Category: Jazz

S_V_H Fine and Mellow image2

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

fine&Mellow_3This second image of Fine & Mellow shows the music, painted using brighter colors, to separate it from the background. Different from my original thinking, this painting is not going to be a visual of a black and white video.  Instead the colors in this artwork are my emotional reaction to the video: the contrast of light and dark, and what I am seeing and hearing in the back-en-forth between the sounds from the musicians, and Billie Holiday’s voice. It turns out that a darker lower contrast artwork was just a first reaction to watching the video for the first time.

My first big color move came from the words  “He wears high draped paints_ Stripes are really yellow,”  which shows in the stripping of the beams.  Actually knowing my art,  how could I have left out bright yellow out of this artwork. That logical move changed everything.

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H Fine and Mellow image1

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

Fine and Mellow words and music by Billie Holiday.  This performance on live TV in 1957 was all I needed to convince me to paint this music. In this video  Billie Holiday sings Fine and Mellow  accompanied by Ben Webster, Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins, all on tenor saxophone, Vic Dickenson on trombone, Gerry Mulligan playing the baritone saxophone, Roy Eldridge and Doc Cheatham both on trumpet, Danny Barker on  guitar, Milt Hinton plays double bass, while Mal Waldron is on piano and Osie Johnson plays the drums. These are a lot of great jazz musicians all backing up Billie Holiday.

 

fine&Mellow_1

This early image of Fine and Mellow shows the original medium magenta stripping, after the first re-taping where I reduced the strip size by a half, to try to tone down its impact on the background. This thinning of the line helped, but the strip was simply not dark enough to fit the mood of the video.  In a change from many of my earlier works I decided to paint both the top and bottom white strip in shades of dark purple. Seeing how the purple appeared to work out, I once again re-taped the magenta strips and painted over them with a purple wash, which finally resulted in the background the mood I was looking for.

fine&Mellow_2Up next is the music. For the music my original thoughts where to use brighter colors to contrast with the background. Now, I am thinking differently. This is a rare black and white video of Billie Holiday singing a blues song, so to keep with the atmosphere of that music I have decided against any sharp separation of the music from the background.  Instead, I am going to try to create the effect of the music moving back-en-forth into the background,  and then swinging back out to the forefront of the artwork.

Scott Von Holzen

 

Dave Brubeck’s Take Five

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

 

uwmmusicdept

 Birthday Painting information at the end of this entry.

 

This Dave Brubeck a painting I started in February and finished in early May has finally found its way to ah home. I presented this most wonderful artwork to Timothy Buchholz, my Music Theory teacher and the assistant Professor of Music at the University of Wisconsin Marathon Campus.  This is a long story that started with me taking Professor Buchholz’s Music Theory class the fall semester in 2012. This was my first return to the University of Wisconsin system since I graduated with a Degree in Business Administration back in the Disco summer days of 1971.

I first met the Professor when I stopped by his office to see if he would allow me to audit his Theory class.  I actually studied for this meeting, and it came in handy when he asked me a couple of music questions. I never missed a class, and took all the tests.  I ended up with an A and was tie for the highest score on the Final exam.  But more important I learned I could still learn, and I meet one wonderful and dedicated Teacher. I took his class to get a better understanding of the theory behind music. Though out my life I have enjoyed taking things a part to see how they work. Well that class gave me a great start to understanding the fundamentals of the language that is music. When I finished his course late December I wanted to thank the Professor Buchholz for the wonderful experience I had being part of his Music Theory class.  I decided that the best way to show my appreciation was to paint a picture and present it to the music department.  I asked for his music suggestions, and he came up quickly with Dave Brubeck.

Well it was not until the late spring of this year that I was able to hand over this new version of Take Five. The simple reason, even though this second painting is smaller than my first attempt, was that Professor Buchhloz could not find an appropriate space big enough to hang the artwork. That changed this spring with the start of the remodeling of his Orchestra room. He said I would be invited back in the  fall to see Take Five hung in place.  He also mentioned that they would use colors from the painting to decorate the room, including taking a blue from the painting for the color of the drapes. Wow,  how cool is that having an entire large room in harmony with Take Five.

 

 ON  THIS COMING THURSDAY, JULY 31ST I WILL BE PAINTING MY BIRTHDAY PAINTING. FOR THE NEXT THREE DAYS YOU WILL HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO BID ON THAT ARTWORK.  MORE DETAILS TO COME.

 

Scott Von Holzen