http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsReWx9XdNs
Hoedown is an exciting piece of music. I jumped up out of bed because upon hearing the music I have become conditioned to jump up to my feet. This is because on more than ten occasions I've been sat waiting in various grungy venues and the sudden burst of this music, accompanied by the strong whiff of nag champa, heralded the fact that Bob Dylan and his band were about to take to the stage.
After about 30 seconds or so the announcer's voice would begin over Hoedown... 'LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, please welcome the poet-laureate of rock and roll. The voice and promise of the 60s counterculture. The guy who forced folk into bed with rock. Who donned makeup in the 70s and disappeared into a haze of substance abuse. Who emerged to find JESUS! Who was written-off as a has-been by the end of the 80s, and suddenly shifted gears releasing some of the strongest material of his career beginning in the late 90s. Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome Columbia recording artist... BOB DYLAN.' Hilarious stuff! Some journalist had written a potted-history of Dylan in a review one night in 2002 and the next night Dylan had turned it into his stage introduction; delightful! (For those so minded to see this; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCaGuZARpAM)
After some years with Copland's Hoedown, I believe Dylan is currently showing a silent movie as his introduction, D.W. Griffith's 'Intolerance: Love's Struggle Throughout The Ages.'
Hoedown, though, is such a great piece of music to arrive to. It immediately puts you in mind of bands of brothers riding around the American West on horseback, dropping in town after town, staying a night or two at most, probably having to leave in a hurry. It seems so evocative of men who only know how to do one thing; Keep on keeping on.
But it is also complex. It isn't just a ye-haw giddy-up piece of music; there are complex counterpoints at play. It's a bold declaration of a life in motion.
I wish I could wake-up with this piece of music in my head every single morning! And off I go, galloping into another day...
2 speakeasies:
Hate to be a pedant, but Hoedown has no counterpoint, it is unison with a zylophone. It has unusual harmonies because it is an accurate transcription by Ruth Crawford Seeger of a solo fiddle show piece with double stops (two notes played at once in harmony) from a recording of "Bonaparte's Retreat", played by Appalachian fiddler W.H. Stepp. Copland simply lifted her piano transcription from a book and orchestrated it. You can hear the original on Youtube. Copland didn't credit Stepp or Seeger, but that's the way things were done in those days. Perhaps Dylan wanted to make a statement about that.
Thanks Anonymous, I think you'll find though that the way the band played this song on the Titantic did include counterpoint. P
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