#New England conservatory

[krispyweiss]

Paul Simon Receives Honorary Doctor of Music from New England Conservatory

- “(His) work has expanded the very definition of what constitutes an ‘American Tune,’” school official says

Paul Simon on May 19 picked up an honorary Doctor of Music degree from the New England Conservatory.

“Paul Simon’s work has expanded the very definition of what constitutes an ‘American Tune,’ redefining it as intercultural expression on the broadest possible scale,” Contemporary Musical Arts Co-chair Hankus Netsky said in introductory remarks.

Simon delivered the commencement address and, per comments released by NEC, reminded graduates that “music really is the closest we come to a universal language” with the power to heal, inspire and to provoke tears and laughter. He also told them composition requires a willingness to borrow liberally from their predecessors.

“Take from everywhere,” Simon said. “We are all the recipients of the music that came before us. … So take from the past, take the sounds of the natural world, take city-scape sirens and honks. Take spoken language and technology. Take. 

“The amazing thing is, from these varied resources, a new hybrid will emerge. An amalgam of sound that is fresh. You will own this hybrid, but it isn’t yours. It belongs to your ancestors and the community. So share it generously.”

5/22/24

[kristenbarrett]

what an amazing performance of the Danish String Quartet in Jordan Hall, NEC, Boston, MA 🎶

[thebaffledcaptain]

nantucket historical association emails stop making me want to run away to new england challenge

[i-can-read-to-him]

The Wesper Fic Club's Author Spotlight is a post series that aims to feature two to three fic authors a month, randomly selected from a pool of names put forth on our server. The authors are then asked to answer three interview questions, select up to five of their fics for us to feature, and finally, recommend three fics by others in the fandom.

(Note: Our spotlighted fics are not limited to Wesper, though they tend to be a central pairing in most of our authors' featured works.)

This week, we are putting a spotlight on Ashlynn's writing!

Socials: @oneofthewednesdays (Tumblr) | oneofthewednesdays (AO3)

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Part One: Author Interview

Q: What’s something you haven’t written yet, but want to write in the future?

A:  So, one of my favorite series when I was in high school was The Mediator series by Meg Cabot. I was absolutely obsessed with the budding romance between Jesse and Suze. In fact, I used to write for the fandom back in my fanfiction.net days. Those early fics have been purged from the Internet as far as I can tell. Anyway, I want to write a Mediator AU for the Six of Crows fandom. Instead of zowa powers, Jesper can see dead people. These dead people may or may not include the ghost of his mother. In his first year at university, he ends up moving into a room in a building that used to be an inn back in the 1800s. Wylan is haunting his bedroom. (He was murdered en route to a music conservatory back in the day). Jesper decides to solve the mystery of Wylan’s murder, at first because he is annoyed by his ghostly roommate. He wants to force Wylan to move on so he can have his room to himself. But later Jesper begins to care about Wylan, even falling in love with him. If you have read The Mediator series, you already know how it is going to end…. Also, Paul Slater will be played by Kuwei Yul-Bo. If you know, you know.

Q: If you could travel anywhere in the Grishaverse, where would you go?

A: I would travel to Ketterdam to study at the university. I absolutely fell in love with the description in the book, with its crooked little alleyways filled with bookbinders and apothecaries. It reminds me so much of Oxford University in real life. I had the opportunity to conduct archival research at Oxford as a visiting scholar when I was in graduate school. During my two summers in England, I spent hours nestled in the Bodleian Library, surrounded by stacks of books. The design of the Boeksplein is basically the same, but with more interesting gargoyles. I am also about to begin my career as a university professor, so the University of Ketterdam just seems like a good fit… as long as gunfights don’t break out in the reading room.

Q: Apart from sight, what is your favourite of the senses to describe when writing?

A: I absolutely love writing with sound, especially words with subtle onomatopoeia. I love the rustle of leaves on a crisp autumn morning, and the murmur of the wind through the branches of a willow tree. I draw quite a bit of inspiration from Edgar Allan Poe here. When I was young, I fell in love with his description of a heartbeat in “The Tell-Tale Heart.” His poem “The Bells” is absolutely mesmerizing to me, and I borrow sounds from it all the time. Indeed, Poe talks quite a bit about the importance of sound in creating mood in one of his essays—“The Philosophy of Composition”—and it is something I think about quite a bit when I write. I love to use the ticking of clocks and the dripping of water to stretch silences. Finally, I absolutely love movies like the Quiet Place franchise because they are a study in soundscapes. In another life, I think it would have been really cool to become a foley artist in the film industry.

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Part Two: Selected Works

Sleep No More

Teen | 51.1K | Wesper Modern AU, NYC, Homelessness, Angst with a Happy Ending

Sleep No More is my love letter to New York City. In the opening scene, Wylan wakes up on the 7-train as it leaves the tunnel at Hunters Point Avenue. The glare flickers beneath his eyelids, making it impossible to sleep.  I took the same commute on the 7-train for several years when I was working out at a school in Queens. I would spend over an hour on the train, listening to Crooked Kingdom and other audiobooks on my commute. On one of those commutes, I started to consider the challenges Wylan would face as an unhoused teenager in the city. The story evolved from there to include alternating point-of-view chapters between Wylan and Jesper, and of course, some guest appearances from other crows, as they work together to outwit Jan Van Eck.

Musée des Beaux Arts

Teen | 24.6K | Gen with background Wesper, Kanej Friendship, Pre-Canon, Post-Canon, Ableism, Happy Ending

I wrote Musée des Beaux Arts during the Six of Crows Big Bang event back in 2022. I wanted to explore how Wylan and Kaz complement each other as character foils throughout the series. Therefore, the story includes alternating point-of-view chapters, starting with the Queen’s Lady Plague. The title comes from a poem of the same name by W.H. Auden, and I tried to incorporate themes from that poem throughout the story. The poem, in particular, discusses a Pieter Bruegel painting called Landscape with the Fall of Icarus. Therefore, artwork plays a central role throughout the narrative. Each chapter shares a title with a famous painting from the Dutch Golden Age. My favorite chapter is probably the third because I had so much fun writing Jesper. 

Sankta Margaretha and Other Tales Of Sorrow

Teen | 18.4K | Kanej  Hurt/Comfort, Family, Angst, Implied/Referenced Non-con

This was the first story that I ever wrote for the Six of Crows fandom, and it is easily my most popular fic. It follows Mama and Papa Ghafa on their journey to Ketterdam to reunite with their daughter. I had so much fun developing the unique narrative voices for both Mama Ghafa and Papa Ghafa. The Lives of the Saints features heavily in this fic as well. I fell in love with the story of Sankta Margaretha when I first read it, and I wanted to infuse as much of that mythos into the story as possible. It is, at its core, a story about faith and forgiveness. Plus, I got to write one of my favorite interactions between Papa Ghafa and Kaz Brekker. 

Escapology

Teen | 2.2K | Gen  Modern AU, Escape Rooms, Friendship, Humor

Escapology is such a self-indulgent little fic. I am an escape room enthusiast in real life. I have traveled to multiple cities with my friends to complete escape rooms. We have, to date, done thirty-nine rooms together as a team. I wanted to explore the chaotic energy of a Modern AU where the Crows work together to escape an Ice Court-themed escape room. Kuwei is their poor, exhausted gamemaster.  If we ever get our Six of Crows spin-off, I need Netflix to create an exclusive Ice Court escape room in real life. Can you imagine how fun it would be? 

Pas De Deaux 

Teen | 9.7K | Wesper Holidays, Healing, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Post-Canon

I am so fond of this little fic, and not very many people have read it compared to some of the others, but I am not surprised because it was a winter fic that was published well after the winter holidays. It is heavily inspired by the Soldier Prince story in The Language of Thorns, which was in turn heavily inspired by The Nutcracker Suite. Wylan is struggling with less-than-happy memories during Nachtspel, and Jesper helps him make new memories. I started this story writing the kiss at the end, and then had to write nine thousand words to actually get to the kiss.

