cartesian nostalgia

from a performers point of view this weekend’s RealNewMusic 2008 festival was one one of those rare events that was a joy to participate in from start to finish. no backstage drama, rivalries, one-upmanship or back handed compliments. walking in to soundcheck and seeing scott mcintosh (pbe partner in crime) playing in john mahr’s group (brother mallard) brought back a wave of nostalgia from when the three of us used to play in csuf’s diverse instrument ensemble (d.i.e.)

also performing sat night was steve moshier’s liquid skin ensemble. both steve and janine livingston (who were members of the original cartesian reunion memorial orchestra ((crmo)) and have been playing together for close to 25 years). this was the first show that we ever played together and i was happy to finally hang out with steve and have a chat longer than a handshake or a online exchange.

thanks again to shane cadman for bringing in another successful year of producing the RNM festival. i also need to thank shane for pushing me to apply for the redcat spring studio. i usually don't have pieces (new and unperformed) that fit those more "official" festivals and thought it would be an interesting experience to write something on a pretty quick deadline for a change. (like many of my movie brethern)

its also worth pointing out (and getting back to the nostalgia) that before becoming the new music impressario that he is today, back in the 80's shane (as well as scott and john) used to play in the illustrious theatre orchestra (ito) that was playing gig’s at royce hall and getting regular airplay on kcrw and kusc (which used to have a great alt-classical radio show hosted by bonnie grice). although i really miss the crmo and the ito, on saturday night it was easy to see and hear that the "carteisan school" is alive and well in all of our groups.

the sandbox

after another long day of composing and video editing the wife unit looks over and states "its an addiction, right?" i nod silently in her direction and realize its probably a good time to stop for the day. although we have been married 15 years, i don't think we have had the conversation that followed. composing is something i do, but really this blog is one of my few outlets to "talk" about it. calling it an addiction is probably technically true, but we did agree that over the years i have become more a more functional human being in the process.

i used to be pretty bad and could easily ignore everybody for days trying to get a project started (and i even asked her to leave the house a few times) just so i could write. it seems silly now and i'm pretty embarrassed about it. over time i have learned to trust my instincts and as long as the ideas are flowing i cancel everything else and write until as much and as long as i can.

right now i am in what i call "the sandbox". its the stage when i have a fully realized idea. every morning is another opportunity to 'play'; build new castles, and tear down the old ones that the tide is starting to wreck. its a very satisfying place to be.

first there is the idea (sometimes i sketch them out, or write them down for a later date), and if wake up the next day and still think it is a good idea i'll start to make it real. this is where the most unpleasant and painful part of the process is. until that idea is "real" and becomes a full piece i usually find myself in a focused mad dash to get as much of it on paper as possible.

sometimes the ideas are quick fully formed (life's too short, retrace our steps act II, summerland and principal of sufficient irritation) other times the initial idea seems strong, but somehow the realization feels a little off (fearless leader, retrace our steps act I, myinnersatan).
why and how this happens, i don't know? i think pieces are like kids, and i want to see them all grow up and be successful, but in the end you learn to accept their strengths and weaknesses as part of the human condition. one of the stranger recent developments is that i have noticed that some people have much higher opinions of some of my "kids" than i do. both pieces have had many versions (awkward teen years) and though my group really enjoys performing both, i still flinch and shuffle my feet during various sections.

there is a strange process in which the initial "idea" becomes a composition. all i can say is that it is a gut feeling and you know when it works. sometimes i have to confirm it in rehearsal, but these days my intuition is getting better. this is the problem solving part of the process, a little nip and tuck here and there, from that original idea a universe is implied and i get to live in it for the duration of the creation of the piece. this part is wonderful. you know you are here when you can walk away from the piece and come back in few days and still are interested in the same things. no matter which metaphor i use (playing in the sandbox, living in matrix...) this is very much like a video game where you get to live inside of the world you created.

the next step is taking it rehearsal and seeing how everything translates to the real world. over
time this has become easier and usually have an idea of what will work and where the problems might be. the first few readings are very important and feel that if a group of intelligent adults dont "get it" within a few hours then i really need to look long and hard to answer those "why's?" (that is why i tape all my rehearsals") i think there are two sides to this coin. on one side we reasonably only have 2-3 rehearsals before a show and need to be able to put something out in a short amount of time. if there are problems i know that we can smooth over the initial bumps and i can make some changes over the next few months, but its very important to be able perform the new works in a timely matter so you can always be rotating in new repertoire into the show.

its a strange dichotomy; when i'm writing i'm thinking about performing and when performing i'm thinking about writing. i'm not sure how to turn that switch off and afraid what would happen if i could.

learning a new instrument

this spring continues to be a steady progression of ups and downs. the flu was a 5 week body blow to start the year and this past week (welcome spring!) allergies have been kicking my ass.

that all being said, i'm finally back to my routine of transcribing, writing and arranging except this time (instead of pencil and paper) i'm using my laptop (ableton live/macbook pro/midi keyboard) as my primary instrument. the purpose of putting aside the pencil and paper and transcribing music by ear (using the keyboard and recording directly into the software) i'm forcing myself to figure out how to recreate the sounds i'm hearing (and in the process figure out its strengths and weaknesses of the software). its interesting that this process of transcription is a a much more tactile experience you would think (instead figuring out a passage by playing it and then writing it down), by performing (while recording and then looping) each element of a piece, its a more viseral process that feels quite different and opens up my ears in some new ways. it also gives me an idea of how i can use this technology in a live performance.



