In The Music

After the fire

2011-07-23T10:59:00.000-06:00

End of the world, part deux

2011-07-04T21:34:00.007-06:00

There we were, minding our own business - enjoying the hot summer Sunday afternoon in the high desert of New Mexico - I looked out my bedroom window to see the first plume of fire on the hillside.

By Tuesday night, the fire had grown to this:

Then the video "fly-over" shows the aftermath.

We are fine. We are safe. We have seen earthquake, wind and fire. We have heard the still small voice of God, and we are changed.

Homage to Milton Babbit

2011-01-29T21:43:00.001-07:00

I never cared much for Milton Babbitt’s music. It seemed like a complex mathematical system – completely serial: from pitch order to register to dynamics to notes to rhythms, but where was the music? We learned the systems, and while I understood the technique, it just seemed bloodless and hyper-academic.

Then, 35 years ago, in the first semester of my graduate studies, Milton Babbitt came to speak to our 20th century music class. He brought a recent example of one of his piano pieces in which he used the serial technique he called “semi-combinatoriality”… basically showing how hexachord were permutations of other hexachords. That was the secret to his compositional system. He explained the system, and at the same time – he admired it.

Then it struck me how much he clearly enjoyed the sonic universe he had created: After he explained the way he’d composed his piece, he played a recording of the work. And within a matter of measures he smiled – grinned actually – he swayed with the rhythm, he glowed with pride and pleasure at this 3 minute piece he had made. I realized the joy he derived both from the success of his mathematical system displayed in sound and the emotional thrill of hearing the music he had created.

After our hearing, one of the skeptics in the class asked Dr. Babbitt, “Do you like that?” and in that moment I learned two points of wisdom that changed my life: He said, “The first hearing is always the hardest. You have to teach you ears the ‘language’ and give it the opportunity to appreciate and enjoy it.” And “yes. That’s the most important part of composing in any system: it’s your voice – you have to like it. You owe that to yourself first.”

Several years later, Milton Babbitt was the keynote speaker at my doctoral commencement. I did not have the opportunity then to thank him for the wisdom he brought to my seminar, years before. But I often thought of that day, especially when I write my music. Thank you Dr Babbitt…. You were a great teacher.

The Daily News

2011-01-12T10:16:00.001-07:00

Every morning – after I’ve read my email and played a few games of computer solitaire – I take the dogs for a walk. Actually, “walk” is kind of a misnomer; it’s more like a “smell”.

This is a bonding exercise for our little pack: sharing the smells on the morning walk and I am merely there to witness their daily ritual. In their own language they chuckle and gasp at the various smells along the route. They stop at the juniper bush in front and see who’s been by. Each one takes a sniff, and then we move on: “nothing new here… just bunny-poo”. A little further down the road, “Sparky’s already been here.” And “The River of Fur (three New Foundlands) has been by…” Then “Over here! Somebody had chicken for dinner last night!” “Uh-oh, Scruffy’s people forgot to pick up his shit again… Oh, that’s old shit.”

Everybody checks it out. Each smell. Gabi studies it in depth, with special interest in rabbit shit and bird droppings. Grreta will smell up one side of a blade of grass and down the other side to identify whoever left their “mark” – and she refuses to move on until she is finished. Bindi is dedicated to the hunt – and when he finds “evidence”, more often just eats it… but not until it’s been thoroughly examined by Gabi and Grreta.

And then! Together they huddle over the scene of a great disaster! Wait, wait! A coyote has been this way! Here is genuine coyote-shit! Red and mottled with bits of bone all in a great, tantalizing pile, right in the middle of the road!!. Grreta takes charge: she smells, she looks around, she reports to the others, they all hover and smell and discuss the pile of shit. Then Gabi goes about 10 feet away, up in the dirt! She’s found the ground all stirred up in a circle and… wait! Rabbit blood! Something happened here! The others join her. This smell is slightly older than the coyote-shit, but … yes, they are related! Same coyote! It’s a killing field – definitely! That Coyote has caught, slain and eaten a rabbit. It appears by the thorough cleanup of the site that the Coyote has a great deal of experience killing and eating rabbits. It is “His Nature”! And what about the rabbit? Are there more? Gabi looks under the pinon tree and in the usual rabbit dens… nothing new there. Grreta looks up in the far distance for signs of the Coyote: could He be walking across the arroyo now? She has spotted them before, and someday she dreams of catching one in the act.

And Bindi? He scruffs the dirt where the rabbit was slain, and then with a flying leap: he rolls in it.

How like in real life.

Mother's Day

2009-09-29T07:22:00.012-06:00

We gathered around her sickbed – my two younger brothers and I. And we watched as our mere presence began to revive her. First, she got color in her cheeks. There was a clear, bright sparkle returning to her eyes. There was a brown bruise mark near her left eye that she’d gotten when she fainted six weeks ago, when she fell head-first and hit the pavement. We watched as her wounds began to fade. She was weak and tired, from a month of pneumonia and we watched as she began to perk up, respond to our meager jokes with a smile – she gets it. She had no appetite, she said. And we coaxed her into eating. Ice cream was the essential ingredient – one quarter of a turkey sandwich and a whole scoop of ice cream – and we watched as her energy level began to rise.

We worked hard to be attentive, but not hovering; to engage but not over-tire her; we gave her all of our attention without expecting any return. It was our turn. We were just there: Rob would go out to the patio for a cigarette but he was sure to remain in sight; he texted his wife who was 600 miles away – he is both places at once. Mark checked his email on my laptop, and conversed at the same time with that easy, hearty laugh he is the master of joviality. I ran down to the dining room to get her a cup of orange juice, or fixed the CD player and put some music on, I was generally puttering and being present at the same time. Late at night, I laid on the couch and listened for her gentle old-lady snore to signal that she was sleeping and then I slept.

I thought about the delicate balance of dignity and the quality of life. Eighty-nine years old and facing the end like a wall. What she wants is to get back to normal. This IS the New Normal: nobody thinks beyond the moment when we all return home to our lives and she continues to recuperate. The New Normal is an apartment in an old “independent seniors” facility. Normal is everyone who knows her who waits while she dredges up their name and tries to be polite and honest at the same time.

She wonders if it’s worth the effort. Maybe she does it for us - her kids? For the sake of her friends? For the memory of Dad? For one more dish of ice cream? One more game of bridge? And a constant prayer… “surrounded by the love of God” ? And all she wants is for us all to be together again - her “three good kids.”

We all did the best we could.

Let Evening Come

Text & Time In The Music

2009-09-23T07:58:00.000-06:00

All right, all right - I've had it!

I know the answer, and I've been waiting for somebody to ask me the question - but I can't stand it any more. Sitting through HOURs - months! - of rehearsals; being yelled at by punk-baby conductors who "...can't understand why your diction isn't clear! ... can't understand what we're singing!... yadda, yadda, yadda!" This is Basic Brow-beating 101. And they just don't get it! Somebody print this up and put it on his piano!

