Joy

About

Joy used to be an essential ingredient of Western ‘concert’ music
Until ‘serious’ composers and critics took hold
Of the moral aesthetic of composition trends
Purely joyful music became something ‘old’
But in the other styles of music I cherish Joy still abounds
Pop, Rock, Trad & African music are regularly imbued with joyful sounds
What joy there is in modern ‘art’ music is often tainted with jarring discords
It seems we’re unable to find unadulterated joy in unadulterated noise

So it’s out with the noise and in with the groove
Of Niwel Tsumbu

There’s Joy in Rumba, Joy in Jigs, Joy in Sex, Joy in Sebene
There’s Joy to be found in African music even when expressing pain
The joy Africans find in the hardest places gets them through vicious days
There’s joy in the African music that inspired this piece
Congolese legends like Franco ét L’TPOK Jazz
Zaiko Langa Langa, Grand Kalle ét L’African Jazz
The Lion of Zimbabwe Thomas Mapfumo
Toumani Diabate, the Kora Virtuoso
There’s Joy in the modern pop evolution of 80’s synthesized sounds
Animal Collective, Vampire Weekend and Phoenix top the class
The 80’s brought brief Joy back into contemporary classical sounds
John Adams, Steve Reich and prolific Philip Glass
I’m an 80’s child so perhaps I’m just nostalgic for childhood toys
Life was much simpler then, it was so easy to express Joy
Everything gets too serious when we grow up
Everything gets way too serious when we grow up
Everything gets really far too serious when we grow up
I don’t wanna ‘grow up’, we should we have to ‘grow up’?
I want to experience unadulterated joy once again

So I’m doing it with 3 electric guitars, electric bass & double bass, prepared percussion, prepared piano, flute, alto flute & piccolo, Eb Clarinet & Bass Clarinet, Tenor Trombone & Bass Trombone, violin, viola and violoncello and a joyful melange of household objects at the end.

I put a serious amount of work into this work, but it’s not a ‘serious’ work
It’s not for academics to analyse or criticise.
It’s a Western concert party piece.
It’s time to Crash the Party.