Wednesday, July 8, 2020
Monday, July 6, 2020
Monday, October 14, 2019
In the thick of it
I'm deep in the thick of things now. I missed a lot of composing time during the summer, but I do have a series of sketches to work from.
If I only had some time.
In the midst of my semester of teaching, I'm also typesetting parts for a new work by Hans Abrahamsen, a horn concerto, and have another set of parts due in the middle of November for another composer.
I have no doubt I'll make those deadlines, but it is taking me away from my composing until they are done.
In the meantime I have a premiere next week of the latest version of Paradiso, a full(-ish) orchestra version, at the College Music Society national convention. It goes back to the original version, except that there is no soprano saxophone, harp, or piano available. Without the piano, I also had to change the ending, adding two more bars. I don't know if I'll change the other versions, yet. The piano had a flourish during the final chord, and it just didn't work in other instruments, so I gave in a more final ending. I'm going out to hear a rehearsal Tuesday of next week before the Thursday premiere. (Oct 24 at 8 pm, University of Louisville Symphony Orchestra.)
Other than that, I don't have a sniff of a performance until I finish my piece for Tenor Sax and string quartet, which still doesn't have a name. My run of performances hasn't really survived the move to Cincinnati, unfortunately. I've submitted pieces for a number of concert series, but nothing has stuck.That isn't the best way of getting performances, but I need to keep my oars in the water until something happens, another commission or something.
Next semester, I'm teaching an overload, including two new courses, so I won't have much free time.
Back to the grindstone ...
If I only had some time.
In the midst of my semester of teaching, I'm also typesetting parts for a new work by Hans Abrahamsen, a horn concerto, and have another set of parts due in the middle of November for another composer.
I have no doubt I'll make those deadlines, but it is taking me away from my composing until they are done.
In the meantime I have a premiere next week of the latest version of Paradiso, a full(-ish) orchestra version, at the College Music Society national convention. It goes back to the original version, except that there is no soprano saxophone, harp, or piano available. Without the piano, I also had to change the ending, adding two more bars. I don't know if I'll change the other versions, yet. The piano had a flourish during the final chord, and it just didn't work in other instruments, so I gave in a more final ending. I'm going out to hear a rehearsal Tuesday of next week before the Thursday premiere. (Oct 24 at 8 pm, University of Louisville Symphony Orchestra.)
Other than that, I don't have a sniff of a performance until I finish my piece for Tenor Sax and string quartet, which still doesn't have a name. My run of performances hasn't really survived the move to Cincinnati, unfortunately. I've submitted pieces for a number of concert series, but nothing has stuck.That isn't the best way of getting performances, but I need to keep my oars in the water until something happens, another commission or something.
Next semester, I'm teaching an overload, including two new courses, so I won't have much free time.
Back to the grindstone ...
Monday, August 12, 2019
I'm confused
I tried to post to this blog from my laptop while I was out of the country, but on my desktop, I seem to be able to.
This is really frustrating. My other blog is the same. As far as I can tell, I am logged in through the same account.
I'll post something here in due course.
This is really frustrating. My other blog is the same. As far as I can tell, I am logged in through the same account.
I'll post something here in due course.
Wednesday, May 22, 2019
Moving along
I spent some time yesterday with my new material, transposing and classifying all the sets (5/7), and little else. Today, however, was more productive. I'm fleshing out a progression, figuring out what portions of the sets work - well, they mostly do, but more how they relate to each other. If discovered that if I put the C/Eb on the bottom it sounds more like a tonic chord, than if D/F# are on the bottom. Basically, it doesn't really matter where the B appears.
Yes, that is D Eb F# B C for the 5-note set (Set I). Set V is all the other notes.
I'm not sure how that affects my D tonal center yet. At the moment, I'm fine with it. I just need to be aware of my cadences. There will still be a D in the chord, but it won't be on the bottom.
Thus far, I'm jotting down several fragments, with no real concern about how they will fit together. I have a 7 chord progression for the strings, a longish melody for the Tenor Sax (without rhythm at the moment), with chords implied (and a progression), as well as another sustained quartet passage which the sax joins about 15-20 seconds into it.
That's all with the new material. I have a few fragments and a progression with the old material. Looking at the sets, I might be able to use them together. The old Set I (D G B C Db) has many intervals in common with the new Set I - 3 notes the same and the others are only a semitone different (or in the opposite direction). It's the old Set V that is too full of semitones.
I'll work some more on it tomorrow. I need to let it steep a bit.
Yes, that is D Eb F# B C for the 5-note set (Set I). Set V is all the other notes.
I'm not sure how that affects my D tonal center yet. At the moment, I'm fine with it. I just need to be aware of my cadences. There will still be a D in the chord, but it won't be on the bottom.