Diction is a property of time.

It is not a matter of how you pronounce it but when.

In the rhythm of the text everything happens in precise sequential moments in time, together, all the same way. Just as unison vowel color results in a beautiful choral tone, so does rhythmically articulated consonants result in crystal clear text.

All the time people tell me - "I've never been very good with rhythm" And I tell them, I was never very good with rhythm, UNTIL I learned how to count-sing.

So the task - as a choral musician begins to learn the music is as follows:
1. Count-sing ( eewww ...we hate count-singing! we just wanna sing the music)
Why? - because count-singing gives the pitches a metric context in time.
Repeat after me: "count-singing gives the pitches a metric context in time."

It's about accents, and weight within the measure. It's about tapping your head and rubbing your tummy at the same time. It's about reading music without having to think of anything but the count. It's about finding and maintaining a consistent tempo in an ensemble. It's about multiple parts all singing the same words: "One-e-&-uh, Two-e-&-uh, Tee-e-&-uh." It's about articulating something together for clarity.

Robert Shaw said, "It's harder to sing in time than in tune." (p.2 of my autographed score of the War Requiem by Benjamin Britten)

Ash Wednesday

2009-02-25T21:52:00.009-07:00

A time of reflection:
"We are dust and to dust shall we return."

All life is, is energy; energy never dies but is transformed. It thickens and slows, sometimes freezes and congeals. The more something rots, the more alive it becomes. Not one organism, but billions of organisms, then returns to liquid, then gas, then ether, then disperses and feeds and joins new life all over again - even dust.

Indeed, as matter is constantly recycling, so the spirit - that higher energy frequency, that super super-consciousness - travels through time, becoming manifest. Matter and material - physical and incarnate - again and again and again and again, ad infinitum, up the ever-winding spiral of double helix doubled and doubled again until we find our way home. A gain.

We are dust. And to dust shall we return.
We are light. And to light we must return.
We are heat. And to heat we will return
We are photons and neurons, gamma rays, ions and quarks.
And to such stuff as stars are made, we seek to return.

The End of the World

2008-10-07T06:53:00.008-06:00

The other night I experienced a rare and sudden seizure of rage and anger. I didn’t stop to think about where it came from, what was I mad about, or what would be the consequences of my emotions. I just yelled – loud. I slammed doors and then I cried – hard. For a split second, I was surprised by the flaring pain in my chest and then I turned and raged some more and cried some more.

It did not feel good. I did not feel better.
But it was not the end of the world either.

I think I was always afraid that if I ever got really mad, it would be so dire and consequences so great that I could bring on the end of the world. (there’s a little arrogance for ya.)

And then I looked around – and it was the end of the world! The stock market plummeted and people lost their jobs; the earth quaked, crops failed, marriages failed and families fell apart; loved-ones died; whole families were wiped out in car accidents and plane crashes, marketplace bombings, coups and riots, floods and tsunamis.

Prophets and seers are pretty safe in their predictions, because for someone, somewhere, everyday, all the time - the world is always ending.

...and it's NOT my fault. And just because I don’t have an occasional dramatic, what we call a “scenery-chewing” tantrum, I can’t save the world, either.

But in the morning, the world is reborn. I am reborn, to go on – be kind and thoughtful; be hopeful and generous; be faithful and truthful.

God is with us; we are not alone. Thanks be to God.

In the Desert

2008-07-31T21:53:00.006-06:00

I came here just to look around and try to decide what to do next.

This vast sculpted land!

God tried his hand at carving: by erosion, by landslide, by earthquake and cataclysm, each a different tool of creation like chisels and plane and sledge hammer, in this giant eternal media. And then God steps back to see how light plays on all his creation: Never ever ever to see the same scene the same way twice, or be seen the same way again.

And so God stays here in the high desert to play – fine tuning and tweaking this limitless Creation – even today – What will a drought do to the color of this sand? How might a hot wind refine the curvature of this gorge? One new wildflower imported from the south by a thirsty bird can take seed on that dust-worn mesa and in a matter of a few dozen generations will color that valley a red/yellow never seen before; nor again.

Is God ever satisfied? Does God ever finish?
What would God do if God ever got tired of creating? At most, rest? And then begin again?
And we observe and wonder, record and remember, imitate and emulate, worship and adore, honor and each in our own way – do likewise.

And I - no-talent genius -
I walk the land of enchantment,
I see the fields of creation,
paintings and sculptures
galleries and studios
rows and rows of shops selling
the fruits of genius
and I crave the simple faith of the genius life.
How can this be? How ever can this be?

Courage. Not talent or material; not patronage or support, really; there are visions and ideas aplenty here.
What is needed is simple, raw, native courage.

Listen

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A Crisis of Confidence

2008-06-21T08:39:00.003-06:00

I woke up in a panic… I don’t know what the f%#^ I’m doing!

I can write the music – I know exactly how I want it to be. I can rehearse and conduct the music – I know exactly how it should sound. But I can’t produce a recording. I don’t know who can – though there must be plenty of producers and recording techs around who can do this. I don’t have any money to front a project like this. I’ve got this great vocal ensemble whose good will and talent I’ve been taking advantage of for a couple of months now, and they’re starting to slip away from me. It’s a stretch to ask them to show up week after week, without a plan or a schedule or any discernable progress.

So I resort to writing more music, more arrangements – just to keep them entertained and interested?

This is good stuff. I know it. And they know it.
But is it great? Will anybody want to hear it? Will it sell? ... It’s pretty square stuff. It is not slick. And then I start to really doubt …

Okay – so, I step back and take a look at this:

Am I doing what I know how to do? Yes – I wrote the music

What don’t I know how to do? Um… the next step? Production? Funding? Recording? All the stuff beyond the chorus- vocals – guitar tracks, keyboard tracks, hand bells (for God’s sake!), children’s choir? Editing? Post-production and? Marketing? Promoting?

How many people do this in their little home studios? (I think of Les Paul in the hall of a flea-bag motel with his portable reel-to-reel and a couple of mikes, looking for the perfect sound space…)

And am I doing this to make a million bucks? To market it world-wide? To get my tracks up on iTunes and Amazon.com?

I believe that in a perfect world, everybody sings.

I believe the next paradigm for music is ethereal: I believe that after live concerts and performances, after radio and records and 8-tracks and cassettes and CDs, comes the internet and downloads and streaming digital sound-files and podcasts and shared music worldwide. I believe in music to be made, to be sung, to be listened to, to be lived in.

But I still don’t know how.

My Dancing Day

Something to Gripe About

2008-04-18T07:17:00.004-06:00

As long as I'm blogging....

The real problem with online music (and believe me that's the next thing and it's irrevocable) whether you get yours from iTunes or Amazon or a buddy in Indonesia or eBay, is NO LINER NOTEs! No texts, no translations, no bios, no orchestra personnel lists or production info or program notes or dates. This may ok for the latest, up-and-coming rock band - but it is NOT okay for the latest, downloaded, bought-and-paid-for track of the J. S. Bach motet "O Jesu Christ, meins lebens licht" BWV 118.

