"In the nature of the object" : Pandolfi scores Wittgenstein

Poetry Scores is at the very beginning of a very long process of scoring Ludwig Wittgenstein's philosophical prose poem Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921).

Soon enough we'll create an index page where the entire score can be followed in sequence, but for now we'll post finished mixes as they arrive, in or out of order.

Next up: "In the nature of the object" by Carl Pandolfi, which sets to music Proposition 2.0122 through Proposition 2.0124 of the Tractatus.


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free mp3

"In the nature of the object"
(Wittgenstein, Ogden, Ramsey, Pandolfi)
Carl Pandolfi

Produced and recorded by Carl Pandolfi in St. Louis.

Carl Pandolfi plays piano, electric bass and sings all vocals.

 

Executive producer: Chris King for Poetry Scores

Music (c) 2014 Carl Pandolfi

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We are scoring the first English translation of the Tractatus that C. K. Ogden commissioned and published and took credit for, but F. P. Ramsey actually performed, with benefit of Wittgenstein's corrections, delivered personally, mouth to ear, as Wittgenstein liked to do poetry (philosophy). Their translation is in the public domain and posted on Project Gutenberg, but here is the part Carl scored in "In the nature of the object."

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from Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

by Ludwig Wittgenstein

translated from German
by C. K. Ogden and F. P. Ramsey

 

2.0122      The thing is independent, in so far as it can occur in all possible circumstances, but this form of independence is a form of connexion with the atomic fact, a form of dependence. (It is impossible for words to occur in two different ways, alone and in the proposition.)

2.0123      If I know an object, then I also know all the possibilities of its occurrence in atomic facts.

                  (Every such possibility must lie in the nature of the object.)

                  A new possibility cannot subsequently be found.

2.01231    In order to know an object, I must know not its external but all its internal qualities.

2.0124      If all objects are given, then thereby are all possible atomic facts also given.

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However, if you are patient (crazy) enough to read along in the Tractatus while listening to Carl sing, you will see he scored it out of order.

With a repetition here and there I'm not printing, and leaving out the numbers of the propositions, Carl scored and sings this lyric:

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In order to know an object, I must know not its external but all its internal qualities.

The thing is independent, in so far as it can occur in all possible circumstances, but this form of independence is a form of connexion with the atomic fact, a form of dependence. (It is impossible for words to occur in two different ways, alone and in the proposition.)

If I know an object, then I also know all the possibilities of its occurrence in atomic facts.

If all objects are given, then thereby are all possible atomic facts also given.

(Every such possibility must lie in the nature of the object.)

A new possibility cannot subsequently be found.

 

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This starts at Proposition 2.01231 (which is not where Carl left off on the previous song in the Tractatus score, "Atomic Facts"). Then he jumps back in the text to Proposition 2.0122, which is in fact where he had previously left off, and scores that. He keeps going into Proposition 2.0123, well and fine, but then leaps forward to Proposition 2.0124, leaving two lines from 2.0123 unsung, which he then goes back and scores to close the song. It's from this previously orphaned scrap of 2.0123 that Carl gets his outro and title, "In the nature of the object."

Technically, this breaks one of the few rules of a poetry score, which is to score every word of the poem in the order written by the poet. But the song is so brilliant, we forgive him.

 

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Carl Pandolfi

 

Since this song shows more of Carl's classical training and skills, maybe now is the time to say he is classically trained, with composition degrees from Webster University and the Indiana University School of Music. His work has been performed by none other than the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. He is also a veteran contributor to Poetry Scores and countless other creative projects and bands, notably The Lettuce Heads and The Painkillers. He is on SoundCloud too.

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"Started as an improvisation using piano and voice simultaneously," Carl said of this score. "Did some editing, adding all the words I had tried to get away with avoiding. Drones soaked in reverb makes music fun."

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The Ogden/Ramsey translation of the Tractatus is in the public domain. The music is (c) 2014 by Carl Pandolfi. Free sharing of this mp3 is welcome and encouraged, but please consult Poetry Scores for production-quality audio and composer permission before making any commercial use. Thanks!

