From: owner-onlyjoni-digest@smoe.org (onlyJMDL Digest) To: onlyjoni-digest@smoe.org Subject: onlyJMDL Digest V2007 #487 Reply-To: joni@smoe.org Sender: owner-onlyjoni-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-onlyjoni-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk Archives: http://www.smoe.org/lists/onlyjoni Websites: http://www.jmdl.com http://www.jonimitchell.com Unsubscribe: mailto:onlyjoni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe onlyJMDL Digest Thursday, March 13 2008 Volume 2007 : Number 487 ========== TOPICS and authors in this Digest: -------- Re: Never saw this discussed here: Joni & percussion [Dave Blackburn ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 07:31:21 -0700 From: Dave Blackburn Subject: Re: Never saw this discussed here: Joni & percussion I think Joni herself has excellent time-her guitar and piano playing in particular-and appreciates the bed that an interesting groove creates for a song. Some of these are authentic ethnic grooves she co- opts, like "The Jungle Line" and "Dreamland". I don't think of the congas on Blue, Hejira and For The Roses in the same way though; those are pretty standard issue percussion beats behind acoustic guitar of the post-Woodstock bongoes-in-the-dirt variety. One song, although programmed on a drum machine, which is rhythmically intriguing is "Lucky Girl". You try and figure out where "one" is before the vocal comes in! Thomas Dolby, I assume, puts the snare backbeat on the 12th beat of a 12/8 pattern...very unusual. Nowadays songwriters routinely use "loops" of sampled percussion grooves to write over-keyboards and recording software come loaded with them-and in that sense Joni was kind of ahead of her time with TJL and Dreamland. Dave ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 11:45:29 -0400 (EDT) From: Catherine McKay Subject: Re: Never saw this discussed here: Joni & percussion - --- Dave Blackburn wrote: >One song, > although programmed on a drum machine, which is > rhythmically > intriguing is "Lucky Girl". You try and figure out > where "one" is > before the vocal comes in! Thomas Dolby, I assume, > puts the snare > backbeat on the 12th beat of a 12/8 pattern...very > unusual. I was just listening to that song a day or two ago, thinking much the same thing. If you had to count in to the vocals, or some of the other instrumental parts for that matter, it's tricky. Kind of one-and-two-and-THREE-and, one-and-two-and-THREE-and, with what I think is a very slight pause before "and"; or "I'm-a-luck-y-GIRL-uh" with all that dinga-dinga-ding stuff in the background. Hard to represent in words and it really looks goofy written out. Catherine ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 14:04:01 -0400 From: "Barbara Stewart" Subject: Leonard Cohen - tix purchase link for entire tour Toronto tix go on sale this Sat Mar 15 at 11 AM, so fix your speed-dial and bookmark the URL!!!!! Pass it on!!!! (note he's back in London later after part of his European stint - jumping around a lot it appears - NO USA!!!!!!!! - starts June 6 & 7 in Toronto - see link below.) ========================================== Rare UK concerts for Leonard Cohen 2 hours ago Singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen is to play his first live shows for 15 years. The 73-year-old will embark on a world tour this summer. There will be eight UK dates including the Glastonbury and Big Chill festivals. Rob Hallett of tour promoter AEG Live said: "For many, this tour will be the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the legend that is Leonard Cohen. "We, as a company, are honoured to bring this long-rumoured tour to reality across the globe." Details of the tour were announced hours after Cohen was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, along with Madonna and the Dave Clark Five. The Canadian star will kick off in Toronto on June 6 before moving to Dublin for one gig on June 14, followed by the UK dates. Ticket details are available from : http://leonardcohen.aeglive.com ( http://leonardcohen.aeglive.com/ ) http://aeglive.com/tourdates.php?id=17701&detail_type=event from : Barbara L.Stewart, MLS Library - Sesame Workshop 1 Lincoln Plaza, 4th fl, NYC, NY 10023 USA tel: 212-875-6393 fax: 212-875-7309 barbara.stewart@sesameworkshop.org "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about the things that matter." - ML King ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 11:17:53 -0700 (PDT) From: Monika Bogdanowicz Subject: Re: Never saw this discussed here: Joni & percussion Joni has an impeccable sense of timing, especially when it comes to what she is playing vs. what she is singing vs. the percussion itself. I can't tell you any of her weird timings on songs. I just know they're different. Standard rock is 4/4. Name almost any popular rock song and it is a steady 4/4 beat. Occasionally when they want to be wild