What's a girl to do??? Translate the text myself? Go to the library and look it up? Spend hours of fruitless Googling or Wikipedia-ing? Scholars and musicologists, it's time to band together and do something about this! Fix it!

Meanwhile.... I'm going to Hawaii...

A Dog Named Cynic

2008-04-06T08:02:00.009-06:00

I woke up this morning needing a place to put my cynicism. I'm not a cynic by nature, but there it was, dark and scary, drooling in the corner of my cozy bedroom next to the pile of unexamined and un-shredded junk mail. I tried to tell my cynicism that I was too busy to deal with it now (simple denial usually works – at least it does with my procrastination and my various other fears, and especially my phobias) but there it was, flinging unspoken theories and far-flung what-ifs into my pre-dawn consciousness:

What if?
…the war in Iraq was just a distraction, contrived to stir up our patriotic fervor in the name of "all that's holy": our security, our future, our children, our land, yada-yada… meanwhile, oil companies jack up their prices; banks and investors bet on our loyalty and our patriotic fervor in order to make a "killing" of their own; banks lose money, investors and CEOs make money – or take it all, as it were….

What if?
Banks and mortgage lenders get this really good idea to make "good credit rating" a virtue. Then they provide credit cards and low-interest loans to anybody with a "good credit rating", and without a credit card we can't buy anything online, can't rent a car, can't get a plane ticket, can't put gas in the car, can't buy anything from a catalog or whatever. Then, to be sure that we stay in the credit loop (and because we have such a "good credit rating"), they raise our credit limit anytime we come near the previous limit. Then, they hike the interest rate up to 29%, even to 33%, and watch us scramble to keep up with the monthly payments by inching monthly revolving credit cycle down to 28 days or less. Meanwhile, they make it legally impossible to declare Chapter 7 bankruptcy (the poor man's escape hatch) and credit counselors turn up all over the internet -- Suze Orman berates us on the evening news for having gotten ourselves into this mess.

But it's okay. I don't feel like a total shit because I've got a "good credit rating" and it's my next-door neighbor who's gone into foreclosure, not me. And even though gas still costs $3-fucking-30 a gallon, and while it only seems as if I pay $900/month in interest on these good-credit-rating credit cards, the balance remains $40,000 and climbing, but everyday the mail arrives with more teasers for low-interest (but very high APR) credit cards, and tantalizing offers for equity home loans, and no-guilt tickets to financial freedom.

I decided to look for other cynics with whom to commiserate. I wasn't exactly sure who they were, so I Googled them and lo! there they were in Wikipedia! Ancient Greeks! A whole school of them!! The Cynic's philosophy was that "the purpose of life was to live a life of Virtue in agreement with Nature." (What happened to my "good credit rating"?) "...This meant rejecting all conventional desires for wealth, power, health, and fame, and by living a life free from all possessions. As reasoning creatures, people could gain happiness by rigorous training and by living in a way which was natural for humans. They believed that the world belonged equally to everyone, and that suffering was caused by false judgments of what was valuable and by the worthless customs and conventions which surrounded society."

Oh, my God, I had no idea! But why are they called Cynics, I wonder?

Again, Wikipedia: "...the name Cynic derives from the Greek word κυνικός, kunikos, "dog-like" and that from κύων, kuôn, "dog" (genitive: kunos).... It seems certain, however, that the word dog was also thrown at the first Cynics as an insult for their shameless rejection of conventional manners, and their decision to live on the streets."

(And here I was deriding and denying my inner cynic because I thought it was a bad thing….)

"…Later Cynics also sought to turn the word to their advantage, as a later commentator explained, "There are four reasons why the Cynics are so named. First because of the indifference of their way of life, for they make a cult of indifference and, like dogs, eat and make love in public, go barefoot, and sleep in tubs and at crossroads. The second reason is that the dog is a shameless animal, and they make a cult of shamelessness, not as being beneath modesty, but as superior to it. The third reason is that the dog is a good guard, and they guard the tenets of their philosophy. The fourth reason is that the dog is a discriminating animal which can distinguish between its friends and enemies. So do they recognize as friends those who are suited to philosophy, and receive them kindly, while those unfitted they drive away, like dogs, by barking at them."

What if!!?? We all refuse to be victims of this system?

What if ? Cynicism, in the name of all that's cynical, actually offers people the possibility of happiness and freedom from suffering in an age of uncertainty, as they so proposed 2500 years ago?

What about our capitalist ideals, I want to know!? What about our Global Market Economy? What about my mortgage payment? And how is all this different from Idealism, I asked myself (besides the fact that cynicism descended from Socrates and idealism from Aristotle and Ayn Rand)? Okay, permit me a moment's digression while I go back to the Wikis:

"…Idealism is the doctrine that ideas, or thought, make up either the whole or an indispensable aspect of any full reality, so that a world of material objects containing no thought either could not exist as it is experienced, or would not be fully "real." Idealism is often contrasted with materialism, both belonging to the class of monist as opposed to dualist or pluralist ontologies." (Okay, that's more than I wanted or cared to know.)

"What if?" (barked the dog in the corner).

What if? The average 21st century materialist cannon-fodder like myself decides enough is enough, and says: "I've been laid off. I'm up to my ears in good credit and I'll never be able to get ahead in this system. I'm going to stop buying stuff. I'm walking away from my financial responsibilities, moving into my hot tub, and the global market economy will just have to go on without me. I'm becoming... A Cynic!"

I'll tell you what if:

First, the stock market crashes, banks go bust, everybody's savings disappear, everybody's "good credit rating" turns to dust and all the CEOs retire and move offshore. Then, millions of illegal aliens come flooding over our borders to take all the jobs we no longer have, icebergs melt and Brazil fries, China goes bankrupt and returns to a repressive socialist society, great earthquakes will cleave the western hemisphere down the middle causing the Mississippi river to flood its banks and engulf all our crops; famine ensues, and the NAFTA highway is built next to my hot tub and 18-wheelers are roaring past me all night, every night, and God says, "Enough already, send in the Four Horsemen. This is the end of the world, people. Deal with it."

The world ends? All because I'd rather live in a hot tub than offer my whole being to the banks? I don't think so! I'm going back under my cozy blanket of denial. I'll just tell the cynic to shut up, I'm going back to sleep.

How Can I Keep From Singing

2007-07-17T16:05:00.001-06:00

Here's something to keep you going during the tough times, or just to soothe and encourage:

How Can I Keep from Singing?
Impromptu performs in The Cathedral of St. Phillip, Atlanta. 11/24/02.

Dangerously Overeducated

2007-06-04T07:13:00.000-06:00

Last Christmas I received a black sweatshirt with the above title emblazoned across the front: Dangerously Overeducated. I wear it proudly, and try to live up to the title as best I can.