what initially has got me so excited about this setup is the ability to perform modular pieces like Terry Riley's Rainbow Over Curved Air, Rweski's Les Moutons de Panurge or my Prinicple of Sufficient Irritation, looping live performances from a laptop and midi keyboard (instead of the racks of pedals) the end result is an electronic instrument that functions as a very flexible continuo.

another problem with performing electronically is that the instrument choices are limiting also. right now there are really two main choices... either a keyboard (which is not especially bad, but doesn't give you all the options that the technology implies) or a midi pad controllers.



i'm really intereted in korg's new kaossilator "dyanmic phase synthesizer" which is basically an x/y graph style melodic sound generator. i'm (and others i think) are still searching for a simple and intuitive interface so that you can perform live. some recent examples are the monome and yamaha's tenori-on.

obviously some of the issues that comes up with using any looping instrument is its ability to be performed with other instruments. by seeing some local bands using pedals and laptops i finally think the technology has caught up to what was in the air in the late 60's and 70's. ninja academy is a good example of a two-person rock band that has one of the most virtuosic examples of looping live instruments that i have seen. i'll be going into rehearsal with this new setup and should get a better idea of what works for me by trial and error. i've setup a twitter feed on the right to post impressions and snippets along the way.

the sausage factory

as you can see on the right side of my blog i have decided to start twittering my new project. so far i’m about 2 weeks into getting my chops back after spending the last 8 months editing, recording, and promotion of my retrace our steps EP and life's too short CD. the whole process that doesn’t really lend itself to creativity and i find it practically impossible to work on new pieces while recording, editing, mixing and promoting my older ones. so now as i’m winding down the promotion i’m getting ready to start a new project by each day transcribing some music that interests me.

the goal of this is to shed some light on the sausage factory and to make the complex simple by keeping a journal of the my process. twitter makes the most sense for just jotting down what i might be doing on any given day. blog posts like this are more to organize the “big picture”(like right now) and give some insight, but my main intent is to document how i get things done. hopefully by shedding a little light i can encourage others to share their own “dark arts” of composing. (i'm sure if you asked 50 composers what they do you will probably get 50 answers).

composers are a strange bunch. i can hang out with my mused friends and we swap our successes and failures, but i have found that composers are not really type of people to hang out and talk shop. we like to dish on the politics and philosophy that surround art music, but i think its like we each think we are guarding the secrets to our own personal alchemy and are afraid to expose our process to to the masses for fear that me might get called out for being a fraud. its too bad, the sharing of ideas, strategies, techniques and “best practices” is a great way to pass on the tools of our craft, yet the most common transmission of this information is only to our private students and not to each other. for me to fill this void, i have made up for this by gravitating to a small group assorted writers, artists and filmmakers that i try to hang out with on a weekly basis.

so here are some of background details about this project. i’m setting off in a new direction by changing my process up a bit. i’m writing music for a side project that is going to embrace my more electronic tendencies. i listen to quite a bit of it and am interested in the possibilities of what it can offer.

the first step started during the fall i have been making playlists of quite a bit of electronic music that i like and have been transcribing a piece a day over the last 2 weeks. i have mainly been figuring out how to make these sounds and timbres using my laptop as an instrument. right now its more of a performance based process, instead of transcribing a piece on paper, i am performing it and looping using the laptop (ableton live/macbookpro). so far i'm getting an idea of the strengths and weaknesses of using a laptop in live performance and what a ensemble would look and sound like that blends acoustic and electronic instruments.

the first project i’m working on is a deconstruction of david toub’s this piece intentionally left blank. the main reason of doing a deconstruction is quite simple, i want to get a handle on the technology with a piece i know really well (and like) and play around in its universe. i already have “deconstructed” the piece to its basic harmonic units/gestures and i’m going to turn them into loops that i can perform on my laptop (think a terry riley solo performance using modern technology) i figure as i get used to the technology i'll start to write more "original's", but i figure i better walk before i run (and right now i'm crawling).

how wonderful is brian ferneyhough?

so this is the post where i'm supposed to give you some special reason to come to our next show on tuesday september 25th. i just got back from a really great rehearsal and ready to start spreading the propaganda.

with the traffic in southern cal i know it takes a special kind of person to drive anywhere after a long day of work. the real question is why is this concert worth attending? first off we are sharing the concert with the new kids on the block of new music (NKOTBNM or as they liked to be called real quiet) the nyc based chamber group is making its first los angeles/oc appearance the just released their new album tight sweater (featuring the music of marc mellits)which is pretty frakkin' great. besides mellits music they are playing music of phil kline, and annie gosfield.

as for the pbe. i'm kinda surprised that we are even playing this show. last may it looked like curtains for the us, carl, ryan and bruce would all be leaving the pbe after graduation. thankfully bruce decided to stay for the time being and our original bass player matt menaged moved back into town this summer. this lineup is a powerhouse and has gelled quite nicely. i'd say its pbe 3.o.

so what about the show? or as they used to say "where's the beef?"our goals are very consistent and simple. we want to entertain you, we want to make you think and we want to have a great time performing music that we wouldn't get to play anywhere else. entertainment wise, its the strongest set we have yet played. as a show its got something for everybody; garage band jam's, covers, vocal fun and some modular improvisation. so go ahead see for yourself...

cheap admiration-
its technically a harmonic deconstruction of johann pezel's sonata ciacona in B. its a great introduction to what we do and always lets the audience know we are more garage band than chamber group.

