You Got It, Dude

The Return: Part II

2009-02-21T11:50:00.002-05:00

Back, again.

It's funny... going back in review and looking at the entries I had forgotten about (most of them short and frantic) that have led up to recent and forthcoming events. One such entry said something about me being consumed by insanity whilst writing my new orchestra piece. After two rehearsals (I have the good fortune of being allowed to conduct the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic for the premiere) I must say I am very pleased with the way things are going and grow more and more excited every day for the March 4th concert! More details on that as it approaches...

In other news, I recently took half of the first prize for the Harry Archer Memorial Scholarship, which awards $1,000 to a student composer for string quartet composition. This year the Parker Quartet came to CMU to conduct the reading and played beautifully. Our judges were Professor Donald Wilkins (CMU) and Professor John Beall (WVU) along with a vote from the quartet.

At their request, I also have a score in waiting with the American Composers Orchestra for their Penn Presents new music reading and "lab" in Philadelphia in April. Keeping my fingers crossed that they will actually read it.

A few other musical projects on the side include a new work for the Ion Sound Project, a new string quartet and a nonsense opera. We'll see where they all lead. For now, staying focused on what is in front of me!

The Return...

2008-12-16T09:20:00.003-05:00

Hello, blog!

After another short hiatus, I am back in action motivated in particular by two very exciting premieres that occurred within the last two months. As I alluded to in a previous post, I have had the good fortune this year to write a full-scale orchestral/choral work for the Carnegie Mellon Holiday Concert which was conducted by Robert Page on Friday, December 5 and broadcast live on WQED and WQEJ. Dr. Page was featured on the radio in an interview with Stephen Baum and paid me some very kind compliments, referring to our past collaborations on "Katsu!" and "Krljavestica!" (my works always seem to end up with exclamation points in the title...) and the exciting premiere of "Hodie Christus natus est". The combined choirs (Concert Choir and Repertory Chorus) did a fine job in preparing my "non-polarized" melodies and counterpoints (Page's terminology) and the orchestra really brought it together in a superb performance that I hope will not be the last! Aesthetically, the work is my own, but falls on the accessible side of the fence as I had to cater somewhat to the Christmas concert crowd. That said, I managed to give a few people a start (most of the first four rows nearly leapt out of their seats) with some powerful bass drum action. As always, I tried to instill a sense of mystery and awe by using greatly contrasting sonorities and drawing very heavily from Renaissance and Medieval sources to pay homage to the antiquity of the text and the "feeling" of Christmas as per the text. The work was very well received and I am really looking forward to next year when the Heinz Chapel Choir plans to unveil my "Coptic Hymn", a work for a cappella chorus with four soprano soli hidden in the loft.

You can watch the performance by clicking here and navigating to "past events" and "holiday concert". The password to watch the video is "xmas" and my work is the fifth piece on the program (following the Corelli Christmas Concerto).

November 15 saw the premiere of my work "Dialogues" which was composed to illustrate my findings after my journey this summer in Eastern Europe. Before the performance I made a surprise dedication to Marilyn and Ray Gindroz, my benefactors for last summer's trip and who have both become my dear friends. Richard Cowan, the new bass/baritone voice teacher at CMU was my narrator and did a wonderful job bringing my diary entries to life against a fairly abstract backdrop of sounds from the flute, bass clarinet, violin, cello, celesta, piano and percussion. This work was also very well received and we will be coordinating a repeat performance at the Gindroz Foundation fund raiser this year at the art space in Regent Square, an outlying neighborhood in Pittsburgh.

As for the rest, I am dedicating next semester to choral and vocal music, looking to compile a book of music for a cappella choir to record and send out to my buddies in the choral world. I have begun work on my Missa Occulta, a large scale work for pipe organ, 2 violins, bass, trumpet, horn, trombone, flute, clarinet, bassoon, percussion and small chamber choir that I hope to perform in Heinz Chapel possibly in the late spring. I also plan to compose a one-act chamber opera and whatever else may happen my way. More later!

"Serious" Tietjen

2008-09-21T20:59:00.002-04:00

Steven: "Yes, 'Serious Tietjen,' he was my puritan grandfather."

Me: "Awesome."

Quotes

2008-09-17T16:02:00.002-04:00

[regarding creativity and my latest composition project which has been draining my energy]

Joel: "I've found that my best work is the work that is projectile vomited from my head."

Me: "Dude, this piece is like my head exploded in a mason jar... and is now being spread on the toast of creativity."

Joel: "Hehe... sounds like something The Tick would say... except it would be 'the Toast of Justice'."

Me: "Right."

The Magic of Christmas

2008-09-15T09:18:00.003-04:00

The value of time, i.e., patience, is the secret key to understanding any Universal Mystery. As many of the ancient neophytes have related, the true Mysteries are enshrouded in arcane symbolism and esoteric riddles, to which there is one key to understanding, one key to decode their cypher — a key that is (if not symbolically) lost forever.

Time, in my opinion, is one of the greatest media for at least emulating that key and allowing life to return to you its own fruitful rewards. Given time to develop, given time to mature, given the accumulation of experience over time and the greatest amount of effort put forth across a span of time, without regard to its passage.

How does this relate to music? Time, and patience, when coupled with the most carefully regulated degree of tenacity allow people to come to understand one's music. First the composer's vocabulary is established, then an understanding matures of the composer's ability to mold, transform and adjust his vocabulary to suit the needs or restraints of varying degrees of ensemble. Indeed, music and its notation (as a friend once pointed out to me) are the visual representation of the passage of time itself.

Writing music takes time. Understanding, appreciating and hearing the profundity of a great work of art takes time to cultivate. Just as cutting corners and stunting [personal] development leads to instant gratification in deceiving the passage of time — knowledge and understanding should be questioned in a person who enjoys or is satisfied without effort anything considered art after only their first experience with it. In this way, a work of art should be viewed all the more critically in proportion to the amount of effort and therefore time put into its creation.