Two years ago, my brother gave me my doctoral hood for Christmas. Most Ph.D.s don't bother to buy all the academic regalia unless they're actually IN academia and are required to don such rigamarole 2-3 times a year. But since I started singing in an Episcopal Cathedral choir, we are "allowed" to wear the academic hood for Evensong services and other special occasions.

This same cathedral choir in which I sing is going to England this summer to sing "in residence" in Windsor Chapel and then Canterbury Cathedral. Because of money and time constraints, I will not be going along - but it occurred to me yesterday that I should send the doctoral hood in my stead. I could appoint one of the singers who IS going to wear it in services - and then I could "be there" in spirit.

Ah, but I'm skirting the point - my blog today is a rant. I want to bitch and complain and stomp and scream: this comes from the very darkest pit of my stomach, Goddammit. And the problem is that without a carefully crafted well reasoned-out thesis, even a rant is just bitching and moaning. I read deathless theoretical tomes - many by my former colleagues in academia - and I get this wrenching knot in my stomach. It's all esoteric, however logical, well-ripened avant garde bullshit.

Then I woke this morning with an epiphany - of sorts: I don't want to talk about music. I just want to make the music. I don't want to analyze it to instruct - I just want to know: how does it work? and maybe why? Do you suppose the nuclear physicist feels this way? He doesn't want to actually use that bomb, he just wants to know how it works - for the pure esoteric joy of knowing? And if hypothesis become thesis becomes theory becomes revelation - all the better?

I wanted to compose a choral fanfare: the text (by Alice Corbin) began: "After the roar! After the fierce modern music!" I composed an 8-part arpeggiated vocal exclamation to fit the text - and the first time we sang it, it was wonderful; dissonant, tense and alarmingly explosive, and I blurted, "Oh, my God! What have I done?"

Red Earth - Overture.

THAT's what I mean when I say to myself: "Go home; write more music."

Spring Fever

2007-05-30T12:19:00.000-06:00

I think I was trying to test the blogoshpere or something - see how long I could let my blog lie fallow or if maybe it would expire of its own dis-use. I just went to a tech-workshop where the "theme" was new trends in technology and they kept saying over and over... don't blog unless you love to write. hmm... what I love is composing music and I haven't been doing much of that lately either. That is really what this blog is about: writing music.

Ok - I got the CD of Epiphanies, my Violin & Organ Suite - premiere was January 28th, and I was not there because I was here conducting Handel. The recording arrived in the mail last week - all in one hour-long track. So I downloaded it to my masher and cut it down to my piece only - 17+ minutes. I'd post it here but at 32 MB it's much too big.

Besides, I think you had to be there...

The Results Are In

2007-03-03T07:26:00.000-07:00

Top 10 of 99 Total URLs By KBytes

#	Hits		KBytes		URL

1	4	0.38%	11901	17.94%	/MuFiles/Falcon.mp3
2	5	0.48%	11586	17.47%	/MuFiles/dirty-tarantella.mp3
3	2	0.19%	7989	12.04%	/MuFiles/leteveningcome.mp3
4	2	0.19%	7636	11.51%	/MuFiles/Bells/Tolling1.mp3
5	2	0.19%	7285	10.98%	/MuFiles/Avowal.mp3
6	3	0.29%	5418	8.17%	/MuFiles/comethoufount.mp3
7	4	0.38%	3480	5.25%	/MuFiles/Bells/6-Chimes.mp3
8	2	0.19%	3054	4.60%	/MuFiles/BachPrelude.mp3
9	2	0.19%	773	1.17%	/MuFiles/Epiphanies/epiphanies-1.pdf

These are the Hits for February - Column 2 shows the number of actual "hits" or people who listened or downloaded soundfiles - Grand total 26 hits. Ok, ok - 14 or 15 of them were probably me... jeez.

I submitted three songs to a peer review for ASCAP. Most of the submissions were real "songs" like you'd expect to hear on the radio. Then I have to listen to nine songs and rate them (remember American Bandstand? "uh... I like the beat, it's good to dance to..."). And now, I just feel old - I was never with it. My lyrics either come from nameless or dead poets. I never did get into drums or electric guitar. I'm not much good to dance to... I am not where it's at. Neither am I very "avant garde"... No symphonies or operas, no commissions or tours. I'm not even on YouTube.

I like my music. I go to my blog and listen to my music. I'm one of the precious few. But it's all a vanity - a self-indulgence. I play computer games, I go to work, I sleep, I drive to the next gig and work and go home, eat something, play a computer game, read my email, walk the dogs, listen to my music until I fall asleep again.

Your Hit Parade.

2007-01-30T07:48:00.000-07:00

I understand the internet - I've been here since 1990.
I grok "google" - as a vowel or a noun.
I have a link to YouTube in my bookmark toolbar folder.
I blog, therefore I am.

I found and bought my house on the internet.
I publish and sell music on the internet.
I keep in touch with friends and family all over the world on the internet.
Old friends and former students, colleagues and singers in choruses I directed 25 years ago find me and reconnect.

There is no question that cannot be answered on the internet - sometimes with hundreds of different answers. And yet - I remain boggled. (did you ever notice how blogged is the jumble for boggled?):

So this is an experiment - I've put severak sound-file links here: Please, dear friends, just pick one and listen to it - or, as they say, "Hit me".
Then recommend this sound-file to ONE other person. Have your friend come to this blog and listen to a sound-file, then they can recommend this sound-file to one other person... and so on. When we reach the ba-zillionth listener, I think I'll have a Hit.

Okay? Ready? GO!

Soundfile #1 - Tarantella
Soundfile #2 - Bells
Soundfile #3 - Bachanalia
Soundfile #4 - The Avowal
Soundfile #5 - Come Thou Fount
Soundfile #6 - Explorers
Soundfile #7 - The Falcon
Soundfile #8 - Let Evening Come
Soundfile #9 - Chimes
Soundfile #10 - Moon of Wintertime

Same scene, one week later

2006-12-30T14:26:00.000-07:00

and then God came out from behind the clouds and laughed:

you can click on the picture for an enlarged photo. Feel free to right-click on the picture to Save the photo to your computer. It's spectacular!

2006-12-25T12:36:00.000-07:00

christmas carol central:

2006-12-21T17:31:00.000-07:00

Marco sent me this link; it's wonderful!!
(especially for an old horn player like me)

the Clarion Brass do the 12 days of Christmas right.

so... send me your favorite internet christmas carol setting and I'll post it here.

a merry christmas carol for all

2006-12-18T21:03:00.000-07:00

now this canon was actually composed by Mozart (K. 560) - but the words never quite work in polite company, so when we were doing the first annual wine tasting and Mozart sesquicentennial celebration last month, we made up new words and everybody had such fun singing it, I took great liberty to write christmas carol words. So - here you go - download it, print many copies, share it with friends, sing it at parties. Careful, though! it's a very sticky tune, and you'll find it hard to get rid of it once you start humming and whistling it in lines at the post office and in the bank and singing over the musak in the grocery store, in the shower, you'll wake up singing it and go to sleep humming it... and it will make your Christmas more, more, more, more merry and a hap-hap-hap-hap-hap-happy New Year to all. And may we live in peace for evermore.

