In an interview posted at Grammy.com centered around his new album and other topics of the day, Bill Frisell touches on one of my recurring topics, and unsurprisingly, we are in total agreement.
On Harmony, you interpreted songs ranging from Pete Seeger to Lerner and Loewe. On Valentine, you draw from a similar well — there's a Hal David and Burt Bacharach song sharing space with a traditional hymn. To you, how does American folk music connect to the Great American Songbook?
I've always had a problem with how we put [them in separate categories]. I know we need words to describe things and we have to talk about the music, but when we put these labels and names on it it always has the effect of making it smaller than what it really is. To me, they're all part of one thing, whether it’s Beethoven or Monk or Robert Johnson or Jimi Hendrix or Morton Feldman. It's all music and it all fits together in my imagination.
I think as human beings, when you’re really immersed in the music, it takes you to a place where you’re not thinking about what it's called and all that stuff. For me, it’s a big ocean of melodies and it can all coexist.
Sadly, no link at grammy.com for Morton Feldman. I could find only one instance of a recording of Feldman's music having even been nominated (a recording by Alan Feinberg of Palais de Mari along with Charles Wourinen's Third Piano Sonata plus some shorter Feldman pieces, nominated in 1996.) I did, however, find a quote from a blog post by Doyle Armbrust, violist for the Spektral Quartet, saying "I can’t think of any more profound contradiction to the Grammys than Morton Feldman’s Quartet No. 2"
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