Music in Bukowski / Bukowski on Music (1 Viewer)

Does a total list of classical music references in Bukowski?s work exist?
Which composers did he prefer and which pieces?
Has his point of view on music ever been thoroughly discussed?
 
Music in Buk

I was beginning to think no one else cared about this....I've posted the same question twice....to thunderous silence. I'd love to begin this list myself but I have no access to Bukowski books. Chinaski's list of composers seems to go with what I can recall. But I can't recall any specific pieces. His view on music? He hated popular stuff, rock and roll. He wrote at least once about how the stations that did play classical music tended to play the same stuff over and over....anyway, yeah I'd love to see a list of musical work he mentions!
 
Buk wrote a good one for Borodin"”the chemist and composer"”and his less-than-charming wife.

Poptop

In answer to Poptop, Sibelius give B hours of listening pleasure?perhaps his favorite.

Signed, Poptop

...*gave*....

(for future reference: all typos are deliberate)

I was beginning to think no one else cared about this....I've posted the same question twice....to thunderous silence. I'd love to begin this list myself but I have no access to Bukowski books. Chinaski's list of composers seems to go with what I can recall. But I can't recall any specific pieces. His view on music? He hated popular stuff, rock and roll. He wrote at least once about how the stations that did play classical music tended to play the same stuff over and over....anyway, yeah I'd love to see a list of musical work he mentions!

I believe that Bukowski's taste in classical music was broad and eclectic, including some of the modern classisists from Europe, such as the Scandinavian composer Carl Nielsen. Buk liked the modernists too because, I get the impression, he liked new sounds as well as listening to stirring versions of the old warhorses. The classical FM music station dominating the airwaves in LA from the 40s through the 80s was KFAC. They were heavily into the three B's but played a little of everything. I think Bukowski took notice of whatever sounds came along as he was listening when he was writing"”in the same way as he accepted whatever came along in life"”, and in Barfly, when classical music is being played as part of the sound track, you hear the real voice of one of the legendary KFAC announcers. That would have been a good trivia question for anyone growing up in LA to identify the rich, baritone voice of Karl Haas, the man who announced the afternoon line-up of performances like an immortal. When you hear a voice like that year after year, before and after the music itself, it becomes a reassuring vocal icon in your head, tantamount to the dependability of the waves lapping upon the ocean shores for centuries. That's probably why they used Hass's voice in Barfly, because Bukowski had listened to him for years with familiarity and enjoyment, KFAC being the only classical music game in town; and they were lucky to get Karl's voice before the station went off the air in 1989 from lack of commercial support. According to legend, the station's DJs had amazing career longevity, and their combined time with the station supposedly logged in at over 400 years!"”92.3 FM on the dial. I believe Bukowski listened to shitloads of composers he may have liked but never mentioned. He would have perished without the bottle, but I think he would also have perished without KFAC getting him through the hangovers, uncorking his emotions to write, and elevating his soul with the endless variety of these soothing and complex sounds.
 
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Karl Haas never worked for KFAC. His "Adventures in Good Music" program was syndicated first out of Detroit and then out of WCLV in Cleveland. He dropped dead in 2005. By any chance, do you know the name of the piano piece that opened the program each day?
 
Actually, it was Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 8, the "Pathetique" Second Movement. I got curious after my posting and researched it.
 
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Wasn't that the same movement as featured in the opening scenes of Born Into This?

Piano Sonata No.8, Op. 13 "Pathétique" Adagio Cantabile. Its one of my favs.
 
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