current anniversaries

the blog turns one today, rituals are good.

current aniversaries

blog 1
pbe 4
compose 5
house 7
teach 11
marriage 13
california 16
trombone 26
db 35
pb 36

good times

we had the shortest rehearsal ever last night. david was sick as a dog, yet dragged himself in to play. we started reading all the new material for our next shows in the end of july and august (nothing is confirmed but more info coming soon). the night was mainly about reading the new piece i wrote yesterday and reading eric's modular work seven that he adapted for the pbe. in my new piece (cheap admiration) i felt like i had a better control of the orchestration and it was more idiomatic for the group. besides that both pieces were really fun to play, deb(my wife) said she was surprised that the music was so "happy".

this summer another big change is that i decided to rehearse as a 5 piece. it is mainly because matt and the strings are busy and i want to be able to rehearse weekly. i think consistent rehearsals are a good tonic for us. a smaller group will fit better in clubs and other alternative spaces that a 9 piece cannot play. in the future i can see alternating between the big and small versions of the pbe depending on the situation.

like i said in the last post, one of the greatest feelings is when you have just started a piece and you know its going well. the weeks ahead are going to be great. at this point i probably have enough material for at least seven new works. writing during the summer has never been my strong point, but i think i finally have gotten over the hump.

good times indeed

composer camp

just finished my composer camp victory lap with my pitbull pal javi. we took a very scenic walk through the hills above my house where you can see the jpl campus, mt. baldi, the hollywood sign, downtown los angeles skyline and catalina(on a clear day which today was!). victory laps are reserved for sunday nights when i have had a good week. its been quite a while since the last good week, so i have snuck a few in when i really didn't qualify. (javi also has his version of the victory lap where he runs into the living room with his food bowl after dinner)

all of this comes about from my self-imposed exile (that i now call composer camp) in which i spent last week figuring what i really care about, cleaning up my process and catching up on my reading, listening and score study.

i finished retrace our steps in spring of 2004 and since then its all been about promotion, concerts and recording. now that i have the time to write again, it was really hard to get back into the process (hence my self-imposed exile). the week was pretty brutal, anytime you cut yourself off from the world with limited input from outside influences can be very strange.

the main thought i have been carrying around is that i needed to work out some kinks in my compositional process. usually i spend a couple of weeks working out the harmonies, form and gestures and then see where it takes me. this presents a practical problem that the final result (although very interesting) usually resembles little of my original ideas. this process had much to do with inspiration, or being "in the mood" to write. i wanted more control and to work out my original ideas to their final result. it relates to when i first started teaching, i would come in with a organized lesson plan and student asks a question which throws off the whole lecture. not too bad to do on one day, but after a couple days in a row is not good. since i've learned how to stay on task in the classroom, i figure i should be able to do the same with my music, its all about the preparation.

the week has revolved about finding my center(where my interests currently are) and honing the process. typical "camp" day revolves around transcribing pieces (nyman, weezer, spoon, rodgers, my chemical romance... anything that has made it become part of the heavy rotation on my playlist) reading (graphic novels, short stories, and other strange recommended books by my friend john sinclair), going to the gym (i have to leave the house once a day) and listening to lots of music. surrounding myself with things that are intriguing and interesting is a good way to get the cobwebs stirred up. my analysis of pieces has gotten to the point to try and sythesize what makes them special. for the last 6-8 weeks i've been listening to limited rotation, but this week i cut the list down to the ones that stand out. i transcribe their gestures, harmonies, form, text, rhythms, and anything else that makes the music unique. why does the music work? what about it is important? after you really know a composers "tricks", learning their music becomes a common language between the two of us. whether the are alive or dead, i probably learn more by the notes they have written then ever talking to them. words lie, notes are forever.

through all of this i also adjusted my process. i have always started with voiceleading and form and gone from there. i have never found a way to really deal with all of a piece contrapuntally, but i finally took the advice that i resisted in lessons and started sketching on pencil and paper. after contrapuntally working out much of the piece on paper i felt much more connected to ther voiceleading and was pushing notes around the paper rather that relying on intuition to finish it.

i guess this is the point where i have to describe the big "why" in this process. you must be thinking why do you spend so much time with other peoples music. can't you just sit down and be "inspired"? my answer is simple.

you have to know where you came from, and how it works. everybody has influences, but its what you do with them is the point. glass loved indian music and beethoven. reich freaks out over javanese music, coletrane and bartok. i spaz over all of the above. i know that i'm still in composer puberty; working out the kinks, getting comfortable with my technique, and putting a group together. saturating myself in music that i love is the best a 30 year ride (if all goes well) that has just started. i could be accused of stealing; but i'm not taking their gestures, harmonies or forms. its much cooler than that. every time you learn a piece, i mean really learn it, you share its logic. its all there, you just have to know which questions to ask.

the best part of composition is when you know its a real piece. you have created your own universe with its own set of rules, colors, and characters. if things go well you get to play in utopia for a while (too long and it spoils), and when its finally done and bring it to the group its like sharing my new friends with the old ones.

i know they are going to get along and cannot wait to meet each other.

belated meme

thanks devin for the nudge....

