Subtle Satire
SOME of my friends hold that "Spike" Jones is not so much a buffoon as a musical satirist and that he is doing
music a great service by riotously guying the over-played "light classics" and the more banal popular songs. This may be true, but to my ear, there is a cer‘tain obviousness and a frequent coarseness in his approach. Satire in music is extremely difficult to do well, as the failure of much of Erik Satie’s work demonstrates. For my money, the best musical satirist performing to-day is the pianist Charlie Kunz. Listening to a whole 15 minutes of Mr, Kunz’s playing from 1YC recently, I was astonished at the simple yet comprehensive nature of his destructive method. Seemingly without effort, he made every piece he Played sound exactly the same, monotonous, uninspired, trivial, insignificant, as hollow as an empty petrol-drum, as void of expression as an idiot’s face. Relentlessly he pressed from "tune" to "tune," smoothing out accidental differences into a vast desert of tinkling dullness. More power to this talented artist. His playing must do more to expose the uniform inanity of modern popular music than any amount of hostile criticism from serious musicians.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19490812.2.19.2
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 529, 12 August 1949, Page 11
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199Subtle Satire New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 529, 12 August 1949, Page 11
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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