Shortly after, The Beautiful Girls started playing. I was quite disappointed (having heard good things about them) and went off to purchase a souvlaki. Their music was entirely bland and unoriginal, consisting of very little more than a couple of basic chords and dull bass lines-- what one might expect of a high school band. The next act more than made up for the disappointment of The Beautiful Girls. Blue King Brown were fantastic as usual (this being the fourth time I'd seen them). A fantastic synthesis of many musically talented individuals, through whose music came an incredible sense of rhythm and fun. Especially impressive was the percussion section- the drummer and percussionist had an incredible sense of rhythm. They did a fantastic job of priming the crowd for the main item.

The Cat Empire were amazing. The talented musicianship, intense rhythms, catchy melodies and the pervading sense of a good time communicated through their albums pales in comparison to what is delivered by a live show. Although there was a focus on songs from the newest album So Many Nights, it was fantastic to see they did not neglect their earlier crowd-pleasing masterpieces. Unfortunately (but obviously), they played their worst-ever song No Longer There (the flaccidity of which is incomprehensible compared to their otherwise excellent body of work). Extended improvisations from the Empire Horns (Ross Irwin and Kieran Conrau on trumpet and trombone respectively), the virtuostic Ollie McGill on keys and drummer Will Brown were a fantastic addition to the well-known studio-recorded tracks. Highlights of the show included the four dancers during Sly and the two dancers (featuring guest guitarist and percussionist) during Two Shoes, which was a visual treat. The night was powerfully ended by the encores: new track The Darkness and all-time favourite The Chariot (which we were to sing/hum/whistle for the rest of the night). A fantastic night out, supported by amazingly talented Blue King Brown and others. Much more than well worth the $65 ticket price!!

And here's my Cat Empire station from Pandora - The Cat Empire Radio.   That station has been playing an excellent selection of tunes all day, including a new favorite, "Kate" by Ben Folds Five.

Enjoy!

Definitely more from The Cat Empire to come.

Tot ce-mi ramane pana atunci este acest solo mult iubit dintr-un Lost Song

http://www.goear.com/listen.php?v=838a6d2

http://www.goear.com/listen.php?v=3979411

http://www.goear.com/listen.php?v=eb23c98

http://www.goear.com/listen.php?v=6856eac

http://www.goear.com/listen.php?v=53ebc59

http://www.goear.com/listen.php?v=3326f3b

(the band was The Cat Empire)

Além dos cangurus, a Austrália tem coisas muito interessantes - e curiosas. Por exemplo, o Cat Empire, uma banda de Melbourne, cujo som não combina nem um pouco com a idéia (ou a falta de idéia) que temos da Austrália. E, por isso mesmo, combina muito com a idéia (ou a falta de idéia) que temos da Austrália.

Deu pra entender?

Não?

Então vejam, e ouçam!

The Cat Empire - Sly

The Cat Empire - Two Shoes

The Cat Empire - Days Like These (Live at Commonwealth Park)

Yesterday was also Fan Night, which meant that anyone tech-savvy enough to get on the Internet could vote for their ideal set-list. My friends and I were pleased with this because it meant we would be treated to a lot of their older songs which I like a lot more than their newer stuff. I particularly enjoyed hearing the now very well-known and crowd-pleasing version of The Chariot featuring a French speaking rendition of Hotel California.

Fan Night also meant everyone was given a free gift for attending. Maybe I'm easily pleased, but I was stoked to get a freebie that didn't come in the form of a stubby holder. I will definitely be packing that sleeping mask on my next long trip away. I love gimmicks and I love freebies, so even though I didn't feel like the night was anything near the energy and enjoyment I experienced first seeing them live a few years ago, I still walked away a pretty happy punter.

These kinds of cross-over collaborations between orchestras and other musical styles have a lot of appeal and interest across audiences, but I think they are hard to do well. In some I have heard, the orchestral instruments can barely be heard above the rock band. They are often tucked off the the side and back of the stage area, playing a wimpy kind of musical role of lush sustained string chords, brassy stabs, or just loads and loads of fast passages that don't end up being audible in the mix.

The project between AYO and The Cat Empire was not like this at all. Firstly, the orchestrations were superb. They were done mostly by Ross Irwin (musical director of the project) and they had a lot of character and smartness and slickness about them. (After the Thursday night concert a couple of the performers and I raved about the writing, and played around with appropriate words to describe it - dark, gritty, edgy, urban, cheeky, quirky, gravelly...). Also, the concerts were the outcome of a very carefully thought-out process, or learning framework, of introducing the AYO musicians to improvisation, and building their skills and confidence through workshops, rehearsing and discussions. The orchestrations were not fully written out, planned and decided - there was scope for the AYO musicians to have input, and several performed improvised solos in the concerts. Several of the musical interludes between songs were free improvisations, which took the ensemble off into quite intense and colourful musical landscapes, before bridging back into the next song.