Total Volume of Music on your computer?
studio pc-1198 songs, 7.5gb
studio mac, 2791, 18.6gb

Last CD you bought?
gimmie fiction, spoon

Songs/Albums/Podcasts currently playing?

i usually alternate between listening to pop music, art music, and my audible subscriptions of this american life. now that a cheaper version is available (podcasting) i have added some of the kcrw podcasts, and the wonderful bbc program in our time

right now i am in a pop music mode and these 3 albums are in heavy rotation:

spoon, gimmie fiction

weezer, make believe

my chemical romance, three cheers for sweet revenge

i have to admit all three albums are immediately accessible and disposable. its well crafted and fun. when i listen to pop music i'm not really a word guy, so i really haven't figured out what the songs and bands are about, but i like what their music is. each band has its own voice. good commuting music to distract from the drudgery of the daily grind.

Five songs that I listen to a lot or that mean a lot to me?
i'm not really a song guy, right now i think it is a phase i'm in. writing a good song is a pretty common skill. i'm more interested in the grand statements that composers make in their prime. by the way i'm not really a color in the lines guy so i my lists are a little messy.

1. eight lines, steve reich/music for 18 musicians, steve reich

one of the really embarrassing things about growing up in the suburban midwest was the lack of variety in the music i was exposed to. i think the reason i have such trashy taste in pop music has a lot to do with the middle of the road music i grew up with; journey, styx, chicago, rush, and yes... many harder rock or alternative groups were frowned upon by my parents. it wasn't until college my ears started to open up and the first alternative music i was exposed to was reich ( by my very patient and frustrated teacher walter mays. i wasn't ready to study anything, but instead of composing he wisely had me listen to music each week)
its kinda funny that before i heard any real "alterative" music like talking heads, pixies, b-52's... i was into reich, glass and adams.
my life changed after hearing reich's music. i'm not sure which piece of music i heard first, but the bootleg tape i made in the library wore out long before i could afford to by the cds.

2. coronation of poppea, monteverdi/book 8 madrigals of war and love, monteverdi

i had studied a lot of music when i got grad school, and was pretty adamant about who and what i was. long compositions were by people who couldn't edit themselves. by being part of the early mtv generation i really didn't have the patience to listen to any piece over 30 minutes. after i studied these pieces my thoughts started to change. both works represent monteverdi when he was at his prime! in his 70's no less. although i am not a big opera buff, i have been told that the coronation of poppea is one of the most "pure" operas ever written. no extra scenes, a wonderful mixture of recitative and aria, clear and well developed plot and characters, and the bad guys win at the end. the libretto by busonello seems like it was written yesterday. absolute power corrupts absolutely, and there is nothing you can do about it.

studying the book 8 madrigals of war and love were also a high point. monteverdi organized them in two parts, the first half is about falling in love and how hard and difficult it is to chase the girl (war). the second half is all about once you are in love how unhappy love can be. i'm not a musicologist, but the madrigals seem to be for an evening of entertainment for the local royalty. the result is an entertaining collection of the trials and tribulations of love. i really was drawn into the material of taking a subject (love) and instead of getting to the point through a story (narrative), a much more intricate and nuanced groundwork could be layed out through this weird subject drama/secular oratorio. after studying the book 8 madrigals i saw the connections that go through the works of virgil thomson, robert ashley, philip glass, and laurie anderson.

3. einstein on the beach, philip glass

this piece is kind of like tolstoy's war and peace. everybody quotes it, but how many people have read it or understand it? i had heard parts of it and liked for years, but never really had the time to take it all in. after my monteverdi studies i felt like it was time and i was not disappointed. someone told me there are three types of successful compositions;

1. the ones that you like and figure you could compose yourself
2. the ones that you admire and hope to write someday
3. the few that knock you out of your seat and cannot comprehend how a human could do that

after listening to the whole piece, i felt as if i discovered the pyramids. in its parts the piece is somewhat comprehendible, but as a unified work i challenge you to listen to the whole thing without stopping and not cry at the end. (hell i haven't even seen the damn thing) there is something that both monteverdi and glass have in common that is scary. in their best works, the scores are simple 3 line pieces. when i finally got a look at the einstein score, it looked so simple similar to the monteverdi i was floored.

4. the little prince, lloyd rodgers/the black book, lloyd rodgers

lloyd... my mentor and teacher (of course i'm biased). i could talk about lloyd and what he means to his students for days, but his music stands on its own. the little prince was a chamber ballet collaboration between lloyd and artist mark stock, and choreographer raiford rogers that premiered at the japan american theatre in the mid-80's. ( i have a vhs tape that needs to move to dvd very soon) the music from the little prince is deceptively simple and impossible to get out of your head and stands as the definitive version of Antoine de St. Exupery’s wonderful story.

little prince overture mp3

the black book moves in the opposite direction of the little prince. composed daily from december 2000-december 2001, the black book is a collection musical epigrams, sketches and exercises of open and modular notation. they represent the work of an artist who doesn’t need the conceit to “write it all down” anymore. by choosing to deal with the seeds of composition and notation, each day of lloyd’s monumental blueprint can be realized into for their own indeterminate beauty.

Five people to whom I'm passing the baton:
veronica paez, daniel wolf, shane cadman (dude start your blog already), scooter piestch (you too!), and alex shapiro

for those of you lurkers....
if you check in from time to time to read this but don't have your own blog. now is a good time for you to join the blogging world... get to it!!

final note
for those of you who have been patiently reading empty space in my blog, sorry the well has been pretty dry for the last 2-3 months.
life and career changes are pretty taxing. i'm now onto the next professional phase of my "dayjob". after 11 years of teaching 5-12 grade students, i'm moving into the part-time college teaching world. one day you realize your not getting any younger and time is more important than money. its a pretty scary step to take, hopefully one of my retirement accounts will be around in about 30 years.

bach wins! see you tonight!