Why modern rock music, movie music, and even classical music sucks: Good melodies are gone

Reader Bryan called my attention to the 13-minute video below made by “Inside the Score”, a person who usually posts discussions of classical and film music (his/her Patreon account is here).  This video diverges a bit from that theme, but I think it’s on the right track. Bryan said this about the video: WEIT readers […]

Country musicians choose the one song that best represents their genre

Although Ken Burns has now removed the free episodes of his “Country Music” series from his website, there are still extra features you can watch. One of them is a half-hour clip of country musicians, producers, and writers being asked to name the one song that they think best represents country music. At first Burn’s […]

Answers to the rock song quiz

Here are the answers to my rock song quiz from this morning, in which you were asked this question:   Here are a few words. Name a rock song in whose lyrics they appear, as well as the singer or group who recorded the song   The words are in bold below, and I found […]

Rock song quiz

I have some things to tell you (that’s a riff on a Thomas Wolfe short story), but am putting the finishing touches on my Jesus and Mo foreword, and so—as Captain Oates said—I may be some time.  But here’s something to occupy at least the rock and roll aficionados among you.  It’s no fair Googling […]

Two by Randy Travis

I’ve now finished watching to Ken Burns’s fabulous eight-part television series (sixteen hours), “Country Music”.  Don’t miss it! There are a lot of wonderful songs, and one thing I realized about country music, which hadn’t hit me before, is that the tenor of country songs is far more personal than in, say, rock or pop […]

Paul McCartney on how he wrote some of his hits

As usual, YouTube is a black hole, for when I watch one video, a bunch of other ones “recommended for you” pop up on the right side. And how well they know me! Yesterday this 27-minute video of Paul McCartney appeared, and I had no choice but to click on it. It’s a fascinating soliloquy […]

“Here You Come Again”

If you’re not watching Ken Burns’s PBS series, “Country Music,” you’re making a mistake: almost every reader who’s seen it, including those (like me) who aren’t huge fans of country, have found it mesmerizing.  And you can see all the episodes free online. When I was exercising this afternoon, and listening to my iPod Nano […]

Ken Burns’s new documentary, “Country Music”

Even if you’re not a fan of country music (I like some of it but not a lot of it), you will want to watch Ken Burns’s latest documentary, “Country Music” (the website is here). This was done in collaboration with two producers, Dayton Duncan and Julie Dunfey. There are eight two-hour episodes, making it […]

“The Weight”: A multicultural rendition

Reader Michael called my attention to this Playing for Change video which is not only a fantastic rendition of a famous song—a song that turns 51 this year (not 50, as the video notes state below)—but also shows how music can bring people together, at least for one song. I wish we could somehow leverage […]

Why great rock—and its performers—are doomed

I’m gonna gripe about modern rock music again and contrast it with the music produced between the early Sixties and mid-Seventies, which I consider the apotheosis of rock—just as I see the apotheosis of jazz lasting from the mid-Thirties to the early Sixties, ending with Coltrane. Since their apogees, both genres have gone downhill. And […]