So what the hell am I talking about? Well, I am in sort of a celestial mood this morning as I sit down to complete my setting of Hodie Christus Natus Est for choir and full orchestra. In a fit of excitement, I have nearly finished the entire work in full score in the span of three days. Enough time put into it to yield a satisfactory product? Only time will tell, not to mention the success of the performance. Time, however, has been my ally in what brought about the possibility of this work as my latest triumph comes once again from the wonderful Robert Page who has come to know and show interest in my music over the past ten years.

This past Friday, I sat down in his office to discuss my latest work for a cappella choir — the "Coptic Hymn" — delivered dutifully to John Goldsmith for the Heinz Chapel Choir's Christmas Concert. Riding Dr. Page's positive reaction to the work, I proposed writing a short piece (about 5 minutes) for full orchestra and chorus for Carnegie Mellon's Holiday Concert. He accepted.

The most exciting detail for me is this will be the second work in one week to be premiered (by two different ensembles) and broadcast live on PBS (Pittsburgh's WQED, which has brought us, among other things, the first live television broadcast into a classroom [in 1955] and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood). That said, Dr. Page's acceptance of my proposal has also given me an opportunity to write for orchestra and be ensured two orchestral premieres within three months, as my official orchestra piece (a requirement for both undergrads and graduate students at CMU) will be premiered, myself conducting, on March 4, 2009.

More details to follow.

Yes... for your information:

2008-09-09T11:44:00.002-04:00

I am embarking down a road of insanity with my latest orchestra piece.

Attack of the Mutant Caterpillar!

2008-09-01T10:21:00.010-04:00

Well... needless to say I wrapped up the lemonade fast and I have to say I feel fantastic. I ended up cutting it short by a day, due to some dizziness I had been experiencing. A point that was brought up in light of this was the possibility that I don't have as "toxic" a body as the average person who might undertake such a drastic regimen, due to the fact that my entire life my family has eaten relatively simply, and I have never drunk softdrinks or sodas nor had much of a sweet tooth. I'm sure the "ten day minimum" is totally arbitrary, and despite my falling short by a day, I recommend fasting in principle and practice to anyone interested in hitting that metaphysical "reset" button or just looking to wring out their spiritual and physical sponge!

As part of my "get back in shape" routine, having started with the fast, I am back on solid foods I have been cooking 90% from scratch. It's been very gratifying to make simple things like hummus, pesto, tomato and cucumber salads. I have certainly become intensely selective on what I buy and choose to eat, though I'm sure eventually I'll cave in to some of the less healthy vices I participated in before (red wine ideally being the healthiest of them!).

I have begun jogging again and practicing Tai Chi with hopes of fully returning to Kung Fu before long. Yesterday afternoon, while I was out on a jog along the Upper Panther Hollow Trail I encountered this terrifying creature:

I am not joking when I tell you I spotted it from at least ten yards away, and upon closer inspection found it to be at least six or seven inches in length! It was just bumbling clumsily along the path, overturning leaves and twigs and being proud that it was the largest most frightful caterpillar I have ever encountered. A middle-aged hippie couple strolled by a moment later (the man in a sort of bicycling suit that looked like it had been tailored out of a dashiki with thinning shoulder-length hair, the woman equally decked out in burlap with a walking stick) and jumped at the sight as I crouched over the creature observing its weird movements. I looked up and said, "looks like something out of the Amazon, eh?"

The woman could only think to say "he's certainly been eating his Wheaties!"

Wheaties, indeed. At home I remembered to look up the monster, finding it in a Google search by typing in "giant green caterpillar with spiny orange horns". It is known as the Hickory Horned Devil, a fittingly Appalachian sounding title accommodating its Western Pennsylvanian discovery. It is fairly common to the area, and after an over-winter subterranean pupation it becomes this marvelous specimen:

Better known as the Regal Moth or Citheronia Regalis it certainly peaked my newly developing interest in the Natural Sciences, though I haven't yet graduated to the level of collecting live specimens (so far my collection has halted at recently deceased cicadas I find on the sidewalk in Squirrel Hill). I did, however, during an hour or so of tottering around the internet find this interesting website that creates custom mounted insect displays. I guess I'll save up and start ordering custom framed bugs I encounter, I'm sure it's cheaper than a bottle of ether anyway.

If I see another lemon...

2008-08-24T09:02:00.002-04:00

So I have officially begun day EIGHT of my fast and it's still going pretty well. I have to say, regardless of whether it is placebo or not, my skin feels smoother, I breath clearly (no more stuffy nose from allergies, at all), and, of course, the convenient side effect of having lost a ton of weight. Now, the weight, or they say half of it, will come back once I start to eat solids again... but it is my goal to immediately begin regulating that with exercise and see if I can't continue to burn fat and get back on my regular diet. I admit, on Day Seven (yesterday) I started to grow concerned that I was doing something wrong as the whole morning I experienced mild dizziness. At first, I blamed it on having gone out and exercised, perhaps a bit too vigorously for the level of calories I am taking in per day (maybe 600). After consulting several online sources, all of which only sang praises about the days following the third, I decided to distract myself and go down to Target to buy some more kitchen supplies (I have already begun to plan a huge menu of foods I can cook entirely from scratch; there is value in knowing everything that is going into your food!).

After coming back home armed with measuring spoons and a juicer I checked my [previously by] eye measurements and found that I had been selling myself short on the Maple Syrup component of the recipe; the primary source of carbs and calories. I mixed up a new batch and drank down a few glasses and in an hour or so I felt right as rain. Though the difference in proportion was seemingly nominal (I might have been using 1 1/2 tbs rather than 2 tbs) it seemed to make all the difference. Last night, I had a very disturbing dream that I was being tempted by all kinds of foods and was sneaking nibbles of Wheat Thins and corn chips, all the while suffering that ambient dream-state anxiety that I would shortly begin to experience serious problems because of eating before I was supposed to. This morning, however, I feel more energetic and refreshed than ever, though I am looking forward to conquering the last two days and easing myself back onto solid foods.

