Artists + Musicians

baimun

Funkasaurus Rex
I remember I was studying art history in college while listening to a Frank Zappa recording and it suddenly dawned on me that my appreciation of each came from similar paths.

When you think of Pablo Picasso, most people think of the geometric portraits, almost messy and childlike in their presentation, but when you look through his portfolio of work you find a very skilled artist who developed that style. Not a result of a lack of skill that ended up with a product, but the other way around. Purposefully choosing to challenge the perception of what is "good" or "beautiful".

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When I first heard Zappa, I heard something like a coarser, messier, Santana and assumed that he had these musical ideas that were beyond his skill set, but once I became a fan of Steve Vai (Flexable and Left Overs) I reapproached Frank's music and was stunned to discover passages of fluidity and virtuosity... making me realize that the other coarser, out-of-the-norm musical passages were deliberate choices in style and texture.

I then took that comparison one step further and realized that Vai was much like Dali. You can see the fluid details. You can tell the dexterity of the artist... but the places taken are very strange and alien.

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I think it's possible to draw those parallels in most art/music comparisons...in some musical pieces, Zappa, Vai, Glass and many others you can often hear elements of Mondrian's mathematical linear proportions as well as Pollacks psychotic chaos, often in the same piece...
 
I have often, especially in my electronic music days, collaborated with artists to combine art and music in various ways, as well as providing background music for art shows. They blend nicely.
 
This kind of reminds me of the DVD I bought of Nels Cline and Norton Wisdom. Norton is an artist and he gets together with Nels. It is Just Nels with his guitar (and massive effect) playing live while Norton paints. It is a pretty cool watch, this is just the preview.

 
I have often, especially in my electronic music days, collaborated with artists to combine art and music in various ways, as well as providing background music for art shows. They blend nicely.

A friend of mine had a private performance at his house by Jennifer Batten. She had a projection screen with different paintings to accompany her songs.
 
I don't really agree with the artists used for those analogies, I get where you're coming from. And I agree that visual art and music share many parallels.
 
OK, so by that assertion, is Kris Kristofferson's rendition of his composition "Sunday Morning Coming Down" different than Johnny Cash's? Is the composition tied to the performance to the degree that it doesn't matter who does it, or is it dependant on the composer?
 
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