In the Chicago soundtrack, during Mama Morton’s song. The last "Momma’s good…to yoou…"oh man. 
I’ve heard a London stange version of this that is just AMAZING, i didn’t think the human body was capable of such sound.
storyteller0910–
There’s another musical parallel in SWEENEY TODD that’s very subtle and took me forever to discover–did you notice it?
In the flashback sequence, when Lucy goes to the masked ball at the Judge’s house, the guests are dancing to a minuet-like melody. We only hear a few bars of it before Mrs. Lovett picks up the narration again.
The minuet melody is based on the same theme as the Beggar Woman’s obscene song: " 'Ow would you like a little squiff, dear, / A little jig jig, / A little bounce around the bush? . . . "
Euuuwww!
I thought of this song the second I saw the thread title, but my favorite part has to be the section at the very end of the third movement. The melody from the beginning of the first movement, which is very forceful and dissonant, is sung sweetly, a cappella, and very very soft. Send shivers down my spine just thinking about it…
The entire song has become one of my favorites since I sung it in choir, but I haven’t found one other person that likes it (besides the choir director) before now. I like dissonance!
DeVena, that is a great one. I love that part, what the liner notes refer to as a nearly inaudible high C on clarinet.
Have you heard the reissued CD version from a couple years ago, the one Phil Schaap had a hand in remastering? For the first time in the history of the album, they’ve gone back to the original acetates for the restoration, instead of the same tapes they’ve used all along. There’s a little more surface noise, true (because it hasn’t been sloppily EQ’d out), but you can now hear the air coming off the cymbals, and the ambient sound of Carnegie Hall is very obviously there. Amazing bit of work on this one, considering the age and circumstances of the recording.
Another good one is the reissue of Duke Ellington’s Live At Newport. In a nutshell, the Voice of America and Columbia both had microphones set up for the performance, one set for broadcast and one for recording. Ellington’s guys were sometimes playing into the broadcast-only mikes, and so they had to go back in and (gasp) overdub the missing instrumental solos and backing parts. Just recently, though, somebody found a tape copy of the VOA broadcast in their archives. Phil Schaap fed both versions of the concert into a digital editor and synced them up, so now the performance is the original concert, in it’s entirety, NO overdubs, and…it’s in stereo! One tape is completely on the left, one is on the right. Great listening - and for the tree-dwellers who want the version-as-released, the CD includes the “tampered” version as bonus material on Disc 2.
Another good thing about both of these albums is that they have the different solos indexed, so if you have a CD player that can search for index numbers withing tracks, you can punch up Jess Stacy’s solo, or Paul Gonsalves, or whatever. A nice, well-thought out touch.
And as we wind on down the road
Our shadows taller than our souls
There stands a lady we all know. . . . .
With power chords crashing in the background.
Also,
Out here in the fields
I fight for my meals
I put my back into my living.
I don’t need to fight
To prove I’m Right
I don’t need to be forgiven
Gives me goosebumps.
Snug -
Wow! I just went and listened to “Poor Thing,” and there it is. You are my new hero.
Also, euuuw indeed!
- FCF
todd33rpm, I had it, but my sister has “borrowed” it - thanks for reminding me to get a replacement!!
Beat me to it.
I also get shivers from:
The dissonant violin chord that pops up at regular intervals in Queensryche’s Silent Lucidity.
Miles Davis’s trumpet at the beginning of So What on Kind of Blue. Just a beautiful few minutes.
DeVena, glad to be of service. Compared to that nasal- sounding original vinyl, the CD is an amazing improvement.
Think I’ll go home and pop it in right now. I’ll be sending you Carnegie Hall mind-vibes to help get you over until you can pick it up!
Absolutely!! and I’ll join you by posting a couple of the many I have from Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George.
First off, so many moments from Finishing the Hat, but particularly at the end when George (Mandy Patinkin) looks at the dog and sings “Look I made a hat, where there never was a hat”. (Jeez, I’m getting goosebumps just typing it.)
And another is at the very end of the first act when the tension builds and the entire cast is singing together “… on an ordinary…”
and there’s all this tension, and they they all hit it together “…Sunday!!!” (YES!!!).