Besides that, motivated by a new beginning and a return to healthy living I began my Tai Chi regimen again, which, once I am taking in some protein I will endeavor to practice daily as I had been before I left Pittsburgh after undergrad. I have even considered reenlisting in my old Kung Fu school, despite the fact that I left in disappointment when I realized that despite having forged friendships, shown enthusiasm and excelled in private and group sessions, no one was above the carefully designed syllabus for maximizing profit. I suppose, however, that whenever I want to find truly traditional and "genuine" martial arts instruction, I'm just going to have to go to Hong Kong. That said, I only benefitted from the wonderful people I knew there and the Kung Fu I did learn, the proof being that back then I was in the best shape of my life.

I hate you.

2008-08-21T08:53:00.004-04:00

Strong words, aren't they? Simply by reading the heading of this entry any number of possible reactions may occur. That tingling feeling behind your ears, the sinking, burning sensation in your chest... "is he talking about me?" you ask yourself, whoever you are.

No, of course I am not referring to anything specific. The thought came to me during my morning exercise routine down the Panther Hollow Trail (Upper). A few days ago a friend had been chatting with me online and brought up his view that I came off (to him) as a fairly "negative nancy" (his words). Now, endeavoring to rectify this false impression, I attempted to discover the heart of the matter and investigate the elements that caused this perspective to develop.

"Well, what do you like?" he asked.

I was swift to point out that if I were able to list only the things I favored in this world my point of view would by default be excessively negative. That is, of course, if one were to assume that anything that didn't make the list were automatically cast into the "dislike" category. That's when it hit me - as is standard in this world the misconception comes from the assumption of extremes. That is, if you don't like something that means you dislike it, or hate it.

Hate, of course, is much to strong a word for my taste. Anyone who really knows me understands that (while I phase through the occasional dark period) under my dry and sarcastic exoskeleton is a guy who "walks the middle path". I try not to concern myself with hating anything, due to the fact that hating something requires effort and energy put toward that end. Now, that statement isn't put forth in an effort to arouse confusion or further misinterpretation by associating that attitude with apathy. What I find most people are unable to grasp is that an opinion needn't be consciously rendered about everything, if one chooses to place whatever it is outside of his sphere.

We had been discussing musical theatre, a genre of music that I admit I am not partial to, when he asked "well you hate musicals right?" Much confusion ensued when I explained I didn't hate them at all but when confronted by the follow up question "but you don't like them?" no satisfactory compromise of values (beetween hate and love [odi et amo]) could be reached. I guess the best example would be to ask someone if they "like" or "hate" something utterly disconnected from their existence...

i.e., "do you hate wax paper?"

"No."

"Then you like it? Do you like wax paper?"

"What? I don't know, I don't not like it... I've never thought about it before,"

Aha! Therein lies the rub. The obsession people have with assessment and assigning values to things be they concepts, objects, aesthetics... now that I've got you thinking about something as trivial as wax paper, the pressure to decide whether or not you like or dislike it, overlooking the question of whether or not you even use it or come into contact with it is nearly overwhelming. Even later, you are walking down the street or catching up with a friend over coffee and the thought erupts into the conversation like "Christian asked me if I like wax paper earlier, what the hell?"

"Well? What did you say?"

"I dunno, I mean, who cares about wax paper?"

"Yea, I hate that guy."

Brief lemonade follow-up

2008-08-19T10:01:00.002-04:00

An afterthought I had while exiting the parking lot of Trader Joe's this morning...

The virtues of fasting, not only felt spiritually and mentally, can be summed up in the realization of how lucky we are that we may choose not to eat. Undoubtedly, I will return to a fairly standard diet next week: Union Grill french fries, Bangkok Balcony tofu pad thai, the occasional late night Bocca "extra spicy" tofu "chik'n" patty... but if for no other reason, to observe that a vast portion of the world survives without food incidentally, those same people working harder physically and under the greatest stress of all (the fight for survival) than we assume we do in our world, fasting may bring us closer to the conscious realization of our etherial substance. Indeed, a religious practice, an occult virtue, ascetic requirement, a form of protest, a component of alchemic ritual and a necessity for performing natural magic and connecting astrologically with the heavenly spheres, to undertake a fast is a virtue unto itself, regardless of connecting with the profundity of the act.

On a less philosophical note: I bought California organic lemons from Trader Joe's, the difference is astounding! The other lemons taste like poison in comparison, I shall never revert.

If life gives you lemons, buy maple syrup...

2008-08-19T07:47:00.004-04:00

Good morning!

So, in honor of returning to the USA and subsequently to Pittsburgh after a busy summer of jet-setting around the East and Midwest I have decided to gear up for a bit of change. That is, trying something new to reset my system and readjust to my television-less life of solitude. For the past three days I have been attempting to carry through on the Master Cleanse or "Lemonade Diet" which, I must say, has a been a wholly fulfilling experience. Paranoid about accuracy in attempting such and extreme body cleansing ritual I consulted as much literature on the subject as I could find, including a few online diaries of progress written by other (somewhat less literate) individuals. Interestingly enough, as I mount day-three of my fast I seem to be suffering identical (and very accurately predicted) effects. I have not eaten solid food since last Saturday, and until today had not experienced any hunger pains. This morning I was awakened by hunger, which, since my morning walk through the woods and first glass of magic lemonade have completely subsided. All in all, they say as long as you can get past day-three you are home free to the end (the cleanse requires fasting on lemonade made of 1/2 squeezed lemon, 2 tbs grade B maple syrup and cayenne pepper added to filtered or distilled water for a minimum of ten days [though some people break 40!]) and I must say I am already feeling the results. Since starting my head has been clear, I have been more energetic and much more focused.