fearless leader-
this tune has had more versions than a cat has lives. it started very unsuccessfully as an ambitious modular experiment that failed miserably in a live reviewed performance at whittier college (thanks again to the oc register's tim mangan for a really polite review of that debacle). over time it became more of an orchestration study. its not a perfect piece, but at the time i think i was creatively blocked and i looked at finishing it as a challenge to overcome. i keep asking the group if they want to take it out of the set, but they seem to like it more than me.

eye for optical theory
this probably has to be one of my favorite michael nyman tunes. i have never been able to find a score of it, so one summer i decided to write it down. its based on a repeated ground bass (kind of like fearless leader) and about halfway through i realized his "trick" is that he only was using combination of about 8-9 repeated melodies. my version plays on this and i just started with my sheet of melodies and hooked them together like lego's to make my own version. in last nights rehearsal i added a call and response introduction where our keyboard player eric plays one of the antecedent licks and we play its consequent answer. we play this game until he wants to start the piece and then plays the first line in octaves to let us know to go on. its fun way to bring a little life to one of our fluffier pieces. i also strongly feel that a night of any one composers music can be pretty exhausting. a little nyman along the way sets up the rest of the show really well.

life's too short
this is the showpiece of the night. its one of the few compositions that i have written that came out effortlessly fully composed and orchestrated. in our first rehearsal we played it head to toe without stopping once. its a pretty damn good piece and i'm still couldn't tell you how i wrote it. what is it about? self actualization through nihilism, nietzsche meet tony robbins. its in english. you will be able to understand the text. its over the top. its funny. its in your face.

in many ways i think its a conceptually a reaction of going to a very well performed master chorale concert in which all the music was by american composers but none of it was in english. everything was well written and orchestrated, but the concept of having your audience sit and listen to some "secret code" was insane. scanning the crowd from the back row of disney hall this performances seemed more dehumanizing as the evening wore on. the audience wanted to like it, and seemed desperate to connect with the music. (it was beautiful) but what kind of conversation goes on for an two hours in a variety of assorted foriegn languages? sitting in the audience felt like a strange ritual listening to an evening of recently composed choral music without theater or narrative.

anytime you add vocalists to anything its like hearding cats. on most nights the energy they add to an instrumental show can be hard to control. when they come on stage its easy for me to forget my job (the cues and conducting) because i really love to hear them sing. over time i realized that once i get them to the middle of most pieces we loosen up and have a lot of fun on the back end.

principle of sufficient irritation (11/25/05)
this is probably or favorite piece. its written in a modular style with a variety pre-composed melodic syncopated and ostinato lines. (terry riley's in C is the most famous example). overall its more similar to the improvisational process used in tv shows like curb your enthusiasm or any of christopher guest's wonderful movies. the piece has a very clear beginning middle and end and we all know our responsibilities in each section. for instance i play some melody in the first section, lead the group into the canon in the middle, and play ostinatos in the third. how and what i'll play i can choose every night. over time there are happy accidents that turn the piece in new directions. each new player that comes in also brings their own personality into the piece. one of the good things about 11/25 is that its got a nice rhythmic/melodic turn when it we start moving from the submediant to the tonic moving from a hard charging 6/8 to 3/4. (and back to the original opening statement) while it serves as a very energetic totem that no matter how the evening is going that once we get rolling towards that 'turn' its a very simple engine that creates quite a lot of energy. some nights we even feel like we can levitate the stage during this section which is the whole reason i got into this racket.

are you sold yet? still skeptical? i know i have been to more bad new music concerts than i count. please don't hold that against me. i hated them also. how about if i sweeten the deal with a guarantee (of course i can't really afford to give you a money back offer... i'm only public employee) if you don't like the show i'll buy you a beer, i just don't want to hear about how wonderful brian ferneyhough is.

back to school part II, transcription tips

get the music in your ear, sing it back to yourself, play it on your primary instrument and then try and write it down.

focus on what you hear well, most people hear either the soprano or bass lines the best.

work on one part or element at a time. if you are transcribing a pop tune, try and write down the form or harmony first. then go back to get the melody.

by having the harmony you can sometimes deduce the notes you are having trouble with through basic analysis. visa versa, the having the melody down cold can help you figure out the harmony also.

its pretty hard at the beginning. try to work consistently every day. if you can only transcribe for 15 min a day a first no problem. you shouldn't keep working if you get tired or have a headache. my ears are horrible when i am tired. for me its something i do when i first wakeup in the morning.

along those lines some days your ears just don't work. don't worry its normal. come back the next day and it all will be well.

work in small chunks, get 4 bars and then move on.

use a good rewind, computer based programs like itunes work very well. transcribing directly from a cd can be problematic. they don't like short rewinds.

pick something you like, life's too short.

back to school edition

do something musical every day
learn your language
transcribe by ear
analyze pieces you like
some pieces (your favorites) you will want to know everything about
keep on the lookout for things that make you go hmmm.
why does it catch your interest? what makes it different from the other pieces?
you might just focus on one element (form, harmony, melody, orchestration, counterpoint, rhythm...)

wash, rinse, repeat

mother tongue

just to start this off on the right foot let me point out that i really like going to la master chorale concerts. i'm really glad they tackle so much new music and i thought the concert was very well performed. i'm not sure why i'm so snippy about this gig, but here are my comments, take them with a grain of salt if you wish.

the organ cadenzas in james macmillan's Magnificat sounded like the would work better for a chamber orchestra. this was the first of many cadenzas during the evening that went on too long. i figure if you are going to write one, they should either get the 'essence' of the instrument or illustrate the performers unique 'personality' these did neither. a cadenza is kind of like the circus train stopping in your neighborhood, either the elephants will do something cool or just crap on the side of the tracks.