Todd I actually had the pleasure of performing that with a full ensemble of guitar and bass players (as opposed to tape which is the way it was actually intended). Yes, truly an exciting piece. I have a video of it and a friend was going to put it on a web page for me, but it would appear to have not happened. ::shrug::
There are so many wonderful moments, both lyrical and musical, that grab me. For starters:
The opening notes of Jeff Buckley’s Last Goodbye
Michael Penn’s emotional “how biter is that swill?” from Don’t Let Me Go
the extended piano solo at the end of The The’s Uncertain Smile
the pleading “Don’t tell” at the end of Crowded House’s Into Temptation
A bunch of my favorites have already been mentioned - I especially concur with the Beethovens and Copelands - but here’s another:
“The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight,” on R.E.M.'s amazing Automatic for the People. The last line of one of the verses is “…or a reading from Dr. Seuss,” and according to interviews, when they recorded the song Michael Stipe kept accidentally pronouncing Seuss as ‘Zeus.’ So what happens on the album version is, Stipey sings “Seuss” correctly and then you can hear him giggling as he goes into the chorus: “Callmewhenyoutryto waaake her up…” and it’s just this wonderful moment of sheer joy in his voice.
I’d like to put in another vote for U2’s The Joshua Tree, especially on “Where The Streets Have No Name” when the bass and drums kick in about 1 minute into the intro. The whole intro just gives me shivers every time I hear it, and it’s even better live.
Another great U2 moment is in “Gone”: “Goodbye, no emotional goodnight/I’ll be up with the sun…”
And finally, Coldplay’s “Don’t Panic”. Basically the entire song, but especially “We live in a beautiful world, yeah we do, yeah we do”
The lines
“Where troubles melt like lemon drops
Away above the chimney tops”
in Eva Cassidy’s version of “Somewhere over the Rainbow”
Moe, that had to be quite a rush. From your experience with Electric Counterpoint, was it difficult to keep track of where you were in relationship to everything else (around the metric shifts, for example)?
What I especially like about that piece is how the third movement can seemingly sound like a jig and a funky disco groove and a rock song and a classical piece more or less at the same time, especially when the meter flickers back and forth and yet some of the guitars don’t appear to change at all. (I haven’t seen the score for this, so I’m going by what I’m hearing; apologies if I’ve got it wrong).
I also like the harpsichord-like textures in the trio of acoustic guitar parts in that same movement. It made me wonder what exactly inspired Steve Reich to compose it.
Oh, and have you heard the Tranquility Bass “Megamix” on Reich Remixed? It uses the second movement of Electric Counterpoint as its foundation sample, with excerpts from the start of the first movement a little later, and flies in more samples from something like six or seven more Reich compositions, including Drumming, Clapping Music and Music for 18 Musicians, among others. Surprisingly good stuff, as I’m not a huge remix fan.
Wordy One, I’ll second Buckley. I’m also big on “Dream Brother,” any version…but the studio take amazes me all the way through. That thing is packed with moments that leave me breathless.
I’ll also agree with Crowded House…the descending bass part after “don’t tell” sets it off perfectly for me. Also from Temple of Low Men, I’ll take the final minute of “I Feel Possessed.” Nobody except Neil Finn could make a song about being romantically “owned” sound so seductive, especially when the swirling atmosphere effect kicks in around his voice during his final repetition of the title.
It’s funny, I’m not even a bit religious, but the two moments that always give me goosebumps are the “Fall on your knees” line from O Holy Night, and the very beginning of the overture from Handel’s Messiah.
For sax, I pick the solo in the middle of Dogs of War by Pink Floyd.
For piano, I pick Van Halen’s Right Now and Vince Guraldi’s Cast your Fate to the Wind. The entire songs.
For vocals, I pick Roger Daltrey and his wail mid-song on Love Reign O’er Me.
For lead guitar, I can’t pick a particular favorite because that’s just too hard. Off the top of my head, I would pick the opening riffs to either Rush’s Working Man and the Stooges 1969. The Stooges have this really gritty sound on the first album I’ve taken a real liking to.
The guitar solo in Blue Rodeo’s ‘5 days in May’…right where the first SERIOUS chord kicks in, man thats such a good moment…
[/minor hijack] has anyone else even HEARD of Blue Rodeo? Dare I ask, anyone know what song I’m on about? [/minor hijack]
When Tori Amos sings “Dance with the sufis, celebrate your Top 10 in the charts of pain” on Cruel
Very wille-inducing
Yes, in fact, please do.