Thus far, I'm jotting down several fragments, with no real concern about how they will fit together. I have a 7 chord progression for the strings, a longish melody for the Tenor Sax (without rhythm at the moment), with chords implied (and a progression), as well as another sustained quartet passage which the sax joins about 15-20 seconds into it.
That's all with the new material. I have a few fragments and a progression with the old material. Looking at the sets, I might be able to use them together. The old Set I (D G B C Db) has many intervals in common with the new Set I - 3 notes the same and the others are only a semitone different (or in the opposite direction). It's the old Set V that is too full of semitones.
I'll work some more on it tomorrow. I need to let it steep a bit.
Monday, May 20, 2019
Inspiration ...
... or you could say "lack of."
As of today, that isn't entirely true. I've been trying to get some notes down on paper, and while I have a few, I wasn't really happy about any until today.
Yay!
Not so fast. That may may mean discarding everything that I've done before today. It's not a huge amount, but I hate to do that. I'm still rather unmotivated. After coming up with the new material today, I plinked around on the piano and was satisfied. It had a sound world that I was comfortable with. I took Jenny to work, did my workout at the gym, and then I was back in procrastination mode.
What is going to make this piece difficult - and what has made it difficult so far - is that I am using 5 and seven note sets, but I only have a tenor sax and a string quartet, i.e. 5 instruments. Of course, I can use double-stops in the strings and not use the entire set in the chords. It just leaves me the choice of what notes not to use: which notes can I drop from the chord without losing the color of the set. It's not that difficult in the 5 note set in the string quartet context. As long as I keep D and F#, I can use any two of the other notes and still get the flavor of the chord. If I think of the 7-note set as two chords, I can use either as 3-note chords and add one from the other, of two notes from each of the chords, to get the polychord flavor.
I also have 17-note row, which distills into a 12-note row - D# and D can appear in multiple positions. I haven't decided whether I'll use permutations of the 17-note version, or just the 12-note one, and leave the 17-note one as a melodic outline.
Formally, I'm leaning towards a similar pattern to Labyrinth (and the sketches for Sym. No 4) which is 3 main movements separated by two free interludes.
My plan looks like this:
I. Slow and dark
II. Interlude - free (Ten. sax and one other instrument)
III. Free - fast fragments darting here and there
IV. Interlude 2 - free (Ten. sax and a different instrument or two)
V. Fast irregular rhythms
It may all change, of course. BTW, I didn't like my original material because it was too dissonant, and the sets were too similar. Sometimes with all that dissonance, you need some pure consonant intervals to clear the air. There was a perfect 5th in each, but the rest of the sets held a preponderance of semitones, and I kept being forced to use tritones from one of the notes of the P5.
That's probably too much information for most of you. Needless, to say. I've found the material, so now I need to excavate the piece from it. I think coming up with a title would help, but I don't have it yet.
As of today, that isn't entirely true. I've been trying to get some notes down on paper, and while I have a few, I wasn't really happy about any until today.
Yay!
Not so fast. That may may mean discarding everything that I've done before today. It's not a huge amount, but I hate to do that. I'm still rather unmotivated. After coming up with the new material today, I plinked around on the piano and was satisfied. It had a sound world that I was comfortable with. I took Jenny to work, did my workout at the gym, and then I was back in procrastination mode.
What is going to make this piece difficult - and what has made it difficult so far - is that I am using 5 and seven note sets, but I only have a tenor sax and a string quartet, i.e. 5 instruments. Of course, I can use double-stops in the strings and not use the entire set in the chords. It just leaves me the choice of what notes not to use: which notes can I drop from the chord without losing the color of the set. It's not that difficult in the 5 note set in the string quartet context. As long as I keep D and F#, I can use any two of the other notes and still get the flavor of the chord. If I think of the 7-note set as two chords, I can use either as 3-note chords and add one from the other, of two notes from each of the chords, to get the polychord flavor.
I also have 17-note row, which distills into a 12-note row - D# and D can appear in multiple positions. I haven't decided whether I'll use permutations of the 17-note version, or just the 12-note one, and leave the 17-note one as a melodic outline.
Formally, I'm leaning towards a similar pattern to Labyrinth (and the sketches for Sym. No 4) which is 3 main movements separated by two free interludes.
My plan looks like this:
I. Slow and dark
II. Interlude - free (Ten. sax and one other instrument)
III. Free - fast fragments darting here and there
IV. Interlude 2 - free (Ten. sax and a different instrument or two)
V. Fast irregular rhythms
It may all change, of course. BTW, I didn't like my original material because it was too dissonant, and the sets were too similar. Sometimes with all that dissonance, you need some pure consonant intervals to clear the air. There was a perfect 5th in each, but the rest of the sets held a preponderance of semitones, and I kept being forced to use tritones from one of the notes of the P5.