Here's a soundfile of the Very (Mozart) Merry Christmas

Go ahead - sing along!

..and now for something completely different!

2006-11-19T08:07:00.000-07:00

Mozart in the streets:

Too Busy to Blog?

2006-11-16T08:17:00.000-07:00

The least I can do is post another soundfile: The Falcon - this one (written in 1978) has paid the rent more times than I can count!

Recently, I received an email from a student of 30 years ago whose middle school chorus was going to perform The Falcon. Imagine that! A timeless masterpiece, and I ain't even dead yet! Enjoy.

My Fortune:

2006-10-06T22:57:00.000-06:00

I received a bag full of fortune cookies for my birthday. Today's draw: "you are only as old as you act."

Woo-hoo! Is that right on?

Today (my actual birthday) I shut down the swamp cooler for the winter and caulked cracks in the stucco. Also shut down the sprinkler system for the winter. Paid bills. Dyed my hair (flavor of the month is Herbal Essence #11G "Amber Shimmer'). Walked the dogs about 2 miles. Went to the office for a couple of hours. Bought two pairs of new shoes. Went out to dinner and a movie - saw "Little Miss Sunshine" and loved it. Bought my first senior ticket for the movies!

Got a birthday greeting email from an old boyfriend of 40 years ago. He writes that he just retired - and suffers the common complaint of the recently retired: that he is busier than ever.

This is what 60 is like. I'm lucky; I'm healthy; I have a home and friends and meaningful work and a creative life and music. Very lucky, indeed.

Hell Week - the morning after, Part 2

2006-09-18T07:20:00.000-06:00

One week later: Everybody is worn out, sick, allergic, knocked-out-and-down-for-the-count and I feel like Typhoid Mary.

The weather is partly to blame - New Mexico had more rainfall this July & August than any summer in the past 112 years. That's the good news; the bad news is that there are bugs and allergens floating around that nobody has ever experienced before: swollen & red eyes, epic fits of sneezing, billowing clouds of used tissues overflowing waste baskets (and pockets), stiff and sore joints, rashes, dry skin and hives, plagues, pestilence, and all manner of flies and lice.

Within days after the concert half of the bass section and two tenors came down with bronchitis; two or three of the sopranos and altos got head-colds and laryngitis; one alto has major allergies - sneezing, wheezing and general misery; and the conductor has twisted something in her neck and is in constant pain.

For my part - I spent last week after the concerts begging for donations to cover my project budget and in that regard I blame George Bush. I don't see much point in creating a budget that's mostly fantasy. Certainly we did not exceed our budgeted expenditures (think about the parallel of foreign wars and trade deficits, here) - if anything our expenditures were somewhat under-budget. But our income was way under budget. As the Bushies would say, "Our income failed to meet expectations." And we still had not paid the director and the accompanist. What's that got to do with George Bush? (you may ask): It's the attitude that deficit spending and debt accumulation in the name of a worthy cause is a virtue. So, there I was, like some kind of karmic, latter-day Mozart - hat in hand, hitting up everyone I could think of for donations as soon after the concerts as I could - while the "spell of the music" was still on.

Okay, okay. It's not George Bush's fault.

Three months ago when I started blogging this blog, I wrote about having to put myself out there and The Dare" Juls said, "I don't know why it has to be this way for anybody else, but it has to be this way for you because you do not ask for what you want or need, and you dishonor your genius by exercising it on the cheap. There is help to be had IF YOU ASK FOR IT, and that's the not-doing-it-all-by-yourself part. You have not allowed anyone ELSE in on your dirty little secret, which is your music genius. You have to exhibit respect for your music by asking for help in producing it."

Remember that? And did I try to do this all by myself??
Did I just hope that people would open up their checkbooks and send money my way without my having to ask for it?
Should I have done this begging two months ago, instead of after-the-fact? Uh-huh!
Did I take this Dare and prove myself? Umm, NOT.

Instead, I waited. I hoped. I wished. I prayed. I wanted. I did every thing but A-S-K.

Until - in a fit of deep embarrassment and threat to whatever personal integrity I might muster - I did ask. I asked people who I was pretty sure would not say "No." I asked everybody but mother - and several people moved heaven and earth to bail me out. These ARE angels - dear, dear friends - who came to the rescue. Thank God! Thanks to these angels we are covered, our obligations are met and our debts are paid. One donor said, "This is borrowed money - but we believe in you." (Do I believe in my own genius?) Another donor said, "We may have to make some sacrifices - we're on a fixed income." (as he wrote a check from his money market fund) "... but we want to help."

And what of the dare?
It’s still hanging out there - unanswered. And I, the arrogant passive-aggressive genius am pretty much where I was before this began.

Now, dear friends, I will tell you about Hell and other lessons learned the hard way:

Hell is not about being broke or in debt. Hell has nothing to do with failure or disappointment. Hell is not being beholden or being betrayed or being arrogant or being denied or insulted or indebted. Hell is not anything that happens, nor anything you do. Hell is disconnection. Hell is a world without love. Hell is a world without music. Hell is self-denial. Hell is out there, alone and doing it all by yourself and hating yourself and everybody else for doing it alone. Hell is the void – without love, without friends, without God, without hope or resource. And that’s what Hell week is – trying to do it alone, self-abasing and self-abusing in the name of “a worthy cause.” Get it?

And here are the angels who pulled me from the jaws of my self-made hell and helped me connect again - in the music: Julie, Ben, Chuck, Beth, Gary, Connie, Erie, Susan, Viera, David, Freda, Mary Ann, Loren, Lydia, Mark, Maxine, Jim, Gay, Betsy, Johanna, Merri, Charlie, Mimi, Brianne, Sam, Mary, Nan, Ann, Bonnie. And Ariel.

Here is a sound file from the concert. "Come Thou Fount" Listen and enjoy.

Hell Week - the morning after, Part 1

2006-09-09T07:02:00.000-06:00

Santa Fe is an old, old city. Before it became the hideously expensive, chi-chi arts center it is today it was a wilderness fort, it was the Palace of the Governors, it was a trading center for various Pueblo tribes, it was the scene of conflict and commerce dating back to the 11th Century A.D.

This is Fiesta Week in Santa Fe. I had no idea! I mean... I knew, but I certainly didn't know what this is all about: it's like the Rose Parade and the Superbowl and Mardi Gras all in one. They reinact various customs and moments in history without much context - burning Zozobra (a 50 ft statue intended to represent "gloom"), today there will be a parade: floats, marching bands, horsemen - Conquistadores and indian slaves, cowboys and indians, trappers and soldiers and indians. Mostly they party.

