scene in the UK, many of them absolute bangers.

Yvonne's voice on the chorus...

Are you dancing?

Nicola Pedreschi was a postdoc in Oxford Mathematics until the summer. But like several Oxford Mathematicians he is a musician, in Nicola's case in the band Eveline's Dust. So here is the lead single from their new album. This is their website.

"If it keeps on rainin', levee's goin' to break..."

This song was made famous by Led Zeppelin, but the original was written by Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe McCoy in 1929, two years after the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 which killed hundreds and forced hundreds of thousands from their homes.

Who were the first boy band? Probably The Jackson 5 (R.I.P. Tito Jackson who died at the weekend), but The Osmonds were hot on their heals. In fact this song was intended for the Jacksons. The genre became known as bubblegum and much of it was. But this is class.

This song starts as if they are making up as they go along. Which in Big Star's case probably wasn't a million miles from the truth. But wait for the chorus.

Big Star did it all. Made unfashionable music at the wrong time, sold no records, self-destructed and influenced generations of subsequent bands. As they sing: "Love me, we can work out the rest".

The Herbs was a children's show featuring puppets named after, yes you guessed it, different herbs. So Lady Rosemary, Sir Basil, Dill the Dog, Sage the Owl etc., and Parsley himself who introduced each episode. It was written by Michael Bond who also wrote Paddington Bear (statue on platform 1 of Paddington Station, of Paddington that is, not Michael). The rhyming of Parsley with harshly is genius.

I will leave it to you to imagine how this would work for different areas of maths.

Some songs' greatest moment comes in the opening bars or words. When Charles Trenet starts to sing, with those first two words you know you are on to a good thing.

La Mer is also one of those songs expropriated by other languages (and lyrics). There are English, German and even Soviet Russian versions amongst others.

The vibraphone consists of tuned metal bars which the player hits with mallets. It is common in classical music, but especially prevalent in jazz and there is no-one better on 'vibes' than Milt Jackson. Here he is with Modern Jazz Quartet, the group founded and led by pianist John Lewis and in which Milt spent much of his career.

So shut down the laptop, kick off your shoes and let John and Milt sink you in to summer. They start slow. Then get a little less slow. But never get too fast.

What do you call someone who hangs out with musicians?

A drummer.

Okay, drummers get stick (sic). John Lennon, when asked if Ringo was the best drummer in the world, said he wasn't even the best drummer in the Beatles (actually that is probably apocryphal). But drummers are important and even cool, and none cooler than Honey Lantree. This is 1964 and women are not drummers.

The song itself is a piece of classic pre-lapsarian sixties pop produced by legend Joe Meek. Go Honey (especially from 1.27).

If you had wandered in to Hyde Park in the summer of 1966 you might have seen a bunch of barely twenty somethings making a cheap promo film and launching a mod anthem. The mods (from 'modernist'), sharply dressed, riding their Lambrettas (mopeds), had evolved in London in the 50s, listening to jazz and blues and ska, but by the following decade were also listening to the likes of The Who. 

The kids were alright.

Some pieces of music, especially classical music, are often familiar, but you can't name the composer... 

Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg wrote this short piano piece in 1896 in memory of his and his wife Nina's recent 25th wedding anniversary celebration. It is played here by Alice Sara Ott.

And today sees the start of the BBC Proms, eight weeks of largely, but not exclusively, classical music from all eras in the Royal Albert Hall in London.

A familiar story: album released, ignored for years, then slowly hailed as a masterpiece.

This is the title track. Enjoy the weekend. Linda is determined to enjoy hers.

This song, St Etienne's first single, was literally recorded in a member of the band's bedroom studio. It's a cover of a Neil Young song.

The band were named after the French football team that lost the 1976 European Cup final to Bayern Munich. Apparently the band really liked their kit.

70s disco from Tina. Her voice gets higher and higher as the song goes on. It's kind of a relief when she stops.

There used to be a radio feature called 'Bigger than the Beatles' which was a light-hearted way of featuring bands who should have perhaps have done a lot better than they did. These guys fit the bill.

This is a version of an aria from 17th and 18th century composer Alessandro Scarlatti's opera 'Il Pompeo' by Nora Fischer & guitarist Marnix Dorrestein, taken from Nora's 2018 album.  

'O cessate di piagarmi, o lasciatemi morir (wound me no more, leave me to die)'

Some Bond songs are memorable, and there's Lulu's 'The Man with the Golden Gun'. 

Nancy Sinatra nails it.

'Zep' are known for hard rock based on the blues, but they had a melodic side as well as 'Ramble On', from their second album, demonstrates. Singer Robert Plant liked his Tolkien and the song references 'Lord of the Rings.'

Yes

In the second half of the nineteenth century, Richard Wagner revolutionised opera which he saw as a total work of art with music part of a wider visual, poetic and, especially, dramatic experience. 'Das Rheingold' is the first of the four operas in his 'Ring Cycle'. This prelude describes the River Rhine, calm and majestic.

When Paul McCartney released his first post-Beatles solo album it didn't do well, at least with the critics. Compared to his radical bandmate John Lennon, he just seemed twee and lo-fi.

Many years later the album is seen as hugely influential. In fact the pendulum has swung on so much of his solo work. Even so, it is hard to believe no-one at the time thought 'Every Night' a great song.

Marshall Bruce Mathers III (aka Eminem) has announced that he is finishing off his alter ego, Slim Shady. A highly controversial and comic creation he gave vent to what Eminem saw in everyone, though, as is perhaps inevitable, the artist gradually turned in to a grumpy old dad, moaning at what rap had become. Marshall also had his addictions and became close friends with Elton John who helped him through them.

Fanny Mendelssohn was a prolific composer of over 400 works, mainly piano pieces and songs, most of which were never published in her lifetime (the first half of the nineteenth century). She was also a very talented pianist herself.