"The Seattle Composers’ Salon fosters the development, performance and appreciation of new music by regional composers and performers. At bi-monthly, informal presentations, the Salon features finished works, previews, and works in progress."
Aaron Keyt: Sonata after Haydn - Keith Eisenbrey, piano
Mr. Keyt announced before Keith played this piece that it was a reworking (based on his musical upbringing between the twin pillars of modernism: serialism and aleatory music) on Haydn’s Sonata in E, Hob. XVI:31. The result was not really serialist (though based on ideas from the Haydn treated as pitch classes) and not at all aleatory. Rather, it seemed to me a hard-edged neoclassicism. I’m sure I heard hints of Hindemith. It was all very delicate though loud in places, angular and squiggly, and with surprising flashes of intense beauty – such as the final two chords of the second movement or the gamelan-like melody in the finale.
Clement Reid: Northern Lights, and Three Stories
Another blogger (and audience member) said this reminded him of the music of Greg Short, and I would agree on this point. Late Romanticist tone-poems in inspiration, yet scaled down to solo piano, with sudden dissonances, interesting coloristic effects, and ecstatic climaxes; each piece was a broad epic that took place in just a few minutes.
Jay Hamilton: #5 for Left Hand, and Did Everybody Get a Balloon?
The left-hand piece was intended as a rebuttal to the “cheating” left-hand piano repertoire that tries to make it sound as though both hands are playing. Here most of the writing was simple (though not simplistic or easy), and in the bass register – exactly as one would expect for a left-hand solo. Yet there was nothing “missing” in this quiet piano introspection.
Then Mr. Hamilton gave instructions on how to play the balloons that he’d handed out at the beginning of the concert, and let everybody improvise. With that, he broke down any stuffy pretense we had about having gathered to listen to recent “classical” compositions.
Monday, March 10, 2014
Video Installation Review: Etsuko Ichikawa's "Echo at Satsop"
This is one of an ongoing series of works commemorating the earthquake, tsunami, and resulting nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, 2011. At first, however, it appears to celebrate the immensity of space rather than any kind of disaster; it is only after some contemplation that one makes the connection.
Before entering the installation space, I could hear deep booms and clatters echoing from within. After entering, these resolved into the sounds of metal railings and pipes, struck like gongs, and reverberating in a vast chamber. The video began a half-minute or so later with the silhouette of a cooling tower of a nuclear power station. Nuclear, yes, but here appearing as an art object; a gigantic abstract sculpture, a huge curving geometric shape. As the scenes shifted to images from the interior of the tower, it became obvious that the sounds were made (and echoed) from inside. Birdcalls echoed from outside. A tiny human figure (the artist herself) walked along parapets and the rim of the tower’s summit; clad in the white robes of the priestly caste of some ancient, unknown civilization (or perhaps those of a future world). Close-ups of her clapping (the sound becomes colossal in that space) and dropping water from a bamboo pipe into the void. Fade to black; the sounds and reverberations continue for another six minutes with no video.
So what have we experienced?
It seems to be an exploration of the reverberation of sound in a large space, rather than a lamentation for victims of a nuclear disaster – more akin to Paul Horn’s Taj Mahal recordings or the classic “Cistern Chapel” CDs by Stuart Dempster (with or without the other members of the Deep Listening Band) than Penderecki’s Hiroshima music. There is no sadness or horror here. There is only tranquility generated by the interaction of sound, space, and visuals.
But what kind of space is this? A decommissioned nuclear tower; it was originally not an expansive echo chamber, but a home to the same kind of power that has nearly destroyed Fukushima. The generation of such power was not, or course, originally intended for harm – Fukushima (and Chernobyl) are not Hiroshima or Nagasaki – but the question remains: is this power safe? What is it that drives us to attempt to harness it to begin with? And what will happen after the power is no longer needed, or after our civilization has run its course and collapsed into dust as all works of humans must?
