For some reason, this week’s playlist is decidedly American with a dash of protest tossed in. Ha! This week, I became especially infatuated by the work by Rzewski, titled “The People United.” Listen to track 5 first, which is a powerful version of a crowd singing the piece, followed by the Theme and First Variation of a much longer 36 variation work. Rzewski wrote the piece in 1975 as a tribute to the struggle of the Chilean people against a newly imposed repressive regime.
Enjoy!
About The Long Tail Sessions: Last winter, I traveled from LA to NYC on a Virgin America flight and loved that the in-flight entertainment featured musicians in alphabetical order. At first, I found it jarring to see Beethoven next to the Beatles, but then I thought “Of course they’re featured side-by-side, that’s how we enjoy music these days.”
With this in mind, I’m pleased to present a weekly series of playlists dedicated to those of us who are not genre specific in our listening habits. Just as your listening habits have changed dramatically over the past 20 years, so have the ways musicians get paid for their original work. My primary goal for this project is to introduce you to music you might not have heard before. Many of the artists featured on each playlist are trying to make it as performing artists. Help them by sharing the videos you love, following the artist and committing to attend one of their performances the next time they’re in town.
Thanks so much to all! I’d love to feature a song by an artist of your choosing. Please send me along a song by your favorite artist and I’ll do my best to get it on an upcoming playlist