Now, many health care "professionals" advise against any detox diet, citing them as potentially dangerous and merely having placebo effect. I have to say, however, taking that into consideration, fasting is a natural part of many ritual traditions in every culture in the world, and a great part of my interest in doing it to "restart" my system is motivated by the mental discipline required. I don't care about losing weight (it will come back once I return to my normal diet) so much as affirming my will power. I also would not be attempting it if I hadn't so many friends who have done it or do it regularly and sing its praises. I may consider making short fasts (a day or two a week) a regular part of my routine, as a symbolic affirmation of my personal mysticism. Here's to eradicating toxins!

On the topic of my morning walk; it is usually a run, however being in a depleted state of carbs and protein I have decided to tone it down to daily "movement" to keep the metabolism up and get my blood moving. This morning I hopped out of bed at 6:00am (I am also endeavoring to reset my schedule to the glory days of undergrad: up at dawn, day of productivity to follow) despite having been awakened at 2:30am by my new downstairs neighbors, apparently musical theatre affiliated, singing in high fluty tenor arpeggios and generally talking loudly (I mean, "projecting"). I threw on my sneakers and set out carrying a mala of Tibetan skull-shaped beads carved from Yak bones (I like to count them as I walk) and had a brisk walk down Wightman and over on to Beacon. About a 1/4 mile down Beacon I was stopped by the marvelous early morning atmosphere; cool, crisp air, purple morning haze in the western sky that delicately washed out to pale blue, capped by a strikingly brilliant and sharp waning full moon. I sat down on the grass and stared up at the moon for a while, thinking back to a wonderful woodcut by Hokusai I once observed in which a "samurai contemplates the full moon" from his deck, beflowered by cherry blossoms. My only thought was the wish that the entire day could have this quality of silence and ethereal beauty, that it could be just after dawn, all day. I guess for that I'll have to move to Iceland or something. On my walk back the sun was just illuminating the clouds in the East, creating magnificent golden razors on the edges of the clouds there.

Inspired by beauty, I shall work on the Kyrie of my Missa Occulta today, having completed the sketch for the prelude yesterday. Later I have to begin sketching ideas for the work inspired by my journey to Europe this summer, which will have a premiere this fall some time following my lecture and slide show. I also have to re-sketch my orchestra piece and have found inspiration in the work of Buckminster Fuller after a recent trip to the Whitney Gallery; planning a work for winds after his Dymaxion Dwelling Machine.

Back in the Saddle

2008-08-17T09:36:00.002-04:00

Dear friends... I am back! After a fulfilling summer filled with adventures I have finally returned to my humble apartment in Pittsburgh and cannot wait to get started on all the projects I have been planning, and have been inspired to write after my travels. It is amazing how important "personal space" is when it comes to the creative process. While I love my parents dearly, and it is always fun to "go home" for a while (though the idea of "going home," as I turn more and more into a grown up, starts to mean things other that "going to my parents house") I found this summer that I was utterly powerless to create outside of what has become my home base here in Pittsburgh.

So... now that I'm back, what is on the proverbial plate? The orchestra piece, of course, is a high priority. Carnegie Mellon's composition program offers one of the highest luxuries of any music school in requiring its students to compose a work for full symphony orchestra in order to complete the degree. The luxury part comes in the guaranteed performance by the usually-pretty-good Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic.

Now, many of my contemporaries in the modern world of composition might consider the orchestra to be a "museum" and on that theme question the validity of such a requirement in lieu of conceptual and practical achievements in composition. As for myself, Messien being one of my Four Pillars of Musical Inspiration, my vocabulary and aesthetic has begun to develop into the "for gigantic orchestra" genre. From that I have also developed an ear for timbre and how the process of combining timbres can create a larger sound from a smaller ensemble. As I often say, "I set pictures to music" I could just as easily say (in my quest for the surreal in sound) "my work is a musico-optical illusion". That is, it sounds bigger than it looks!

Besides the orchestra piece, I have begun work on my "Missa Occulta" or "Secret Mass" which shall be a setting of the Latin liturgy scored for large pipe organ, two violins, cello, classical guitar, trumpet, trombone, flute, clarinet, percussion and ten solo voices (SSATB). The planned premiere will be in Heinz Chapel (a beautiful space reminiscent of the St. Thomas Church in New York, with a magnificent pipe organ). The work is a ten movement setting, with rhythmic structures derived from occult numerology (both Cabbalistic and Alchemical) and my own mystical melodies derived from the Hebrew names of the Sephiroth and branches of the Tree of Life. I am even going so far as to create occult diagrams in the score, in the layout of the music.

I am also planning a work for violin and orchestra to submit to the Queen Elisabeth prize in Belgium, and several works for solo violin, violin and string orchestra as well as brass and percussion with a possible reading by the CMU Wind Ensemble.

The last large project (is there enough time in the day?) shall be my one-act opera. The details are secret, but rest assured it is weird, macabre and creepy. Kind of like Edward Gorey.

More details to follow... I have lots to do!

Back in the USA

2008-07-05T08:37:00.003-04:00

Have I disappeared forever? In short: no. First of all, to the ladies I met at the Sofitel Athens Airport Hotel, I hope you all made it home in a timely fashion on the flights you had hoped to get on! It was a pleasure talking with all of you, and if you managed to find my little blog you can be sure my story will unravel here in the next few weeks!

For everyone else: amidst rising columns of fireworks blasting literally around our flight path, the fourth plane I tried to get on in two days touched down in Pittsburgh last night at about 10:30pm. I had been awake for nearly 23 hours, and nearly bitten my nails down through flesh and bone in anticipation of achieving standby seats first from Athens to New York (failed) then to Atlanta (success!) and at last a first-class upgrade to Pittsburgh. Coming home on July 4th could not have been a better feeling, and now, sitting at my own desk in my own apartment feels better than I could have imagined.

