Music Video Stardom

Hey everyone,

Welcome back. And welcome back to an opportunity to be in a YMS music video! Plume Giant is shooting one today starting at 11 a.m. and going until around 6 p.m. (earlier if you guys are good dancers who get moves quickly?) Meet at Phelps Gate to walk over to the site in Wooster Square.

According to an e-mail from Oliver, this will be a "decked out Busby Berkeley type production with trombones coming out of car doors and sgt pepper costumes."

Wikipedia

There will be pizza and champaign. The YPMB will be featured. So much delicious.

Wear clothes along these lines: marching band, americana, sgt pepper, ziggy stardust.

Plume Giant

Mmmhmmmm?

If you're not getting back in time but are free Monday, Plume Giant is also looking for a group of about ten people for a smaller, rag-tag "featured" band from 10–4 tomorrow. Contact them for details.

Be moviestars,

Z

Hola, Apocalypse!

Don't you love it when an event's title is in Spanish for no reason? I know I do ;)

Tonight's lineup might be almost as good as a trip to Madrid...almost.

yep, took this one in Madrid

In the Morse/Stiles Theater from two Yale and one alum band are taking the stage. At 8:30 it's A Streetcar Named Funk, at 9:30 alum band Brother K (my limited research into this group says nobody knows who they are but they sound "chill."), and Salivating Eyes at 10:30.

Streetcar, or rather bassist Nathan Prillamen '13, has been working on some funky originals, so be sure to look out for those.

Salivating Eyes is kind of goofy, as the following "cover" video shows. These guys know how to have fun. But when it comes to their originals, they really bring it. The guitar solos alone are enough to make my eyes salivate (whatever that means?!?!?)

I really love this song...and that drawing is pretty sexy...

So get ready for FUNKY, CHILL, SHREDDING SALIVATION. In that order. Alright, I support this.

See you front and centre,

Z

Olusola Wins NBC Sing-Off

Kevin Olusola MC '11, beatboxer and cellist, just won NBC's "The Sing-Off" with his group Pentatonix on the show's season finale Nov. 28.

The a cappella group requested Kevin join them in the competition after hearing his beatboxing. Sadly, Kevin could not also assist the Whiffenpoofs, who could not generate the necessary appeal to advance on the show.

Check out the Pentatonix performing a cover of Florence And the Machine's "Dog Days Are Over" on the show's semi-finals.

But even more impressive than this televised victory is Kevin's cello, vocal and beatbox single "Void of a Legend" with Antoinette Costa.

Download it on itunes here.

Z

Go Underground

Tonight from 8-11 check out the underground rap scene!

The WYBC presents 216 Underground Rap Show! At Dwight 216.

Rappers include Tayo Ajayi BC '15, Jake Backer MC '14, Evan Okun & The Freestyle Collective from Wesleyan, Alan Sage SM '14, and Jacob Sandry BC '15.

Watch them spit somerhymes.

Beethoven and Cooley

So I am slightly annoyed (this may or may not be understatement)

I am annoyed (slightly) because.

1) I have to write a piece for carillon (the big bells in Harkness) for my composition class. While originally I thought Cool, I get to write for bells! That’s awesome! I must be frank. This assignment is kiiiiind of driving me insane. The bells just keep ringing and ringing; you never get to write in rests; and the dissonance just keeps piling up. To add insult to injury, the assignment itself requires a ton of weird harmonies and a disturbing amount of repetition. (I never want to read the sentence “You must demonstrate a high degree of motivic coherence!” again.) I am a failure of a composer because I can’t get this to sound even halfway good, and I am days behind.

2) The carilloneur in my class for whom we’re all writing is having her orchestra piece played tonight 8 p.m. by YSO alongside Beethoven. The concert’s title “Beethoven and Cooley” satirically juxtaposes the two composers. Of course, you’d go to a concert and hear both of them! Unfair.

3) I just listened to the piece, and pairing Ludwig Van Beethoven with Emily Cooley PC ’12 might not actually be so outrageous.