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PREVIOUSLY ON "SCORING THE TRACTATUS"

Carl Pandolfi scores the title of Wittgenstein's "Tractatus"

"Atomic facts" : Pandolfi scores Wittgenstein

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Object image from Object: Australian Design Center

 

"Shape of a man" translated into rock music and Russian

 

 

The poetry scorer scored: one of my own poems, "Shape of a man," has been scored for rock music by Nick Barbieri and translated into Russian by Kanat Omar.

Kanat has performed his translation in his hometown of Astana, Kazakhstan. With the help of our friend Joachim Faust, I performed my poem in Astana with Kanat that night without even leaving St. Louis.

Here is all that stuff in the order it happened, starting with my poem.


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SHAPE OF A MAN

It is said (by my mother,
for one) that a woman will shape up a man
only for the man to move
on to another woman, more attractive
than she, superficially,
only available to the man because
he’s shaped up, now. It is sad,
she said, but it’s in our nature. There’s nothing
a woman can do. We can’t
stand a man to be so shapeless. But he can’t
stand still long enough for us
to shape up his sorry heart and soul the way
we clean up all his awful
things and body habits, just before he goes.

-- Chris King

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Nick Barbieri's score of the poem.

 

 

"Shape of a Man"

(Nick Barbieri, Chris King)

Nick Barbieri

 

Nick Barbieri: drums, rhythm and lead electric guitar, vocals

Mark Buckheit: electric guitar

David Melson: bass

 

Produced and recorded by Nick Barbieri in St. Louis, Mo.

 

Mixed by Meghan Gohil at Hollywood Recording Studio in Los Angeles, CA

 

Mastered by Elijah "LIJ" Shaw at the Toy Box Studio in East Nashville, TN

 

This free download is intended for free sharing and non-commercial use with (c) reserved by Nick Barbieri/Chris King. Contact us regarding any commercial use. Thanks.

 

 

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Nick Barbieri, hotel selfie
 

 

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Kanat Omar's translation of the poem into Russian.

 

                                                                                                                                               Крис Кинг

ОБЛИК МУЖЧИНЫ



Было сказано (также и
моей матерью), что женщина лепит мужчину
только для того, чтобы он ушел
к другой женщине, более притягательной,
чем она сама, но разве что внешне,
доступной мужчине только потому, что
теперь он обрел черты. Это печально,
сказала она, но такова наша натура. Женщина
ничего не может с собой поделать. Мы не можем
оставить мужчину столь бесформенным. Но и он
не может оставаться с нами столько,
сколько надобно, чтобы вылепить его огорченное сердце и душу,
мы отскабливаем все его ужасные
свойства и телесные привычки просто перед тем, как он уходит.

- Перевод с английского Каната Омара
 

 

 

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Kanat Omar via Skype,
looking over the shoulder of Joachim Faust
 

  

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And then we have Kanat Omar performing his translation in Astana, prefaced by me performing the poem via Skype some 6,151 miles away in St. Louis. The beginning of my bit is slightly clipped.

 

 

 

 

I enjoy how the fancy coffee machines speak their international language in the background. Not sure why the camera operator focused on the bookshelf, not the poet.

 

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Kanat Omar is a Kazakh poet, journalist and filmmaker who visited the Center for the Humanities at Washington University last year for a five-week CEC Artslink Residency. Mary Laurita, a humanities dean at Washington University, introduced Kanat to Poetry Scores.

 

We have high hopes for working much more with Kanat, translating poetry in and out of our respective languages and other media. Stefene Russell of Poetry Scores is currently working on English translations of Kanat's poetry with Joachim Faust, and more St. Louis poetry is being translated into Russian by Kanat, his friend Pavel Bannikov, and others. Stay tuned!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Atomic facts" : Pandolfi scores Wittgenstein

Like we were saying, Poetry Scores has various composers setting Ludwig Wittgenstein's philosophical prose poem Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921) to music.

We'll eventually create an index page where the entire score can be followed as it emerges, but for now, in the beginning, we'll post finished mixes as they arrive, in or out of order.