In short, my European adventure panned out exactly as I had hoped, and left me with the most gratifying sense of accomplishment as I was able to stick to my itinerary and accomplish almost exactly what I had set out to do. The story will go here in the next few weeks. For now I've got to organize and get ready to head to New York for the next few weeks.

Check back soon!

East Coast Jet-Setter

2008-06-06T11:37:00.006-04:00

Well... as anyone reading this (or anyone who expected to have read something in the last month) can see, life has had me busy lately! As my last post indicates, the premiere of "Krljavestica!" was a tremendous success. Karl and I sat down recently and under his skilled hand edited our three camera shoot together into quite a good looking DVD of the performance. Even my dad, a veteran award winning television producer, won't stop blabbering about how it "looks like a real TV show!" in a tone of voice which echos amateur excitement rather than professional approval.

Classes at CMU wrapped up around May 2 (whatever that Friday was...) and shortly thereafter I headed up to New York to hang with my parents and spent a weekend out on the Hamptons with my dear friends the Nobles. A fun time was had by all, a definite okay second to Nantucket, a destination that has eluded my grasp lately. From Wainscott I traveled back to New York and then up to Manchester, New Hampshire to finally visit with my sister and see her company in action. While taking a tour of her factory I came across the sample shirts pictured below, which we took with us, cleaned up and promptly wore out in Manhattan to the joint birthday party of Polly and Rachel. Our fashion statement was very well received and we each managed to convince a shocking majority of people that we were either sponsored (ala NASCAR) by such a diversity of prep-school field hockey teams and high school Lacrosse clubs or that we owned them all and weren't afraid to show it off.

Yes, we are awesome; obviously.

After the birthday party (another raging success) for which I extended my stay in New York another two weeks, I bummed around a bit more, went hiking with Karl up to Minnewaska where this picture was taken:

Of course, you are correct in supposing I plan to use this as my headshot for all forthcoming publicity.

After that, I went back up to New Hampshire after a pit stop in Boston where I saw my long lost friend Daniel, took him to dinner with the fantastic trio (Kate, Aaron and Justin) and my sister. Hung out in Manchester for a few more days and took the scenic route home along the 101 (all the way across New Hampshire) to Rte. 9 across Vermont and onto Rte. 7 near Troy, New York which intersects Rte. 22, the road that took me straight to my parents' front door. It was a stunning drive, just me with the windows down, driving casually through green meadows, in and out of ancient valleys, through sleepy old towns seemingly frozen in time at various stages (like sediment in rock, 1890s, 1920s, 1950s, 1980s) and out into the odorifery of New York dairy farmland. I am absolutely ready to move to Bennington, VT... beautiful town!

Let's see... in other news I have completed all of the music for the new video game "Nicktoons Knightro" being developed with Nickelodeon Studios by my friend Steve and his company, Raw Thrills in Chicago. It was a fun project and a lucrative step into the world of commercial composition. Heretofore a world I have had no interest in, but this experience showing how fun, easy and valuable it can be, an avenue I am looking forward to pursuing alongside my more abstract concert music route. Needless to say, having kept in touch with the friends I made in Hollywood was a good move, more on that later!

So now, I am back in New York, sitting at my parents' kitchen table which has been my makeshift office for the last month or so (I actually was able to compose two or three of the final cues for the Nicktoons game right here) and waiting for my oil change to be done so I can head back to Pittsburgh tomorrow or Sunday. Then it's off to Europe for my wild adventure in Orthodox Christian Liturgies!

Move over Indiana Jones (ps, saw Crystal Skull and don't care what you think because I loved every freakin' moment of it!).

CK

Success!

2008-04-15T12:45:00.003-04:00

Well, this past Saturday (April 12) saw the premiere of "Krljavestica!" and things could not have gone smoother. The performance was just stunning after a near perfect dress rehearsal and the piece was very well received. Interestingly enough, the excitement of having my own composition premiered has subsided and taken second place to the satisfaction of having conducted it. Everything worked out so well, my choir was magnificent and the instrumental ensemble could not have performed better! Amazingly, the dress rehearsal (two hours before the concert) was the first time the entire ensemble had ever been together all at the same time!

Anyway, to all who made it to the premiere, thank you for traveling such a long way for fifteen minutes of spooky music (to use Joel's term, to experience the "Kriegescore" in person). There are three big projects in the works for the Fall and Spring of 2008-2009, after I return from the Balkans and Eastern Europe. The first is my new Latin mass, overlayed with secret occult numerology and alchemical symbolism (magic squares, cabbala, astrological diagrams, you know, all the normal stuff), my orchestra piece which I plan to conduct and a chamber opera to be presented in concert version some time in 2009.

Now that I have some time, check back for regular posts!

KRLJAVESTICA!

It's been too long!

2008-04-08T08:27:00.004-04:00

Dear Blog,

I do not believe in the excuse "I'm too busy". Being "too busy" to write down what is happening in your life defies the purpose of keeping a diary, blog, journal or record of any kind. If you weren't "too busy" you'd have nothing substantial to write about. That said, it has been a hectic month preparing for this Saturday's premiere of "Krljavestica!" which I predict is going to be fantastic!

We had our first combined rehearsal this past Friday which was moderately scary, but improved across the two hours we pounded notes and rhythms so I am optimistic in the remaining three rehearsals things will shape up. Sadly, we were missing one percussionist (Eddie was off auditioning for Louisiana and Santa Barbara, good luck, Eddie!) which makes a huge difference considering when you score a work for 2 percussionists and 2 pianists, one missing is a quarter of the entire orchestra. It's like trying to perform Mahler 5 with no French Horns.

Anyway, we got through it and my choir is doing really well! For anyone interested, here is a link to a partial performance we did two weeks ago in the music school's convocation. The password is "krlj". The first half is a talk I gave about the subject matter and form, and at about 32'00" is a brief performance of excerpts from the work, sans choir.