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Part Three: Author's Recs

Bright Morning Stars by endoftheworld 

Mature | 163.5K | Wesper Hunger Games Crossover, Canon Typical Violence, Rebellion

This is the second story in Now We Are All Chosen Ones. While I would encourage you to read the opening story in the series first, it can absolutely stand on its own as a self-contained story. Jesper has always known that he would be reaped for the Hunger Games. It was only a matter of time. Meanwhile, Wylan is the son of the president, and he begins to realize that he is being watched. Bright Morning Stars keeps you on the edge of your seat from start to finish, and I absolutely love how the author wove together Six of Crows and the Hunger Games. 

hybrid signal by pyrrhlc

Mature | 110K | Kanej with background Wesper, Helnik  Fairy Tale Curses, Haunted House, Monster Kaz, Hurt/Comfort

Written through the lens of a Beauty and the Beast AU, this is an absolutely gorgeous exploration of not only the love between Kaz and Inej, but also the meaning of forgiveness in all its forms. The worldbuilding is stunning, and I loved how the enchantment transformed each of the crows. There are tragic notes to it, of course, there is an eventual happy ending. 

crystal cut by twosoulsinonehome

Mature | 107K | Wesper Enemies to Lovers, Slow Burn, Figure Skating, Hurt/Comfort

I have reread this fic at least three times since the final chapter was posted in February. It is a figure skating AU. I know nothing about figure skating. However, I was absolutely entranced by the annoyances-to-lovers dynamic throughout the fic. Wylan is a figure skater. Jesper is his coach. Will they kill each other before the end of the season? Or will they kiss each other senseless instead? (Who am I kidding? You already know the answer to that question.)

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Please support our authors by commenting and leaving kudos on any stories of theirs you read and enjoy! Don't forget to also reblog this post and check back soon for our next author spotlight to come.

Interested in joining our server and getting to know our community? Feel free to request an invite via the @i-can-read-to-him ask box.

[rainbow-sunshine-unicorn]

Imagine a kanthony fic where Kate is the younger sister BUT the story doesn’t really change at all? I have the entire thing planned out in my head, I swear!! Just walk with me here.

What if the Sheffields succeeded in marrying Mary off to a titled Lord, a mean and cruel one, but fortunately he dies within a year or two of their marriage. Unfortunately with no son being born from the union, Edwina and Mary are swiftly kicked out by the new heir and Mary goes back to living with the Sheffields and that’s how she meets Kate and her father. They fall in love and run away with their daughters to India.

After Kate’s dad dies, Mary is overwhelmed with grief and Edwina is overwhelmed with taking care of Mary, which leaves Kate all alone. She deals with it by filling her day with learning everything, Latin, dance, making English tea (even though it’s despicable) and running the household because there’s no one else to do so.

Then one day, Mary gets a letter saying Lord Sheffield is dying and he wants to meet her. She agrees to go back to England if they’ll sponsor BOTH of her daughters for a season and the Sheffields agree.

When Kate and Edwina are presented to the Queen, impressed by her wit and personality, she picks Kate as the diamond.

Meanwhile, Anthony who’s decided to marry doesn’t want anything to do with young debutantes and their shiny dreams. All he wants is someone to look after his siblings till he is alive and in return he will settle upon her a cottage for her inevitable widowhood. He has no plans to beget an heir and put his son through the pain of losing a father. After he dies, Benedict can worry about heirs. Really what he wants is a governess as a wife, a marriage with no room for love. He’s settled on courting young widows.

Then his mother who neither understands nor particularly approves of his plans for marriage, drags him to the Conservatory Ball where he meets the Season’s shining diamond, Miss Kate Sharma, who’s perfect and beautiful and everything he can’t have. But he sees Edwina delicately brushing Kate’s hair out of her eyes and considers her a prospect.

But Kate has already overheard him declaring his intentions for a wife (because some things never change) and no way she’s allowing him to mess with her sweet docile sister.

And Anthony’s ideas about the perfect diamond are challenged when he discovers Kate riding alone in the morning

ARE YOU GUYS SEEING THE VISION, BECAUSE I AM!! In fact, the vision won’t leave me alone

[another-bryk-in-the-wall]

Coast (Brian May x f!reader)

i am being cringe fail and writing rpf cause my brain is empty but my heart is full of love for the space poodle.

please enjoy. or don't. i'm not the police.

warning: tooth rotting fluff, rpf

words: 1000

*

“That’s it. I have enough. Pack your things, love, we are gonna drive out.”

Two days ago, Brian had come home from yet another exhausting trip. This time the band had to venture to New York for discussion of new songs, new albums, new tours, new this, new that… Everything new, produce this, do that, and not a single ‘thank you’ was muttered for making the company millions in revenue. They didn’t even book the band some fancy hotel rooms. No no no, they had to save money too. And the worst for Brian? The city. The light pollution was so bad, he couldn’t even see the night sky from his tiny balcony. The whole city smelt like weed, alcohol and piss mixed with vomit. Everyone at the subway stations looked like they’d rather throw themselves on the rails than spend another day in the office. Charming.

To put it short, Brian was pissed when he came back home.

A mutual friend who owned a bit of land an hour and a half away from London was called, arrangements were made quickly, and before you knew it, you were on the road with a stressed Brian. He needed nature so badly, longing for it after only seeing concrete and asphalt these past few weeks. His ears were longing for the songs of the birds early in the morning, maybe even getting woken up by a rooster. His nose was longing for something different than the stench of the city. His eyes were longing for a bright green landscape. But most of all, he was longing for you.

Thankfully the weather forecast seemed good, unusually good for England. On the way to the cabin, it didn’t rain a single drop, the only sound heard was the singing of Brian to the songs on the radio.

At this moment, you mean everything

You in that dress, oh my thoughts I confess

Verge on dirty

“Look Brian, if you have some needs, you have to speak them out loud.”, you couldn’t help yourself, teasing your love next to you. A smile spread over his face and he just had to laugh. Everything you said and did made him so happy. The rose coloured glasses hadn’t gone away, even after so many years.

“Not here, not in the car! Imagine someone sees us and takes a picture!”, Brian faked shock, but you both knew you were even wilder when Queen wasn’t that big. So many fucks in bar bathrooms, behind bars, whenever a few minutes of passion fit into his busy schedule. One time you even did it in a studio, but never again after Freddie complained about the wet spot he accidentally sat on. Oh no, you had spilt your coke before, you had quickly apologized and got a towel to clean the seat. For whatever reason, Freddie believed you. Roger’s quirked eyebrow and his elbow into Brian’s side spoke of a different chain of thought. John was just disappointed, but that was nothing new with the antics you two pulled from time to time.

“You got a point there.”

*

From the cabin, you were able to hear the sea, a sound Brian had missed just as much. Unpacking and getting to know the place you were in, you both were pleasantly surprised. The cabin consisted of one main room, a kitchen, a bathroom and a bedroom. And a small conservatory, big enough to dine in, with a small couch facing the sea.  It was enough for you, enough to calm down and relax. Enough to get away from the craziness that is your life.

After a quick errand run into the nearest town, evening drew close. Together you had cooked a pasta dish Brian loved, some creamy sauce with broccoli and even more herbs. Dinner was served in the conservatory, the stars as witness to how good the pasta tasted.

“Love…”, Brian started halfway through the previously silent meal, piquing her attention, “Could you imagine living like this? Out in the countryside, around us barely anything but nature? Maybe own a few animals?”

You thought for a moment, imagining yourself in this situation. Brian was looking after the sheep you had bought together, bleating heard from all over. For whatever reason he was shirtless and sweaty as he commanded the herd, making sure they were safe and sound. Oh,  dominant, shirtless, sweaty man, even better, YOUR man…

“Earth to (Y/N), Earth to (Y/N), are you still here?”, Brian’s laughter ripped you out of your thoughts, joining him in his laughter.

“Sorry, I just imagined you as a hot farmer!” “Hot farmer! You think that’s something I could pull off?”

“Of course! Brian, my dear, you would make a brilliant farmer! Even better than what Paul McCartney did back in the 70s.”

“Hmmm…maybe? Who knows…”

“And if you suck at farming, we’ll dye your hair white and put you into the stable with the sheep. It’s not like there’d be much of a difference.”

“Hey!”

*

The morning sun tickled your nose, shining through the cracks of the curtains. Despite having two blankets, Brian managed to ditch his own and got under yours, his arms wrapped around your middle. He was a human radiator, spreading warmth and comfort no matter where you were. You smiled at the feeling of pure love spreading through your body and moved into his touch, your body melting against his. It felt as if you were made for each other in every possible sense. The familiar feeling of Brian next to you could calm every bad thought, as they didn’t matter as long as you were with him. The familiarity of him was something you longed and missed so much when he was on tour or whatever trip they had to do for the band, yet there was something exciting and new whenever he came back. Every tour brought something new out of him, something new that you were excited to find and figure out. If this trip was the same? You had yet to discover.

