Sunday, February 15, 2009

Stephin Merritt's Millennium music list


More Magnetic Fields stuff: Around the time of the millennium Stephin Merritt selected a list of 100 recordings, one for each year of the 20th century. It's very interesting list, made by a songwriter and former music critic who thinks that Irving Berlin, George Gershwin and Abba are much more important than Bob Dylan. It's been removed from the Time out site, but I found it on a Spanish blog. I'll repost it here to make sure it won't disappear from the 'net.

  • 1900 Tosca (Puccini)
  • 1901 Marie Tempest, soprano: "Les filles de Cadix" (Delibes)
  • 1902 "The Entertainer" (Joplin)
  • 1903 Joseph Joachim, violin: "Hungarian Dance No. 2 in D minor" (Brahms)
  • 1904 "Meet Me in St. Louis, Louis" (Sterling-Mills)
  • 1905 Suite bergamesque (Debussy)
  • 1906 "Love Is Like a Cigarette" (Victor Herbert)
  • 1907 "Pomp and Circumstance" (Elgar)
  • 1908 "I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now" (Joe Howard)
  • 1909 "Alexander’s Ragtime Band" (Irving Berlin)
  • 1910 Prometheus (Scriabin)
  • 1911 Posthumous debut of Das Lied von der Erde (Mahler)
  • 1912 "That Shakespearian Rag" (Buck-Ruby-Stamper)
  • 1913 Le sacre du printemps (Stravinsky)
  • 1914 "I’ve a Shooting Box in Scotland" (Cole Porter)
  • 1915 "Play a Simple Melody" (Berlin)
  • 1916 The Planets (Holst)
  • 1917 The Original Dixieland Jazz Band: "(Back Home Again in) Indiana"
  • 1918 "The Real American Folk Song (Is a Rag)" (Gershwins)
  • 1919 Al Jolson: "Swanee"
  • 1920 Musique d’ameublement (Satie)
  • 1921 Fanny Brice: "My Man"
  • 1922 114 Songs (Ives)
  • 1923 Eddie Cantor: "Yes, We Have No Bananas"
  • 1924 Ukulele Ike: "Fascinatin’ Rhythm"
  • 1925 "Manhattan" (Rodgers & Hart)
  • 1926 George Gershwin, piano: "Someone to Watch over Me" (Gershwins)
  • 1927 Showboat (Kern & Hammerstein)
  • 1928 Eddie Cantor: "Makin’ Whoopee"
  • 1929 Maurice Chevalier: "Louise"
  • 1930 "Love for Sale" (Porter)
  • 1931 Gracie Fields: "Sally"
  • 1932 "It Don’t Mean a Thing If It Ain’t Got That Swing" (Duke Ellington, Billy Strayhorn)
  • 1933 Ethel Waters: "Stormy Weather"
  • 1934 Goebel Reeves: "Hobo’s Lullaby"
  • 1935 Top Hat score (Berlin)
  • 1936 Peter and the Wolf (Prokofiev)
  • 1937 "My Funny Valentine" (Rodgers & Hart)
  • 1938 Ella Fitzgerald: "A Tisket, a Tasket"
  • 1939 Glenn Miller: "In the Mood"
  • 1940 Wilf Carter: "You Are My Sunshine"
  • 1941 Billie Holiday: "God Bless the Child"
  • 1942 "Be Careful, It’s My Heart" (Berlin)
  • 1943 Vera Lynn: "I’ll Be Seeing You"
  • 1944 Les Brown and His Orchestra with Doris Day: "Sentimental Journey"
  • 1945 Edith Piaf: "La vie en rose"
  • 1946 Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys: "Blue Moon of Kentucky"
  • 1947 "Be a Clown" (Porter)
  • 1948 Four Last Songs (Richard Strauss)
  • 1949 Vaughn Monroe and His Orchestra: "Riders in the Sky (A Cowboy Legend)"
  • 1950 Patti Page with Jack Rael and Orchestra: "The Tennessee Waltz"
  • 1951 "4’33"," a.k.a. the silent piece (John Cage)
  • 1952 Folkways’ Anthology of American Folk Music
  • 1953 Screamin’ Jay Hawkins: "(She Put the) Wamee (On Me)"
  • 1954 Judy Garland: "The Man That Got Away"
  • 1955 Julie London: "Cry Me a River"
  • 1956 Forbidden Planet score (Bebe and Louis Barron)
  • 1957 Black Orpheus score (Jobim)
  • 1958 The Diamonds: "The Stroll"
  • 1959 Gypsy (Styne-Sondheim), starring Ethel Merman
  • 1960 Psycho score (Bernard Herrmann)
  • 1961 The Paris Sisters: "I Love How You Love Me"
  • 1962 The Tornadoes: "Telstar"
  • 1963 The Ronettes: "Be My Baby"
  • 1964 Dionne Warwick: "Walk on By"
  • 1965 Ellie Greenwich: "You Don’t Know"
  • 1966 The Velvet Underground and Nico
  • 1967 The Jefferson Airplane: Surrealistic Pillow
  • 1968 The United States of America: The United States of America
  • 1969 Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin: "Je T’Aime" (Gainsbourg)
  • 1970 I Am Sitting in a Room (Alvin Lucier)
  • 1971 Joni Mitchell: Blue
  • 1972 Michael Jackson: "Ben"
  • 1973 A Little Night Music (Sondheim)
  • 1974 George McCrae: "Rock Your Baby"
  • 1975 Kraftwerk: Radio-activity
  • 1976 ABBA: "Dancing Queen"
  • 1977 Electric Light Orchestra: Out of the Blue
  • 1978 Blondie: Parallel Lines
  • 1979 Gary Numan: "Cars"
  • 1980 Young Marble Giants: Colossal Youth
  • 1981 The Human League: Dare
  • 1982 Roxy Music: Avalon
  • 1983 New Order: "Blue Monday"
  • 1984 Cocteau Twins: Treasure
  • 1985 Les Rita Mitsuko: "Marcia Baila"
  • 1986 The Jesus and Mary Chain: Psychocandy
  • 1987 MARRS: "Pump Up the Volume"
  • 1988 Marc Almond: Mother Fist and Her Five Daughters
  • 1989 Chris Knox: "Not Given Lightly"
  • 1990 Public Enemy: "911 Is a Joke"
  • 1991 Boyd Rice and Friends: Music, Martinis and Misanthropy
  • 1992 Tom Waits, Bone Machine
  • 1993 Pet Shop Boys: "Dreaming of the Queen"
  • 1994 Saint Etienne: "Like a Motorway"
  • 1995 Pulp: Different Class
  • 1996 Gravikords, Whirlies & Pyrophones, Experimental Musical Instruments
  • 1997 White Town: "Your Woman"
  • 1998 Dancing with the Dead, The Music of Global Death Rites
  • 1999 Fox, Inc.: "Obvious Fake"

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great listing!! I like this kind of music!! Thanks for sharing!!

My Messy Blog said...

You like it? Then you're most likely gay. :-) no, actually I like that kind of music too, and I'm fairly hetero.

Anonymous said...

Cool,I discover your blog! Neil gaiman, Merrit, Moore! I listen Ben in the merrit list. And Trondheim, a french i havent read yet.I'm french too. Thank you for your blog!
Yoann

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the list!

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