I don’t intend to get political here, and I don’t believe that Ms. Ichikawa intended to make a political statement about nuclear power either. There are legitimate arguments both for and against its use and its safety. Rather, this installation/video seems to be using the no longer used nuclear cooling towers as a metaphor for the impermanence of things. (The use of the water from the bamboo inevitably recalls Zen artwork, and parenthetically the idea of impermanence and the return to nothingness espoused by that philosophy – see my further comments here.) The tranquility created by the vast echoes in the enormity of the space invites us to look beyond temporal impermanence into something that is eternal and unchanging.
Echo at Satsop runs until March 14th, 2014, at Jack Straw New Media Gallery, 4621 Roosevelt Way NE, Seattle.
Before entering the installation space, I could hear deep booms and clatters echoing from within. After entering, these resolved into the sounds of metal railings and pipes, struck like gongs, and reverberating in a vast chamber. The video began a half-minute or so later with the silhouette of a cooling tower of a nuclear power station. Nuclear, yes, but here appearing as an art object; a gigantic abstract sculpture, a huge curving geometric shape. As the scenes shifted to images from the interior of the tower, it became obvious that the sounds were made (and echoed) from inside. Birdcalls echoed from outside. A tiny human figure (the artist herself) walked along parapets and the rim of the tower’s summit; clad in the white robes of the priestly caste of some ancient, unknown civilization (or perhaps those of a future world). Close-ups of her clapping (the sound becomes colossal in that space) and dropping water from a bamboo pipe into the void. Fade to black; the sounds and reverberations continue for another six minutes with no video.
So what have we experienced?
But what kind of space is this? A decommissioned nuclear tower; it was originally not an expansive echo chamber, but a home to the same kind of power that has nearly destroyed Fukushima. The generation of such power was not, or course, originally intended for harm – Fukushima (and Chernobyl) are not Hiroshima or Nagasaki – but the question remains: is this power safe? What is it that drives us to attempt to harness it to begin with? And what will happen after the power is no longer needed, or after our civilization has run its course and collapsed into dust as all works of humans must?
I don’t intend to get political here, and I don’t believe that Ms. Ichikawa intended to make a political statement about nuclear power either. There are legitimate arguments both for and against its use and its safety. Rather, this installation/video seems to be using the no longer used nuclear cooling towers as a metaphor for the impermanence of things. (The use of the water from the bamboo inevitably recalls Zen artwork, and parenthetically the idea of impermanence and the return to nothingness espoused by that philosophy – see my further comments here.) The tranquility created by the vast echoes in the enormity of the space invites us to look beyond temporal impermanence into something that is eternal and unchanging.
Echo at Satsop runs until March 14th, 2014, at Jack Straw New Media Gallery, 4621 Roosevelt Way NE, Seattle.
Saturday, February 8, 2014
SIMF (Seattle Improvised Music Festival) 2/7/2014
This is the only SIMF concert that I’m able to get to this year. It was, however, the one that I most wanted to see – I was curious, if nothing else, about Andrea Neumann’s modified autoharp.
Joe Morris: Solo Guitar
Three pieces: 1. Splintered needles of sound, rather in the manner of some of Elliot Sharp’s acoustic improvisations. 2. Fingernails used to create a scrubbing, bowing sound. 3. Variations on the above, with a surprising amount of melodic development. In all three pieces, short tone “cells” continuously evolved in a state of flux, each sprouting numerous variations and techniques.
(album cover by Bonnie Jones and Andrea Neumann, with Christine Abdelnour)
Andrea Neumann: Autoharp / Gust Burns: Electronics
Gust’s electronic device was known as a “dub plate” – which is apparently a variation on the standard turntable. Andrea’s autoharp was amplified with a pick-up and run through various guitar foot pedals; it may also have been retuned or prepared (though with the sound distortion from the pedals, this was not obvious). Together they produced a sparse soundscape. Foggy memories of sounds emerged and faded back into the silence of the room. Here was a cluster of high notes on a piano; there was a voice speaking unintelligibly; over there were crystalline prepared-piano timbres. Electronic hums occasionally floated through the air. The room itself seemed to get into the act with crackings and boomings; the old boards and beams of the building were expanding and contracting with the cold winter night (outside) and the warmth (inside).