they go for the 3/4 beat or 2/4 beat or something. Joni defies all of this and goes her own way. Joni has said that her music is NOT jazz because Jazz has its own laws. She's right. Even something as progressive and free as Jazz has its rules which she defies as well. I love the drummers Joni has worked with. They don't feel the need to beat the crap out of their drums. They aid the song rather than bind it. I wish I could find me a drummer who when the music gets soft...knows how to keep a beat going outside of tapping a cymbal... -M - --------------------------------- Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 17:52:10 EDT From: PassScribe@aol.com Subject: Re: Joni's Voice > Monika Bogdanowicz > Subject: Joni's singing > > I had been looking at some internet polls (as I run into sometimes) and > there was a best female vocalist poll in which Joni did make an appearance but > did not win. That being said, would you consider Joni to be one of the > greatest female vocalists (splitting up female and male since that is how it is > done...no intentions here)? Afterall, you can like someone and not think they > have the greatest voice or even much of a voice (IE: Bob Dylan). What do you > think? > > You're right, Monika, in that you can love someone's music and not think they have the best voice. Not that I dislike Joni's voice, but often, it's what they do WITH that voice that makes a difference- like, in Coyote, where Joni changes her tempo and style to say, "No regrets, Coyote..." to make that phrase stand out, even though the entire song is sung almost in a "spoken word" style. At other times, I appreciate the way lyrics are split between two lines so that a word that you would expect to be on one line gets sung in the next. In "Court & Spark", for example, one verse says "Looking for a woman" and the next says, "To Court and spark". But, Joni sings "Looking for a woman to" and "court and spark" with a slight hesitation between them and stretching the word "court", creating phrasing with much more style. For those reasons, I WOULD consider her one of the best female vocalists. Of course, it helps that she WROTE most of the songs she sang, although there have probably been some singer-songwriters who have written great songs that were covered (better) by other singers (I think Linda Ronstadt did many superior covers of other writers' songs, for example). That said, I like Joni's voice very much, although there were times I would cringe at the yodeling at the end of "Woodstock", or the shrillness during "Calfornia." I also like her latter-day, deeper voice (whether it's from smoking or just age) although her Court & Spark era voice is my favorite. There are some singers who's voice (& style) I seem to like, no matter what they sing, regardless of its quality, like Chris Smither, Ryan Adams, Joe Jackson, Neil Young, etc. There are also a few people who's voice I just can't stand to listen to, like Willy Nelson. I once walked out of a Barbara Cook concert at the intermission because her voice went right through me. Glad I got the tix for free. Kenny B NP: GREAT new Joe Jackson album (Rain). Kenny B > ************** It's Tax Time! Get tips, forms, and advice on AOL Money & Finance. (http://money.aol.com/tax?NCID=aolprf00030000000001) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:07:57 -0700 From: "Mark Scott" Subject: Re: Leonard Cohen - tix purchase link for entire tour - ----- Original Message ----- From: "Barbara Stewart" > Details of the tour were announced hours after Cohen was inducted > into the > Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, along with Madonna I just can't help it. I cannot take an organization seriously that honors a genius like Leonard Cohen and then at the same time bestows the same honor on....Madonna. Personally, I think Joni was right on when she skipped that particular 'honor' at the time she was inducted. Mark in Seattle ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:21:09 +0000 (GMT) From: Subject: JT concert on PBS Perhaps someone has mentioned this already. JT was in concert on PBS Saturday night. Great, great concert! And he mentioned Joni when he introduced "You've Got a Friend," saying she'd sung on it with Carole King, who wrote it, of course. A picture of JM & JT together flashed on the large onstage screen. Then he said (mocking today's street slang), "I guess today you'd say she was my bitch. Actually I was her bitch." It was funny in that JT sort of way. Reminded me of the Croz's quote about Joni and Mussolini somehow. lots of love, Anne ------------------------------ End of onlyJMDL Digest V2007 #487 ********************************* ------- Post messages to the list by clicking here: mailto:joni@smoe.org Unsubscribe by clicking here: mailto:onlyjoni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe ------- Siquomb, isn't she? (http://www.siquomb.com/siquomb.cfm)