Next month's lunchtime music thread is #Popiversary2, with tracks released at intervals from 2022 all the way back to 1953.
I have two ideas for this thread, and would like readers' input.
Do I give a month of laidback chilled tunes... or a month of Christmas songs?
By a clear majority, the people have spoken. A month of laidback chilled music it is. Tunes to hear by the pool, the temperature just perfect, the right sort of drink and company.
(I may repeat the idea of #Popiversary2 for Christmas songs in December...)
The picture gives the precise schedule.
#Popiversary2 is summertime chill through the years. Here, #Maro and friends yearn for a better world, better in some indefinable way. Deeply sad, and deeply optimistic at the same time.
Performance from the Festival da Canção in 2023.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUjtDMZF6oA
Inspired by the #NASA spaceprobe, #Vangelis worked with #AngelaGheorgihu and sounds from the actual moons of Jupiter for an out-of-this-world soundtrack.
The album is more background music than foreground, which makes it perfect for #Popiversary2.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DT0Ex6bKnQ0
A married woman falls in love with someone who isn't her husband. This is a peril for the monogamy; perhaps there's some presumed heterosexuality.
Taken from #TaylorSwift's cottagecore phase, "ivy" may be inspired by Emily Dickinson and Susan Gilbert.
It's been adopted by the #gaylor crowd, who are the best literary critics around: aggressive interpretations of female sexuality through contemporary texts.
"Ooh, this is a bit Secret Garden", I thought when hitting track 5 on #LindseyStirling's album. This part is a musing on what it means to be immortal, just one fragment of a (gasp!) coherent concept album.
And chilled enough for #Popiversary2.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8ox23El2HE
Does your film or tv show feature strong women? Well-defined characters? Pervasive queerness? You need a soundtrack from Sunna Wehmeijer!
This piece soundtracks the only formal occasion in the 52 episode story.
#SheRa #SPOP #SunnaWehmeijer #CatraInASuit #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HThcccnqNGs
In this 8½ hour album, Max Richter explores sleep, activity, consciousness, and a slower pace of living.
Rather than present the whole work, here's just one track, from the deep sleep after the third dream.
(#Popiversary2 moves into its era phase: 2014-17 today, 2013 tomorrow.) #MaxRichter
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IEKidI7BnI
Recording again after 17 months off... what? 17 *years*?! No way.
A slice of late-90s dreampop, expansive and atmospheric and with a vocal line buried somewhere in the mix.
Hope Sandoval keeps her familiar phrasing and vocal lift, sings with weary resignation about the drudgery of life. And it sounds so enticing, too.
#Popiversary2 #MazzyStar
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTUEsPXOprU
Whosoever unlocks the centuries-old song cycle shall be the true king of #Popiversary2.
#ToriAmos shifted across to a classical label for this work, reflecting her usual concerns (relationships, myths, gender) through tracks from before the dawn of pop music.
"Edge of the moon", for instance, is based on a Bach flute sonata.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tU-BaubPu5k
Volker Bertelmann, who recorded early work as Hauschka, offers a piano-and-strings piece. For me, it sounds like a bicycle being pedalled along the canals and fields of the Low Countries, whizzing along with the sun on my back and nary a care in the world.
Bertelmann's gone on to do film scores - "All Quiet on the Western Front" his most famous.
#Popiversary2 #Hauschka #piano #bicycle #ClassicalMusic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2BFJlPmF9c
The Brooklyn indie trio wanted to make the soundtrack of someone exploring a secret garden at night with a flashlight. Earthly music with a certain dreamlike, magical quality.
Heather D'Angelo went on to compose for "Vampire Academy", Annie Hart's released some punk albums.
#Popiversary2 #AuRevoirSimone #Dreampop
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TMm7Z9JcB4
Eros did what Nik Kershaw could have done: turned a sudden mid-80s success into a lifelong career.
By 2003, almost two decades into his art, Eros has moved towards warm and inclusive adult rock, most clearly on the album's lead single.
"An emotion forever" is about the love that remains even when the warm bodies are apart.
Any summer evening by the pool has to feature this track. It's the law.
Henry Binns and Sam Hardaker had been respected remixers for years before their own album came out. It was worth the wait, and this track remains a high point of their career.
#Zero7 #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_OKigBRqBI
Craig Armstrong is Baz Luhrmann's go-to composer; this track is an extension of his work on 1996's "Romeo + Juliet".
The rest of the album is similar soundtrack extensions, songs that sound like they ought to be on a soundtrack, and some oddball covers.
#Popiversary2 #CraigArmstrong #BazLuhrmann #movie #soundtrack
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTSe_pdxAzA
Out of Soft Machine and into the concert hall, Karl Jenkins composed a baroque style with a clear nod to Vivaldi's Four Seasons.
In this opening movement, solo parts begin to emerge and alternate with concert motifs, building drama and suspense.
You might know it from the diamond adverts.
#KarlJenkins #ClassicalMusic #BaroqueMusic #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hViPSRHyU0Y
The final studio album from Simon Jeffes' chamber jazz-classical project, "Union Cafe" is like a big box of rich chocolates, perhaps too much to enjoy in one sitting.
Jeffes died in 1997, but his work lives on at the intersection of intellectual and accessible, Penguin Cafe have a new album this month.
Six points if you recall where you've heard this recently.
#Popiversary2 #PenguinCafeOrchestra
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tp6Tx0dftYE
Written in 1976, Górecki built from Mahler's mournful bass and solo voice. This movement uses the words of a prisoner of the nazis: "Mother, do not cry, no, do not weep, Most pure Queen of Heaven, Protect me always."