Naomi Segal: trombone / Bonnie Jones and Jonathan Way: electronics
This began as a continuation of the previous set. Bonnie started with thumping and knocking on the table where her electronic equipment sat; these sounds were amplified and filtered and cycled back into the room. Naomi added slivers of melody on her trombone. The piece grew and developed organically. The two electronic musicians functioned as a single player; the trombone likewise added what seemed to be electronic sounds (sometimes also filtered and repeated). The result had the effect of a symphonic work, with its own development and climaxes.
After hearing this concert, I’m disappointed that I won’t be able to make it to the next one, tonight (2/8/2014). All concerts of the series are at the Chapel Performance Space at Good Shepherd Center, Seattle.
Joe Morris: Solo Guitar
Three pieces: 1. Splintered needles of sound, rather in the manner of some of Elliot Sharp’s acoustic improvisations. 2. Fingernails used to create a scrubbing, bowing sound. 3. Variations on the above, with a surprising amount of melodic development. In all three pieces, short tone “cells” continuously evolved in a state of flux, each sprouting numerous variations and techniques.
Andrea Neumann: Autoharp / Gust Burns: Electronics
Gust’s electronic device was known as a “dub plate” – which is apparently a variation on the standard turntable. Andrea’s autoharp was amplified with a pick-up and run through various guitar foot pedals; it may also have been retuned or prepared (though with the sound distortion from the pedals, this was not obvious). Together they produced a sparse soundscape. Foggy memories of sounds emerged and faded back into the silence of the room. Here was a cluster of high notes on a piano; there was a voice speaking unintelligibly; over there were crystalline prepared-piano timbres. Electronic hums occasionally floated through the air. The room itself seemed to get into the act with crackings and boomings; the old boards and beams of the building were expanding and contracting with the cold winter night (outside) and the warmth (inside).
Naomi Segal: trombone / Bonnie Jones and Jonathan Way: electronics
This began as a continuation of the previous set. Bonnie started with thumping and knocking on the table where her electronic equipment sat; these sounds were amplified and filtered and cycled back into the room. Naomi added slivers of melody on her trombone. The piece grew and developed organically. The two electronic musicians functioned as a single player; the trombone likewise added what seemed to be electronic sounds (sometimes also filtered and repeated). The result had the effect of a symphonic work, with its own development and climaxes.
After hearing this concert, I’m disappointed that I won’t be able to make it to the next one, tonight (2/8/2014). All concerts of the series are at the Chapel Performance Space at Good Shepherd Center, Seattle.
Monday, February 3, 2014
Concert Review: Elizabeth A. Baker at the Good Shepherd Center Chapel Performance Space, 1/31/2014
There have been some memorable piano concerts at the GSC Performance Space. Dennis Johnson’s “November”, played by R. Andrew Lee, was particularly good, played last year, fittingly, in November. Though entirely different, these enthusiastic and muscular performances by this young pianist from Florida rate as another.
Ms. Baker played nine pieces. For the first, recordings from the Apollo Moon Landings played over loudspeakers while she played fragmentary motives more or less in the style of Schubert, quite loudly. At first I wondered what the connection was (or if there was a connection) between these two sonic worlds. After the piece, she put it more in context with the first of her several stories for the audience. The piano music was called “Fold-Out Franz”, and related to how she’d found a box of Schubert piano music at a flea market (with a fold-out of the composer). The moon landings didn’t relate except that she’d happened to have them playing once when she practiced the piece and they synched up nicely. Fold-Out Franz serendipitously goes to the moon.
The remaining pieces for the first half were “conventional”, without any electronics or prerecorded parts. One of Philip Glass’ “Metamorphoses” was Glass’ usual “fun with arpeggios”, though with a slightly more interesting chord progression than Glass often uses. Ms. Baker played it with quite a lot of rubato, which always strikes me as odd for this kind of rhythmically precise piece (though Glass himself plays his music this way). As is often the case with Glass, though, this was pretty but the least interesting piece of the evening.
