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Archive for the ‘Music’ Category

Dedicated Follower of Fashion/ Redux

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Music, Video, tagged , , , , , on October 7, 2014| 2 Comments »

GC Myers-Dedicated Follower of FashionThis piece from years ago always sticks out to me when I am rambling around in my past work.  I am never quite sure if I like this piece which is an odd thing for me.  I usually have one overriding opinion on most of my work with little ambivalence.  But this one always gnaws at me and I stll find myself wondering why. 

I showed this on this blog back in 2009 but I thought it was worth showing again today along with its inspiration, a Kinks song describing the 60’s era London fashionistas.

Here it is:

This is called Dedicated Follower of Fashion, based on the song of the same name from the mind of Ray Davies and the Kinks.

I call this one of the Exiles pieces but I’m not really sure if it truly fits. It was done at the same time back in 1995 or ’96 and performed in the same manner but lacks the emotional depth of the others. In fact, it’s defining feature is its lack of emotional content.

I think that this blankness may have been the factor that led me to shape this piece into its final form. The elements of the face were the first part completed and basically dictate, in the way I work, where the painting goes. For instance, he could have been place on a vast and deep plain that sweeps to the distance behind him but that didn’t fit for me.

There was something in his oddly colored features that reminded me of the vanity and obsequiousness of many fashionistas. And that’s where the Kinks come in.

So, maybe he doesn’t quite fit in with the other Exiles but maybe that in itself makes him an exile of sorts.

Anyway, here are the Kinks doing the song…

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Keep Me In Your Heart

Posted in Favorite Things, Music, Video, tagged , , , , , on October 5, 2014| 2 Comments »

giphy falling leavesFirst frost of the season.  As I got out of bed and looked out the window, there was thin layer of silvery shine on the grass beyond the wood’s edge.  There is a real bite in the air as I walk to the studio understanding that autumn is truly upon us now.  A bit later,  as I look out of the studio window, this realization is reinforced as the sunlight filters through the oranges and yellows of the turning leaves, indicating with certainty that the summer is gone and the harsh beauty of winter will soon be here. This filtered light and thoughts of summer gone and winter ahead create a wistful feeling in the air.

It’s one of the rewards of the changing seasons here, a built-in reminder of time passing that serves as a metaphor for our own lives, our own mortality and the ephemeral gift which we are given.  And while simply watching a golden leaf lazily fall through the low angle of the sun to the frosted grass below might not seem like much of a gift, there are times when it feels priceless.

And that is how it feels this morning.

In that vein, the music I have selected for this Sunday morning is a wistful song from the late Warren Zevon.  It’s a song, Keep Me in Your Heart,  that he wrote while in the throes of the terminal cancer that took his life.  Zevon led an interesting, if sometimes crazy, life.  His father, a Jewish Russian immigrant, was a bookie and close friend of mobster Mickey Cohen.  When Warren was 13 he studied with Igor Stravinsky before quitting high school in the early 60’s to go to NYC to be a folksinger.  He knocked around for years before finding success both as a songwriter and performer.  This success came and went several times, often as result of his own self-destructive behavior.  He died in 2003 at age 56.  I’ve always thought it was shame that so many people only know him for Werewolves of London when he wrote so many other beautiful songs such as this.

Take in the day fully and enjoy.

 

 

 

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Lazaretto

Posted in Music, Video, tagged , , , , on September 28, 2014| 2 Comments »

jack-white-lazaretto-youtube-music-video-shadow-2014It’s Sunday morning here in the studio and I am a little charged up, eager to get at some work on my painting table and on the easel that are near that point where they take off on their own.  So I am going to be brief with my music selection for this Sunday morning.  It’s Lazaretto from Jack White.  It has the kind of fiery energy that I want to carry with me this morning.

FYI, the word lazaretto refers to quarantine stations of all sorts– ships, islands, even leper colonies.  It derives from the name of of the biblical Lazarus and has been used around the globe as denoting those places where travelers– if in the case of slaves and refugees they can be described as travelers– are isolated until they are determined to be free of disease.  This song is White’s imagining of what might be going through the mind of such a traveler. Not sure if the imagery in the video has anything to do with this but it keeps you interested for the most part.

Anyway, time for me to charge onward.  Give a listen if you need a little boost this morning and have a great Sunday.

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Goodbye Pork Pie Hat

Posted in Favorite Things, Music, tagged , , , on September 21, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Jeff Beck Wired LP cover 1976I’m feeling quiet this morning with little to say.  But it is Sunday morning and time for a bit of music so I thought I’d fill with something quiet, in its own way.  Something I haven’t heard for some time.  I dug around a bit and came across such a track from guitarist Jeff Beck and his 1976 LP Wired.  I always loved this album cover.This was a pretty big album at the time,  letting Beck take his massive rock-based guitar on a journey into the electronic jazz world of the 1970’s.  It’s an album that I listened to quite often but one that eventually dropped off my playlist for some reason. Not really sure why but I am always happy to hear something from it again.

Here’s his treatment of the Charles Mingus classic Goodbye Pork Pie Hat.  Quiet enough for this Sunday morning.

Have a great Sunday..