Next up: "Atomic facts" by Carl Pandolfi, which sets to music Proposition 2 through Proposition 2.0123 of the Tractatus.

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Free mp3

"Atomic facts"
(Wittgenstein, Ogden, Ramsey, Pandolfi)
Carl Pandolfi

Produced, composed, recorded and performed by Carl Pandolfi in St. Louis, Missouri.

Carl Pandolfi plays acoustic guitar, electric bass, piano, snare drum, electric guitar and sings all vocals.

 

Executive producer: Chris King for Poetry Scores

Music (c) 2014 Carl Pandolfi

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We are scoring the first English translation of the Tractatus that C. K. Ogden commissioned and published and took credit for, but F. P. Ramsey actually performed, with benefit of Wittgenstein's corrections, delivered personally, mouth to ear, as Wittgenstein liked to do philosophy (poetry). Their translation is in the public domain and posted on Project Gutenberg, but here is the part Carl scored in "Atomic facts."

Just once, listen to the song while looking at the part of the Tractatus it scores.

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from Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
by Ludwig Wittgenstein

translated from German
by C. K. Ogden and F. P. Ramsey

2         What is the case, the fact, is the existence of atomic facts.

2.01     An atomic fact is a combination of objects (entities, things).

2.011   It is essential to a thing that it can be a constituent part of an atomic fact.

2.012   In logic nothing is accidental : if a thing can occur in an atomic fact the possibility of that atomic fact must already be prejudged in the thing.

2.0121  It would, so to speak, appear as an accident, when to a thing that could exist alone on its own account, subsequently a state of affairs could be made to fit.

             If things can occur in atomic facts, this possibility must already lie in them.
         
            (A logical entity cannot be merely possible. Logic treats of every possibility, and all possibilities are its facts.)

            Just as we cannot think of spatial objects at all apart from space, or temporal objects apart from time, so we cannot think of any object apart from the possibility of its connexion with other things.

             If I can think of an object in the context of an atomic fact, I cannot think of it apart from the possibility of this context.


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"From a philosophical point of view, the translation 'atomic fact' is less fortunate than 'state of things,'" says Jaap van der Does, our resident scholar for our Scoring the Tractatus project, "but so be it ..."

Ah, but "atomic fact" is much more fortunate from a poetic point of view!


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The composer and one-man-band Carl Pandolfi is a veteran contributor to Poetry Scores and countless other creative projects and bands, notably The Lettuce Heads. This is the atomic fact of one of his eyes. Him on SoundCloud too.

"Kind of turned out like a cross between TMBG (They Might Be Giants) and Leon Russell, but still mainly Schoolhouse Rock," Carl said of this score.

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The Ogden/Ramsey translation of the Tractatus is in the public domain. The music is (c) 2014 by Carl Pandolfi. Free sharing of this mp3 is welcome, but please consult Poetry Scores for production-quality audio and composer permission before making any commercial use. Thanks!

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PREVIOUSLY ON "SCORING THE TRACTATUS"

Carl Pandolfi scores the title of Wittgenstein's "Tractatus"

Carl Pandolfi scores the title of Wittgenstein's "Tractatus"

Poetry Scores recently announced that we are going to translate Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921) by Ludwig Wittgenstein into other media, starting with music.

We have songwriters scoring Wittgenstein's great philosophical prose poem, in the original English translation that Wittgenstein went over personally with the person who did most of the work on it, F. P. Ramsey. The first English translation was commissioned, edited and published by C. K. Ogden, who took sole credit for the translation; but we are giving Wittgenstein, Ramsey and Ogden a shared lyrical credit.

St. Louis composer Carl Pandolfi has finished the first piece of our poetry score, which sets to music the very first part of the poem, and that is the title, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.

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Free mp3

"Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus"
(Wittgenstein, Ogden, Ramsey, Moore, Pandolfi)
Carl Pandolfi

Produced, composed, recorded and performed by Carl Pandolfi in St. Louis, Missouri.

