Thanks for reading Fran Magazine, a biweekly blog by Fran Hoepfner (me). This issue is for all subscribers, paid and not, as well as general audiences. I am currently experimenting with making all Wednesday issues free and Sunday issues paid. If you have relevant thoughts on that, feel free to sound off in the comments. Consider subscribing or upgrading your subscription for access to more Fran Magazine. It’s worth it!
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This too could be you!
A major update on my tomato plants
As readers of the Fran Magazine Sunday Dispatch know, I have been keeping a watchful eye on my fire escape tomato plants. I’m not a keen gardener or especially good with plants. I keep a steady group of houseplants that I try not to kill (and have mostly succeeded, barring an infection in my aloe last year treated by my friend Tristan who has a certification in plant surgery). The tomatoes, in turn, have been a big risk, emotionally-speaking. If I can’t even keep a tomato plant alive, etc.
But look what I discovered on Monday:
Ignore the orange tomato in the foreground — that one is still not ready as of this morning. But its sibling… let’s see what we got.
Yup, that’s a tomato. There aren’t even “worms inside” (?) as I predicted there could be to Phil. It’s a little green, but I’m partial to a tomato that’s a little green. It tasted like a tomato, too, both sweet and grassy. My fire escape tomato plant experiment is officially a success. ✅
Is there such thing as “basic” taste in classical and instrumental music?
Thanks to a solid handful of folks who wrote in response to Sunday’s request for topics or areas of interest. There’s a lot I intend to get to in the next coming weeks with a lot of compelling jumping off points. I wanted to start with an email from film critic Sarah Welch-Larson, whose work you can read at Bright Wall/Dark Room or in her fascinating book on the Alien franchise. Sarah wrote:
How do you feel about Ludovico Einaudi’s work? I stumbled across him when I was looking for new fodder for my writing playlist (thank you Spotify algorithm), and I’ve found that I like it in small doses, but that it all starts to sound the same if I listen to too much all at once. I think his music is pleasant, but I’m wondering if that’s just another way to say “basic” or “easy to listen to,” and I’m also wondering if you have recommendations for what else to listen to, using Einaudi as a jumping-off point.
Prior to this email, I had no feelings about Ludovico Einaudi’s work. I wasn’t sure that I’d ever heard of him. Take a listen here.
(At first I read the title “Live from the Steve Jobs” as a kind of “live from the Steve Jobs score” but it’s actually the Steve Jobs Theatre, which I never knew existed.)
Perhaps, however, Einaudi’s work might feel more familiar in the context of the television and film, in which case you may recall his score work for the Best Picture winning film Nomadland from a mere three years ago.
I was struck by the way Sarah wrote about Einaudi’s music:
I’ve found that I like it in small doses, but that it all starts to sound the same if I listen to too much all at once. I think his music is pleasant, but I’m wondering if that’s just another way to say “basic” or “easy to listen to”
To me, there are five different responses at play here:
Enjoyable (in small doses)
Same-y
Pleasant
Basic
Easy to listen to
Talk about some Midwest capitulating!!! The difference between my life had I stayed in Chicago and my life out on the East Coast is that I would just write “I don’t like it” and move on with my day.
I’M KIDDING, OF COURSE! I can see what Sarah is getting at as I listened to Einaudi’s music: it is background noise. Not unpleasant, but not engaging either. Does anyone remember the score to Nomadland? You might as well tell me that movie is score-less for all I remember.
There’s a reason that Einaudi’s music is enjoyable in small doses, same-y, pleasant, basic, and easy to listen to, and that’s because it’s effectively pop music. Think about a commercial-free hour of pop radio as you drive the suburbs, or an algorithmically-designed running playlist. These are compiled and composed in order to provide the least dynamic reaction possible so you can focus on doing your thing. My initial read on Einaudi’s music is that this is mostly pretty boring — there’s not a lot surprising about what I’m hearing. Not that that indicates a lack of quality, but the primary focus seems to be entirely outward. This is music designed for a listener more than it is a matter of artistic expression. The only thing I could compare it to was the instrumental Billy Joel albums my parents would put on in the car when we were children that often included nature sounds (I can’t find the specific examples, but trust that something like “She’s Always A Woman” would be bookended by birds chirping or whatever).
