Word: backgrounds
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Such balance was achieved in the second movement, where dense triplet runs, exchanged around the orchestra, blanket the background with a literal whirlwind. Where the low strings were a little muddy and understated, the winds were articulate and perfectly balanced. When the runs finally arrived in the upper strings the execution was clear and precise. After a climax, which perhaps could have been heightened, a cannon in the brass section follows. Here, with staggered entrances, the strength of the brass choir was fully exploited, each voice clear and sonorous...
...been acclimated to the loose, raw groove of his earlier work. Listen to the intro of the first single, "Stepping Stones": acoustic guitar chords ring out (good), followed by spacey-sounding slide (not so good), then the upright bass enters the picture (very good), followed by background singers crooning "na na" (what the...?). The rest of the album is maddeningly uneven in the same way. Catchy, funky numbers are buffered by colorless, inarticulate rants. Promising compositions are deprived of vitality by slick production and extraneous instruments and vocals...
...addition, the reader continually needs background information about new characters and new situations in order to understand what is happening in the novel. In order to provide this information, Sharpe lapses from time to time into somewhat dry expository sections, which, while maintaining the oddity of the story through the description of strange situations, lack activity and direct character involvement...
...City is at its best in its subtler moments. During Brackett's interview, for example, a folksy guitar strums gently in the background as Baily plies millions of viewers with his simple charm. When Brackett cuts abruptly to a commercial, both guitar and Baily are unceremoniously replaced with a garish sneaker advertisement. The spell is suddenly broken and the effect is undeniable: we realize we've been played, effortlessly manipulated by a half-wit and a cheesy soundtrack...
...urging of a drama professor who suggested that he find a way to showcase and celebrate "the richness of our South African culture" in a format that might easily be understood by the rest of the world. Msomi's epiphany came when he realized that the political background of Macbeth-- the half-mythologized atmosphere of the warring clans of medieval Scotland--was eerily similar to that of the birth of the Zulu nation, united out of many warring tribes under the great 19th-century leader Shaka Zulu. Moreover, Shaka's life was oddly parallel with that of Macbeth: a diviner...