i liked eve belgairan's persian influenced composition (sang) much better than i thought i was going to. she wrote for the persian santur (72 string hammered dulcimer) and daf and tombek (persian percussion) as continuo instruments in a western style. so while i really enjoyed the performance i wounder what we would think of an brass quintet hired to play iranian folk songs? i know this work was presented to be a 'cultural exchange', but it feels a pretty colonial and imperialistic to me.

my anticipated 'highlight' of the evening was to finally hear arvo part's te deum live. i have listened to the piece over the years and wondered if i would like it more live. i think its a primer in great writing for a chorus and strings, but have never been able to listen to it in one sitting. thursday's performance was no different. disney hall makes a great frame for the piece. the sound of the aeolian harp (prerecorded) was amazing, but i found myself getting bored listening to his endless re-orchestrations of similar material.

the best thing is that this concert crystalized my thoughts about writing for chorus. so... what kind of conversation goes on for an two hours in a variety of assorted foriegn languages? sitting in the audience felt like a strange ritual listening to an evening of recently composed choral music without theater or narrative has to be some really fucking great art music or i can't buy it. what does it say about composers (mcmillian and belgarian are british and american) who choose to write in a language in which the audience will not be able to follow along? i don't get it, and it feels like a big dodge to not write in the mother tongue of our audience. this has always been a slow burn with me, and i'm not saying everything should be in english, but somewhere in the middle part's te deum it was easy to see from the back of disney hall that we all were listening to very well orchestrated aesthetic experience in which the 120 member los angeles master chorale had much to sing about and nothing to say.

addendum, 061007

i don't have anything inherently against 'absolute' vocal music. its just i think it all boils down to the presence or absence of a narrative structure. i think when you choose a text that is in another language/not recognizable then you must have other strategies to connect to your audience. if the purpose of art music is to reflect upon the human condition (at least its mine) then this night's performance clearly illustrates why our audiences still have problems connecting to 'new' music.

vacation?

i guess this past week i have been adjusting to what many people would call "vacation". its been a bit disorienting because for the first time in a long while i don't have anything that i have to do until i go back to work in late august. i still have the retrace cd to finish mixing and i'm 75% done with my next one. with no summer gigs and the short term future of the pbe unclear, it seems easy to step out of the never-ending cycle of composing, rehearsing and performing (at least for this summer), and see what its is like to be "normal" again. already this week i read a book (p.k. dick's the game players of titan) , started to catch up on reading the last two months of the new yorker, and have endured my wife's looks of derision and pity while planting myself on the couch playing video games (halo 3 beta). usually i would feel quite a bit of anxiety without having a piece to write or concert to plan. what the hell, a few months of vacation never hurt anybody? (gulp)

monday morning quarterback

csuf's d.i.e. had a pretty good show last wed night in which we premiered david toub's piece this piece intentionally left blank. i thought it was a very effective composition and pretty good first performance. enjoy the mp3.

this performance represented the best of social networking and was made possible by david having a well designed website with scores and mp3's. he also is very smart by having some pieces in open c score that are easily adapted to any instrumentation (most pbe music is written this way) which is the point of the diverse instrument ensemble.

anyway ,it was a challenging but fun piece to play and great example of the exchange of ideas by making your music public. i look forward to playing more of music like this and encourage others to follow.

"now " and "then"

last night was a great example of what i find frustrating in undergraduate comp forums. i know that composition is one of the "black arts" of teaching, so i am really not here to throw stones at students our students. all of the pieces were very well prepared and performed (except for one piece that was so bad i thought was performance art), but it always frustrates me hearing pieces from young composers that sound 100-200 years old. may i strongly suggest that they you spend more time listening the "now" instead of the "then". you can reject it all of it if you want, but you should have a good idea of a majority of the art music composed in the last 30 years.

when i was in kansas, my first teacher, walter mays, did me the biggest favor by forcing upon me long listening lists in place of any actually writing. by keeping my away from the pencil he did me the best teaching possible for a very young and naive student and i was quite happy when i found a group of living composers that excited me. he started me in the 1970's and pushed forward, and then we jumped back starting with pierrot lunaire and filled in the gaps through the 60's. overall it gave me a sense of place and i have had many years to think about how i fit in to it.

we can evaluate our compositions in many ways; is it idiomatic and well orchestrated? does it have a consistent logic or musical universe that it resides? even if all those things are in place i'm not sure how writing in the "ars antiqua" style is a useful artistic exercise unless it is somehow connected to the now. i think it is one thing to write music that sounds like chopin and quite another to distill what makes chopin's music interesting and apply that to your own art. the journey to figure out how we fit the "now" and "then" into our own personal narrative is just as important as any pen and paper "technique" we can acquire.

horse sense

last saturday was the 2nd rehearsal of life's too short which focused on the having the group sing and play. its clear now that hubris got the best of me. my idea was to use the ensemble as a greek chorus to accompany the soloist and to rotate the orchestration so that 2 or 3 players would be available to sing at any time. in my mind i could see it clearly, and it was not for lack of effort of the ensemble that it was a failure. (thanks guys for trying without any complaints) of course now i really feel like a loser. it seems lately i have been working out many of my "technical problems" in previous pieces. much of the counterpoint and orchestration from my long suffering fearless leader led to a much cleaner and clearer instrumental continuo in life's too short, and i already can see how to solve this problem of having the ensemble do some singing and i still might have them sing at the end, but overall its clearly not the right type of piece for this. while i'm flogging myself over this i thinks its valid to point out that i knew there was a pretty chance that it wouldn't work, but i have a pretty stubborn side that has to follow through to the gruesome end to prove the point. my grandfather called this horse sense and it would have been damn well easier to get kicked in the head when i was younger.