#Popiversary2 #Gorecki #DawnUpshaw #ClassicalMusic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HN2DiY5OXF4
A setting of a seventeenth-century poem by Rabbi Shalom Shabazi turned into a song John Peel championed and a German number one hit.
Ofra Haza's combination of traditional Yemeni instruments and Western disco was augmented by some very effective scratching, Haza's music was sampled on Eric B & Rakim's "Paid in full".
Haza died in 2000 of an AIDS-related illness.
#Popiversary2 #OfraHaza #Yemenite #Judaism #JohnPeel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvDkryqHoHE
In February 1986, Michael Hurll asked Paul Hardcastle for a shiny new title theme for Top of the Pops. "The wizard" was written in a couple of days; the fizzy-bangy-twiddly tune was used for the next 5½ years.
When Paul had had a bit longer to think about the tune, he came up with this mellow mix. It featured on the 12-inch single.
#PaulHardcastle #TOTP #Synthesiser #Jazz #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4g3MPQEdlnI
Footage of original film from the Apollo moon journey was edited together; you may know the film from its reissue as "For All Mankind".
Brian Eno's music is calm, stately, clear and purposeful. "Weightless" centres the electric piano, its riff still sounds contemporary four decades on.
#BrianEno #Space #Electronic #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ku0mbtyfuwY
Baroque music tended to repeat existing ideas, and Nyman's work is based on an extract from Purcell's 1691 work "King Arthur", recycled through the same chord sequence as doo-wop music of the 1950s.
This tune has been used in many adverts and sampled by another baroque act, Pet Shop Boys.
#MichaelNyman #Minimalism #Baroque #ClassicalMusic #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHiJkLmclkA
Television uses a lot of library music. These tunes can be broken into many little bits - 30 seconds for the title sequences, 5 seconds as break stings, longer segments as background music.
"Stargazing" is at the calm end of Monkman's work, the gentle relaxing tune for late night chill.
#FrancisMonkman #LibraryMusic #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDhB1PoLluA
Eschewing the "naïve" lyrics from earlier work, Giltrap honed his aggressive strumming style and - by 1977 - mostly made songs without words. "Heartsong" lost the Ivor Novello for Best Instrumental Choon to Elton's "Song for Guy".
In addition to this theme from "Holiday", Giltrap accepted a commission from ITV's equivalent "Wish You Were Here".
#GordonGiltrap #TvThemeTune #Holiday #Popiversary2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktRsmHrLHU4
Siebert was a boy musician in the Cheshire Regiment, and taught himself how to play and compose for the brass section.
He wrote a lot, still gets performed by brass bands, though none of his works crossed over into the more popular sphere.
The piece is performed by the Brass Band Corgément, conducted by Bernard Voiblet. And happy dynamic living!
#Popiversary2 #EdrichSiebert #BrassBand #BurkissWay
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssqC-OtTVPw
Art and celebrity never gelled comfortably for Joni Mitchell, and we first heard the result of her inner conflict - fuelled by her breakup with James Taylor - on the album "Blue".
"California" is an unsettled song, it doesn't want to be here, but nor does it want to leave for her old life.
#Popiversary2 #JoniMitchell #California #folk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6tlDUqRMUo
JS Bach wrote the original, slightly before our 70-year horizon.
It was reinterpreted by the electronica pioneer. Carlos helped to develop the Moog synthesiser, and showcased its possibilities on this groundbreaking album.
#Popiversary2 #WendyCarlos #JSBach #electronica
https://archive.org/download/lp_switched-on-bach_walter-carlos_2/disc1/02.05.%20Brandenburg%20Concerto%20No.%203%20In%20G%20Major%3A%20Third%20Movement.mp3
Graceful and ornate, in the style of the summer of love. Hardy asks extistential questions - "who can tell if tomorrow will be like today? Who could promise someone to love them forever?"
#Popiversary2 #FrançoiseHardy #chanson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCugKgvgpTk
The thoughts of a kamikaze pilot on the night before his mission, and an unlikely global hit. It was imported by a student who had lived in Japan, one of her roommates borrowed the record so it could be played on the radio.
"Sukiyaki" is a Japanese food, enjoyed by record company exec Louis Benjamin; the original title was "Ue O Muite Aruko".
#Popiversary2 #KyoSakamoto
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C35DrtPlUbc
I uploaded this video a few years ago, because it's one of my father's favourite songs and it reminds me of my childhood when he would play it on the cassett...
The title track from the film of the same name, it's about being kissed six days a week - but be chill on Sunday, Craig.
#Popiversary2 #MelinaMercouri
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qzJtiMI4pI
The biggest hit from a Rodgers and Hammerstein show? Quite possibly.
Emile and Nelly have recently met, and worry that the other might not return their love. The song gets reprised throughout the film (and earlier musical), a recurring theme of their evolving relationship.
#Popiversary2 #SouthPacific
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5dPtkVCRsg
As soon as Jules Verne's work came out of copyright, Hollywood made a big-budget movie starring David Niven as Willy Fog.
This piece soundtracks an addition to the book - a hot-air balloon ride above France, landing in Spain.
The soundtrack is acclaimed as Victor Young's greatest work - and his last, he died before the movie opened.
#Popiversary2 #VictorYoung #AroundTheWorldIn80Days
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3llx6XK0Ew
Composed by Henri Betti, lyric by André Hornez and Jerry Seelen. The song was turned down by Edith Piaf, and popularised by Suzy Delair.
Eartha purrs the original French lyric, then adds some English-language translations. It's one of her best-remembered performances, and certainly one of the steamiest!
#Popiversary2 #EarthaKitt #GetARoom
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWCo5ex40IQ
Our group declare to be true