 

Carl Pandolfi sings all vocals and plays Casio auto drumbeat (from a 1990s-era keyboard), electric guitars, electric bass, synthesizer, snare drum and piano.

Executive producer: Chris King for Poetry Scores

Music (c) 2014 Carl Pandolfi

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Carl Pandolfi described his creative process:

I was playing around with the title words using a cheap songwriting toy that Mike Burgett had that "sings" your spoken words for you. One of the funky rhythmic responses stuck in my head and came out as this dance track after I decided to complete it in the style of a quasi-Gregorian chordal chant (organum, loosely).

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The title of Wittgenstein's book, Latin for "Treatise on Logic and Philosophy," was suggested by the English philosopher G. E. Moore (who, with Bertrand Russell, was an early and primary influence on Wittgenstein's thought). We think Moore deserves a share of the credit for the title song as well, since he came up with the title.

Moore was echoing Spinoza's title Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, but we figured we'd leave Spinoza off the songwriting team. Wittgenstein himself preferred his original German title, Logisch-Philosophische Abhandlung.

Moore's title for Wittgenstein's poem was scored by St. Louis composer Carl Pandolfi, a longtime contributor to Poetry Scores, among countless other creative projects and bands.

Carl Pandolfi
 

We understand that Wittgenstein's books are shelved in the philosophy section and taught in philosophy departments, but they certainly can be enjoyed (and scored) as poetry. Wittgenstein himself wrote, "I think I summed up my attitude to philosophy when I said philosophy ought really to be written as a poetic composition" (from his personal notebooks, published in Culture and Value, translated by Peter Winch).

The Ogden/Ramsey translation of the Tractatus is in the public domain. The music is (c) 2014 by Carl Pandolfi. Free sharing of this mp3 is welcome, but please consult Poetry Scores for production-quality audio and composer permission before making any commercial use. Thanks!

NOTE:

The Department of Philosophy at the University of Missouri - St. Louis has thoughtfully organized a Talk about Wittgenstein's Tractatus 5:30-8 pm Tuesday, February 25 in Clark Hall Room 411. Professors Waldemar Rohloff and Rebecca Schuman invite anyone to attend and encourage you to prepare by reading the Preface and Propositions 6.4-7 of the Tractatus.

'The power and peace of life's rhythms': In Memory of Julia Foote

 

Julia Foote

Julia Foote was a defining catalyst of what became Poetry Scores. I didn't realize this until she had passed. As one of her eldest son's oldest and best friends, I was included in a long list of people asked to write memories of Julia for her family memorial in Ephraim, Wisconsin. That's how I came to write this memoir of Julia and her impact on my life. Thinking about Julia and writing this, I saw how much she shaped the creative passions that I shared with her son, and to what extent those passions led us to where we are today.

Julia was very recently remembered as an artist in New York, one of her many homes. Lij sent me a snapshot to show how the curator had printed my essay and posted it on the wall as part of the show. That made me think that I should post the essay on our digital wall here. Lij thought that was a great idea, so I share this in memory of Julia.

Some of Julia Foote's memorial art show in New York, with my essay posted.

Photo by Lij

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My best friend’s mom

By Chris King


Your best friend’s mother always changes your life, even if you never meet the lady. But Julia Foote was a major influence on me in many ways besides giving life to the person who became my best friend and lifelong creative partner.

Elijah Anderson Shaw, Julia’s oldest son, was one of the best musicians on our campus at Washington University. I, emphatically, was not. I was a terrible singer with notebooks full of poems I had been turning into songs with my childhood best friend Skoob, who could barely play guitar. There is no way Elijah would have joined our band had his mom not just given him a banjo and fiddle that he wanted to learn how to play. Elijah said he’d join the band if he could learn banjo and fiddle, more or less, live on stage – and 25 years later, we are still making music together.

This band I started with Julia’s son changed my life. I ran away from graduate school and my first career as a college professor to travel with this band. I met my first wife, and began to find myself, traveling around the country playing music in this band that was made possible by Julia’s hand-me-down banjo and fiddle.