[everythingloureed]

Lou at the Colonade Hotel, prior to his concert at Jordan Hall, New England Conservatory of Music. February 3, 1973. Photo by Jeff Albertson.

[poisonously-alluring-sev]

Snape Preference ~ Books He Recommends

Severus Snape Masterlist

Context You ask him for something good to read and he gives you a pile of books he thinks you'll enjoy. (This is excluding the obvious amount of potions and herbology books he probably has)

The Secret History by Donna Harett Under the influence of a charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at a New England college discover a way of thought and life a world away from their banal contemporaries. But their search for the transcendent leads them down a dangerous path, beyond human constructs of morality.

The Resurrectionist: The Lost Work of Dr. Spencer Black by E. B. Hudspeth

Philadelphia, the late 1870s. A city of gas lamps, cobblestone streets, and horse-drawn carriages—and home to the controversial surgeon Dr. Spencer Black. The son of a grave robber, young Dr. Black studies at Philadelphia's esteemed Academy of Medicine, where he develops an unconventional hypothesis: that the mythological beasts of legend and lore—including mermaids, minotaurs, and satyrs—were in fact humanity's evolutionary ancestors. And beyond that, he wonders: what if there was a way for humanity to reach the fuller potential these ancestors implied?

Masters Of Death by Olivie Blake

There is a game that the immortals play. There is only one rule: Don't lose.

The Maidens by Alex Michalides Edward Fosca is a murderer. Of this Mariana is certain. But Fosca is untouchable. A handsome and charismatic Greek tragedy professor at Cambridge University, Fosca is adored by staff and students alike—particularly by the members of a secret society of female students known as The Maidens.

What Moves The Dead by T. Kingfisher When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania.

What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.

Murder Your Employer by Rupert Holmes Who hasn't wondered for a split second what the world would be like if a person who is the object of your affliction ceased to exist? But then you've probably never heard of The McMasters Conservatory, dedicated to the consummate execution of the homicidal arts. To gain admission, a student must have an ethical reason for erasing someone who deeply deserves a fate no worse (nor better) than death. The campus of this "Poison Ivy League" college—its location unknown to even those who study there—is where you might find yourself the practice target of a classmate...and where one's mandatory graduation thesis is getting away with the perfect murder of someone whose death will make the world a much better place to live.

Botanical Curses & Poisons: The Shadow-Lives of Plants By Liz Inkwright In both history and fiction, some of the most dramatic, notorious deaths have been through poisonings. Concealed and deliberate, it's a crime that requires advance planning and that for many centuries could go virtually undetected. And yet there is a fine line between healing and killing: the difference lies only in the dosage! In Botanical Curses and Poisons, Fez Inkwright returns to folkloric and historical archives to reveal the fascinating, untold stories behind a variety of lethal plants, witching herbs, and fungi. 

Dracula by Bram Stoker Irish author Bram Stoker introduced the character of Count Dracula and provided the basis of modern vampire fiction in his 1897 novel entitled Dracula. Written as a series of letters, newspaper clippings, diary entries, and ships' logs, the story begins with lawyer Jonathan Harker journeying to meet Dracula at his remote castle to complete a real estate transaction. Harker soon discovers that he is being held prisoner, and that Dracula has a rather disquieting nocturnal life. Touching on themes such as Victorian culture, immigration, and colonialism, among others, this timeless classic is sure to keep readers on the edge of their seats! Now available as part of the Word Cloud Classics series, Dracula is a must-have addition to the libraries of all classic literature lovers.

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik I decided that Orion Lake needed to die after the second time he saved my life.

Everyone loves Orion Lake. Everyone else, that is. Far as I'm concerned, he can keep his flashy combat magic to himself. I'm not joining his pack of adoring fans. I don't need help surviving the Scholomance, even if they do. Forget the hordes of monsters and cursed artifacts, I'm probably the most dangerous thing in the place. Just give me a chance and I'll level mountains and kill untold millions, make myself the dark queen of the world.

Hope you enjoyed this quick idea I had. Also, all of these books are amazing and I 100% recommend all of them!

[thatrickmcginnis]

BERNIE WORRELL, Toronto, 1987

I became a Parliament-Funkadelic fan before I heard a note of their music. It was 1977, and I was reading my brother-in-law's copy of Rolling Stone, which contained a concert review of the P-Funk Earth Tour at the back of the magazine. I saw the costumes and the spaceship and despite Toronto radio being nearly completely P-Funk-free at the time, I thought this looked like it must sound amazing. When I finally found my way to hearing something by George Clinton and his band(s) - I think it might have been "Flash Light" but I'm not sure - I wasn't disappointed, and when I started taking photos I made it my mission to get a portrait of anyone who was involved in the P-Funk universe. First up, and quite without expecting it, was keyboardist Bernie Worrell.

I had, of course, seen Bernie Worrell as part of the extended Talking Heads filmed by Jonathan Demme for Stop Making Sense. P-Funk were on something of a hiatus in the '80s, so various members of the group were appearing in all kinds of situations, and Worrell showed up in Toronto as part of the Golden Palominos - drummer Anton Fier's art rock/indie supergroup. Worrell was born in New Jersey and was an accomplished musician, studying at Juilliard and the New England Conservatory of Music before a meeting with George Clinton inspired him to move to Detroit and become part of the collective of musicians recording and touring as either Parliament or Funkadelic or both.

I shot precisely four frames of Bernie Worrell, who I nervously approached during soundcheck at the El Mocambo, a Toronto club, knowing that I only had a third of a roll of 120 film left in my Mamiya C330. The stew of influences I was processing as a young photographer included Francis Wolff's work on the covers of Blue Note albums, and while I might not have been able to explain it at the time, I was definitely paying homage to (or ripping off, depending on how you look at it) Wolff's work on records by John Coltrane, Bud Powell and "Baby Face" Willette. I'm not sure these photos - the whole of the shoot, as of this post - have ever been published outside my old blog. Bernie Worrell died of cancer in 2016.

[jpbjazz]

LÉGENDES DU JAZZ

DON BYRON, AGENT PROVOCATEUR

"Nobody calls up Eric Clapton and says, 'Yo, Clapton, you're the white guy that plays all that black {expletive}, right? Why don't you come play at a rally?' What makes them think they can do that to me?"

- Don Byron

Né le 8 novembre 1958 à New York, Donald Byron était issu d’une famille musicale. Son père, Donald Byron Sr., était postier et jouait de la contrebasse dans des groupes de calypso. Sa mère Daisy White travaillait comme téléphoniste et était aussi pianiste. Sous l’influence de sa mère, Byron avait été initié à une musique diversifiée allant de la musique classique à la salsa et au jazz. Exposé à la musique de Dizzy Gillespie, du percussionniste cubain Machito et de Miles Davis durant ja jeunesse, Byron avait également assisté à des spectacles de ballet et de musique classique.

Même si le fait d’avoir été familiarisé avec une musique aussi éclectique l’avait aidé Byron à bâtir un style très personnel, il n’avait pas toujours pu exploiter tout son potentiel en raison de ses origines afro-américaines. Il expliquait: "Nobody wanted to believe I was capable of doing the classical stuff. I'd show up and they'd say, 'You want to play jazz.' In the classical pedagogy, I had teachers telling me my lips were too big."

Byron ayant été atteint d’asthme durant son enfance, un médecin lui avait recommandé d’apprendre à jouer d’un instrument à vent afin de développer ses capacités respiratoires. C’est ainsi qu’il avait commencé à jouer de la clarinette.

Byron avait grandi dans le sud du Bronx aux côtés de jeunes juifs qui avaient contribué à développé son intérêt pour le klezmer, la tradition musicale des Juifs ashkénazes d’Europe centrale et d’Europe de l’Est. Décrivant son intérêt pour la musique juive, Byron avait commenté: ‘’I was playing Jewish music 15 years before all of this downtown [radical Jewish culture] activity. [Klezmer] is just a music that uses clarinet; it’s just one of the musics that I play that uses clarinet. I was interested in the chord changes and the scales. There’s lots of little musics around the world where the clarinet is kind of like the lead instrument.”