This Saturday's performance will be webcast live here at 5:00pm. I hope you can tune in if you can't make it to the performance.

As for my commercial endeavors. Next Thursday sees us wrapping up all the music for Raw Thrills' "Nicktoons Knightro" which has been a really fun project to put together. Here's hoping my new commercial reel (complete with in game movies of Spongebob Squarepants racing through Bikini Bottom) pulls in some orchestration gigs from my friends in Hollywood. Get it? Reel? Pulls in? Fishing? Okay, okay, I've said enough, I'm too busy for this.

*CK

First Glimpse...

2008-03-01T17:47:00.003-05:00

So this past Friday I conducted the last ensemble rehearsal of "Krljavestica!" until March 28. We managed to wrangle a recording engineer and made an excellent recording which I will use as a preparatory aide for the choir (though we will be rehearsing totally a cappella). Check out these few snippets of the orchestra... I can't wait to hear it with the addition of the choir! Remember, this is just a rehearsal (our third and best so far) so be kind!

Krljavestica!

2008-02-25T08:12:00.005-05:00

I think I may have mentioned my newest project in a previous post or two (I'm way too lazy right now to go back and look) so I thought I'd post a little update on the progress of "Krljavestica!". The first and most amazing thing I think I should write concerns my recent meeting with a CMU alumnus who was visiting to speak in a special seminar on careers in the arts. He has found success as an actor (apparently leading in the new Mike Myers film yet to be released) and is a trained musician. Anyway, we got on about discussing our various professional accomplishments and latest projects and I produced the score from under my arm (it's too big to fit in my bag, I have a weird fetish for giant scores) and cleverly showed him the cover page.

Now, to be sure, when most people are bombarded by the barrage of consonants that is the word Krljavestica, they usually flinch like someone is throwing a haymaker at their forehead. This fine chap, however, immediately raised a querious eyebrow and said, "is that Serbian?"

Well, I nearly fainted, and as it turns out he is also in a band with a young Balkan fellow who was once the leading rock singer in Serbia. Although I would have remained far more impressed had he not told me that bit.

Back to the point. I have written a large work for choir, soloists, 2 pianos and large percussion ensemble (2 players) which I am producing and conducting under the guidance of Robert Page. We have hand selected a wonderful group of singers (24 in total) from around Pittsburgh and a fine cast of soloists all of whom I will be cramming those consonants into and forcing them to sing to me in Serbian starting March 5.

On the work itself, the subject matter was revealed to me by JSTOR one day while I was obsessively researching traditional vampire folklore. Naturally, as "real" vampires are categorized as disturbed ghosts or zombies (a subject for another post) the subject of witches and witchcraft came up as related in my search. Though there is no mention of vampires, JSTOR produced an article depicting a curious Balkan festival celebrated on the eve of Lent every year and most recently observed by an outsider in the mid 1980s. It's sort of a "Serbian Mardi Gras" and involves the construction of bonfires, leaping and exclaiming wild incantations, blackening faces with ash, the slaughtering and consumption of an unfortunate hen (representing a witch in her transformed state), all to guard against the influence of witchcraft, as witches are holding their sabbath during that time. I was immediately reminded of the fantastic paintings of Goya, and indeed reaching further back to various woodcuts from the Nuremberg Chronicles and other wonderful books depicting similar events which clutter my sagging bookcases. Possessed by the theatrical nature of the idea, I gathered up some lines of Serbian text from the article (only 5 in all) and set to work crafting the piece. It took me about 4 months to complete the score, and 2 weeks ago Friday I started rehearsing with my ensemble. This Friday I hope to have a recording of the rehearsal (sans choir) which I will post as a preview, but if you're already thinking Les Noces, Renard or Carmina Burana you're not too far off. This work I am hoping will be my contribution to the canon of exotic percussion cantatas.

More updates on that in the future. Rehearsals have been going exceedingly well, needless to say I am crazy excited to hear the choir!

New Music UPDATE

2008-02-25T08:01:00.002-05:00

Okay, so since I am an ignoramus the example in my previous post of Dave Matthews completely misses the point I was trying to make as it was pointed out to me by one of my more informed peers that Matthews in fact has pioneered an up-to-date Grateful Dead style jam-band kind of improv which is the particular quality of his music that draws his audience. Also, you have just witnessed the longest run-on sentence at least in this blog. It's a lot of fun if you read it out loud without taking any breaths. Or maybe I'm just crazy.

New Music, Old Music

2008-02-21T10:45:00.003-05:00

Just a brief post concerning something Bob Page said in a choral rehearsal this past Tuesday. He finished all he wanted to rehearse, with about 10 minutes to spare, sat down on his stool and brooded for a minute before asking who in the group had seen the 60-Minutes segment on Dudamel. Naturally, as the room was 90% full of college age vocal majors (sorry, had to say it) not a single hand was raised. Admittedly, I didn't see it either, my only excuse being that I have no interest in owning a television, so I rely on reading the New York Times Arts section on a daily basis. Of coure, when he asked who had read the article in Opera News OR Classical Voice about power-house mezzo Stephanie Blythe, he was met by the same sea of blank faces (or the Carnegie Mellon silent treatment, as he likes to say).

At any rate, Page launched into a fairly excited rant about how wonderful it was to see the enthusiastic youth taking hold of the classical music establishment, and, hopefully, breathing some life and interest back into it. He went on to pose the question of "why do we do this?" to the group, saying "Benjamin Britten: DEAD, Vaughn Williams: DEAD, Franz Schubert: DEAD... so why do we waste our time and energy doing this?" He pointed out that in Brahms' time, orchestras and choirs did not perform any music by dead composers, indeed, all music approaching the dawn of the 20th century was very much alive, and it was an afternoon event to go and hear the latest symphony by the young new composers, not always to the rave reviews ignorant and aging audiences praise them with today. After that reflection, he asked one of the sopranos in the front row how much live music she had seen in the pat year. She told him "I've only seen opera"

"Which ones?"

