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Music Haiku

From Laurie Niles
Posted October 24, 2004 at 04:41 AM

Haiku is a Japanese verse form of three unrhymed lines. The first line has five syllables, the second line has seven syllables, and the third line has five syllables.

So here are a few to get you thinking:

Squeaking and squawking

All eyes roll to the heavens

The clarinet speaks

=====================

The jam session starts

Somebody calls "Giant Steps"

Cold fear grips my brain

=====================

Here's the girl singer

Stepping to the microphone

Pitch, time, all gone now

=====================

Gig is going well

Some one requests "In the Mood"

I look at my watch

=====================

Gorgeous chick tells me

"You sound just like Kenny G"

My ego shatters

=====================

Three-eight, eleven-eight

Damn you, Andrew Lloyd Webber

Five-eight, seven-eight

=====================

The woodwind doubler

Practicing the piccolo

Frustration defined

=====================

Pit orchestra gig

Days and nights become as one

I have no damn life

=====================

Bad intonation

Strings are sharp and reeds are flat

Brass, too loud again

=====================

An oxymoron:

"He plays the accordion

With delicacy"

=====================

Bassoons forever

Try in vain not to sound like

A farting bedpost

=====================

The strings slowly tune

When they're done, the unison

Is anything but

=====================

"I can't find my note"

Bemoans the confused singer

"Quit now," we all pray

=====================

That plate of hors d'oeuvres

Cost more than we're getting paid

Think we underbid?

=====================

God bless Trust Fund gigs

Only have to eat Ramen

For a few more weeks

So a veyr poor translation from Japanese of my favorite:
The mask that I bought,
Very large eye holes,
Autumn festival.

Men wo kotte,
okii me no ana
aki matsuri

The mask traditionally worn at the autumn festival is a skull. The point being that even though on e is having a good time winter (or death) is coming soon.

One of the most famous for rather nefarious reasons is:
You only live twice,
Once when you are born,
And once when you die.

No prizes for guessing the movie...

So instead of a season word, howabout a string word?

the fiddle I got,
was sounding really super
but my g string broke

Cheers,
Buri

The best recording?
It's Heifetz. No reason why.
This thread is boring.

I'm in school today.
Twenty minute group lessons.
Tuned up? Lesson ends.

Finzi Introit blues
Squeals too high to stay in tune
My harmonic hell

Thus, he wrote:
"Rickety-rackety
Boulez and Stockhausen,
Serial exponents,
Know all the tricks.
Opium tone-rows they
Inhale with joyousness
Dodecaphonically
Getting their kicks."

student's recital
i hope i taught them something
what is a b flat?

No time to practice
Too many teenage dramas
Blown concentration

I pay attention
take notes, ready to focus
the day ends, oh well

School - the kids are gone
Morning solitude, what joy
My violin sings

While on stage, my Strad
Fell from my fingers and crashed!
It became toothpicks.

The smallest viol
That the world has ever seen:
A Stradivirus

Prunes can be eaten like that
Prunes can be turned juice
Prunes are used by violinists!

:D

One-Sim

To mute or not to mute?
My delight or theirs?
Fuzz-buzz sound or shrill joy?

Gotta practise, when to practise? Day time night time what time right time? Now!

Oops, the 17 syllables are there but not in the right order.

There once was a man who ate prunes
Which seriously affected his tunes
Whilst playing the harp
His flats became sharp
So now he's just playing the spoons

Just fill up my board
With poems to make me laugh
I'll give you all stars

Or fill up my board
With poems to make me cry
I'll give you stars, too!

tending I'd give them...
I'm all out of stars, I can't
give without them, I...

The center of a prune.
Cheers,
Buri

New instrument stand
Walnut, made with loving hands
Cradles violin.

Musical notes soar
Flowing through the crisp clear days
Autumn arias.

Tree sheds ruby leaves
burying green grass. Sad notes
drift through window pane.

