Meridith Monk @ the Greene Space

I was listening to WNYC's New Sounds program tonight.  The most accurate way to describe the sounds is this: voices straining to imitate  fire engines screeching over a string quartet.

Jeez, I could just imagine what junk the host had to listen to to have selected the awful stuff he was playing.  The song came to an end to applause.  What I'd been listening to was not music chosen by the host, but a live performance by Meredith Monk & Vocal Ensemble along with the Todd Reynolds Quartet from the record release party for Monk’s latest album, “Songs of Ascension”.

Right away I thought of a Jules Pfeiffer cartoon in the Village Voice which showed a prototypical 50's early 60's era beat type identifying the film everyone walked out on as a test. 

Someone somewhere will claim some wretched excess as art.  Between songs the host,  John Schaefer said, "You explore the boundary between noise and music."  I think she's gone over to the dark side.

I left a post on the page indicating that I'd never heard her music before, but midway through the first piece the Garcia effect kicked in.  (I thought that was the most succinct and civil way of saying that I'd never voluntarily listen to her music again.)

Put another way, I'm too old to waste my time for this.  When I was younger I watched Antonioni's "Red Desert" twice because I couldn't believe that it was so bad on the first viewing.  It was. 

I don't intend to repeat the error with Monk.  Time has become too valuable.