best laid plans

i'm back from a working spring break here in lala land. just finished booking a few shows through may and i'm back to working on the vocal piece i started in the fall (life's too short). the original version was quickly improvised using the abelton live software program. its a very powerful looping program/sequencer that passed my bullshit test by letting me easily create live realizations of modular pieces like terry riley's in c and lloyd rodgers the swing.

initially i had been using the program to help organize the spoken parts of the libretto, but on the third or fourth session i started recording my improvisations which became the form i am currently using.

i was excited by the power of the technology (i still am using it to improvise how gestures unfold). the main drawback of using this technology quickly became that my improvisation left little space (aesthetic, not rhythmic) for the vocal lines. later attempts to add them in seemed pretty silly and forced. sometimes you get lucky and there leaving certain elements to chance serendipitously work out, but this time i had to admit it was a compositional square peg in a round hole.

so version one was thrown into the trash... (it worked great as spoken word performance art though) but i must have saved up some good karma, because the new version is all that and a bag of chips. last wednesday we had our first instrumental sightreading and it almost played itself. this time the vocal parts slipped right into place without a fight.

the libretto is another pastiche text (like retrace our steps), and is a collaboration with my good friend john sinclair who helped me cobble together a conversation between nietzsche and a friend of ours. here is a first taste of a spot near the opening, enjoy.

n.
this is life as you live it
now and have lived it
you will have to live again and again
times without number
and there will be nothing new in it

f.
to those people who have made a difference in your life
you can do anything you want, because god wills it
you can do anything you want, whether god likes it or not
you can tell GOD what to do

n.
but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh
and all the unspeakable small and great in your life
must return to you and everything in the same series and sequence

f.
life’s too short
and you’re shorter than life
life’s too short to remember how to be who you are
i haven’t heard from you
have you heard from you?

(as you can see they are not really listening to each other. probably more like talking at each other)

because i can't be beethoven

i'm taking a quick break from a very fruitful writing session on my new vocal piece (life's too short)((yikes, serendipitous irony alert!!)) rehearsal starts tomorrow, more to come later.


okay, quickly i was scanning my newsreader and can't believe i missed parris patton's great performance art last weekend at the dangerous curve gallery. link to lovely linda's review at the losanjealous blog and original the because i can't be beethoven site.




piano hacks unite! bravo! bravo!









pictures from losanjealous.com

newmusicland

daniel wolf cannily points the limitations and travails about having a blog and dialogue it spawns.

Personally, I think that Newmusicland is a microeconomy (or a series of microeconomies within a microeconomy) without much real at stake. Sure, there are prizes to win and teaching gigs to hand out, but in the end, it's a bloody struggle over bloody nothing, or a mad rush for crumbs (thanks to Joyce and Feldman), and even with the "best" resume and connections the distribution of laurels and better day jobs ultimately involves a large factor of the arbitrary. Establishing a public musical identity as a composer means taking a strong position, having strong opinions, and saying through our music in a very public way that I like this and (implicitly) not that. But are our strong opinions only to be placed in public in the form of our music, and not our words? When we switch to words, do we suddenly have a license to duck and cover?

i think its good to point out the drawbacks of blogging: everything we say online probably won't get us a better job and will most likely be used against us someday, and yes sometimes our online discussions probably amount to a hill of beans, but for those of us who remember the time before the internet, any information about newmusic was limted at best.

growing up in kansas i had little connection to newmusic or artmusic at all until college, but these days i first hear about somebody online much earlier than hear about it on "the street" . hopefully our ramblings give an accurate (although sometimes myopic) portrayal of the 'zeitgeist' in which we live. as i pointed out recently i am lucky to be a part of the southern california "cartesian school", but i also appreciate that our online newmusicland community that has connected me to people like daniel wolf, corey dargel, jeff harrington, and david toub (and a cast of others on my blogroll...now this is where the internet is like a big reacharound) just this weekend got into a emusic frenzy because of david toub's extensive mp3 link dump (david, i especially thank you for introducing me to real quiet, marc mellits, and steve layton)

like any community, it is only as vital as those who participate and there will always be more "lurkers" than than commentators. so far our little club seems to be pretty open to a wide variety of art and ideas, and we have mostly stayed away from throwing rocks at each other. (except a recent minor stoning of christopher rouse).

good ideas do crop up online, the recent discussion of open study scores has prompted me to start editing posting my own music. this semester at CSUF, the diverse instrument ensemble (d.i.e) has enjoyed rehearsing and is planning to perform of david toub’s online scores (when a 65 yr old faculty member brings a piece to rehearsal from the internet you know its having some effect). like fantasy baseball there is always going to be arguments about who the hero’s and villains are, but by telling these stories and sharing our experiences through our newmusicland microcommunity gives meaning to our strange and pitiful existence.

overall i am always interested in reading about people who are doing. reading about those who are actively involved in their community whether it be musiciology, kazoo training, writing ya fiction or grip work is much more interesting than passively consuming some of the latest feel good claptrap. everyday its easy to feel like we are faced with the 'faculty cafeteria' problem, surrounded by disgruntled who are forever complaining about how the young are fracking up our lives. by turning off the noise and joining a club (ferret blogs anyone?) our online microcommunities can serve as to channel the best of our collective ideas, creations and experiences.

