Strong Songs

On this Patreon-funded bonus episode, Kirk breaks down the two most fundamental aspects of music: rhythm and harmony.

There's the Y-axis, harmony, which tells us which frequencies we're hearing in which combinations. And there's the X-axis, rhythm, which tells us how those frequencies are playing out over time. Much like most music, it's a mix of math and magic that takes many moons to master.

REFERENCED ON THIS EPISODE:

• "I Will Always Love You" by Dolly Parton, performed by Whitney Houston
• "Stairway to Heaven" by Led Zeppelin from Led Zeppelin IV, 1971
• The Pentatonix cover of "Havana" from Top Pop, Vol. 1
• "Stayin' Alive" by the Bee Gees from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, 1977
• "Countdown" by John Coltrane from Giant Steps, 1960
• "The Waltz of the Flowers" by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky from The Nutcracker, 1892
• "You Really Got Me" by The Kinks from The Kinks, 1964
• "Use It" by the New Pornographers from Twin Cinema, 2005
• "Take Five" by Paul Desmond and "Blue Rondo a  la Turk" by Dave Brubeck from Time Out, 1959
• "Cory Wong teaches audience to count 25/8" posted by Arlington Hayne to YouTube
• "Weni" by Timnit Welday via YouTube
• "Janie Runaway" by Steely Day from Two Against Nature, 2000

'GRAM BY 'GRAM

If you're interested in occasional music and Portland-related photos and videos, follow Kirk on Instagram @kirk_hamilton. https://www.instagram.com/kirk_hamilton/

NEWSLETTER/MAILING LIST

Sign up for Kirk's mailing list to start getting monthly-ish newsletters with music recommendations, links, news, and extra thoughts on new Strong Songs episodes: https://tinyletter.com/KirkHamilton

STRONG PLAYLISTS

You can find playlists containing every Strong Song as well as all of Kirk's weekly music picks from his other podcast, Kotaku Splitscreen, on both Spotify and Apple Music.

SUPPORT STRONG SONGS ON PATREON!

This episode was made possible by Patreon, so, the biggest of thank-yous to all of Strong Songs's Patreon backers! The next one of these bonus episodes will focus on individual instruments, so if you want to help reach the goal to make that episode happen, head over here: https://Patreon.com/StrongSongs

JANUARY 2020 WHOLE-NOTE PATRONS

AccessViolation
andrew walters
CALEB ROTACH
Chad Barnard
Dan Apczynski
Dave Florey
Glenn
Jared Norris
Mark Schechter
Merlin Mann
Ryan Torvik

JANUARY 2020 HALF-NOTE PATRONS

Adam Georgandis
Alex Singer
Alexander Polson
Amanda Furlotti
Andre Bremer
Andrew Baker
Andrew Lee
Arjun Sharma
Bill Thornton
Brett Douville
Brian Amoebas
Brooke Wilford
Chas Lednicky
Chris Brown
Cyrus N. White
David Stroud
Earl Lozada
Eero Wahlstedt
Elliot Jay O'Neill
Emily Williams
FlSHBONES
Forrest Chang
Gavin Doig
Jacob Dye
Jaehoon Jeong
James Johnson
Jasmine Fellows
Jeffrey Olson
Jennifer Bush
Jeremy Dawson
John and Sharon Stenglein
Jon O’Keefe
joujou
Juan Carlos Montemayor Elosua
Jules Bailey
Justin Liew
Justin McElroy
Kate Albury
Kevin Morrell
Kevin Pennyfeather
Mark Steen
Matt Gaskell
Max Schechter
Melanie Stivers
Michael Blackwell
Miriam Juskowicz
Mueller
Nate from Kalamazoo
Nicholas Schechter
Richard Toller
Robbie Ferrero
samuel gardner
Shane DeLeon
Shaun Wiese
SP
Tanner Morton
Tom Clewer
Tom Lauer