Okay - I am not naive - I AM oblivious! This is the very week I scheduled to produce my concert in Santa Fe. I can't say that I wasn't warned - Santa Feans emailed ahead to say that traffic is hell, so we slipped into town the back way, unscathed. The editor of the Red Earth collection (the centerpiece of the concert) just left town for the week and would not be at the concert. The music critic gave us a great write-up in the paper, then I think he left town, too.
So we had a small and very appreciative audience - it was mostly people we knew personally, or people who were escaping the revelry down on the town square: about 60 ever-lovin' souls. And what they said (afterward) was they loved it.

On stage, though, we were sweating! Pros or not, we needed more time to rehearse. Problem is - if we'd had more time, more people would have to miss more rehearsals and the result would probably be the same - good, capable but not quite gelled yet. Ben got it right: we had six years of Impromptu in Atlanta not just to learn music but to learn EACH OTHER - to become a real tight-knit group. And I wouldn't say we really knew each other - people would come and go - the group would change a little, but together we grew IN THE MUSIC. We recorded, we performed, we just sat around my dining room table and sang.

This new group is so capable and musical and we have a great sound.
This new music is wonderful - some of the best stuff I've ever written!
This director is so into the music and so well prepared and she really seems to love this music.
Everybody really does know and like the music
-- and someday soon we'll know each other as well and we can relax and roll with the punches and enjoy ourselves in the music.

But first - we have to get ready for another performance tonight. This time in Albuquerque - no Fiesta, just the State Fair week.

No sound files for you today. COME TO THE CONCERT! 7:30 at the Cathedral Church of St. John, corner of 3rd and Silver in Albu-quack-quack. If you can't make it - you can send your donations to Santa Fe Music Works, P.O. box 23198, Santa Fe, NM 87502. No kidding!

Hell Week - Open Dress

2006-09-06T07:14:00.000-06:00

Picture this: eighteen singers, a lovely parlor Steinway grand piano, the harp is in place and in tune (for the moment), the flute is ready - low and whispy like a spirit flute, and 40 of our nearest and dearest friends alltogether in the living room of our very dearest (perhaps soon to be ex-) friend. It's just a run-through. What could happen? Lots of things could happen... and maybe they won't.... so what am I worried about. Opening night jitters? There's a lot that could go wrong this week AND everything is exactly as it should be. (remember what I said: "there are no wrong notes, only differences of interpretation.")

Here is the lesson of trust:
Trust the music.
Trust the performers.
Trust the conductor.
Trust the space.
Trust the music to the performers, the conductor and the space.
Trust the audience.
Trust myself.
To trust the music is to honor the performers and the conductor and the audience
....and myself.

The days of doing all this to honor The Patron - be it the King or the Philanthropist or the Sponsor-with-naming-rights or the Academic Review Committee - those days are over. This is just about being in the music.

Here's a sound-file for you: Let Evening Come
poem by Jane Kenyon, used with permission Graywolf Press.

Hell Week - The Fun Part

2006-09-05T06:25:00.000-06:00

You have no idea how many things there are to forget - IMPORTANT things - until 5 a.m. on Tuesday morning of Hell Week.

Hell week is, by definintion, the concert week - last minute rehearsals, last minute publicity, last minute arrangements for chairs, music stands, lighting, recording set up, program printing, piano tuning, radio interviews, picking up artists at the airport, last minute shopping for the right blouse because your usual old favorite has seen its last performance, last minute arrangements for ushers -- and this is the list of things I remembered. God knows what I've forgotten!

This is supposed to be the fun part:

We had a long, hard-working and productive rehearsal in my dining room yesterday. Eighteen people and three dogs, electric piano and chairs for everybody (except the dogs). First run-through with the flute and harpist. First run-through with the baritone soloist... though he has not had a chance to run one of his solo songs in the context of the program, he did sing through the two songs that include chorus. Ten pieces! in the program. We did drop the three piano interludes - much to the gratitude of the pianist who is suffering the onset of arthritis in her wrists and really doesn't need to be banging on the piano any more than necessary. I'm afraid my little yamaha didn't quite meet her standards, either -

Oh, that brings me to the piano! Remember, the Cathedral doesn't have a piano? Well, actually it does - it's an old Steinway upright, which the Cathedral choir director says is insufficient for the standard of the cathedral - nevertheless, negotiations with a local music store were insufficient to make a deal for a 24 hour rental with tuning and moving, so the old Steinway will have to do. At least it stays in tune, and has a certain rustic charm which I believe is perfectly appropriate for some of this repertoire.

Cast adrift in a sea of tonal ambiguity...

2006-08-20T22:15:00.000-06:00

A few words about life and 21st century tonality from a distinctly practical and non-academic point of view:

Here's the thing about tonality: there's this relentless drive toward a resolution. It's a kind of inevitability, that once you declare your homebase, define it and then venture away from it, you ad-venture away from center until you find yourself in another key - another country - you can't remember how you got there, and you don't know how the hell you're going to get home again... and the worst of it, if you call for help - you're going to feel like a damn fool, or Wagner, or both.

How like real life, this is!

Ok, bear with me now. Tonality: the functional relationship of pitches to a single central pitch in a scale. The tonal center is like the king on a chess board, and all the rest of the pitches define that central pitch by the way they relate to it and to each other. Like, I am who I am because of the way you relate to me. and when that relationship is gone... whoops! I lose ground. my stomache gets all queezy and my head aches and I don't know where I'm going, and things pile up, and I don't have all the answers, and I become absent minded, the clutter grows, the seas swell and roil and I am cast adrift in a sea of tonal ambiguity.

There was a time when theorists believed that if it didn't sound pretty, it wasn't harmonic... that may still be true but the fact is, pretty sounds just float out here looking for resoluntion and it's dissonance that motivates! You know the urge to scratch that itch until it bleeds - that outright pain may be better than the goddamn tickle - get up and do something!