*one of the my main internet conundrums is that there are ferret (we are new ferret parents) and lego train blogs, but i cannot figure out for the life of me why the music education community is so empty. maybe it is all because edwin gordon's sound before symbol theories have become reality?

the cartesian reunion "school" (a short history of a long tradition 1979-present)

Although I have decided to at least temporarily continue to make my music available, I am entirely finished with the music establishment. No mainstream American music institution will be permitted to perform my work (Not that there's much chance of it anyway). Why? Because it's a rigged game and because it's run by the elite; the same people who profit from dead Iraqi women and children. Some of the same people who stage terror attacks. Am I saying that, for instance, Esa-Pekka Solonen is a terrorist? No, but I am saying he works for terrorists, among others. I don't want that job.Publish

william houston- socal composer/music director/bomb thrower

the above statement could sound like sour grapes from a bitter artist who has not been 'anointed' by the mainstream. knowing a little about our little antisocial 'club' can put this bomb-throwing statement into a proper context.

in any type of music making, being an independent/alternative artist means that we don't accept the status quo. "the content of the media (composition/creation) is irrelevant, the form of the medium is what changes our consciousness." marshall mcluhan's statement that the medium is the message means as much today as when it was first thrown (1964) into the public discourse. technology makes it possible to freely bypass the 'official' delivery systems of art music (through bittorrent, youtube, myspace, and blogs like this), while we freely compose, perform and distribute our compositions and performances however we like.

unlike some students who sit in the back of the class quietly waiting to be called on, we do not wait. our current situation hearkens back to an outdated patronage system based on control and that expects everybody to know their place. today, for most composers, getting music performed means that the music is submitted for approval by committee. in this world musicians are expected to audition for the privilege to perform. some of us have chosen the alternate path, the path less traveled (and of course less profitable).

everybody knows where the 'money' (though not easy money) is. if you play by their rules you can be in their club. we have chosen to bypass the 'approved' media of the art music delivery system (concert hall and orchestra). we have chosen to form our own institutions, and perform in our own venues. i'm proud to be a member of this loose collective of southern californians that have been composing and performing an alternative/art music that has been largely undocumented for almost 30 years.

as you can see below, our little 'club' has grown over the years to make music for our own ensembles on our own terms. now it should be easy to see the teeth behind Bill Houston's words. Starting in 1979 the founding members of the Cartesian Reunion Memorial Orchestra (Michael Bayer, Chuck Estes, Douglas Hein, William Houston, Steve Moshier, Frank Riddick, and Lloyd Rodgers) have blazed a trail through many actions and few words, lending force to the credo: "say little, do much." when every once in a while one of them pops into the zeitgeist with something to say, we might want to listen.

a short history of southern california new music ensemble-based composer collectives

Cartesian Reunion Memorial Orchestra (1979-1992)
this groundbreaking group featured compositions by Michael Bayer, Chuck Estes, Douglas Hein, William Houston, Steve Moshier, Frank Riddick, and Lloyd Rodgers. at various times, the orchestra featured musicians Jannine Livingston, harpsichord; John Glenn, bass; Lloyd Rodgers, clarinet and keyboard; Douglas Hein, acoustic guitar; Diana Halpern, violin; Joeseph Goodman, violin; and Michael Baer, violincello

Domes (1987-1990)

performance orchestra featuring the works of Jeff Fairbanks, Mary Thompson, Michael Coleman, Alysse Sanner, Chris Tardif, Martin Tardif, and Stuart Miller. featuring performers William Houston, vocals; Martin Tardif, electric bass; Dave Black, string bass; Steve LaCoste, flute; Jeff Fairbanks and Steve LaCoste, percussion; Joe Bouchard, guitars; Brian Beshore, violin; Eric Berkqvist, bass trombone; Diane Barkauskas, accordion/keyboard; and William Houston, keyboard.

William Houston Ensemble (1988)
Alan Lechusza, saxes; Diane Barkauskas, accordion; and William Houston, keyboard.

Illustrious Theatre Orchestra (1992-1999)
Shane Cadman, Paul Greenhaw, John Hoover (composers); Shane Cadman, tenor saxophone, keyboard; Christine Dietrich, vocals; Paul Greenhaw, keyboard; John Hoover, baritone sax; Scott Mcintosh, clarinet; Douglas Fairbanks, keyboard; and others.

Liquid Skin Ensemble/Steve Moshier (1998-present)
Steve Moshier, vibes; John Glenn, bass; Jannine Livingston, keyboard; and others

Lloyd Rodgers Group (1993-present)

Lloyd Rodgers, keyboard; John Glenn, bass guitar; Bruno Cilloniz, vibes and percussion; Gary Hung, violin; Mellisa Rodgers, trumpet; and Luigi Cilloniz, marimba and percussion. other members have included Sean Ferguson, electric guitar; and Paul Greenhaw, vibes

Music Action Corps (2001-2003)
composer collective featuring the music of Sean Ferguson, electric guitar; Matt Menaged, bass guitar; Bruno Cilloniz, vibes and percussion; Jeremy Reinbolt, vibes and percussion; and Eric Hendrickson, keyboard

paulbaileyensemble (2002-present)
featuring works by Paul Bailey and other composers, living and dead, performed by Scott Mcintosh, clarinet; Carl Stronach, bass guitar/vibes; Bruce Gallegos, electric guitar; Ryan Nunes, vibes; Eric Hendrickson, keyboard. other members include Sean Ferguson, electric guitar; Matt Menaged, bass guitar; Nelson Ojeda, keyboard; Bruno Cilloniz, vibes; Sam Formicola, violin; Sam Fisher, violin; Shalini Vijayan, violin; Feranado Vela, viola; and Christopher Searight, bari sax. vocalists include Nicole Baker, Nike St. Clair, Susan Taylor Mills, Karen Hogle, Sean Mcdermott, and Paul Cummings.