 

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Reinvention/ Redux

Posted in Music, Painting, Video, tagged , , , , , , , on September 18, 2014| 1 Comment »

GC Myers- Larger Than Life

GC Myers- Larger Than Life

I’ve often write about change, lately in the form of fighting against my own selfishness through acts of generosity, somehow hoping that this reinvention of the self makes me a better person and affects change in others.  I spent a few hours yesterday with John and Ron, a couple currently from Iowa and Illinois, each side of the Mississippi, who ad come to the West End Gallery specifically to see my work.   I had a great time getting to know them a little better and learning more about their lives.  Listening to them over lunch,  I found that their own lives were stories of reinvention, of finding new identities.

It really struck a chord with me, making me appreciate how creative and adaptive we are as people.  Sometimes it’s a practical matter, out of the need to meet the demands of our basic needs, and sometimes it is a matter of changing behaviors that we realize are negatively affecting our lives.  Either way, the result is a new self of some sort, hopefully one that brings us more happiness and satisfaction with ourselves.

It reminded me of a post from several years ago, in 2009, where I wrote a short bit about reinvention, using Loretta Lynn as my subject.

Thanks to John and Ron for the inspiration for this morning.  It was great meeting you and I hope the rest  your trip goes smoothly.

Here’s what I wrote back in 2009:

Reinvention.

What I was is not what I am and what I am is not necessarily what I will be.

We’re fortunate to have such an opportunity, to be able to change and evolve over our lives.  To be able to show the world other and new facets in our prisms.  The only question is why do some people take this opportunity to reinvent themselves and other do not?

I thought about this the other day when I was in the studio, prepping work for my next show. I was listening to Van Lear Rose, an album from a couple of years back from Loretta Lynn, the Queen of Country Music.   It’s a great album with Jack White of  White Stripes fame  producing and playing.  The songs have Loretta’s unmistakeable signature voice and songwriting but have a new feel.  A little more edge and a little less twang.  A new side to Loretta.  She took the opportunity, when it presented itself,  to step forward and change.

But what about those who don’t?  Why don’t they continue to evolve?   Are they simply satisfied with where they are?  In music this is pretty common, guys playing the Oldies circuit, performing the same songs that they made popular when they were 18 years old.  Perhaps the opportunity to change never showed up.  Maybe they felt safe in staying in their tried and true routine of rehashing the past.   No risk there.

Who know?  I surely don’t but I do know that this chance to change our skin, chameleon-like, is an opportunity  that the truly creative should not simply push aside because for them to remain static is death.  Take the risk.

Here’s  a little Loretta from Van Lear Rose:

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Open All Night

Posted in Music, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , , , on September 7, 2014| 1 Comment »

GC Myers- Moonshadows

GC Myers- Moonshadows

I am in the midst of preparing a group of work to take with me when I go to Alexandria this coming weekend for my annual Gallery Talk at the Principle Gallery on Saturday.  It’s like a mini-show with some new paintings fresh from the studio including the piece shown here, Moonshadows.  It’s a smaller painting on paper, a 6″ by 9″ image, that moodily focuses on the moon and the  shadows cast from it by the Red Tree and the Traveler on the path.  It’s a simple and quiet piece, one that invites thought.

I have also narrowed down the field for the painting that will be given away in a drawing at the Gallery Talk.  There are two pieces that I am going back and forth on, both having real meaning for me.  As I pointed out before, it’s important to me to give away work that is real and alive at these events and I think either of the two pieces I am considering easily meet that requirement. I will reveal the piece in the next day or two so check back.

Being Sunday it’s time for some music and in keeping with the theme of the painting I chose an older song, Open All Night,  from Bruce Springsteen’s great 1982 acoustic album, Nebraska.  I find it hard to believe that this album is over thirty years old but when I consider how many times I have ran these lyrics through my head as I’ve been driving somewhere, I am less surprised.

Anyway, enjoy and have a great Sunday…

 

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September Song

Posted in Favorite Things, Music, Recent Paintings, Video, tagged , , , , , on September 2, 2014| 3 Comments »

GC Myers- Septemebr SongIt’s hard to believe that September is upon us already.  September always has a contemplative feel, a pause after the hustle and bustle of the summer months before making the transformation into the cooler, grayer months.  The leaves begin to turn.  The days get shorter. The air takes on a cool hardness that is a keen reminder of the coming coldness of the winter.

One of my favorite songs is the classic tune from Kurt Weill, September Song.  It’s been recorded by literally hundreds of artists through the years from many genres, from Jimmy Durante to James Brown to Lou Reed.  Willie Nelson does a rendition that is very delicate, maintaining the tenuous nature of the tune.  Just a lovely version.  I’ve included it at the bottom.

The image here is a new piece, a 6″ by 10″ painting on paper that I am calling September Song.  It is part of a group that will be accompanying me for the trip to the Principle Gallery on September 13th, when I will be giving a gallery talk there.  More info on that later. This painting has a wistful feel, as though the tiny figure is pausing on the path to reflect on where he has been, what he has seen and done.  The sun above and the churning rays of light emanating from it represent the inevitability of time, of change.   I wasn’t sure what to title this painting but when I realized that we were into September, the tune immediately came to mind and the narrative of the scene filled out for me.