The Not-So-Easy Parts

2006-08-18T08:29:00.000-06:00

It seemed like such a great idea:
1. Write a bunch of music.
2. Get people to perform it. (they love it, by the way. They all tell me how much they love it; how glad they are to be doing this. I love it – it sound’s great. The audience is going to love it – I hope.)
3. We have a radio interview lined up for Sept. 6th; we have newspaper interviews and stories lined up for that week.
4. We KNOW we have an audience of at least 26 people who will be at the informal dress rehearsal… it may be as many as 30-35 people total… plus 16 singers. So that’s a minimum of 45 people crammed into the livingroom. That will be cozy.
5. The recording tech was looking at the space and thinking about mic placement.(…he snapped at me when I said I didn’t want the mics too close to the singers – he said, “I’m the professional; I know what I’m doing here." Oops. Sorry.).
6. The conductor wants a contract.. or at least a letter of agreement .. She deserves a contract! I’ve got a budget all lined up – but Jesus, I’m betting on the come here! And it’s the same story with the pianist – she knows we’ll pay her. Nobody knows how or when.
7. I am not being paid. There is nothing in the budget for the composer. (Note to self: go back. Read the blog “the Dare”. right, right. Gotcha…)
8. We did get a small donation check ($250) in the mail just the other day. (pop that puppy right in the bank!)
9. What I need is UNDERWRITERS! (Yeah, yeah… that’s the ticket!) Someone to just write a check, hand it to us and say, “Here. This music deserves my support.”
10. I figure all we need is for 200 people to come to one of three performances and throw 15 bucks each in the basket and we’re covered. Right. Pray for me, mother of God! It’s just simple mathematics.
11. Now here’s an idea – as long as we’re recording these performances (no editing - just record it! ) we could put ‘em up on the web , like right here in the blog- and people could download tracks for, say, a buck each. And tell all their friends – it’ll be the next best thing to being there. Mozart had his subscribers. This could be like 21st century subscribers. And for a mere $2.50 a pop, I’ll throw in a ringtone for your cell. Cool, huh?
12. Do we really have to rent a piano? Maybe they’ll loan one to us for an ad in the program… and tune it for free…
13. Programs! Oh, yeah – I have to put together printed programs, flog ads, write program notes and print them. And have a list of donors, and a way to make donations – another begging insert for that –
14. Two out of five rehearsals done. Singers are really “getting” the music. We’ve sung through everything at least once… the hard piece is really beginning to gel. But we’ve had people missing at each of the rehearsals, and different singers will be missing next week. Time is not measured by “how many weeks between now and performance,” it’s “how many rehearsal minutes we’ve got left?” (like, y’know, “how much cash is available on that credit card?”)

The canvas of music is time. It is liquid air… it gets spent. Time gets all spent and time runs out and the music is still floating out there in the ether waiting for its turn to be heard, waiting for the frets to die down, waiting for the do-lists to be done, waiting for everyone to just sit down and listen and hear.

"… And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea."

Here’s another sound-file: “Explorers” (© 2002. MLPBadarak)
The text is from T.S. Eliot’s “Little Gidding” (used by permission.)
Do yourself a favor: Sit down and listen.
Then do me a favor: Send me a buck.

flogging the blog

2006-08-09T07:21:00.000-06:00

I've been out in the blog-hood looking for other composers & musicians... I found a former student who's been living in Budapest. I found a former colleague who's a music critic in New York. I found the Daily Nooz - which is pretty funny. All the blogs have links to other blogs and/or sites, a trail of breadcrumbs to help quel my curiosity - or lead me down the rabbithole.

Somebody named Anonymous (could it be the famous medieval woman composer Ann Onymous?) has been posting my blog: urging me to link my site to these "interesting places" which turn out to be ads for money-lenders, drug sellers, plastic surgeons and other dens of dubious iniquities.

This morning, I read in the NYTimes (dot-com, of course) that some 62-year-old woman's entire online search-life was used as publicity by her server (AOL - by name). In a matter of minutes, people followed the breadcrumb trail of her search links and found this 62-yr-old Georgia widow who loves dogs and likes to help friends search for stuff online. AOL issued an apology. But there she is - user No. 4417749 - complete with her picture and every search she's made online, without regard for her motivation, no less privacy in the last year or more...
Quoth the NYTimes (Ur-blog?) "AOL removed the search data from its site over the weekend and apologized for its release, saying it was an unauthorized move by a team that had hoped it would benefit academic researchers." I hope user No. 4417749 has a new internet provider... umm... google? hotmail? Right.

Perhaps I'll go google myself now. (it's the millennial vanity)

Here's another soundfile. Enjoy.
http://www.villawisteria.org/MuFiles/Bells/4-Cascades.mp3

The Easy Part

2006-07-27T20:26:00.000-06:00

Writing the music is the easy part.

It's the copying, proofing, formatting, recopying, correcting, printing, proofing again and reprinting, xeroxing, and then comes the really hard part: no, it's not the rehearsing or performing - it's the promoting! Writing ABOUT the music seems way harder than writing the music. Getting the critic to listen and take note. The bio, the schedule, the background on the organization and the ensemble, the programing for the next season: all the PR that goes into the preparation and production. Production details, getting the audience.

I am making some progress. Singers have their music; the pianist has her music. (I mailed it all on Monday). I still don't have a venue for the Santa Fe concert, though I do have a fallback venue if the first choice fails. One of the board members wrote a great email to a friend asking about possible hotel venues in Santa Fe - but that being Fiesta weekend, and barely six weeks from now, I don't hold out much hope. Just keep on doing something every day... I spent all day working on PR - and that's ready to go. Juls helped with editing and proof-reading the PR. Without her, I fear I'd never get any of it done. And then another Board member's will have lunch with the local music critic tomorrow, and she'll give him the PR packet.

See? I'm not doing it all myself! I'm not doing alone.

A few years ago I composed an unaccompanied choral setting of Denise Levertov's poem "The Avowal" - I wrote it for the singers, as kind of a warm-up piece - to help them find a blend with each other and to kind of allow everybody, audience and performers alike, relax and float with the music. The text begins "as swimmers dare to lie, face to the sky and water bears them..." That's what I want: just to float. But the point of the poem is that lying in water, on your back can be a scary thing - we have to let the water bear us; "...as the hawk rests upon air and air sustains them" we have to let the wind carry us. (BTW, I love the idea of air sustaining the hawk, in contrast to the singer using air to sustain a sound. ) I tried to use that in the composition - until the singers and the listeners just can float or fly along effortlessly

"...so I would learn to attain
freefall, and float
into Creator Spirit's deep embrace,
knowing no effort earns
that all-surrounding grace."

And that's the easy part: The Avowal

get your next soundfile here!

2006-07-22T20:22:00.000-06:00

and hold on to your socks!
Tarantella

Call me Maestra

2006-07-21T08:08:00.000-06:00

I will always remember the time when I was directing an orchestra & chorus in rehearsal, and one of the clarinet players raised his hand and said, “Maestra, I have a question...” And I felt this… rush. It was a completely new and very, very cool feeling: complimentary, respectful and courteous and quite flattering – it was such a rush! I remember realizing in that moment that certain protocols of respect and collegiality from the eighteenth and nineteenth century actually remain in some circles at the end of the twentieth century, and I had just been inducted into those hallowed circles when this musician put me upon the podium and called me, Maestra.

But I got over it quickly. It’s not that I was uncomfortable though I certainly was unaccustomed to being called Maestra – in fact, I was quite at home up there making the music. Maybe I was afraid that I would lose something – I’m not sure exactly what – and would be alone. I do know that my mother often warned me about “showing off, or making a spectacle of myself, and the virtues of being modest, self-effacing,” and yada, yada, like that. I thought I preferred to be just a regular guy.

Soon after that time, one of the singers in my chorus made a podium for me. It’s a beautiful, heavy wooden box with inlaid beige carpet on the top. It’s sturdy and, well… authoritative. For a long time I used it in rehearsals – frankly because I’m so much shorter than the singers in my chorus – and I always use it performances, often even if there is one provided by the concert hall.

