The "Reasoned List of Poets" under the "Crit: Prosody" section below contains many links to the thing itself, i.e. poetry as poem rather than as metaphor or critical text. But these links are the thing itself on this site so far:
Recordings of the avant-garde (well, at least experimental) late-1970's group Udgitha. Feel free to do just about anything you want with these recordings, but if you claim them as your own or make money off of them without sharing it with us, you will die. This is not a threat. I will not kill you. But it's a fact. If you steal these, you will die.
1) Udgitha in world premiere live performance of barely rehearsed material at Moorpark College, California (c. 1976 ?). This was conceived of and executed as a continuous performance, but I've broken up the sections below. The Jabberwocky at the end was unplanned, with Bryan Butler running around the auditorium acting it out while I recited it standing on my head in the lotus posture (at least I think I did it that way in this performance; I used to do it that way a lot.) Although it was 30 years ago, please excuse any inaccuracy in the memorized text, especially considering that I haven't the slightest idea of what text I memorized from.
We also had two dancers, sisters, and good dancers, too. But I refrain from adding their names because I'd probably get, at the best, the spelling wrong.
The recordings are from a cassette tape copy of a cassette copy of a cassette copy of a reel-to-reel master, recorded originally under primitive conditions. I've tampered with it in an attempt to improve the sound quality. Audio remastering (such as it is) was done in Audacity on an HP Compaq nx9420 laptop.
Personnel (alphabetical order):
Bryan Butler, violin
Dirk Johnson, vocal
Jim Long, percussion
Wally Stoltz, double bass and Farfisa organ
Works:
Flesh and Reflections, text by Dirk Johnson
mp3@64kbps (2,632 kb)
Near Death and Death, text by Dirk Johnson
mp3@64kbps (5,484 kb)
Eating Game, text by Dirk Johnson (possibly offensive)
mp3@64kbps (3,066 kb)
People Like You Belong in a Zoo, by Wally Stoltz
mp3@64kbps (958 kb)
Jaberwocky, text by Lewis Carrol
mp3@64kbps (958 kb)
The entire performance on one track
mp3@64kbps (13,574 kb)
2) Udgitha again... sort of. We had studio time in Moorpark's state of the art recording studio. I had just gotten back from the freight train trip discussed elsewhere on this site as "Riding with Adolph Bolmeijer".
I was pretty totally out of it from that greuling and insane trip, so I honestly don't remember everyone who was there or very many details. Of course, the Udgitha crew as above (I think) plus Richard Pohl on prepared piano and in the recording booth. I know that there was at least one other person. Apologies to anyone who was there whom I don't remember being there. Let me know, please.
We were all baffled to reduce bleed into the mics. It was "free". The musicians played whatever they felt like and off of whatever others felt like. I tried to fit in with what I read, a mixture of Basho, Milton, a lot of others, and my own work. What survives here is Richard Pohl's mixdown, which he did in the Cal Arts recording studio sometime in the early 1980's while he was a student there. He also added the track of plainsong at that time.
I don't remember precisely, but I believe that the original recording was several hours long, which Richard mixed down to just under 6 minutes.
The recordings are from a cassette tape copy of a cassette copy of Richard's master. At least this original was recorded under optimal conditions, though the copy I digitized from isn't so great. I've tampered with my extant and aging second generation cassette copy in an attempt to improve the sound quality.
Personnel (alphabetical order):
Bryan Butler, violin
Dirk Johnson, vocal
Jim Long, percussion
Richard Phol, prepared piano and recording engineer
Wally Stoltz, double bass and Farfisa organ
Works:
Complete Work
Texts on the mix by Basho, Milton, and Dirk Johnson
mp3@64kbps (2,765 kb)
History of English Prosody, by George Saintsbury (Volume I herein complete, with brief and extensive tables of contents herein for the other two volumes) One of the literary critical masterworks of all time, the History has been called the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire of prosodic study. Agree with it. Disagree with it. Love it. Hate it. But read it, and read it carefully.
Reasoned List of Poets is from Historical Manual of English Prosody by George Saintsbury, (Part IV, Chapter II, pp. 298-315). The Manual is the companion to the History. I've tried diligently to track down a comprehensive set of www resources for the texts of the poets listed by Saintsbury in his Corrections, modifications, and additions are requested. Please send them to dirk@dirk-johnson.com.
Glossary is also from Historical Manual of English Prosody by George Saintsbury, (Book IV, Chapter I, pp. 265-297). This is an extensive glossary of English Prosody, and supplants the brief one in the History.
Historical Manual of English Prosody extensive table of contents is herein.
For other prosodic indications, see especially:
Basil Bunting (more coming)
Robert Duncan (more coming)
T.S. Eliot (more coming)
John Hollander (more coming)
Charles Olson (more coming)
Ezra Pound (more coming)
William Carlos Williams (more coming)
Yvor Winters (more coming)
Louis Zukofsky (more coming)
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