Online companion for ‘Kinky and Karlheinz’

Transcript extract:

“It’s a lovely marriage of Bob’s dedication to the words and my dedication to the sonics. It’s got a lot of power in it. The sound of the crickets - I think we just stuck the mike out of the window. It was in New Orleans! But I realise now, it’s really a song about someone surrendering to darkness, and the man in the long black coat is just like a figure for darkness. It’s the power of storytelling really, because you can exercise a philosophy through a character, so as a writer you are not taking a full responsibility for it. It’s like picking up a hitchhiker on the way and the hitchhiker presents a rant. It’s not your rant.”

The entire transcript of this interview with the record producer Daniel Lanois is printed in Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz. The interview was originally broadcast on The Music Show on 8 April 2000.

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Audio: Bob Copper’s (1915-2004) recollection of singing folk songs to the seagulls must be one of the most magical moments in the history of The Music Show. A long interview with Bob Coppers was first broadcast on The Music Show 22 February 2003 and is still among the most requested in the show’s history. The interview is printed in it entirety in Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz.

Listen also to another audio sample from the same interview.

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Audio: Blossom Dearie declares herself a jazz singer.

This extract, originally broadcast on The Music Show as part of a longer interview with Blossom Dearie on 18 February 1995, is printed on the very first page of Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz. It starts a chapter featuring long interviews with Annie Ross, Sheila Jordan, Harry Connick Jr, Michael Feinstein, Betty Carter and Kurt Elling, along with shorter transcript extracts of interviews with numerous other musicians.

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Transcript:

“I told my dad, ‘I’m not going to be a famous doctor, I’m going to be a famous composer’. And he said, ‘Oh well, you won’t make any money, and you mustn’t be upset if people don’t want to listen to your music and would rather listen to the football, because that’s likely to happen’.”

This extract is part of a long interview with Tristram Cary, first broadcast on The Music Show on 11 February 2006. The whole interview is now available as a podcast on the program’s website.

Tristram Cary was an important pioneer of electronic music and a composer of many groundbreaking works. He is also known for his work in developing the VCS3 synthesiser, used by Pink Floyd, Jean Michel Jarre and Brian Eno, among others. Among the best known of Tristram Cary’s own music is his score for the original Ealing comedy The Ladykillers, as well as the music he composed to accompany the first appearance of the Daleks in the TV series Doctor Who. His music for the concert hall is sadly less well known.

Tristram Cary’s recollection of his father’s (writer Joyce Cary) comment on his career plans is included in Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz together with quotes from many contemporary composers, from Tan Dun to Peter Sculthorpe.

Read also: Obituary in The Guardian.

(Photo © Anni Heino 2005)

Transcript extract:

“There were CD burnings, CD crushing, large trash bins available for people to go throw their CDs away. We’ve gotten a lot of threatening mail. Emily’s front gate to her ranch got trashed. We’ve had to have security put on us for when we get back into the States. It’s just amazing to me that three innocent sweet girls could find ourselves in so much trouble. We have definite political and religious views about things, but we try to not use the stage as a platform for rallying supporters for our views on any subject. We just try to play music and keep politics to our living rooms. And so it’s just amazing that one comment could have been blown so out of proportion and been the top story on the five o’clock news, when a war is going on. What is wrong with the world when what the Dixie Chicks say at a show in London is more important than the fact that we’re going to war? Why do people care what we think?”

This interview with the Dixie Chicks’ violinist Martie Maguire was broadcast on The Music Show on 29 March 2003. The whole transcript of the interview is included in Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz. (See also: The Dixie Chicks homepage.)

Audio: Artist David Hockney talks about how in a theatre the eyes can hear and the ears can see. The music that Hockney refers to is Richard Strauss’s opera Die Frau ohne Schatten.

Hockney’s first and best-known design for opera was for John Cox’s production of Stravinsky’s the The Rake’s Progress in 1975 at the Glyndebourne Opera Festival. This audio extract is from an interview recorded in 1996, when Hockney’s design for Frau ohne Schatten was seen at the Melbourne Festival. The whole interview with Hockney - as well as several extracts of a 2006 interview with John Cox - is included in Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz. It was first broadcast on The Music Show on 19 October 1996. (See also: David Hockney’s authorised homepage.)

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A date for the diary: Sydney Writers’ Festival organises an event titled ‘Finding the words to speak (and write) about music’ on Friday 23 May at 12 noon at Sydney Dance Company Studio 1 (Pier 4-5, Hickson Road, Walsh Bay, Sydney).

On the panel: Andrew Ford and Penny Lomax (The Music Show), Anni Heino, Wolfgang Fink (Director of Artistic Operations at Sydney Symphony) and the harpist Marshall McGuire.

Pictured: the launch of ‘Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz’ during the Adelaide Writers’ Week in March. Seated from left: Maureen Cooney, Andrew Ford, Anni Heino, Penny Lomax and the special guest Eric Bogle. Click the image for a larger view.

Audio: Neil Finn (of Crowded House) remembers his time with Split Enz in the 1970s-1980s, including Noel Crombie’s haircuts.

This audio extract is part of an interview broadcast on The Music Show on 3 February 1996. Other extracts of this same interview are included in the ‘Singer/Songwriters’ chapter of the book Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz.

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Read Roger Covell’s review of Talking to Kinky and Karlheinz in this weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald (Spectrum p. 31).

Audio: Soul and gospel singer Mavis Staples remembers the music in the little church in Mound Bayou, Mississippi.

This audio extract comes from an interview that was recorded in New Orleans and broadcast on The Music Show on 16 September 2000. The full transcript of the interview is included in the book.

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