Counterpoint Culture/Jon Brenner (2005-present)
Yemila Alvarez, flute; Xico Castaño, clarinet; Mike Lasserre, saxophone; Dave Kurutz, guitar; Carl Stronach, percussion; and Jon Brenner, electric bass.

Paul Greenhaw Duo (2006-present, nyc)
Paul Greenhaw and Sean Ferguson, keyboards

Diverse Instrument Ensemble (D.I.E, 1992-present)

A California State University Fullerton chamber ensemble (the barbarians are at the gates) founded by Lloyd Rodgers to serve as an alternative outlet for all of the university's musicians to receive chamber ensemble training through exposure to a wide variety of great music by (mostly) dead composers. over the years the d.i.e has become a de facto training ground for many of these composers and ensembles. d.i.e alumni include:

Yemila Alvarez, Paul Bailey, Jon Brenner, Bruno Cilloniz, Luigi Cilloniz, Sean Ferguson, Paul Greenhaw, Eric Hendrickson, Gary Hung, Mike Lasserre, Scott McInstosh, Ryan Nunes, Veronica Paez, Melissa Rodgers, Carl Stronach, and Nicole Baker (faculty guest soloist)

my apologies to any who have been omitted. please feel free to send your corrections and comments along

after the darkness comes the light

sorry for the long absence.

as you can tell i didn't really feel like posting much for quite some time. some were personal reasons some were professional. overall i needed a break from myself. although the blog has been silent, life goes on. the group is doing fine and we are pretty far into recording the next cd. after the darkness eventually comes the light. i hate this, but it always is proven true. one of the practical limitations is it is hard to tell if the next idea has promise or is another cul-de-sac of banality. (sorry for the mixed metaphor... see what i mean)

part of it is the reality of the creative process. the conflict between what you hear in your head and what comes out on paper. its the desire to capture what is "in the air" that is so alluring and satisfying. i can see/hear it, but cannot i make it.(yet)
it reminds me of my experiences in stock market and gambling. when you are in the flow, of course there is nothing better, but the other side can lead to the worst lows ever. i'm not talking about writers block, i think that is different, but the fight to travel on the new path has been painful.

besides my aesthetic quest, i've spent the past 3 years on recording my first large scale work. (retrace our steps) i'll admit i have a real love hate relationship with the project. i'm real proud of the music, but i wrote it 3 years ago.

every cd i make i learn a lot about recording. if i could i would go back and change some things. the result is that the recording captures the clarity needed for a digital recording, but not the energy that we project in live performance. i wish it had both, along the way i have learned much through the process. at the end i now realize recording retrace our steps is how i learned what i like in the studio and how to get it. of course the problem is that every time i listen to it i hear the growth (in my technique as a composer and recording engineer). it perfectly captures a time in my life 3 years ago. of course that is the joke. by writing and recording a piece called retrace our steps, all i have been able to do is retrace those steps over and over again. learning how to record and mix such a large project. i know prison is bad, but i might choose it rather than of having to live with music i wrote in the past.

thankfully (for my mental health) my current recording project is capturing both the energy and clarity. its probably crazy to be recording the next cd while mixing the last one, but the forward progress and quick turnaround of the new cd is starting to make me feel better about the work done on the retrace our steps.

to make matters more complicated this fall i also decided to create an illustrated version of the retrace libretto.

the content of much of guy debord's text has little meaning (but great influence) in contemporary culture. i'm collaborating with a wonderful visual artist (jared rogness) to bring context to the work that most might miss through casual listening. obviously the music was created to stand on its own. i have no problem if it is listened to casually. but i have learned one thing from those neoconservatives and the libretto is my attempt to "control the message". think of it as a gateway drug to the spectacle.

weddings and funerals

i think i had my 20yr hs reunion last night? i'm still not quite sure how to process it?

last night we shared a show with a long forgotten friend (from kansas) that turned out to be much more than i ever expected. you only expect to run into people like this at weddings and funerals.

my 20yr hs reunion is this summer and my old friend marc tweed asked to play a show with us on his west coast tour with his band the hearers. my hs experience wasn't the worst, but since my family only lived in kansas city for a few years, i haven't had any reason to go back. last night i ran into 8? 10? 12? people that i went to high school with, and many of them now live here in los angeles.

for the last 16 yrs i have lived in los angeles and never met anybody from kansas and in one night i see them all. one classmate (michael lichtenauer) i sat next to in my high school music theory class is a 2-time grammy award winning vocalist and sings with all my friends in the master chorale! another classmate is a jpl scientist who lives right down the street in glendale!! i shared a show with people i played with in a middle school garage band over 20 years ago!!! wtf???

on top of all that, one of my earliest high school students showed up last night***. she is now the same age as when i taught her (25) and we talked over the long path from high school to adulthood. introducing her to my band and my old high school classmates was a surreal combination of all three parts of my life; past, present and future.

that is the best type of reunion i could have ever had. fto!

myself with marc tweed of the hearers.
i played in my first garage band with him in middle school

updates and miscellania:

1. we got a good recording of 11/25/05 from saturday night, enjoy.
   
2. needless to say monday nights show was much better than saturday night. we met some great bands. i barely got to hear the candyland riots, but everybody said they were fun.
   
3. pictures from the scene are now online.
   