Arvo Pärt’s “Partita” shifted the concert into intense high gear. Ms. Baker stated before playing that those used to Pärt’s “tintinabulary” style will be in for a shock – this is nothing like that. An aggressive moto perpetuo begins, with some stutters; then it suddenly collapses into a quiet quasi-fugue. Atonal harmonies and dissonances flicker in and out as the music slowly builds to a climax (of mostly major chords – startling in this context!) and then returns to the beginning. All in all it reminded me more of Bartok or even Ligeti than other Pärt piano pieces I’ve heard.
“The Artist in Turmoil” (written when Ms. Baker was in her early twenties) was an explosion of pianistic passion in the manner of Rachmaninov – though it was cross-cut and fragmentary in a way that made this a wild, dark, angst-y piece.
The first four pieces of the second half were Ms. Baker’s own compositions. Two of these were for piano echoed with electronics into a dreamy, otherworldly ambience. I had expected these to be rather like Somei Satoh’s drone piano pieces (of which “Incarnation” has actually gotten a fair amount of airplay on KING-FM over the past couple of years). I was wrong. The “echoes” did not continue or intensify any piano drones; rather, they sounded quietly, as if from a room down a long hallway. Delicate individual notes seemed to float in the room like stars in the night sky. The first piece, “Homage à Pärt”, sounded more like Pärt than Pärt’s partita did. The second piece was shorter but much in the same vein. These pieces may be a continuation of what Feldman would have done had he gone entirely modal (a direction hinted at in his later pieces). They also reminded me of Dennis Johnson’s “November”, which I mentioned above.
“Magnetic Resonance”, Two pieces for piano and MRI machine, were up next (recordings, obviously, not a real MRI machine.) In the first, an MRI loop produced a “doomp pa-doomp pa-doomp” dotted rhythm on a minor third, over which Ms. Baker had composed fragmentary minimalist and jazzy riffs, with an occasional hint of boogie-woogie. The second was more expansive in mood though shorter: the MRI became sound became a series of drones of various timbres; the piano part seemed to grow out of this in an almost symphonic manner.
The last piece was a set of selections from Hovhaness’ “Visionary Landscapes”. Ms. Baker stated before playing that Hovhaness was one of the first to compose minimalist music; I had never particularly thought of this though a lot of it does seem to be more recent than it actually is. Here, however, the connections to Glass and Pärt were obvious, particularly in the way in which the melodic line is often pared down into nothing more than two or three harmonious tones. The piece stated this at the very beginning; one repeated note gradually unfolded into a pentatonic melody that kept looping but was never the same. Once in a while, deep bass notes resounded like the low gongs in a gamelan. As always, Hovahness’ “tunes” were particularly beautiful.
What to say at the conclusion? Ms. Baker’s compositions continue the classical tradition into the current information-rich generation in the way that they are composed from fragments cut and pasted together (this is not a negative comment) in the way that a hip-hop DJ might combine older popular music into a background texture for a rapper – though in this case, of course, a classical-based composition results. John Zorn has done similar. I’m also reminded of some of the “pseudo-minimalism” by Toshi Ichiyanagi, where various fragments emerge and entangle over a quick, jagged loop consisting of only a few notes. All in all, exciting music.
The remaining pieces for the first half were “conventional”, without any electronics or prerecorded parts. One of Philip Glass’ “Metamorphoses” was Glass’ usual “fun with arpeggios”, though with a slightly more interesting chord progression than Glass often uses. Ms. Baker played it with quite a lot of rubato, which always strikes me as odd for this kind of rhythmically precise piece (though Glass himself plays his music this way). As is often the case with Glass, though, this was pretty but the least interesting piece of the evening.
Arvo Pärt’s “Partita” shifted the concert into intense high gear. Ms. Baker stated before playing that those used to Pärt’s “tintinabulary” style will be in for a shock – this is nothing like that. An aggressive moto perpetuo begins, with some stutters; then it suddenly collapses into a quiet quasi-fugue. Atonal harmonies and dissonances flicker in and out as the music slowly builds to a climax (of mostly major chords – startling in this context!) and then returns to the beginning. All in all it reminded me more of Bartok or even Ligeti than other Pärt piano pieces I’ve heard.