Parmi les autres influences de Byron à cette époque, on remarquait Joe Henderson, Artie Shaw, Jimmy Hamilton et Tony Scott. À l’adolescence, Byron avait pris des cours de clarinette avec Joe Allard. Il avait aussi écrit des arrangements pour le groupe de son high school. George Russell avait également été un de ses professeurs durant ses études au New England Conservatory of Music de Boston où il avait décroché un baccalauréat en musique en 1984. Durant cette période, Byron avait également fait partie du Klezmer Conservatory Band dirigé par Hankus Netsky. À l’époque où il avait obtenu son diplome, Byron était d’ailleurs devenu le leader du groupe. Il avait aussi joué avec des groupes de jazz latin. Byron avait également étudié à la Manhattan School of Music de l’Université de New York.

DÉBUTS DE CARRIÈRE

Byron avait quitté le Klezmer Conservatory Band en 1987 pour travailler avec de grands noms du jazz comme Reggie Workman, Hamiet Bluiett et Bill Frisell. Il avait aussi joué avec des musiciens d’avant-garde comme Craig Harris et David Murray.

En 1991, Byron avait publié un premier album comme leader intitulé Tuskegee Experiments. Le titre de l’album faisait référence à une série d’expériences médicales et psychologiques hautement discutables sur le plan éthique tentées sur des Afro-Américains en 1932. Enregistré avec Frisell et Workman, l’album comprenait des versions de "Auf Einer Burg" du compositeur classique Robert Schumann et de ‘’Mainstem’’ de Duke Ellington. Le Penguin Guide to Jazz avait qualifié l’album de chef-d’oeuvre et d’un ‘’des premiers albums les plus excitants en plus d’une décennie." 

L’album suivant de Byron, Plays the Music of Mickey Katz, avait été une surprise pour les amateurs de jazz qui ne connaissaient pas les antécédents de Byron avec la musique klezmer. Tentative de témoigner de la contribution des traditions yiddish à la culture populaire américaine, l’album avait été décrit en ces termes par Byron qui avait expliqué en entrevue: "People today think that Jewish musicians of the 20's, the generation that could have been klezmers, had the greatest attitude about their own music. But really, those cats didn't want to know... klezmer. They wanted to play jazz or symphony --anything to avoid being stereotyped by klezmer." Malheureusement, plutôt que de mieux faire accepter la culture yiddish, l’album avait eu pour résultat de l’enfermer dans certains stéréotypes. Comme Byron l’avait expliqué plus tard au cours d’une entrevue accordée au magazine Down Beat: "I run into people all the time who don't know I made anything after the Mickey Katz record. No matter how much I've done before and after, it always seems to be that stuff they want to talk about and hear. Sometimes I'm sorry I did it." 

ÉVOLUTION RÉCENTE

Peu avant la publication de l’album Music for Six Musicians en 1995, Byron avait expliqué la démarcation qui existait entre le jazz dit ‘’mainstream’’ et l’avant-garde. Comme il l’avait déclaré au cours d’une entrevue accordée au magazine New York Times:

"Me and most of the cats I hang with, we're too left-wing to be around {mainstream jazz institution Jazz At} Lincoln Center. They should be presenting the freshest, baddest stuff. I don't even exist in jazz the way these people perceive it to be.... I've gotten to the point where I can't care what other jazz cats think." L’album Music for Six Musicians était un hommage à la musique afro-cubaine qui avait marqué la jeunesse de Byron dans le Bronx. La musique latine formait d’ailleurs un volet important de la personnalité musicale de Byron. Continuant de témoigner d’une grande conscience sociale, Byron avait ouvert l’album sur un extrait du poème d’Haji Sadiq Al Sadiq "White History Month," qui contenait des affirmations comme: "You think it fair if there was a white history month? ... I picture a kind of underground railroad, Delivering us in the dead of night from the inner city to the suburbs, Yea, like right into the hands of the Klan?" 

En 1996, Byron avait fait une apparition dans le film Kansas City de Robert Altman aux côtés d’autres grands noms du jazz comme Geri Allen et James Carter. Même si le film était un hommage à la musique du début au milieu des années 1930, la bande sonore avait laissé une grande place au jazz contemporain. Selon le directeur musical Hal Willner, "If you listen to records like 'Lafayette' {by Count Basie} or 'Prince of Wails', there was as much energy as any punk-rock I've ever heard." Dans le film, Byron avait interprété un solo sur la pièce d’Eddie Durham "Pagin' the Blues."

En 1996, Byron avait d’ailleurs publié un album intitulé Bug Music dans lequel il avait rendu hommage à la fois aux compositions classiques de Duke Ellington et aux oeuvres des compositeurs John Kirby et Raymond Scott, qui avaient souvent été discrédités par les critiques malgré leur succès commercial et la complexité technique de leur musique. Comme Byron l’avait expliqué dans l’ouvrage Music and The Arts, "Even in Gunther Schuller's The Swing Era, {he says} it's not really good music.... When you look at the era those cats came up in, that was the stuff that was turning everybody out." Byron avait ajouté que le titre de l’album était inspiré d’un épisode du dessin animé The Flintstones qui comprenait une parodie des Beatles avant que la musique du groupe ne soit considérée comme acceptable par les critiques de la musique ‘’mainstream.’’

En suivant sa propre inspiration et en ignorant les préjugés subjectifs des critiques, Byron était devenu une des voix les plus intéressantes de la musique des années 1990. Dénonçant la façon stéréotypée dont les musiciens noirs étaient traités dans le cadre d’un profil publié dans le magazine New York Times, Byron avait déclaré: "Nobody calls up Eric Clapton and says, 'Yo, Clapton, you're the white guy that plays all that black {expletive}, right? Why don't you come play at a rally?' What makes them think they can do that to me?"

En 1999, lors de la promotion de son album Romance With the Unseen, Byron avait expliqué pourquoi il avait toujours eu des goûts aussi éclectiques. Byron, qui détestait les étiquettes, avait commenté:

‘’I think lots of people listen to that range of music. Ultimately, intellectually, I’m very connected to that range of idioms. The clarinet puts you in a situation that’s kind of unique. There’s no way you can play the clarinet without playing classical music, so well all have that, even some of the cats like Greg Tardy. To play as much clarinet as he plays, you can’t without going to school and studying Mozart. People are just not used to seeing black folks to do that. It just takes that involvement in that kind of music to get to a point where you can even finger some jazz.’’

Byron croyait d’ailleurs que sa jeunesse dans le Bronx l’avait préparé à manifester une grande ouverture face aux autres cultures. Il expliquait:

‘’In terms of trying to put together a poetry project {Nu Blaxploitation}, I grew up in the South Bronx (Eddie Daniels didn’t grow up in the South Bronx) so I saw Grandmaster Flash and DJ Cool Herc; these cats were all around the neighborhood, so I witnessed the beginning of {hip-hop}. My parents are of Afro-Carribean descent so we were into the calypso, and Afro-Carribean stuff and Cumbia... and my father was a jazz musician too, so we even knew some cats who were in and out of the Basie and Ellington bands. So I’m not really doing anything that I didn’t hear before I was 18. I didn’t grow up in a sheltered way, like I didn’t hear before I was 18. I didn’t grow up in a sheletered way, like ‘We’re from the Dominican Republic and we only listen to meringue’’; that’s not the way I grew up.’’

Évoquant son implication sociale et politique, Byron avait déclaré:

‘’I just have a certain politic. I think a lots of people have a polioc, but I think in the past, certainly since the Young Lions era, there hasn’t been a lot of politics in the music. But compared to what Mingus was talking about it’s not excessive, compared to what the hip hop cats are talking about, or the Last Poets, I don’t think it’s excessive. People that know me know what if we’re gonna talk for an hour, we’ll spend 20 minutes talking about stuff that I have in my pieces. When I think about putting that politic and that feeling in the music I think back to the Gary Bartz Ntu Troop. That for me was a model of how to do it, just feeling ike when you put out a thing you want to put out some kind of gestalt picture of what you are. I think we’re at a point in history where people don’t want to think about those things because it profits them to think, or at east to let you think, that all of this stuff is over and we don’t need to be talking about biases of race and gender. And it’s never over, either you want to talk about it or you don’t, so if the fact that you want to talk about it means that you’re controversial. If you read where I was coming from doing the Mickey Katz and doing Bug Music, there’s even a politic to those particular projects.’’