4. if i can edit the video so it looks a little better i should be able to upload parts of the show. (i don't think you want the parts where the camera is bouncing up and down because of the dancing)
5. tim mangan(oc register) is giving us a nice writeup on his blog.
   

***the jmhs students i taught from 95-99 will probably be my most peronal and proudest achievement of my teaching career (long story, more on that another time)

the freight train theory of history

the results of the my latest compositions are starting to take shape. one of these new pieces (fearless leader) represents a new direction for my music. ligeti's death got me thinking about his famous quote:

Now there is no taboo; everything is allowed. But one cannot simply go back to tonality, itÂ’s not the way. We must find a way of neither going back nor continuing the avant-garde. I am in a prison: one wall is the avant-garde, the other wall is the past, and I want to escape.

i think his point isn't really about the rejection of tonality or the acceptance of the avant guard, but the idea that once you choose to follow freight train theory of history, to progress you must reject something else to move forward (ernest krenek in the ockeghem bio).

i think there is a third way. innovation for the sake of something new can lead empty art. my new works are influenced by performance considerations than by artistic innovation. not anything i'm doing is new or cutting edge, but the combinations of these ideas are a practical matter and a response to the limitations of performance and rehearsal i have faced for the past three years.

the pieces are written in c score, to be played by an indeterminate size ensemble so that we are able to adjust the orchestration for each group that gets together to play.

these pieces also have an indeterminacy of parts, form and orchestration. they can be realized in a performance in a precomposed fashion in which all the parts are assigned and the piece unfolds in a specific manner.

yet we also can create a version so that in some sections the musicians can choose which lines to play and even change the form and internal repetition structure from show to show.

somehow the idea of opening up the score for future "customization" makes more sense to me these days. i can think of many examples of similar ideas (duke ellington, charles mingus, terry riley, cornelius cardew...) but this is more an solution to a specific problem.

in rehearsal the early realizations of this have been powerful. it changes the power structure of an ensemble; for us to make music you have to go beyond just playing what is on the page. decisions are made and agreed upon with the ensemble that really matter in performance. how do we want this to unfold? what is the best way to get to the center of this music? where is this piece going? so far many of the "happy accidents" have made the music much stronger. there is such a difference when everybody is when they are given freedom to choose and interact than when they are assigned a specific role.

three years ago i created this ensemble with an idea of an specific instrumentation that i was interested in working with. now i have turned around 180 degrees. its all about having a group a people that want to get together and make music on a consistent basis because we have to express ourselves through the communal nature of rehearsal and performance. the size of the ensemble can expand and contract based on our busy schedules, a only moderately balanced quorum is needed to put on a show. in a very early review, i hope these "adjustments" to my process have freed my ensemble to create music in a more creative and collaborative way and perform in far more often in the future. fto!

on hiatus

since my college classes are now under control, the past few weeks i have been getting a lot of writing in. i have sketched enough material for probably 5 or 6 new compositions. the material came fast and furious so i'm going on hiatus to get some writing done.

recently i have noticed some patterns developing in my compositional output. for some reason i alternate between writing one piece at a time (retrace our steps) or quite a few at once (music from summerland). my current project is more in the summerland camp (direct, music for popular consumption), although one of the pieces is at dealing with some longer forms.

on a daily basis i'm pretty consistent about doing something musical until the next ideas hit (transcription, score study, counterpoint, eartraining... i know it sounds really boring). this process is much like daily the practicing i used to do on my trombone.

now i need to drop most nonessential projects and let the chips fall where they may.
i'm also pushing my next vocal piece the on backburner while accumulate libretto sources. on the slow days i'll probably, jump back to mixing my cd. it used to be hard to work on more than one project at a time but i'm getting better at it. i think revisiting my previous works while creating new ones sometimes helps me get over whatever obstacles i have encountered (aesthetic, conceptual, or technical).

for the near future i'll probably be bookmarking through my del.ico.us feed. (thanks to the standing room for the idea). you gotta listen to the podcast of elvis mitchell's interview of david mamet.

purcell's bitch

anyway, what do you think of the title. i overheard somebody talking a little shit about me the other day. mumbled something that my music was bad purcell. i took it as a compliment. now i want to write something to make it official.

its my friday and i already got a good start on my weekend by skipping my train this morning to get a few hours of writing before i drove into work at the last minute. its funny but i know its"writing time" where i'm a little pissed off about it. my good friend ryan kelly used to say it best. "my day job is getting in the way of my personal life"

that all being said, losing yourself in teaching classes is a good thing. i'm really happy with teaching this semester. i think i've made some good adjustments and there is much less stress than fall. next week my music ed students will be finishing up teaching 4 weeks of 4th grade music. you probably wouldn't think it, but 4th grade is the ultimate music teaching experience. they are at the perfect place to be introduced to music performance (remember the recorder?). they also are a lot more honest and open (concrete stage of development) to good and bad teaching sequences and strategies. they will really let you know if they don't think you are doing a good job. its a really great experience (and somewhat painful) for the pre-credential teachers. i'm really proud how the kept their heads up and took their first steps at teaching. it wasn't always pretty, but now they have a sense of what the future is so now they can start focusing what the first years of teaching will really be like.

the women'’s music festival last week was very interesting. it was fun to see ethel perform some great music and swap some stories in the world'’s worst hotel bar afterwards. marc swed evidently liked it, although i'’m not sure if he ever has aesthetically criticized much. its great that he is such a supporter and good writer about new music, but sometimes i wonder if we are at the same concert. my luck i'll be the first one to really feel his wrath