Radiolab - In C

Episode Date: December 15, 2009

Ok, so last podcast you heard counting babies. Here’s a new spin...

Wait, you're listening. Okay. All right. All right. You're listening to Radio Lab. Radio Lab. Shorts. From.

W. N. Y. C. C. C? Yes. And NPR. Hello, I'm Chad Abumrod. I'm Robert Krollwich.

This is Radio Lab. The podcast. Today on our podcast, we're going to do, uh, what we're going to, we're going to revisit something from our last podcast, the numbers show. And at the same time, we're going to travel to a completely new universe. A whole new universe. You ready for this? Well, I don't know what we're doing.

You genuinely don't know what we're about to do, right? Will you just state that for the record? Audience people, I have no idea what is about to happen. That's good. I like you in that state. So, Tim, do you have the tape of the actual numbers? Yeah. Okay, so here's the thing we're going to be revisiting.

Remember this piece of tape? Four, five, six? Yeah. Can you do that? Okay, don't touch the microphone. Oh, sure. Of course. This is from the numbers piece. Number show.

I'll let you touch the microphone. One, two, three. Do you want to just maybe set it up, give it some context? Okay, so what you're listening to is one of the stars of Radio Lab. She's now about two years old. She's actually, this is her second appearance on the program. That's right. Her name's Mina. You just need Mina. Can you count?

When do we get it. And Mina in this case is learning the business of counting. Yes, that was raw tape recorded of Mina Count. Haunting Lulu Miller recorded it and mean his mother, we should also say, is Amanda and Ronchak. Okay, so what I'm going to do is take that tape and play it for you in a completely new context. A non-radio lab context. What? Maybe I need to say that again.

A completely new context. You're a wild and crazy guy. Okay, I won't even ask why. I'll set it up for you. Okay, here's the backstory. Okay, in 1964, there was a piece of music that we're going to talk about now called in C. In C? In C.

Is that like I-N-S-E as in I-C or in-Lethe C? No, no, it's like I-N-Letor C. Like in the key of C? Oh, okay. C major. And you can hear it. It's kind of a... Sort of Philip Glassy kind of thing?

Actually, it was sort of the original Philip Glassy kind of thing. Oh. In C was written by a guy named Terry Riley at a time when music, it was classical music, had turned very, very dark. You know, people were writing all kinds of, like, really dissonance. stuff. And it was interesting for a while, but then it became... A little dull, a little hurtful, actually. People were losing interest. But then along comes our man, Terry Riley, who writes this piece in sea. Very joyous.

And it was like a watershed moment. I miss, I confess, I miss that moment in the cultural history of America. It just went right by me. Well, lucky for you, you've got me. No, no, seriously, like, NC inspired Philip Glass and Steve Reich and, like, scores and scores of movie music. And, you know, that whole explosion of minimalism. You could even say it, like, inspired techno and all kinds of other stuff. So, in a way, it all comes back to this piece which no one has ever heard before called NC. Oh. So here's what I want to do right now.

I want to tell you about a project that I was involved in that united my radio lab self with my non-radio lab self. And at the same time, brought in Mina, the count. 19, 2-year-old. Okay. There's an ensemble called the Grand Valley State New Music Ensemble, who decided they were going to re-record in C. And also, they asked 18 people, or maybe it's 16, I can't, I always forget, a whole bunch of people to remix the song.

And I was one of the people they asked. Really? When did this happen? I didn't even know that this happened. This happened actually right when a meal was born, so I was on leave. So we are about to hear the Abumrod remix of InC, the world's famous piece that saved America's classical music and turning sour and oaky? That might be overstating its influence a bit, but yeah, I do want to play you that remix. But before that, I want to play you two other of the 18 remixes, which I think are really good.

Okay. Starting with this one. I really like this remix. It comes from a guy named Michael Lowenstern. My name's Michael Lowenstern. I'm a dad, a composer, and a bass clarinetist. Hey, so speaking of bass clarinetist, is that what that sound was? Oh, no, that's a synth.

Whatever it is, I love that sound. You know, the whole thing about NC is that it's really, it's about randomness. Yeah, because the performers are supposed to improvise. And the whole thing about these remixes is that it's about structure. Yeah. And so the things that are most usually, structured about any mix, any remix, especially dance mix, is going to be the drums. Drums do sound pretty structured.