"Mozart, Verdi, Bizet..." her voice seemed to drop as she began to see his point, and suddenly she was almost embarrassed by the realization that she fit right into his criticism, even if as an accessory to the modern trend in concert going. Then, a rambunctious soprano a few seats over chimed in with "FLIGHT!" realizing that they had all seen the Pittsburgh premiere of Jonathan Dove's opera. Not exactly "new", as it received its world premiere in 1998, but still the whole front row came away terribly impressed with themselves.

In an attempt to be more honest, and not give the same "song and dance" (Dr. Page's term for kids who try too hard to supply "meaningful" answers or look more mature than they are) one boyish tenor chirped up and announced he had been to a Dave Matthew's Band concert a few months prior. Then another tenor joined in by pointing out that most of the class attends the new music concerts given by their peers in the composition department, which seemed to impress Bob quite a bit. Still, it only made me think of the number of composers, not voice majors, not novice music appreciators, who decline to attend legitimate public performances of new works. The young composers continue to exude this incurable attitude that if they suspect they won't like something, if they think it will be weird, or it's "not my style" they should avoid it. I raised my hand from the observation deck and supplied my opinion that as a musician, the first concert you should make it your priority to see is the one you think you'll like the least. It's called a challenge, and there is always something to learn. On that same subject, concerning pop music, I also couldn't help thinking about the Dave Matthews concert, which, by my assessment, falls victim to the same trends in listening as classical music does. We ran out of time, but later I couldn't help wondering how many "new" songs, meaning tunes that no one had heard, world premieres, do you think Dave Matthews performed at that concert? My assumed answer: zero. Even of his own music, he just gets up there and plays the "Bach and Mozart" that everyone wants to hear.

So why do I do it? Because I have to. Let's not over think it. As for anyone else... I hope they will learn to challenge themselves, or at least pick up a newspaper and become informed about the world they are making their parents spend so much money on preparing them for.

Works in Glass

2008-02-10T10:18:00.000-05:00

Nothing is more inspiring than having the opportunity to have your work premiered by a professional ensemble and being received warmly and with open mind. Such inspiration came to me last night (as I have been leading up to in my recent posts) at the "reading" and premiere of my work "Blaschka" by our visiting artists, Eighth Blackbird. The evening began with a rehearsal which dedicated 30 minutes to each of the composers who had been selected to represent their University (there were four of us). The compositions were all excellent and in their extreme variety proved a brilliant cross section of the possibility of style and sonority, from jazz inspired swing to abstraction through a microscope (I'll take credit for that one).

Following the rehearsal (after delicately moving CMU's only harpsichord from the rehearsal space to the performance space and lifting it onto the stage... yes, at the end we had to move it back) was the concert which to my initial horror was partially attended by about 100 highschoolers from Cleveland who arrived on a tour bus. After my announcement concerning cell phones and so forth the audience ended up being as quiet as church mice, quieter even than a typical concert going audience! It provided for an excellent recording, which is posted below.

In reflection, while having a work performed by such a wonderful and well recognized ensemble flashes fantasies of possible commissions and sudden worldwide exposure for one's music, the most important part of the experience to me was having a group of people take your music seriously and show up prepared and ready to play, accommodating your wishes and visions. Of course, this has not been my first premiere bordering outside the realm of academia, indeed I spent the last four years working full time in the so-called "real world" (avoid it if you can) but this has certainly been a deeply significant marker on my journey back to creativity, and I predict only great things will develop out of it!

As for the work, it is sadly incomplete, represented here are the first two of what I hope will develop into four or five movements. As explained in a previous blog or two, the work is inspired by the incredible glass sculpture of Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka who created magnificent models of sea life (both microscopic creatures blown up and life-sized) for natural history museums around the world toward the end of the 19th century. So now in size order are my impressions of their representations of two wonderfully strange creatures, Actinophrys Sol, and Argonauta Argo or the "paper nautilus". The preceding links are to images of the actual creatures, below you will find images of the Blaschka models. Have a listen and let me know what you think!

Satoh-san

2008-02-03T08:10:00.000-05:00

Every week the composition department at Carnegie Mellon meets for an hour in "Composition Seminar", a class which brings in outside talent or invites students to present their work in a discussion. This past Friday, we had the honor of being visited by the Japanese composer Somei Satoh, in Pittsburgh for the premiere of a dance piece he was commissioned to write by Attack Theatre. I say "honored" only in reflection as I admittedly had never heard of Mr. Satoh, or "Satoh-san" as another of our guests who accompanied him would continually call him. He arrived veiled in mystery, fiercely Japanese in his unmoving and quiet demeanor, shaved head and stoic scowl. Every movement was rehearsed, he seemed carefully conscious of his posture and spoke (in Japanese, to a female interpreter who sat with knees locked together and hands placed gently palms down atop her thighs in a typically Japanese fashion) almost to the air, calmly and authoritatively. Of course, what most impressed me about Satoh-san's visit was his hauntingly spacious music. I felt, in a way, vindicated by his talk as he addressed the same points which I have been trying to get across to my fellow composers about the use of space, silence and ambiguity in pulse and concept of time. One of the most striking things he said, which goes hand in hand with my own philosophy, is how music itself is "dead". He went on to explain how he felt that before music is created it is dead (or, I think, he meant "nothing" or "empty") while it is being performed it is alive, and by the time each note has been struck, it is dead again.

That is to say, as I have tried to explain to many of my non-musician friends, music is the most abstract form of art, because even once a piece is written, the score is still only an idea. When a painter paints a painting, it is there in front of him, a tangible object containing expressions of the intangible, but "real" nonetheless. When a piece of music is created, it exists only in the thoughts of its creator until that time when it might be performed, and even then it immediately decays with the passage of time and once the performance is finished (indeed, once each note disappears into the cavern of the performance space) it returns to that abstract purgatory, hopefully in the thoughts of not only the composer, but those to performed it and those who listened.