Membre de la Black Rock Coalition, une organisation qui affirmait que le rock n’ roll était inspiré de la musique noire, Byron avait interprété la pièce "Bli Blip" dans la compilation de la Red Hot Organization intitulée Red Hot + Indigo en 2001. Hommage à la musique de Duke Ellington, l’album avait pour but de recueillir des fonds pour prévenir et combattre le SIDA. Dans le cadre de l’album, Byron avait joué aux côtés de Bill Frisell, Joe Henry, Marc Ribot, Vernon Reid et Allen Toussaint. Dans les années 1990, Byron avait également dirigé le quintet de musique classique Semaphore. De 1996 à 1999, Byron avait aussi été directeur musical de la Brooklyn Academy of Music où il avait dirigé une série de concerts pour le Next Wave Festival et présenté en première son spectacle pour enfants intitulé Bug Music for Juniors.

De 2000 à 2005, Byron avait été artiste-en-résidence au New York's Symphony Space où il avait dirigé l’Adventurers Orchestra, lancé la série de concerts Contrasting Brilliance et tranmis sa vision de compositeurs et d’artistes comme Henry Mancini, Sly Stone, la compagnie de hip-hop Sugar Hill Records, Igor Stravinsky, Raymond Scott, Herb Alpert et le groupe Earth, Wind and Fire.

Également professeur, Byron avait enseigné la composition, l’improvisation, l’histoire de la musique, la clarinette et le saxophone à la Metropolitan State University of Denver (2015), l'Université d'Albany (2005–2009) et le Massachusetts Institute of Technologie (MIT) de 2007 à 2008. Historien du jazz reconnu, Byron avait tenté de recréer dans ses albums des moments importants de l’histoire des de la musique populaire, notamment dans le cadre d’albums comme Plays the Music of Mickey Katz (1993) et Bug Music (1996).

Don Byron a remporté de nombreux honneurs au cours de sa carrière, dont une bourse de la Fondation Guggenheim en 2007. La même année, Byron avait été nommé USA Prudential Fellow et avait décroché une bourse de United States Artists, une organisation caritative qui soutient et encourage le travail des artistes américains. En 2009, l’American Academy de Rome lui avait également décerné un Rome Prize Fellowship. La même année, la composition de Byron intitulée Seven Etudes for solo piano, qui lui avait été commandée par la pianiste Lisa Moore, lui avait valu d’être mis en nomination pour un prix Pulitzer en composition. Byron avait aussi été mis en nomination en 2005 pour un prix Grammy pour le meilleur solo de jazz instrumental pour son solo de clarinette basse sur le standard "I Want to Be Happy" tirée de l’album Ivey-Divey en 2004. Byron avait également été juge lors du 2e gala des Independent Music Awards. Élu artiste de jazz de l’année par le magazine Down Beat en 1992, Byron avait également remporté le prix de meilleur clarinettiste dans le cadre des sondages des critiques du magazine Down Beat de 1992 à 1997.

Musicien et compositeur très éclectique, Byron a travaillé dans des contextes diversifiés allant de la musique classique à la salsa, en passant par le be bop, le swing, le hip-hop, le funk, le rhythm & blues et la musique klezmer. Il s’est également produit dans plusieurs festivals de musique à travers le monde, y compris à Vienne en Autriche, San Francisco, Hong Kong, Londres en Angleterre, Monterey en Californie, en Nouvelle-Zélande et à Broadway. 

Byron a collaboré avec les plus grands noms du jazz au cours de sa carrière, de Mario Bauza au Duke Ellington Orchestra, en passant par John Hicks, Tom Cora, Bill Frisell, Vernon Reid, Marc Ribot, Cassandra Wilson, Hamiet Bluiett, Anthony Braxton, Geri Allen, Jack DeJohnette, Hal Willner, Marilyn Crispell, Reggie Workman, Craig Harris, David Murray, Leroy Jenkins, Bobby Previte, Gerry Hemingway, DD Jackson, Douglas Ewart, Brandon Ross, Ed Neumeister, Tom Pierson, Steve Coleman, Living Colour, Ralph Peterson, Uri Caine, Mandy Patinkin, Steve Lacy, les Kansas City All-Stars, les Bang On A Can All-Stars, Medeski Martin & Wood, Angelique Kidjo, Carole King, Daniel Barenboim et Salif Keita. Il a également collaboré avec l’Atlanta Symphony, Klangforum Wien (un orchestre de chambre autrichien), le guitariste auteur-compositeur Joe Henry, l’écrivain Paul Auster, la poète, bassiste et autrice-compositrice Meshell Ndegeocello et plusieurs autres.

Évoquant sa collaboration avec Jack DeJohnette, Byron avait expliqué: ‘’I like those loud, interactive drummers, all of which are coming out of Jack, even Joey Baron and Ralph Peterson - they’d all say in a heartbeat that they’re coming out of {Jack}. So it was just interesting to experience Jack firsthand.’’ Au sujet de sa collaboration de longue date avec le guitariste Bill Frisell, Byron avait ajouté: ‘’We have a sense of line that’s similar and a sense of harmony and how to attack it. I think that we’ve used all of the indefinite qualities of our instruments together in a really kind of unusual way.’’

Un des derniers projets de Byron était un duo avec le pianiste Uri Caine. Il expliquait:

‘’I’m doing this duo thing, gathering songs together that have the kind of control over harmony and the drama of lyrics that an aria from an opera has. I had to try to find some stuff that did that. There’s the obvious stuff, like the Schumann that I love, Puccini, but then I pulled in some Stevie Wonder or some L.A. and Babyface, and we’re gonna have different singers come in and guest. It’s a duo between me and Uri with a few guest singers, some Broadway, some pop, some jazz.’’

Grand amateur de musique classique, Byron appréciait particulièrement la Symphonie No 1 de John Corigliano. Il expliquait: ‘’An excellente performance, great music that actually encourages classical players to make improvisational choices without they knowing it.’’ Parmi ses autres albums de prédilection, Byron citait La Sonora Poncena, un disque de jazz afro-cubain dEdward Simon la Bikina, Musical Conquest de Mike Nichols et Elaine May et Sonny Meets Hawk, de Sonny Rollins et Coleman Hawkins.

©-2024, tous droits réservés, Les Productions de l’Imaginaire historique

SOURCES:

‘’Don Byron.’’ Wikipedia, 2023.

‘’Don Byron.’’ All About Jazz, 2023.

‘’Don Byron Biography.’’ Net Industries, 2023.

JENKINS, Williard. ‘’Don Byron: Range and Vision.’’ Jazz Times, 25 avril 2019.

[beautifulgiants]

Josh Hartnett Tells Julia Stiles How He Escaped the Hollywood Trap

By Julia Stiles

Photographed by Venetia Scott

Styled by Helga Burrill

August 7, 2024

A bunch of years ago, Josh Hartnett did what any former teen heartthrob burnt out by the Hollywood spotlight would do: He moved to England, started a family, and got some goats. Hartnett never stopped acting, but recently the 46-year-old has worked his way back to the kinds of big-ticket projects that made him a star in the first place, including a surprise appearance in last year’s Oppenheimer. The Hartnettaissance continues with Trap, the latest M. Night Shyamalan thriller that centers around a serial killer taking his daughter to a pop concert, only to realize it’s a setup to capture him. To mark the occasion, we reunited Hartnett with his O costar Julia Stiles, who quickly found out they had a lot of catching up to do.

———

MONDAY 7 PM JUNE 25, 2024 LONDON

JOSH HARTNETT: Hey, Julia!

JULIA STILES: Oh my god! Hello!

HARTNETT: Good to see you. It’s been a long time.

STILES: So crazy. Has it been 24 years?

HARTNETT: Something like that. Thank you for changing this from yesterday. We had something with the kids, and if you listen you can probably hear them screaming because they don’t want to go to bed, because it’s a beautiful summer day and we rarely get these over here.

STILES: The sun’s up later in the day, so they never want to go to sleep.

HARTNETT: Exactly. And you have three kids now?

STILES: I do. You have four?

HARTNETT: I have four kids.

STILES: It’s totally amazing, but all the cliches are true that you’re outnumbered and it feels mathematically impossible sometimes. Then you have four, which is mentally another realm.