SO I’M MAD!

Anyway, of course you should go to this. YSO is amazing this year for any of you who were not at the Halloween show. The Beethoven pieces include Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, which features Mia Nishikawa JE’ 14 on piano and Michael Li PC ’12 as conductor and Symphony No. 4 in B-flat Major.

Emily’s piece “Render and Reach” varies a theme making ample use of the different orchestral instruments and smooth yet colourful modulation.

The piece opens with music one might expect to hear at a wonderous ballet or fairy tale dance production as the music creatively varies off a theme, but the piece then goes minor and adds post-Wagner and film score elements, building slowly. Emily then adds small spurts of melodic material in different instruments in a quasi-minimalist fashion that starts to lose me a little, especially when it comes back later in the piece. The piece modulates back to major, blending chords and pleasantly overlapping melodies.

The next section of the six-minute piece is characterized by upbeat rhythmic sections that open with a tapping, percussive sound and quickly incorporate drum kit. The upbeat melodic sections that go with the drum rhythms are underlined with legato re-representations of the theme, which spiral up into a big crash of power only experienced and fully appreciated in orchestras.

Throughout the piece, Emily makes effective use of horns to blare the melody and add emotional impetus. During the minimalistic sections with more sporadic melody lines, the flutes are instrumental in adding continuity with steadily rising harmonies. High, repeated notes in the strings bring back a modified theme and the horns come in to finish for a finale, a grand instrumental flourish.

Fantastic. (damnit)

So yeah. Tickets are $2-$5 for students and $10-15 for non-Yalies. Go. I would, but I have to finish this (and another) piece.

Dooooooonggggg.....

Z

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!

The Rain Brigade, the newly named version of "The Black Marias," is opening for the YSO Halloween show tonight at 10:45 in Woolsey. So be sure to get there on time.

The Rain Brigade at Fall Fest

After them Jamestown, The First Town in America, or their "economically unstable alter-ego" Ghost Town, The Deadest Town in America will play. Which will it be??

Trick or treeeeeeaaaaat!

Z

Get your spook on

What is spookier than having your parents here during Halloween weekend?

Spooky music with your parents, perhaps?

This weekend, bands are giving two musical frightshows back-to-back and costumes are encouraged.

internet photo

First tonight at 10pm it’s The Keep Calm (preparing you for a scarry weekend with your family by reminding you of their name….) and A Streetcar Named Funk at Sigma Chi, 33 Lynwood Place. Sig Chi just became my favourite frat. Thanks, bros for supporting our music scene, bra.

From "Boys in Briefs"

The Keep Calm goes on at 10pm. The band features Alexander Bae BR ’14 (vocals, guitar, piano), John Cocco JE ’14 (drums), Kenneth Crouch ’14 (bass), and Ishan Sinha BR ’14 (guitar).

Their chill sound, fun riffs and collegiate lyrics are bound to leave calming melodies ringing in your heads for the duration of the weekend. Fweewwh.

The Keep Calm at Fall Fest

Songs are always scarier when they’re funky.

A Streetcar Named Funk will bust out four fresh, original songs within a 12-song set as it takes the stage at 10:45. The band features some talented solo musicians; we’ll see how they all come together.

Michael Blume ’12 (vocals), Nathan Prillaman JE ’13 (bass), Andi Zhou JE ’13 (keys), Zach Simao JE ’13 (drums), Will Moritz TC ’12, tenor saxophonist extraordinaire Alyssa Hasbrouck MC ’14 (alto sax...lol), Tim Gladding SY ’13 (euphonium), Grant Phelps JE ’14 (tenor sax), Nathaniel Meyer SY ’13 (trumpet) will take the stage.

Streetcar plays a halftime show (photo from Streetcar not mine)

Then tomorrow at 378 Crown, 9:30 pm, things are going to get really spooky.

Think a Halloween party + parents hosted by Ghost Town the Deadest Town in America.

More on this tomorrow.

From "MarvelBlog"

Are you scared yet?

Z