Another point Satoh-san made, when confronted by the question "does your music serve a higher expression, spiritually or the like?" was to say that the composer must "erase" or "kill himself" in creating his music. This, of course, is a deeply Buddhist and Shinto ideal, understood unanimously in the East, and misinterpreted unanimously in the West. I loved his point, that ego must be eradicated in order to serve the music, as the music does not serve us, but we serve it. It is also very clear why he has developed this attitude as he went on to explain to us that he has no formal Western musical training, but was raised by traditional Japanese dancers and musicians who are all taught the same ideals to perfect their musical ability.

Another point Satoh-san made that amused me was when a visitor to our class asked how he notated his music. Of course, this was a sensible question and built upon a point I had raised (or tried to raise) in asking him how he interpreted the difference between space and silence (one possibly being metered and the other being ambiguous) as it was unclear whether his music was notated traditionally, graphically, spatially, etc. His answer to the visitor's question (after much seemingly frustrated postulating in Japanese) was, "that makes no sense to me!"

Of course, what Satoh-san was trying to communicate was that it doesn't matter "how" the music is notated, so long as it is communicated effectively to the performers. Contrary to my own belief in having an established system of notation, at the very least consistently through a single score, I did see his point, and one of his accompanying musicians (an American) explained that his music is very traditionally notated in the classical fashion.

All in all, it was a fascinating glimpse at one of the few Eastern composers whom I feel has truly established a genuine style rooted in his native vocabulary rather than simply falling into the chic trend of imitating the West once Western instruments have been put at his disposal. Satoh-san speaks in his own voice, does not compromise his philosophy and speaks very openly about his distaste for classical music that is overly academic. Indeed, the basis of his discussion was to say that "technique is not music" and learning technique does not teach you how to write. He commented on Western composers imitating the East, such as John Cage, as using "dead" silence in their music, and only achieving a cold emulation of what they may have discovered when looking to the East. He closed by saying that he has never taught composition, and if CMU were to offer him a job teaching, he would turn it down as he feels he would have nothing to teach.

Inspired by snowflakes

2008-01-27T16:42:00.000-05:00

I thought of this while walking through the snow, I think it sums up my process, philosophy and appreciation for music:

"Visual art is the prism of the artist's eye. To hear the colors that are refracted by the imagination is to unify the impression of sight with sound. Music is the oscillation of the crystal through which imagination is refracted."

Hmmm...

Wunderkammer Nr. 5

2008-01-27T14:38:00.001-05:00

So here is a fun little bit of strangeness, since I am much too busy right now to write a really thoughtful article (just finished the piece for 8th BB and am now starting two new string quartets). Many years ago (and up into the 19th century) people considered the "disappearance" of migratory birds in the winter to be somewhat of an unexplainable anomaly. Aristotle himself theorized that birds went into hibernation at the bottom of the sea, while another gentleman cited merely as "a person of learning and piety" theorized that birds flocked to the moon for the winter in a pamphlet entitled "An Essay toward the Probable Solution of this Question: Whence come the Stork and the Turtledove, the Crane, and the Swallow, when they Know and Observe the Appointed Time of their Coming" published in 1703. Amazingly enough, the possibility of birds migrating to warmer climates became a possible reality to the scientific public when this unfortunate stork was bagged on the Bothmer Estate in Meklenburg on a clear May morning in 1822:

Yes, you have guessed correctly if your first assumption was that the arrow through the dear bird's neck is in fact a central African spear which impaled its feathery victim before the stork took off and flew the entire migratory route back to Mecklenburg. This was one of the first documented clues in the modern era to lead people to conclude that birds in fact migrate great distances across the Earth, rather than go to the moon or merely vanish until Spring. I have to say, it is no less wondrous to me that this stork actually made it all that way with the spear through its neck. This phenomenon is actually not peculiar to the bird pictured above, but has occurred upwards of 25 times since 1822 coining the term "Pfeilstorch" or "Arrow-stork". The bird pictured above is supposedly now housed at the University of Rostock in Mecklenburg.

Four and Twenty...

2008-01-22T21:31:00.001-05:00

Well, after much toiling I have finally finished the two movements of my work "Blaschka" (see Wunderkammer Nr. 3 and "Sixteen Blackbirds Baked in a Pie") for Eighth Blackbird. I am very excited at the opportunity to have this wonderful ensemble perform my work, and more importantly, give critical feedback from the perspective of a professional ensemble, something that composition students rarely have outside of their resident ensembles or student formed chamber groups. The premiere is on February 9th at CMU, naturally I will post the recording once I have it, I am very curious to see how they interpret my score.

My teacher has been on my case lately telling me my music is "very" abstract (subtext: too abstract). I feel like he thinks I am on the verge of some revelation in personal style, as he spends most of my lesson talking about how he used to do the same kinds of scores back in the 60's but has since relaxed into a more conservative style utilizing "drama" over the "academic". I mostly agree with him, to be honest, and it is a high compliment to think that he is trying to use his own development and personal accomplishments to help me in guiding (or perhaps expediting) my development as a composer. I think (without sounding overly presumptuous) he sees some kind of potential in me that he didn't realize in himself until years later, and in some way is trying to initiate me into that realization before I spend my life experimenting to that end. Either way, my thought process is rather abstract, and I do tend to have a very polarized output in terms of style. The elements that my music is constructed of are unanimously mine, but the way they crystalize themselves varies from the spacious pointalism of my Stigmata Musicum Nr. 1 to the rigid boom-chick folk-inspiration of my new work "Krljavestica!" which I will be writing about later on (premiere on April 12, 2008). Anyway, whatever happens, or whatever I choose to write next (just started a new piece for solo viola!) I just have to let myself be guided by that nagging inner voice that in me produces music. For now, let's see how "Blaschka" turns out.