HARTNETT: It feels like we’re back in the ’80s. They’re their own little tribe and we just try to maintain the edges so they don’t go too far in any direction. It’s more like herding children now, as opposed to raising them.

STILES: How old is your eldest?

HARTNETT: Eight.

STILES: And you have a baby baby?

HARTNETT: Yeah. Sorry, I’m sweating bullets—it’s actually hot in England for the first time in a long time. I thought it’d be good out here in the conservatory, but I’m going to open a door real quick.

STILES: Did you say “conservatory”?

HARTNETT: [Laughs] I’ve been living with an English girl for 13 years. I speak it fluently now.

STILES: You speak the Queen’s English.

HARTNETT: [Laughs] I’m constantly having to translate from American English.

STILES: Do you get self-conscious living in England when you use words like “awesome”? American words that mean nothing.

HARTNETT: It doesn’t bother me. I actually think I’ve become more American since being here. But I do get really self-conscious about speaking to people in America, and they think I’ve turned—

STILES: Pretentious?

HARTNETT: You know what I’m talking about.

STILES: Yeah. You don’t sound pretentious at all. It sounds like you’re living your dream. I got nostalgic thinking about, “Whoa, what was happening 20-plus years ago when we made O together?” And I sort of remember that you and I were very similar when we were making that film—and you can correct me if I’m wrong, but everybody in that cast was at a time in their career when we were starting to become more recognizable and fame was something that was entering our lives. You and I both had attention that we didn’t know how to navigate. From what I’ve read about you since then, you left L.A. When was that?

HARTNETT: Well, I never really lived in L.A. Even when we were making O, I was in Minnesota, New York, nowhere, because I was living from set to set. I drove my car down from Minnesota to shoot O and then drove back after that. But the choice to step back from the industry had more to do with just plain sanity. In the late ’90s and early 2000s, as you remember, if you were named as one of these interesting people in celebrity culture, it was then the press’s mission to tear you apart. On top of that, I felt like the celebrity culture was really vacuous. I wasn’t going to be on Cribs, you know? I wasn’t going to be doing Punk’d. I wasn’t interested in any of that. I wanted to be myself amongst people that I knew, so I was able to revert back to my family and friends in Minnesota. Also, after a certain amount of time chasing a goal, I realized that achieving these things wasn’t giving me back the satisfaction I hoped it would, so I had to find something else to fill that gap. I felt, and still feel, that community is what fills it. Achievement is great in any walk of life. It’s a reason to get up in the morning. But the thing that really holds you is your community. I felt that I was kind of rootless at that time, so I wanted to find that community.

STILES: What drew you back into performing?

HARTNETT: I never stopped acting. I was doing films that were, in my opinion, worthy, but really small. A lot of first-time filmmakers, people that inspired me. I was really enamored with Tim [Blake Nelson] when we made O. It was his second film and, as you remember, the amount that he had riding on that production heightened the atmosphere. I love working with filmmakers who have it all on the line, because their first may be their last. I was spoiled at an early age in this business, in that the first few independent films I made were successful, so I thought that would maybe always be the case, and it wasn’t. But coming back to making studio films, what happened in all transparency was that we had a couple of kids, so I wanted to establish something that was a little bit more solid. Our business is very kind to you when you’re making big hits, but it can be difficult when you’re not. I realized I had to actually make a job out of this again, as opposed to it being some sort of hobby that I was chasing for years. And I got lucky that a few directors who I knew wanted to work with me. Then it started to snowball, and I’ve been able to work within the studio system again, which is extremely lucky because it doesn’t always work out that way.

STILES: Walk me through when you thought you were going to do Trap. Was it something that you were pursuing, or did you get a phone call, like, “M. Night Shyamalan wants to work with you”?

HARTNETT: Night and I met at The Village premier in New York a hundred years ago. I knew some people who were in it, and somehow I was invited to this dinner afterward. We started talking and got along really well. So when this came up, we got on a Zoom and took a little stroll down memory lane, started talking about the character, and got along really well. He was coming out to Dublin to produce his daughter’s movie The Watchers, so I flew over and we had another discussion. Then it was the strike, so we couldn’t do anything, but because Night finances his own films, we were able to get a special dispensation and got to start shooting in late October.

STILES: Did you enjoy working on it? I mean, every question that I’m asking you, I’m like, “That’s annoying.” I saw you chuckle when I was like, “So you took a step back from Hollywood”—I’ve had people ask me that question, and I laughed too, because I’m like, “Well, no, I did keep working. It was just independent films that nobody saw.” So forgive me for all of these questions that might be annoying, but I’m catching up from 20 years of the lack of Josh Hartnett.

HARTNETT: [Laughs] Don’t worry, ask away.

STILES: I’m jumping all over the place. How did you and Tamsin [Egerton, Hartnett’s wife] meet? Because I love these stories.

HARTNETT: The most Hollywood way imaginable. We played husband and wife in the worst movie either of us have ever made. No offense to the director, it’ll remain nameless. It just got lost in post-production. We were shooting here in London and both had significant others, and both realized that wasn’t going to work because we really liked each other. So I broke up with my girlfriend, she broke up with her boyfriend, and then after we stopped filming, we started to date. But I was living in New York and she was living in London, so we went on a few vacations together. Then she came out to the States and we went on a long road trip where she met my parents and it kept going. And then she kept staying with me and I kept staying with her. We were living a lot of the time between houses together, and then she got pregnant and then we got married.

STILES: Nice.

HARTNETT: How did you meet your husband?

STILES: We met on a set. He was a camera assistant. It was a little indie movie in the snowy mountains in Canada. I was not in a relationship at the time, but the movie ended and he lived in Canada, I lived in New York, and we would go back and forth taking turns, and that went on for a while. Then we were like, somebody’s got to move in with the other person, which country are we going to live in? And it naturally progressed from there. We were engaged, I got pregnant, and then we got married.

HARTNETT: We were engaged when she got pregnant.

STILES: Do your kids come to set with you?

HARTNETT: Sometimes, but they’re in school and we’re in the middle of nowhere, so they’ve got a nice outdoorsy life. We’re not that far from London, so we’ve still got all that available to us. I try to come back more, is what I’m trying to say. So I’ll go to shoot for hopefully only two, three weeks at a time, and then I’ll come back and see them. But they came out for Trap. It’s tough with school. You don’t want them to feel like they’re missing things with their friends.

STILES: Mm-hmm. I bet you can’t answer this, but do you play a bad guy in Trap?

HARTNETT: It’s fairly well documented already, so I think I can say yeah, he’s not a good guy.

STILES: Is he a sociopath?

HARTNETT: Yes. What Night wants to do, and I really appreciate this about him, is that he’ll take any genre and try to come at it from a different angle. In this instance, he’s like, “I want to make a thriller, but one where the person we’re siding with would be the natural antagonist.” That’s the challenge of the piece.

STILES: So when you’re playing a character like that, do you approach it like he thinks he’s the good guy?

HARTNETT: Good doesn’t really enter into it. It’s about what a sociopath sees as a natural thing to do, and that’s not necessarily something that lines up with any sort of morality system writ large. In his own mind, he feels like he’s being honest, and that’s good enough.

STILES: Wow. Do you take that kind of work home with you?

HARTNETT: [Laughs] Not this one, no.

STILES: [Laughs] I don’t mean sociopathic behavior, but when you’re working on a drama or a comedy, for example, there’s a certain energy that you have to maintain all day. So energetically, do you take that home with you?

HARTNETT: By the end of this, I was drained. It was pretty dark. Even the fun stuff, because it is a funny movie, was rooted in a darker psychology. So yeah, going to that place every day does affect you. But when you have kids, you don’t have the luxury of bringing it home too much because they demand certain things and you have to let it go. I’ve had a lot of people ask me about method acting recently. And I was like, “I think it’s fiction.” I think method acting is a joke that some actor came up with.

STILES: To make them feel like they were putting in the work. I’m so glad that you said that.

HARTNETT: Yeah. To make the whole set focus on and be afraid of them so that they’re the one that really matters in the room.

STILES: But yeah, there is something about kids that keeps you moving forward. You come home and you just have to change the subject, which is healthy actually, and probably more creative.

HARTNETT: Absolutely. For anybody in any job, it’s good to be able to fully invest in the work you’re doing and then come home and have somebody pull you out of it. Otherwise, that’s not really a life.