Now, I am going to give a listen to Willie as he sings September Song:

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I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night

Posted in Influences, Music, tagged , , , on August 31, 2014| 3 Comments »

Paul Robeson and Shipyard Workers singing "The Star Spangled Banner" 1942

Paul Robeson and Shipyard Workers singing “The Star Spangled Banner” 1942

It’s a Sunday morning which means a bit of music here on the blog.  I try to have something fitting the day and since we’re in the midst of the Labor Day weekend, I thought I would have something labor related.  It is a holiday celebrating the working classes after all, something we often forget as we rush to get in that last weekend of the summer.  I’ve talked here before about the labor movement and how it transformed the American life.  Almost every right we now take for granted in the workplace was fought for– and I mean fought for— by workers and organizers who banded together to demand better working conditions and higher wages.

There were some important names in the labor movement of the early 20th century but maybe none so polarizing as that of Joe Hill, a Swedish immigrant who came to America in 1902 and soon after, as an itinerant laborer,  became involved with the labor movement.  He joined the Industrial Workers of the World — the Wobblies— and wrote  some of the most memorable labor songs of the time, songs which are still played today– The Preacher and the Slave (Pie in the Sky) and There Is Power In a Union.

Hill was working in the silver mine areas of Utah when he was accused of a double murder.  Many believe that Hill was innocent , that the evidence cited did  not line up with the facts of the case, yet he was found guilty.   Many believed that his labor connections were the deciding factor in the guilty verdict.  He was executed by firing squad in 1915.

Hill did little to help himself, remaining silent about a wound that the prosecution claimed was inflicted on him during the murder.  Hill’s fiance later stated that Hill had wrote her from prison, saying that her former lover had shot him.  But Hill seemed to sense that he meant more to the movement as a martyr.

And that is exactly what he became.  He was cremated and his ashes divided into 600 small packets which were distributed around the world by the Wobblies to be cast to the winds.  He has been celebrated in word and song.  The name Joe Hill when spoken still draws the attention of those who know their history.

This is a song , I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night, written in the 1930’s by Earl Robinson and Alfred Hayes.   It is performed by the great Paul Robeson, one of the most interesting people of the last century.  Robeson was a star athlete, a lead actor and  headlining singer– the bright light in any sky he entered.    But more than that, Robeson was a ceaseless champion of the labor and civil rights movements.  If you don’t know much about Robeson, please look him up.

This is a subject that needs more space and time than I have to give today and for that, I apologize.  But please take a listen to the operatic voice of Paul Robeson as he sing about Joe Hill.  And remember what this holiday really means.

 

 

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Oops!… I Did It Again

Posted in Music, Video, tagged , , , , , , on August 24, 2014| 4 Comments »

GC Myers- Shadowsong smWell, it is Sunday morning and time for some music once again.  I thought I’d take this opportunity to show how it is not always the what but the how that is important.  Take for instance the song Oops!… I Did It Again, perhaps one of the best known pop songs of the last fifteen or twenty years, performed by Britney Spears.  Like her or not, you probably have found yourself at some point with that tune in your head.

Myself, I have tried to avoid it in any way possible.

But back in 2003, one of my favorites, Richard Thompson,  did a live album called 1000 Years of Popular Music, where he attempts to summarize the last millennium through musical selections from different eras through that time.  He begins  with Sumer Is Icumen In from the 11th century (this debatable with some saying it is later but for the sake of making the album title work let’s go along with the 11th century) and moves through all forms of traditional and popular music all arranged for his single guitar and  percussion, when needed.  It ends with 2000’s Oops!… I Did It Again.

In Thompson’s hands, the song becomes something quite different.  In painting terms, it would be like two vastly different painters doing the same scene.  Let’s say a simple country cottage painted by Thomas Kinkade and Vincent Van Gogh.  They might be the same whats but the resulting hows would be worlds apart.

Give a listen and see for yourself.  And have a great Sunday…

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Sly at 45

Posted in Music, Video, tagged , , , , , on August 17, 2014| Leave a Comment »

sly-stoneIt seems hard to believe that it was 45 years ago that the legendary rock festival Woodstock was taking place.  On this date back in 1969, Sly and the Family Stone played a late night set that was one of the standouts of Woodstock,  destined to become stellar among a number of other legendary performances at the event.

Sly has become less visible in recent years and I am sure he is unknown to many in the younger generations but he and his band were huge in their time, bringing a high-powered multi-genre, multi-racial blend of funk, soul and rock music to a wider audience.  I will go for a while without hearing a Sly song and when one comes on I wonder why I am not listening to this all of the time.  It engages you with a message and some heavy rhythm.  I can imagine some young kids stumbling across his music and feeling like they’ve discovered El Dorado.  It just glows.

I thought it would be fitting to kickstart this Sunday with a little bit of that performance at Woodstock from Sly.  The Youtube video below  is the shorter version of  I Want to Take You Higher and the link below  it is the full version.  Either way, a rocking start to a Sunday morning.  Have a great day.

Sly & The Family Stone – Woodstock 1969 by docfromcpt

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