Well, that was the one thing that I threw to a random generator. What do you mean? You mean that... It gets cut up. The drums never sound the same twice. Oh. So you use the computer to, like, algorithmically randomize the drums? All of the drums are chopped up, and then it'll start shuffling.

So anyhow, it goes on. That's Michael's version. I'm going to play for you one more. from someone that we've spoken with the program before. Zoe Keating, remember Zoe? Do I remember Zoe, of course. Zoe, the cello goddess? The cello goddess, beloved by so many of our people who ride into us.

And that's not, you're not exaggerating. That's tip of an iceberg, yeah, yeah. So Zoe had a very different take. Here's hers. When I got the call to do it, I was sort of, like, both intrigued and scared. Yeah. Because in C is such a well-known piece. Yeah.

Now you called your remix Zink. Oh, um... What does that mean? Zoe in C. Oh, is that what that means? That's what it is, because I never play in C. You know, it's a key that I always avoid. Why, is that hard to play on the cello?

It's the easiest to play on the cello. Oh. It's really easy to play on cello, and it's kind of, um, I think of C and C major as being sort of, uh, childlike key. Yeah. When I think of, like, the key of C, I think of this sort of childlike, optimism, you know, where you're used, like, like I'm looking out the window right now and the sky is that beautiful California blue. And that is a C major sky. I wanted to make it feel like it was

washing over me. Like it was sort of a rushing waterfall. And one thing is that I really wanted it to sort of fall over the edge of the waterfall. Because I wanted to really have that feeling of like, okay, okay, okay, okay, here we come. And now we're going to fall off the waterfall. Over! So that's Zoe's. Isn't that nice? That's really nice. I know. It kind of makes you feel warm.

So are you going to try to, like, improve on that? Because that would be dangerous. I don't know. I enter the... I put mine up against hers and Michaels with extreme caution. But here's mine. So let me set mine up. This is pretty brave of you.

Okay. I know. Well, I'm going to talk for a bit so that people forget the glory of what they just heard. Okay. So, okay, so here's what I was thinking. I was on paternity leave. Right? And you and everybody else was doing the numbers show, right?

Mm-hmm. I remember. And I was hearing some things you guys were doing from time to time, and Lulu played me the piece. She was working on, which was that one about counting, which included the tape that we played at the very beginning. Yeah. Can you do that?

One two, three. And it was funny because I had gotten this NC commission, and I had this little baby. And I was doing that thing, you know, what the people do with babies where you just start counting to them. It's like an instinct. One, two, three. And so I heard that tape, and I was like, oh, that's what I'm doing.

But since I had in C in my head, I was kind of counting to that in C ostinato. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. So it was the two sort of, the two thoughts fuse in my head. I'm already feeling a little sorry for this baby. Excuse me. So the two thoughts fuse in my head.

So I thought, I'm going to remix this piece as kind of a children's song. So this is the dedicated to a meal version of InC by me. It's called Counting in C. uses that tape of Mina counting and my own baby makes an appearance. Is your son going to be in this? Yes, he's one of the first things you'll hear. Oh, you're shameless. You are a shameless father.

It's true. It's true. So why don't we just play the whole damn thing? Let's play the whole damn thing. Do you remember how to count? So that's my NC. Oh, wow. Here's the thing. Don't write and say how much you liked and how he should do this all the time because this would be very very disconcerting for those of us who work here.

What does that mean? I think that this was just a little bit too good, actually, and it's like slightly worrisome. Really, don't write the man because I don't want him to think about other career options. Because I could hear nasal stuff,

Brooklyn playground stuff, Mina. I heard, I wasn't like you went through the drawers of your desk and got every little thing. It's true. It was kind of shameless. It's true. But okay, no more music for a while. No more music for a while.

If you want more information on the record, check our website at RadioLab.org. I also need to thank Bill Ryan, who's the head of the Grand Valley State New Music Ensemble for making the whole record possible. Now to those funders, and they are... Well, they're the National Science Foundation. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and...

Swiss Lone Foundation. Yes. I'm Chad Aboumrod. I'm Robert Kulwich. Thanks for listening.