That's probably too much information for most of you. Needless, to say. I've found the material, so now I need to excavate the piece from it. I think coming up with a title would help, but I don't have it yet.
Wednesday, March 27, 2019
News
Wow, it's almost April, and I've been silent. Part of that has been due to a very large - huge - typesetting job, an opera, which consumed me from before Christmas until a couple of weeks ago. The little time I had was devoted to preparing for the classes I am teaching. Now I feel like I have some time to devote to my true calling.
One of the things that has happened during this period, and it happened only Monday of this week, is that a new version of Paradiso has been chosen to be premiered at the College Music Society National Conference in Louisville on Oct. 24. So what is this new version and when did I have time to write it? When I saw the call for scores, I thought that maybe that the time was ripe for a premiere of the original version for chamber orchestra. The 12' time limit meant that Chaos and Symphony No 3 were out of the question, and after I decided to go for it, I realized that the available orchestra didn't include soprano saxophone, piano, nor harp. Annoying, yes, but I had already arranged it for sinfonietta, without harp or sax, so why not include piano and put a few things back in that I'd removed for the sinfonietta version. I got to the ending, which I needed to change anyway after the performance of the sinfonietta version, and found that it didn't work as it was without piano, so I made a major change, adding two bars to the ending to make it work. That doesn't sound major, but it involved changing the meaning of the ending in my head. I still have to decide whether to go back and change the other versions.
Aside from that, I need to get down to writing my tenor sax piece (tenor and string quartet). I've started and stopped several times, in some cases even short of writing things down. I really need to start keeping a composing journal again - a paper one. At least I could remember some of the fleeting ideas I had for it.
What else? I want to write 3 more movements to add to The Black Pool. It's the water movement of an Earth, Air, Fire, Water piece. The plan is to make them all around 2 minutes long and orchestrate them each in (or after) a style of a different composer, without actually copying the compositional style. Air was going to be Webern, Fire possibly Stravinsky, and Earth Lutoslawski, although my orchestration isn't far from his anyway.
I might also write a few more movements to Temps (cl, vl, vc, pf). There is a solo clarinet movement and Time Knot already finished, and I might borrow a movement or two from Labyrinth, since it is the same harmonic material, probably the second. I was also thinking of the third, but I'm not sure it would work with this ensemble.
A Mighty Fortress is still on the back burner, and the last movement of Night Visions is still a pipe dream. With the assistance of my Advanced Music Engraving class, I have also created a version of Chaos for sinfonietta, which I'm hoping to get a performance for, in the near future.
Well, that's all for now. Time to cook some dinner.
One of the things that has happened during this period, and it happened only Monday of this week, is that a new version of Paradiso has been chosen to be premiered at the College Music Society National Conference in Louisville on Oct. 24. So what is this new version and when did I have time to write it? When I saw the call for scores, I thought that maybe that the time was ripe for a premiere of the original version for chamber orchestra. The 12' time limit meant that Chaos and Symphony No 3 were out of the question, and after I decided to go for it, I realized that the available orchestra didn't include soprano saxophone, piano, nor harp. Annoying, yes, but I had already arranged it for sinfonietta, without harp or sax, so why not include piano and put a few things back in that I'd removed for the sinfonietta version. I got to the ending, which I needed to change anyway after the performance of the sinfonietta version, and found that it didn't work as it was without piano, so I made a major change, adding two bars to the ending to make it work. That doesn't sound major, but it involved changing the meaning of the ending in my head. I still have to decide whether to go back and change the other versions.
Aside from that, I need to get down to writing my tenor sax piece (tenor and string quartet). I've started and stopped several times, in some cases even short of writing things down. I really need to start keeping a composing journal again - a paper one. At least I could remember some of the fleeting ideas I had for it.
What else? I want to write 3 more movements to add to The Black Pool. It's the water movement of an Earth, Air, Fire, Water piece. The plan is to make them all around 2 minutes long and orchestrate them each in (or after) a style of a different composer, without actually copying the compositional style. Air was going to be Webern, Fire possibly Stravinsky, and Earth Lutoslawski, although my orchestration isn't far from his anyway.
I might also write a few more movements to Temps (cl, vl, vc, pf). There is a solo clarinet movement and Time Knot already finished, and I might borrow a movement or two from Labyrinth, since it is the same harmonic material, probably the second. I was also thinking of the third, but I'm not sure it would work with this ensemble.
A Mighty Fortress is still on the back burner, and the last movement of Night Visions is still a pipe dream. With the assistance of my Advanced Music Engraving class, I have also created a version of Chaos for sinfonietta, which I'm hoping to get a performance for, in the near future.
Well, that's all for now. Time to cook some dinner.
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