Contemporary classical music often falls into an “easy listening” category because it’s music designed to get you from point A to point B. For the record, I don’t think this is a bad thing. I think it’s good that there’s music that exists so you don’t crash your car or focus on your work or not have a meltdown at the dentist. My new strategy as someone who doesn’t like going to the dentist is to listen to classical music and found, perhaps to the surprise of no one, that Schumann symphonies are a bit too stressful for a gum cleaning! When I explain to people that my taste in music is mostly “Dua Lipa and Beethoven,” what I mean to get at is that I can sit through hours of four-chord progression pop music that rhymes bad/sad/mad with as much interest and enjoyment as I do something far more complicated and full of conflict.
Easy listening music is often quite lyrical in nature — I wondered, upon putting on Einaudi for the first time, if there were supposed to be lyrics I should know — and involves the least amount of instruments possible. This makes sense: the more instruments you have in the mix, the more harmonies and themes you have to play with. The stage gets crowded, and different music voices have to fight (musically) to make themselves heard. Not so when it’s a simple single piano or cello, ringing clear through your speakers or headphones.
If I think about recommendations for music akin to Einaudi’s — still pleasant and easy to listen to, but less same-y — I would point you in three directions.
Études
Anyone who took piano lessons as a child is familiar with the concept of an étude, which is essentially a short musical exercise designed to hone a particular skill, whether it’s to strengthen a finger or balance of a wrist or get good at playing in a certain key. I love returning to Chopin études, especially.
Here’s a guilty pleasure, inexplicably in the form of Guitar Hero-like piano.
Symphonic poems
Symphonic poems, like easy listening music, are also focused on lyrical intent and melody. As a form, they got popular in the latter half of the 19th century, drawing on nature and impressionism. Bedrich Smetana’s Má Vlast is a favorite of mine, though I can’t escape thinking it sounds Christmas-y (so maybe save it for the winter).
You may also like some of the more lyrical work of Ravel or Debussy!
A different European guy who also does film scores
A little while back, I got into the solo piano music of French composer Yann Tiersen, a regular staple of my early iTunes account for his work on the Amélie soundtrack (lol). Amélie! We used to all think about that French broad and her little smirk so much. Tiersen’s work is a little reminiscent of Einaudi’s, but I find it a little darker without being stressful.
One of the things I love most about listening to classical music is that the same complaints that arise in conversations about any genre or era of music are equally applicable. For every composer whose work I find engaging and entrancing, there are always ones that feel enjoyable in small doses (Schumann), same-y (Bartók), pleasant (Ravel), basic (Dvorak?? lmao), and easy to listen to (Mozart). None of this is bad, and all of these composers possess the ability to surprise and delight me as much as they do often hit familiar beats. When I use algorithms in Spotify or (more frequently) Apple Classical, I’m curious to see the form of the piece I like more than the composer or era in question. Is this a symphonic poem? A concerto? How can I find pieces similar to what I admire but different enough to hold my interest? Sliding sideways through time and history and style has proven as equally enjoyable as going through a composer’s work in full. I kid with Sarah not actually liking Einaudi because I can tell that she does! The truth is that almost all music you like will be easy — whatever that means to you — to listen to, playing on your imagination and bringing life to art.
Thanks for sharing the Guitar Hero-like video. When I listen to piano, I so often drown out the left hand (bass/tenor?) because (1) I played a treble clef instrument growing up, (2) my hearing is bad, and (3) I think it's human nature to hear the higher pitch? I found myself almost solely watching the left hand in the video, absolutely loving the notes there and drowning out the right hand flourishes. It was a really fun music listening experience.
Being told I’ve done some serious Midwest capitulating makes me feel like I’ve finally Made It(TM) as a Midwestern transplant. I also now feel justified for sprinkling his stuff throughout my writing playlist (gotta focus without getting too fired up!) *and* for feeling kinda bored when the shuffle gives me too many songs in a row at once. Thanks for this! I’m a dummy when it comes to instrumental music, for the most part.