The stage was set with the AYO string players on one side of the stage, The Cat Empire on the centre and other side of the stage, and the brass players (from both groups) in a line across the centre back. Where the performances really took off, for me, was when the division between the two groups became blurred, as performers moved about, or performed standing, and became one large, very integrated and inseparable ensemble. The song 'Darkness' was my favourite for this, as well as for the awe-inspiring performance by Harry Angus on vocals, and the frenetic and twisted descent into blissful Balkan madness in the string and brass writing. Happily this was one of the numbers I got to hear twice (as it was performed near the end of the set list). I'm curious to hear it on CD, or in a Cat Empire-only concert. It works so well in this collaboration with the orchestra. Maybe it is a totally different song in its other contexts.

A fun, fun night out - I am sure I was not the only person in the audience straining to leave my seat - hard to imagine not dancing at a Cat Empire gig! I'm feeling very pleased to have been involved in the project. My contribution was small in the scope of the whole week's work, but I got great feedback on it from players and AYO management, and I'm glad to have played a role in a project like this, that, if post-concert conversations are any indication, has given very positive musical challenges & inspiration to all the musicians involved. (Nice work, AYO, for making it all happen).

I mentioned to one young cellist what a great contributor he was in a group situation. I had observed him being very generous in his offers, as well as good at responding to the ideas of others. He was dynamic and full of energy and fun - a good 'engager' - and he was often a catalyst for getting things moving in his composition groups. He thanked me, but went on to say that he knew that he needed to be careful not to dominate other people in these settings, that there were others who might not be putting forward ideas, because he was so immediately forthcoming.

I think about this situation a lot. Sometimes it seems wrong that those who are the bright, happy, uninhibited ones - who have so much to offer a group situation, especially when working in a new area or outside comfort zones - should need to tone themselves down in order to not overshadow other quieter people. It is as if they must somehow take responsibility for others being shyer or less forthcoming. This certainly can happen in schools (I have very clear memories of teachers telling me that I should offer fewer suggestions in group tasks, so that others could 'have a turn' - even though those others never seemed to offer anything anyway! The indignation I felt!). But is it right? At what point should people expect others to keep making space for them, in a creative situation?

Good collaborations contain input from all sources present, I think. Everyone is changed in some way by the contributions of the others. There is richness in ensuring a breadth of contributions from which everyone benefits, and this is an argument for creating an environment in which all voices can be heard. However, some responsibility must also lie with individuals, to be brave about piping up, making offers, recognising when they are holding themselves back out of habit, or long-held behavior patterns. In an educational setting it is right to make allowance for people to some extent, but what is that extent in reality? Is it right that a bright young thing should be holding back his incredible stream of creative ideas, simply to not make others feel bad?

I don't think so. I told him to be as bright and brilliant as he wanted to be. The world has far less to gain from his mediocrity than it has from his brilliance. He should see himself as an inspiration and a guide for others, rather than a dominant presence. He can offer an energy that is infectious, that will give confidence to others, and momentum to the group process - sometimes intangible to those taking part, but always invaluable.

Australian Youth Orchestra

Today I led an improvisation workshop for young musicians from the Australian Youth Orchestra as part of their collaborative Style Workshop with The Cat Empire. It's a collaborative project that takes the AYO musicians quite a way out from the traditional orchestral musician role, into the realms of improvisation, devising and composition. They started the project with me, doing a workshop on the ideal mindset for improvisation and creativity, building an awareness of factors that can inhibit creative responses, and trying their hands at a number of different creative tasks. They created what I felt were some truly original pieces. They have raised the bar pretty high now, for other students with whom I do the same tasks! Later today they will work with Tony Gould, one of Melbourne's great improv gurus. From tomorrow they start working with The Cat Empire guys. Then on Thursday night all the music created through the collaboration will be performed in concert.

One of the violinists was also present at my ANAM talk, and it was nice to see her again and follow up some of the discussion points that were raised on that day - in particular the distinction she (and one or two others) made between music listening and music making. We chatted in the break about ways of listening to music, and the difference in the way we listen to music we know well and have played, to the way we listen to something new.

One of my tactics as a listener is to try to listen with 'new ears', to hear every sound as new and unexpected, and to try to put myself into the composer's imagination.

I have another project coming up with AYO in November - this time with the Young Australian Concert Artists (YACA) program, during their Regional Residency in Albury. We'll work together on two projects with primary school children. Probably inspired by music of Shostakovich.

