Phil Lesh’s passing hit me harder than I expected, probably because I’ve been so immersed in the Dead lately anyway. I persuaded MusicRadar to let me write a column about my favorite Phil basslines, one of which is “Cumberland Blues.” Phil co-wrote the tune, and I assume he was responsible for its moments of intense …
Author Archives: Ethan
Identifying suspensions
Today in pop aural skills, we identified suspensions, that is, melodies that place unexpected non-chord tones on strong beats, before resolving to the expected chord tones. These are melodic suspensions, which are not the same thing as sus4 or sus2 chords, but they are related concepts. Western European classical theory has a lot of clear …
Dark Star part two
RIP Phil Lesh, who passed on while I was writing this. In the first part of this post, I analyzed the Live/Dead recording of “Dark Star” and compared it to several other versions. In this part, I survey the academic literature about the tune, of which there is a surprisingly large amount. First, let’s consider …
Dark Star part one
Just after I posted this, I learned that Phil Lesh died. RIP Phil. See also the academic literature review in part two. Space: the final frontier. “Dark Star” is the ultimate Grateful Dead jam vehicle, and the purest experience of the band, at least as far as the true believers are concerned. The song also …
Modern Band Music Theory
I met Dr Jim Frankel, the founder of MusicFirst, back when I was a grad student. We have been mutual admirers in a passive way since then. It was a pleasant surprise when, over the summer, he asked me to contribute to their new Modern Band curriculum, specifically, the music theory component. It’s now being …
He’s Gone
Back in the twentieth century, there was no easy way to find out what a song was about unless its lyrics were self-explanatory. Grateful Dead lyrics are rarely self-explanatory. I always enjoyed “He’s Gone”, but had the feeling that it was a bunch of inside references that I wasn’t privy to. I turn out to …
We Were Pretending
This is a break from my usual topics to let you know that my friend Hannah Gersen recently published her second novel. I am about a third of the way in, and I can already tell you that you should read it. The story concerns the US military’s surprising interest in new age medicine. The …
Black Peter
The other night at Rosh Hashonah dinner, my stepbrother was playing my guitar and found his way into “Black Peter.” This was not because he had ever sat down and learned it, but because it’s embedded so deeply in his unconscious that he could teach it to himself in real time. This is yet another …
Anyway, here’s Wonderwall
When MusicRadar assigned me to write about Oasis, I was not overjoyed. I figured I would start with the Wonderwall meme and go from there. Once you move past the joke, though, it becomes an interesting question: why did this seemingly unremarkable song become such a standard for amateur guitarists?
MusicRadar column on “Lilac Wine” by Jeff Buckley
My latest MusicRadar assignment was to pick something from Jeff Buckley’s Grace to write about. I chose the weird old showtune. The column was mainly an excuse to meditate on the difference between classical timekeeping (expressive, rubato) and pop/rock timekeeping (metronomic and steady). I also got into Buckley’s complex gender presentation.