It has taken me 15 years since that day to realize that that musician did not put me, on that podium to call me Maestra. I stepped up there, I prepared, I held the baton, I led the musicians with authority and that I deserved to be called Maestra. And the minute I step off that podium I may become ordinary again but that’s the magic of it! It is not vanity nor conceit, it's not even an honor, as such. It's an attitude and a state of mind: it's how I feel about myself as a musician and a conductor and a composer. Then, smile and answer the man's question; lift the baton and make music.

Just do the next thing

2006-07-16T22:22:00.000-06:00

1. I saw the publicity for the concerts yesterday – it’s going to be part of the Cathedral Concert Series in Albuquerque.

2. I talked with a guy about the Santa Fe venue. There’s a snag with Santa Fe: the weekend we want to do this, is Fiesta Weekend (actually, more like Fiesta month from the looks of the events calendar – every thing seems to be pretty well booked with mariachis or flamenco). So if we do it there, we’re going to have to fluff-up the Southwest poetry & Red Earth theme for Santa Fe. That should be easy.

3. I got three sopranos in the last two days. Yah! So it looks like its going to be a nicely balanced chamber choir of about 16 singers.

4. I gave the music to the harpist (also the guy connected to the Santa Fe venue). Next I give the music to the pianist – who is connected to the alternate Santa Fe venue.

5. I think I have a line on a guy who will record for us…

6. I consulted with the choral director and we set up the rehearsals – 5 rehearsals in as many weeks.

7. I FINISHED composing the “Desert Song” – it’s moody, and seductive, and deep and I love it. I gave parts to the harpist and to the conductor. Watch this space for preview sound files.

8. I had the insulting, painful, nobody-will-like-it conversation with mother. Jeez!

( Parents! – in my case, my mother; in Wolfy’s case, his father – just don’t’ get it. They fear for us ( like, we’ll starve, we’ll be eaten by lions, or sharks, we’ll die of thirst in the desert, we’ll never be successful, employed) and they don’t really care much for our music, either. Do not look to them for validation, acceptance or praise – it is not there and will never be.
So I was thinking about Mozart today. All those sonatas and concertos for piano, all those string quartets – written to “pay for” what he really wanted to do, which was write operas. “Get a job!” So, he played parties; he gave salon concerts; he showed up in the town plaza with his piano on a cart and played. He never had a patron, but he found sponsors and sold subscriptions to his concerts.
My mother does not like my music. 'Truth is, she hates it. She asks me, “Do these people want to sing your music? I hope you’re not forcing it on them.” I don’t even know how to answer that. My friend says, “Just say, ‘I’m hanging up now.’ And hang up.” It’s not really rude, it’s just exactly what she thinks: “I don’t like your music, don’t ‘force it on me’.” Okay – she’s not invited. Some bloody karma there! )

Then I got up like a shot this morning, OMG! There’s no piano in the Cathedral!!! Can I do this with organ? No wonder Maxine thought Ben was the accompanist! And Maxine (the conductor) is flying off to UK tomorrow, and the publicity has probably already gone to press. And … there’s too much to do to fret about mother, we’re putting on a show in less than two months!.

Get your daily soundfile here!

2006-07-15T07:24:00.000-06:00

Gotterdammer Fuguing Ausgepisst!

The Project

2006-07-15T06:58:00.000-06:00

My friend Julie calls it sash-twisting. (RE: The Dare, 7/13/06: It's that self abasing, self abusive reluctance to put it out there and let people hear this great music I make; like, “please, suh, a pittance for my treasure? And I swear I’ll never ask again.”) Jeez, it’s not welfare we’re talking here!

It’s time to put on a show. Think of Mozart betting on the come – no grants, no patrons, just a bunch of friends and an old music hall – producing the Magic Flute. How did he do that? Did it kill him? (oo, don’t wanna go there!)

Okay, think of Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney: “How can we make money to save the farm? I know, we’ll put on a show! My mom can make costumes. We can use the barn… it’ll be great!”

I guess that’s what this blog is all about: The Project:
"Red Earth"
I’ve written the music. Now it’s time to produce and perform it.
No more sash-twisting, just get out there and sing.

No-talent Genius

2006-07-13T06:57:00.000-06:00

There is some deep, intrinsic quality about the honest creation of something which has come to me by thought and inspiration and must be written down and made real in sound and time through the connection of minds and souls in performance and hearing by an audience. This is no mere entertainment – this is not very commercial – it is for the hearing, for the listening, for the humming, for the singing, for the remembering, for the dreaming, for the knowing. And if someone wants to give me money for this, great! Terrific! But that’s no reason to write it and I’m not going to stop composing if it’s not commercial enough or if no one buys it.

But there I go – defending myself and my work. And I don’t need to defend it. I have always been aware of the fact that the world is full of people who have a vested interest in the failure of the artist, people who are ready to reject new art, new music, new ideas in the name of commercialism. So what? If Mozart had quit writing when his patron said it was “too complex, too busy, too difficult to understand,” what a bleak and empty world this would be today… how the sound of all music since then might be different. I am confronted by the safe, scared, bland and unchallenged pablum of the commercially acceptable aesthetic every day… it is the food for tiny, empty little minds…

We are just beginning to understand how the complexity of Mozart’s music is the very stuff of genius, Not too long ago the governor of Georgia, in a rare moment of enlightenment, set aside money to give a free CD of music for every infant born in the next five years. And what is on that CD? Mozart, Bach, Vivaldi, Beethoven – and not the easy stuff that lulls and puts to sleep – but the intellectually challenging and brain stimulating stuff that helps children grow inquiring minds with the confidence to explore, develop and acquire a variety of taste and interests… yea, even in the womb.. helping to raise a new generation of people who enjoy and value new art.

Okay… So I’ll keep working on it. And make it perfect and send it out and see what happens. Nevermind, the road is full of disappointments and rejection. Just nevermind and go on.

“…pick yourself up; dust yourself off and start all over again.”

The Dare

2006-07-13T06:23:00.000-06:00

This blog begins with a dare:
it came in an email to me from my oldest, best friend and was prompted by my usual gripe about not having enough money, no recognition, no fame&fortune, blah, blah, blah!
so here it is:

" I don't know why it has to be this way for anybody else, but it has to be this way for you because you do not ask for what you want or need, and you dishonor your genius by exercising it on the cheap. There is help to be had IF YOU ASK FOR IT, and that's the not-doing-it-all-by-yourself part. You have not allowed anyone ELSE in on your dirty little secret, which is your music genius. You have to exhibit respect for your music by asking for help in producing it. Please, sir, I want some more abuse; abuse me, and dishonor my music. Your mother happily complies. No one else agrees with her, but they don't get the chance to say so, or to help get it out into the world. Modesty is self-denial and there is no virtue or honor in self-denial.

Stand up! Make music.