Cherished violin
Purchased with time, labor, skill
Tangible love gift.

Ramblings, Wanda

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'erbrimmed their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

I also like this haiku because it's so cleveryly done:

Children are always
gentle flowers growing wild
nurture them softly

---

Been up to my glass
in Cage, Eliot, Klee--
fermata capsules.

---

No bones in these tunes,
just some gut-racking synapse
and no cider at all.

---

You are the tonic
I revisit each autumn;
too quiet in here.

---

If you were the third
would you feel inferior
to that bright red C?

---

I've been gone on air,
on dull sepia chants, for
many autumns. Cheers...

---

I've lost my scales, childs,
so deep in this labyrinth,
many dismal sounds.

---

Staccato leaves crunch,
ochres clatter on the ash,
how 'bout some Glenn Gould?

---

Would it be too crass
to shout "polyphonic jerk"
at that hill's quilt-face?

---

"Poetry is verb,"
says cummings. I don't believe
in a single noun.

The haiku which caught my attention are: the one that referenced Kenny G, all of Phil Kurian's, Sue's tuning/lesson over, and of course all the prune inuendos and the silly ones (though I always go for the narrative first).

If anyone is interested--many people don't realize they can enjamb lines in haiku and tweak the form, rather than end each line with a clause. Why limit oneself so rigidly, especially given the translated formula which does not make as much sense in our language perhaps?

Furthermore I know of many American haiku-writers who do not follow the traditional syllabic prescription, and their work is still considered haiku.

To me a haiku is not about syllables, but about conveying a brief flash of reality. To me a good haiku should feel like a brushstroke, a gesture that sketches a moment with rustic sensitivity. But what do I know, not much really, only that I am running out of shampoo.

Oh...wanted to ask Laurie or anyone, why does Emil get his name highlighted? I mean we all know he's a rockstar...

Best to all,
k

And ye shall find thread:
V.com Moderation
System. Fare thee well!

left undisturbed since
yesterday? If so, why do
I want to be there...

Which reality
Where asks the brahmin's son, in
Or around the cloud?

(What happens when you
Write haiku on v.com
After reading Hesse)

I had a Buddhist contribution, but deleted it...'twas a bit too over-the-top in my typical fashion. And given my fever and delirium, well, I just won't be held responsible for what might've been said.

btw do you say Hesse with one syllable or two?

ciao,
k

Willard Espy -
"I ku; you ku; he,
She, or it ku; we ku; you
Ku; they ku. Thanku"

I believe you have reduced me to a French cheese,
If one had to be reduced, not a bad choice...
reduced?
mmm, brie.

Laurie, what could be more poetic than this collective effort?
Cheers,
Buri

---

Here's a fresh baguette
for the brie in the oven.
Merdre, where's that beret...

---

Tonight we're watching
'Jean de Florette'; we've got some
good brie and good wine.

---

Something about a
soft white wheel and sun-filled grapes
that makes death easy.

the slivers of light
the specks floating around
breathing slows and stills

behind closed eyelids
images dancing, swirling
heat rises again

notes on paper lines
fading in and out always
just a little more

the phone rings and dies
images swirling, fading
light shifts and moves, gone

eyes open now stare
dogs bark leaves are blown away
hammers on rooftops

fingers are not cold
the stench of freshly cut grass
the sweetness is gone

what could be finer,
than a pungent three-liner,
from Oliver Steiner?

Cheers,
Buri

Carl.

Cheers,
Buri

~~~

That strong, steely sound
Mullova is a goddess
I think I love her

*******

While practicing, I
start to think of more haikus;
and lose my focus

*******

Shosty concerto
1 is amazing; I'll shoot
all who don't agree

*******

My shoulders are sore
Could be six hours of practice
What was I thinking?

*******

Mathis der Mahler
streaming through my earphones like
a colorful dream

Your vibrato's sharp.
Hmmm. Your finger is crooked.
See you next week Jim.

it is not measured well...but i like it!!