Hunger

On Saturday we rehearsed one of the earlier large ensemble sequences, three of the duets, had costume fittings for all musicians, and then a music-only rehearsal, in which we planned to go through all the music in the show, talking through the cues and stage moves as we went.

It felt like a chaotic day, and in some ways less productive than I'd hoped. We (the musicians) ran overtime in our first task of the day, then costume fittings ran over into the music rehearsal. We didn't get through all the music in that rehearsal and finished the day five minutes over. It was a lot to fit in.

In hindsight, I needed to be more assertive in pulling people from the costume fittings back into the rehearsal, as the designer and I had already agreed that we couldn't steal time from the rehearsal - frustratingly, that is what happened anyway. (sigh). The music rehearsal suggested that we do need time to work on the music separately. There were lots of questions and things needing further clarification. There were also concerns that surprised me - adamance that we needed more precise timings for some of the improvisations or cues, and that the ensemble couldn't take cues from the stage. However, the reality with this company is that there is always an element of unpredictability about the performers that necessitates a more flexible way of scoring and cueing. It is the only way that it works. (Cues like, "keep playing X until Y happens on-stage. At that point finish the phrase you are playing and come to a stop').

On Saturday I was resisting a role of whip-cracker - I wanted us to be collaborators together. I didn't want to step on the designer's toes either - she knew we were anxious to rehearse and so surely would not keep people in fittings longer than necessary. However, I should have kept an eye on what was going on, and ensured a sense of haste. The fact that we didn't get as much done on Saturday is my fault, ultimately. It's hard, this project. It will be rewarding and satisfying, I feel sure of that, but it is also incredibly hard.

Puppet Project

This week I am in at ArtPlay again working as Musical Director on a project called Note To Self. It is a creative development working with kids, exploring the narrative and visual potential of some of the symbols of music - instrument cases, staves, clefs, notes, printed music etc. There are ten child musicians and nine child puppeteers involved.

Creative Developments can be glorious fun, where there is time to explore ideas and be very open to the outcomes of the explorations. The directors need to be very tuned-in, always thinking on our feet, attuned to what is working, and how some of the explorations could be developed further. This project has a fairly hefty time commitment - the whole second week of the school holidays - but I am looking forward to the process.

Masters Study

Not much happening here. My friend P came by this afternoon for a cup of tea after the AYO project and she tried to get me stirred up about starting my Ethics Approval application. But my brain feels too full to start anything new. I feel disconnected from my proposed research topic, and unsure even of what it is! Maybe I'll feel different tomorrow, when I finally have a day off and can gather myself together again. I'm feeling a bit fragmented.

This Australia band blends horns, ska, jazz, funk and rock in an upbeat yet cynical combination that is a lot of fun. These guys hardly get any US airplay but are huge back home, having racked up 8 years of hits across three albums. A brief US tour last Fall did little to correct the lack of exposure, but a West Coast tour kicking off in May with an appearance on Leno May 7th should help fix that. A longer US tour in July will follow a European tour in June. To learn more: The Cat Empire /A.

Cat Empire and (my TV boyfriend) Craig Ferguson!

It's like getting chocolate in your peanut butter. Or peanut butter on your chocolate. Oh, you know what I mean!

update: L.O.V.E.D. the Henry Winkler's "Secret" bit. Perfect.

My Cat Empire looked a litte nervous tonight. And seemed like they were just a tich off the Letterman performance. Maybe jet lagged? They were just in Europe, I think. Still, they really rock the house here at Chez Journey. I'm going to hit the sack listening to my boys play the whole Two Shoes. Pleasant dreams y'all.

It really rocks.

I principali componenti sono: Ollie McGill , Ryan Monro, Felix Riebl, Harry James Angus, Will Hull-Brown e Jamshid "Jumps" Khadiwhala.

La loro musica spesso e' descritta come un misto tra Jazz, Funk, Ska e Rock con una forte influenza Latina.

La band e' stata di recente ospite al David Letterman Late Night Show (in onda anche da noi in versione originale sottotitolato in italiano su Raisat Extra) e questo e' il video della loro partecipazione allo show  dove hanno eseguito uno dei loro pezzi di maggior successo,  Sly

When exactly is the ban on non-essential spending lifted again????

The Cat Empire Play

The Cat Empire - Sly

This was the band that played on Letterman Tuesday night. (thanks Sean for the tip) And the song they played. Obviously, this is the "video"...of which I'm generally not a fan, since MTV went all T&A. This one isn't too bad, though. Lot's of band face time actually playing/singing and not, um, fooling around with Ingénues.

Love the sound. Might need to put this on the top of the list for when the ban on unnecessary spending is lifted.

I can't tell exactly what Dave said, but this band sounds great. And they look good too. (hubba hubba)

Gotta look them up.

Tomorrow. Or the next day. G'night