STILES: What do you do on set with all the downtime? Do you have a hobby? I remember during O you had a really nice manual-focus camera.

HARTNETT: Yeah, it was either that or a Rolleiflex. I used to take a lot of photos, and then when everybody got an iPhone and they could do any sort of filter and make their pictures look great, I got discouraged and stopped making my own. But I’m doing it a bit now because my daughter’s really into it.

STILES: You know how much time there is in-between setups. What do you do to pass the time?

HARTNETT: On this one, I didn’t have any free time because I was in everything. And Night wanted me with him the whole time. But the other thing is, with kids, especially if I’m working in the States and they’re going to bed at lunchtime, I’m talking to them a lot on FaceTime. Having four kids and working so much has been really eye opening. I don’t recognize what I must have been going through as a younger person. The amount of time I had to do all sorts of stuff that I was interested in was insane. I don’t know why I didn’t become an architect. I could’ve had 50 degrees.

STILES: Yeah. I was asking because I could never figure out what to do on set. Like, reading would make me sleepy, so I actually stopped hiding. Instead I would hang out on set just to watch what everyone’s doing and chat.

HARTNETT: You were hiding a little bit.

STILES: I think I hid all the way through my twenties and thirties.

HARTNETT: Really?

STILES: I was deceptively shy.

HARTNETT: Yeah. I was always obsessed with the filmmaking culture; I was always kind of there. I’m a little bit less enamored by everything now.

STILES: But the microcosm that everybody creates on a film set is magical. It’s crazy how these mini civilizations form in the span of a couple months or less.

HARTNETT: It’s the circus.

STILES: Yeah. So, have you gotten into British football?

HARTNETT: A little. But I’ve decided that I can’t carpetbag a team, so I’m not like every other American I know who has a club that they care about.

STILES: Do your kids have British accents?

HARTNETT: A hundred percent. I’m a foreigner in my own home.

STILES: You’re the outlier.

HARTNETT: By a long shot. And for a long time, with three girls, I was the only guy, the only American. I’m just way outside of the norm in my family. So we got some goats to deal with that. The goats are more my vibe.

STILES: Oh my god, you have goats! Really living the dream, Josh.

HARTNETT: They’re the sweetest things ever. We got pygmy goats. But I like being the outlier. My wife doesn’t love that the neighbors all call us “the Americans.” She thinks that’s unfair since she’s from here.

STILES: And it’s not a compliment?

HARTNETT: I don’t know if it is.

STILES: Are you feeling a little more relaxed? It sounds like you get your respite and freedom and privacy with home life. When you go and do press for a movie, for instance, do you feel a bit more comfortable with the whole thing?

HARTNETT: Way more comfortable, because it doesn’t define me the way that I felt it used to. When you’re young, as you remember, in this business—

STILES: How dare you?! [Laughs]

HARTNETT: [Laughs] Sorry. But when you’re very young, it’s like you’re trying to find yourself, and the world is telling you what they think you are, and it’s discombobulating. So you’re forced to either fight against or go along with people’s perceptions of you. At this point, there’s inevitably going to be bad shit written, and you’ve just got to let it slide off your back because it’s not the important thing anymore. And you must know by the age of 40 that what matters is what you created in your life. If you don’t, then that’s a problem.

STILES: Well said. You seem like you’ve created this wonderful life for yourself and I’m so happy for you. I’m glad we had the opportunity to talk again. I can’t wait to see the movie and maybe we’ll run into each other in person at some point.

HARTNETT: Yeah. Maybe we’ll be able to work on something when you direct your next film.

STILES: If I ever get to make a second film and there’s a part for you in it, and I call you and you pass on my movie, I will come for you, Josh Hartnett.

HARTNETT: [Laughs] It better be a good role.

STILES: Okay. Challenge accepted.

Grooming: Charley Mcewan using Horace Skincare at The Only Agency. 

Set Design: Lily Purbick.

Photography Assistants: Ryan O‘Toole and Max Kindersley. 

Fashion Assistant: Nina Scott-Smith. 

Production: Daniel Delikatnyi. 

Production Assistant: Morgan Shepherd. 

Post-production: Hempstead May. 

Location: Location Partnership

[typewriter-worries]

Book recommendations please (if possible)

[im looking for dark academia-ish, morbid-ish]

Hello there!

Here's some that fit the mold, I think. Not all of these are my favorite, but you might love them so I don't want to discount them!

If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio - This is a perfect book that'll get you in the "dark academia" mood.

If We Were Villains is a mystery novel set in a New England acting conservatory during the 1990s. After tragedy strikes the fourth year class, we watch their friend group (friends mainly by proximity, mind you) start to unravel.

Calling If We Were Villains a "cozy" mystery wouldn't give the book fair credit. While you can curl up under a blanket, a cup of cocoa and read it while the fall leaves start to fall; it's more of a book that'll leave you on the edge of year seat wanting more. 

You can read my full review here

Breaking Point by Alex Flinn: This is a book that I often describe as a "beginner's guide to dark academia" due to both the subject matter and the age of the main character.

While it's set in a high school, this is still a novel in which the main character is asked the question almost all questions in dark academia books are posed, "How far are you willing to go?"

All that said, at risk of spoilers, this may be one to check the trigger warnings for. It's a pretty dark book, especially for being targeted towards young adults.

You can read my full review here

Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin - This book is actually one of my favorite books of all times and deserves all the praise that has followed it since the year it was published.

Giovanni’s Room follows the story of David, a young man who’s fallen in love with both a young woman named Hella and another young man named Giovanni against the backdrop of 1950s Paris.

We read about, what some might call, a tumultuous love affair and a constant question of identity. Baldwin’s depiction of the internal struggle is masterful without being overtly extravagant.

While it's a slow-paced, shorter read; it'll leave an impression in the best possible way.

Fans of the Impossible Life by Kate Scelsa - This book is a bit of a modern retelling of Brideshead Revisted by Evelyn Waugh, with a few, maybe even many, liberties taken.

It follows the senior year of three teenagers: Jeremy, Mina and Sebastian. Over the course of the book, you go through the coming of age story of each character. Jeremy coming to terms with his identity, Sebastian and his bouts of self destruction and Mina’s relationship with her mental health. 

What's fun about this book (at least to me), is that it's told in three different point of views. Jeremy's is first, Sebastian's is second, and Mira's is third.

That said, there is a pretty infamous scene that I didn't like, but can be skipped over without losing any of the plot (If you read the book, you'll know what it is immediately.)

You can read my full review here

A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood - Much like Giovanni's Room, this a slow-paced short read that's heart wrenching.

It follows the life of George, a gay middle-aged professor living in southern California in the 1960s. We follow him as he processes the death of his late partner, actively still grieves and learns to deal with the concept of being alone, but not lonely.

While the book is very mundane, there's something so human about it, you can't wait to see what's to become of him.

Hope you enjoy the ones you choose to read; if you do, please let me know what you think!

[lumosfm]

𝙀𝙑𝙀𝙉𝙏 002 - 𝙏𝙃𝙀 𝙈𝘼𝙇𝙁𝙊𝙔 𝙒𝙀𝘿𝘿𝙄𝙉𝙂

Druella Black and Gomeisa Malfoy proudly invite you to join them in celebrating the marriage of Lucius Malfoy and Narcissa Black. Taking place on Saturday 3rd August, 1979 in the Royal Botanical Gardens in Kew, England, the long awaited wedding will join the two great families as one in what is hinted to be the wedding of the year. Admission by invitation only, unless attending as a plus one. Formal attire is mandatory. Wedding ceremony will take place in the Royal Conservatory with the reception dinner to follow.

𝙊𝙊𝘾 𝙄𝙉𝙁𝙊𝙍𝙈𝘼𝙏𝙄𝙊𝙉

Hello lovelies! And welcome to our second event here at LumosFM - the wedding of Lucius Malfoy and Narcissa Black! This event will run from today, 1st August, for two weeks to allow everyone to interact with as many other characters as possible! Threads can continue after the event is over, but no new starters should be posted after the 15th August. This event is taking place at the same time as our third group event - Frank Longbottom's Surprise Birthday Party so those who cannot/would not attend this event also have an event they can take part in! Have fun, feel free to post outfits for the events, and I look forward to seeing all of your characters on the dash! ~ Admin Autumn

[slackville-records]

"Steve Lacy (July 23, 1934 – June 4, 2004) was the first, after Sydney Bechet, to devote himself solely to the soprano saxophone. Through its flexibility, richness of tone and swing, he gave the instrument a new lease of life and inspired John Coltrane to start playing it.