It’s odd to put this all together now that she’s gone, but Julia also was responsible for the next major change of direction in our lives. On one of our band’s last tours, we took a day off to stay with Elijah’s mom and explore the Boston suburbs of Lij’s youth. We took a canoe to Walden Pond, and without warning us Julia sent an African elder out to the pond to meet us. Nymah Kumah was this small but powerful elder from the Liberian bush, who spoke with this adorable accent while saying wise, primal things, sort of like a bushman Yoda.

At the end of that summer, Julia put up our band again, this time in Ephraim, Wisconsin, at the Foote family’s beautiful property. I had broken a foot on tour – in Concorde, the town of Lij’s youth – so I spent a lot of time on the porch in Ephraim, talking to Julia while the other guys ran around the place. As Julia’s friends and family will not forget, she was a sparkling conversationalist. For all the great many stunning lives she had already led herself, she always seemed more interested in asking you piercing questions and listening to your stories, and she seemed to understand and appreciate your experiences in a special way that confirmed what was best in you.

Julia was one of the world's great connectors. She knew I was interested in writing and folklore, as well as playing music. So she wanted to tell me about about Nymah Kumah, her friend the African elder. She knew Nymah had an entire tribal folklore committed to memory. She insisted that I come back to Boston and stay with her to document Nymah’s culture. When I say “insisted,” I mean she really insisted. She totally made it happen. After my broken foot healed, I did go out and stay with her in Boston and start to document Nymah Kumah’s memories of Grebo culture.

This made Lij eager to get involved, so he and I packed up and went back to Boston with Lij’s mobile recording studio. We stayed with Julia in Boston and set up a temporary studio in a Roxbury church to make better recordings of Nymah’s songs and drumming. That experience was much more compelling to us than playing in our band, so we basically stopped playing in our band and started going around the country and recording other people instead.

A record we did setting to music a book of hitchhiking poetry by Leo Connellan from Maine was featured on the BBC, so we decided to make turning poetry into music our next main thing. So I would say Julia basically co-founded the resulting arts organization with us. Poetry Scores moved on from music to add other media to our repertoire, and over ten years we have screened zombie poetry movies in Istanbul, curated art shows with Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka, and started a satellite project at the University of Hawaii – Hilo dedicated only to translating Hawaiian poets into other media.

All because of Julia. My best friend’s mom.

I know this story is more about me than Julia, because in our relationship she was the encouraging elder who paid attention to her son’s best friend from college and always tried to bring out the best in me – as she did with Lij, his brother Nate and sister Emily, and countless of their cousins and family friends. I am learning more about Julia herself, now that she is gone, and she continues to inspire and change me.

Lij was staying with my family in St. Louis when Emily called to deliver the crushing news, and as my best friend’s life abruptly fell apart on him, holding up a cell phone sitting at a picnic table in my back yard, I did what I could. I thought about his mom. I looked up her art on the internet. I know her paintings pretty well and have reproductions of several of Julia’s paintings pasted on the turntable that was delivering Lij and me music while his world was falling apart in my backyard.

But I did not know Julia as a writer. While Lij cried and called cousins, I found myself reading online an essay Julia wrote about making a series of paintings about war. She described how she was shocked and disgusted to discover in herself, when she tried to reach it through her painting, every ugly impulse that produces war: jealousy, greed, hatred. But she worked through all of that ugliness, very painfully, and then found herself painting these vast, empty landscapes. She realized that she had come out on the other side of nuclear war in her work, and was imagining an Earth where people had erased themselves. At that point she made a conscious decision to embrace the life that does, miraculously, survive on this Earth, and she turned her gifts to nature painting, to "the power and peace of life's rhythms."

And so my best friend’s mom, Julia Foote, even now that she is gone, is still teaching me about why we make music and art despite all the ugliness, loss and pain. My best friend’s mom is still changing me and daring me to change. I am going to keep her with me, because she’s on my side, my best side. My angel.

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From The War Series by Julia Foote

 

Phantom selfie gallery by Gina Dill-Thebeau

Gina Dill-Thebeau has produced a gallery of phantom selfies for Poetry Scores.

