Are orchestral strings good at expressing emotions? If you’re challenging the devil to a fiddling competition, you’d better be on top of your game. Bring on the exhilaration and determination, then, when The Devil Came Down to Georgia. Contrast that with the eerie discomfort and dread conjured up by the violin and double bass combination on The Innocents’ Song by Show Of Hands, from Charles Causley’s poem. Now we’re cooking.
“Daddy, our baby’s gone.” Another set of parents are mourning the loss of a child in She’s Leaving Home and, as recommender magicman points out, there’s no guitar, bass, drums or keyboards on the track – just voices, harp and a string quartet. Stunning indeed.
Of course, the Beatles didn’t play those orchestral instruments themselves. Back in the day, when I was a young music-listener, no pop bands even had violin players. Now they all seem to – just listen to the future Joan As Policewoman on the Dambuilders’ Teenage Loser Anthem.
My daughter asked me what the topic was this week and when I told her, said “You’re going to need some prog, then.” But I had already chosen King Crimson’s Exiles with its mysterious minglings of violin and viola, and paired it with the sparse crispness of Joanna Newsom’s harp and strange warbling voice on Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie.
Jordi Savall’s viola da gamba sounds mysterious and gentle on French baroque composer Antoine Forqueray’s Suite No 2. I didn’t know him, but what I did know was that I didn’t approve of rock bands using orchestral strings for added pomp. Pompous, was what I called those – until I heard the Manic Street Preachers’ towering A Design for Life. Also with added wow, thunderstorms and Steeleye Span’s Peter Knight on violin, here comes Find the Sun by Mostly Autumn. Uplifting! But would you take a ride with Therapy? Just listen to that scary cello – don’t do it, Diane! Er … Diane?
In 1958, Buddy Holly fired his manager, fired his band, got married and moved to New York. He wanted to experiment with new ideas and new sounds. In 1959, though the song is sad, the string arrangement on It Doesn’t Matter Anymore is vibrant, optimistic – as if it’s looking forward to the future. There was, of course, no future for Buddy himself, so now the sound of those strings has an extra layer, which I am calling the frisson factor. Plenty of that, too, in Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, especially if you look at the date of the performance here. These days the opening bars are enough to tell you something awful has happened.
I’m afraid I haven’t soothed you very much. Sorry about that. But consider this – when you visit Buddy Holly’s grave in Lubbock, Texas, it’s customary to leave a plectrum on the gravestone, to show that the music hasn’t died. So there’s that. Now go and listen to the Charlie Daniels Band again.
Readers please note: the next Readers Recommend topic will launch at an earlier time tonight at 8pm UK time (not 10pm).