Steven Norman Lackritz was born in 1934 in New York. As a teenager, he photographed musicians to sell their portraits at concerts. It was on this occasion that he met the man who introduced him to jazz: musician and conductor Cecil Scott.

In the early 1950s, he became a professional musician, playing clarinet and saxophone in clubs, while studying at the Schilliger House of Music in Boston and then at the Manhattan School of Music. His meeting with pianist Cecil Taylor in 1953 truly launched his career. Taylor introduced him to the music of Thelonious Monk, who would be his main source of inspiration and whom he would play throughout his life.

He quickly specialized in the soprano saxophone and became its major figure. While he is Cecil Taylor's main partner, he also plays with Roswell Bud, Gil Evans, and Thelonious Monk, his mentor.

In the 1960s, after having participated in the rise of free jazz with Ornette Coleman, he moved to Europe and became one of its main representatives. A musician considered as a soloist, he plays and records a lot in solo (his own compositions and those of Monk), but also in duo or with his band.

Steve Lacy died in 2004 in Boston. He had returned to the United States three years earlier to teach at the New England Conservatory. A leading figure in free jazz and soprano saxophone, he was a source of inspiration for many saxophonists, including John Coltrane. He played for a long time on a Mark VI before opting for Series III."

Source: Henri Selmer - Paris, photo by Christian Rose

[justforbooks]

If anybody deserved the title of “Renaissance man” it would be Carl Davis, who has died aged 86 following a brain haemorrhage. A formidably gifted composer and conductor, in a career spanning seven decades he wrote scores for a string of successful films and a long list of some of the best remembered programmes on British television, including the 1995 BBC production of Pride and Prejudice.

Davis won a Bafta and an Ivor Novello award for his score for Karel Reisz’s The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981), scripted by Harold Pinter and starring the Oscar-nominated Meryl Streep, and worked on many other prominent films, including Scandal (1989), starring Ian McKellen and Joanne Whalley, Ken Russell’s The Rainbow (1989) and The Great Gatsby (2000). His theme music for the 1984 horse-racing drama Champions, starring John Hurt as the Grand National winner Bob Champion, was subsequently used by the BBC for its Grand National coverage.

A fascination for the era of silent movies prompted Davis to create new scores to accompany numerous classics from cinema’s early years, including his composition for Abel Gance’s sprawling 1927 epic, Napoleon. His work helped trigger an international revival of presentations of silent films with a live orchestra.

He achieved another career highlight when he collaborated with Sir Paul McCartney on his Liverpool Oratorio, an eight-movement piece based on McCartney’s experiences of growing up in Liverpool. The piece was recorded in Liverpool Cathedral in 1991, featuring the classical soloists Kiri Te Kanawa and Willard White.

Despite his relentless schedule and prolific output, Davis enjoyed a reputation as an expansive and witty conversationalist who could always make time for friends or interviewers. When conducting at occasions such as the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic’s Summer Pops concerts or the BBC’s Proms in the Park, he would gently subvert notions of classical seriousness by conducting in a union jack outfit or a gold lamé coat.

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Carl was the son of Sara (nee Perlmutter), a teacher, and Isadore Davis, a post office worker. His Jewish family had ancestry in Poland and Russia. Encouraged by his mother, he displayed precocious musical ability. He started playing piano at the age of two, and soon became an adept sight-reader. He recalled how from an early age he would listen to the Metropolitan Opera’s live radio broadcasts on Saturday afternoons, and he would obsessively study musical scores of operas and orchestral pieces obtained from Brooklyn’s public libraries.

He took lessons with the composers Hugo Kauder and Paul Nordoff (later the co-founder of the Nordoff-Robbins music therapy programme), then with the Danish modernist composer Per Nørgård in Copenhagen. He studied at Queens College, New York, and the New England Conservatory of Music, Boston, and as an 18-year-old served as an accompanist to the Robert Shaw Chorale. He then attended Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson in upstate New York, which has had a remarkable roll-call of actors, writers, film-makers and musicians pass through its portals. He graduated from Bard as a composer, having already begun to compose music for theatrical productions.

In 1958 he became an assistant conductor at the New York City Opera, and then won an off-Broadway Emmy award as co-composer of the 1959 revue Diversions. This was staged at the Edinburgh festival in 1961 and subsequently transferred to the Arts theatre in London, retitled Twists. It caught the eye of Ned Sherrin, then working in production at the BBC. He commissioned Davis, who had moved to London and was living in decrepit lodgings in Notting Hill, to write music for the satirical TV show That Was the Week That Was.

It was the start of his prolific and varied career in the UK. The Davis touch added lustre to the television movies The Snow Goose (BBC, 1971) and The Naked Civil Servant (Thames Television, 1975); the adaptation of the Anita Brookner novel Hotel Du Lac (BBC, 1986); and the miniseries A Year in Provence (BBC, 1993) and A Dance to the Music of Time (Channel 4, 1997) among many others.

A notable milestone was his ominous and unsettling score for Thames’s The World at War (1973), which was produced by Jeremy Isaacs. It was through Isaacs that Davis became involved in the Thames TV series Hollywood: A Celebration of the American Silent Film, based on the book The Parade’s Gone By … by the film historian Kevin Brownlow.

Davis was tasked with tracking down musicians who had worked on films during the silent era, and the series set him off on a decades-long crusade to revive silent films with newly created scores. He enjoyed the challenge of conducting the music live as the film played. “You have to keep going,” he told the Arts Desk’s Graham Rickson in 2021. “Some conductors use click tracks and headphones. I’m old-fashioned and don’t like being tied to machinery – I try to conduct these things with as little apparatus as possible.”

The most dramatic expression of this was his work on Napoleon, and in 1980 Davis conducted a performance of it with an orchestra and audience at the Empire, Leicester Square. “That first screening wasn’t flawless, but it was electrifying,” he recalled. He subsequently conducted performances around the world, and the score let to him being appointed chevalier of France’s Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1983.

He went on to compose music for more than 50 silent films featuring stars such as Greta Garbo and Rudolph Valentino, for comedies by Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton, and for classics such as Ben-Hur (1925), the Douglas Fairbanks swashbuckler The Thief of Bagdad (1924) and DW Griffith’s Intolerance (1916).

Another genre which Davis excelled at composing for was dance. “The relationship between film and ballet is striking, and I find myself composing more and more ballet scores now, something which the film work has made me much better at,” he told Rickson. For Northern Ballet theatre, he worked with the choreographer Gillian Lynne on A Simple Man (1987) and Lipizzaner (1989). For Scottish Ballet, he collaborated with Robert Cohan, a fellow New Yorker, on A Christmas Carol (1992) and Aladdin (2000). And for English National Ballet’s Alice in Wonderland (1995), Davis (commissioned by ENB’s artistic director Derek Deane) drew on themes by Tchaikovsky.

It was also through Deane’s influence that Davis was commissioned by the National Ballet of Croatia to write Lady of the Camellias (2008), which gave him the opportunity to revisit Alexandre Dumas’s original novel and Verdi’s operatic version of it, La Traviata. The opera had been a favourite of Davis’s since his childhood days of listening to Met broadcasts, and he had also worked on a production of it for New York City Opera. The resulting piece gave the story a contemporary twist, so “the action could flow without pause and indeed the production did effectively utilise projections and film”, as Davis wrote in the recording’s sleeve notes.

He received a Bafta special lifetime achievement award in 2003, and in 2005 he was made CBE.

In 1970 he married the actor Jean Boht, who starred in Carla Lane’s sitcom Bread. She survives him, along with their daughters, Hannah and Jessie.

🔔 Carl Davis, composer and conductor, born 28 October 1936; died 3 August 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[catgondoliere]

John White Alexander (1856-1915)

At the piano (Helen Hopekirk Wilson) (1894)

The Scottish pianist/composer was born in Edinburgh 20 May 1856. She was invited by George Whitefield Chadwick in 1897 to take a teaching position at the New England Conservatory of Music. She and her husband William A. Wilson remained in the United States for the remainder of their lives, becoming naturalized citizens in 1918.

Hopekirk died 19 November 1945.