A phantom selfie is a picture you take of yourself that is, in some way, ghostly or phantasmagoric and titled with a phrase from Andreas Embirikos' poetic sequence Phantom of the Dreams' Origin, translated from the Greek by Nikos Stabakis.

The images are arranged, as in a Poetry Scores art invitational, based on where in the flow of Embirikos' poem the language chosen for the title of the selfie appears.

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"Phantom of the dreams’ origin"

 

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"Like the waters of a sworn jury her eyes’ calmness was troubled"

 

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"Abolition of subservience"

 

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"Cheeks of half-bared women"

 

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"Dead-calm"

 

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"Seasons change and the woman of our times resembles a wick’s chasm."

 

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"Winter Grapes"

 

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"She was deprived of her toys and her lover."

 

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"Thirteen fortunes"

 

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"Terrible are the momentary facts and our desire goes beyond the hourglasses."

 

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"Nocturnal repose"

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"We are all within our future"

 

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"Sparkling tricks of our future"

 

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All photographs by Gina Dill-Thebeau (after Andreas Embirikos).

Check out our open commission for phantom selfies if you want to play along.

Also, Gina was a source in Nancy Fowler's excellent radio and web feature on Poetry Scores and phantom selfies for St. Louis Public Radio and The Beacon.

 

(Contact us if you want to reach Gina regarding use of an image.)

 

Open commission for Phantom Selfies

Photograph by Andreas Embirikos

Poetry Scores is issuing an open commission for Phantom Selfies that translate Andreas Embirikos' 1935 poetic sequence Phantom of the Dreams' Origin into the medium of a selfie.

The process is simple. Take a photograph of yourself that is in some sense "phantom," then title that photograph after a direct quote from Embirikos' poem, as translated from the Greek by Nikos Stabakis.

We ask that you then email your Phantom Selfie and its title to Poetry Scores creative director Chris King (brodog@hotmail.com) or post it to Poetry Scores on Facebook or Twitter.

Need some help thinking through what a Phantom Selfie might be? So did we. So we asked translator Nikos Stabakis. Stabakis replied:

"Phantom" refers to the word Φάντασμα (Phantasma), meaning a phantom/ghost, its etymology pointing to imagination (Phantasia/Fantasy), but also to appearance (as in "apparition" taken to denote a ghost). Some ambivalence there (a creature of the imagination or something that appears through it).

So you could say a Phantom Selfie is a selfie where you appear as a phantom or ghost, "a creature of the imagination or something that appears through it." And it has to be titled using a direct quote from Stabakis' translation of Embirikos.

Poetry Scores previously has scored Embirikos for visual art, guest curated by Andrew Torch, and music, composed by Barbara Harbach. Poetry Scores will release Barbara Harbach's poetry score of Phantom of the Dreams' Origin for chamber orchestra in Spring 2014.

For fun, Poetry Scores will offer a free copy of the Phantom of the Dreams' Origin recording to three people who submit Phantom Selfies. One each of those three winners will be selected by translator Nikos Stabakis, guest curator Andrew Torch and composer Barbara Harbach.

Also, Phantom Selfies will be published on the Poetry Scores blog, arranged according to the title of the selfie and where that title appears in the flow of the poem. Check out how that works by looking at this Gallery of Snow White Mirror Selfies, from our inaugural selfie open commission based on the poetry of Anne Sexton.

The deadline for Phantom Selfies is April Fool's Day, 2014.

Questions? Email Poetry Scores creative director Chris King (brodog@hotmail.com). He can direct questions to Stabakis, Torch or Harbach, if needed.

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Embirikos' photograph of the masked woman borrowed from Fainting Christine.

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Phantom of the Dreams' Origin, translated from the Greek by Nikos Stabakis, is excerpted from a longer Embirikos piece, Blast Furnace (1935).

Nikos Stabakis' translations of Andreas Embirikos first appeared in his definitive Surrealism in Greece: An Anthology, still in print with the University of Texas Press.

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Andreas Embirikos