“The Artist in Turmoil” (written when Ms. Baker was in her early twenties) was an explosion of pianistic passion in the manner of Rachmaninov – though it was cross-cut and fragmentary in a way that made this a wild, dark, angst-y piece.
The first four pieces of the second half were Ms. Baker’s own compositions. Two of these were for piano echoed with electronics into a dreamy, otherworldly ambience. I had expected these to be rather like Somei Satoh’s drone piano pieces (of which “Incarnation” has actually gotten a fair amount of airplay on KING-FM over the past couple of years). I was wrong. The “echoes” did not continue or intensify any piano drones; rather, they sounded quietly, as if from a room down a long hallway. Delicate individual notes seemed to float in the room like stars in the night sky. The first piece, “Homage à Pärt”, sounded more like Pärt than Pärt’s partita did. The second piece was shorter but much in the same vein. These pieces may be a continuation of what Feldman would have done had he gone entirely modal (a direction hinted at in his later pieces). They also reminded me of Dennis Johnson’s “November”, which I mentioned above.
“Magnetic Resonance”, Two pieces for piano and MRI machine, were up next (recordings, obviously, not a real MRI machine.) In the first, an MRI loop produced a “doomp pa-doomp pa-doomp” dotted rhythm on a minor third, over which Ms. Baker had composed fragmentary minimalist and jazzy riffs, with an occasional hint of boogie-woogie. The second was more expansive in mood though shorter: the MRI became sound became a series of drones of various timbres; the piano part seemed to grow out of this in an almost symphonic manner.
The last piece was a set of selections from Hovhaness’ “Visionary Landscapes”. Ms. Baker stated before playing that Hovhaness was one of the first to compose minimalist music; I had never particularly thought of this though a lot of it does seem to be more recent than it actually is. Here, however, the connections to Glass and Pärt were obvious, particularly in the way in which the melodic line is often pared down into nothing more than two or three harmonious tones. The piece stated this at the very beginning; one repeated note gradually unfolded into a pentatonic melody that kept looping but was never the same. Once in a while, deep bass notes resounded like the low gongs in a gamelan. As always, Hovahness’ “tunes” were particularly beautiful.
What to say at the conclusion? Ms. Baker’s compositions continue the classical tradition into the current information-rich generation in the way that they are composed from fragments cut and pasted together (this is not a negative comment) in the way that a hip-hop DJ might combine older popular music into a background texture for a rapper – though in this case, of course, a classical-based composition results. John Zorn has done similar. I’m also reminded of some of the “pseudo-minimalism” by Toshi Ichiyanagi, where various fragments emerge and entangle over a quick, jagged loop consisting of only a few notes. All in all, exciting music.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Sound Installation Review: Ruth Tomlinson’s “Lost Long: A Landscape” at Jack Straw
A curious paradox exists within this installation space.
This is a place to linger. Delicate percussion (wind snapping a rope against a flagpole) sounds randomly and as if from a great distance; speaking of picturesque, wide landscapes. Gentle voices proclaim the condition of the cloud cover and of the wind; the timbre is both calming and sensuous.
This is not a place to linger. There is no place to sit or relax. The while light is glaring, unfriendly. The landscape on the wall – made with hundreds of push-pins in the shape of mountains and valleys – is bleached white, the color of the wall, as if scorched by a malevolent sun and then left to disintegrate over eons in a world without life. There is a table in the center of the room, but it emits more garish light and offers nothing but desiccated, abstracted branches (cut from paper with black outlines showing) and skeletal remains of more branches (painted white, again) on the floor below.
The audio is based on the natural, and is friendly, welcoming. The visual is based on the natural, and is unfriendly, even hostile. This is of course the world we live in: “nature” is both a calming balm for the soul and the abode of predators and parasites. This installation is about this, though dividing the experience so that one feels the benevolence with one sense (hearing) and the horrible with another (sight).
But there is more to it than that. The accompanying flier suggests some alternate readings.
1.) The landscape of branches and push-pins is derived from a specific location, and suggestive of memory of that location: perhaps one’s remembrance of a particular place and time diminishes over time, becoming washed out, fading to white, as it were. The glaring light is simply the absence of color, as the memory disappears; diminution of sound also occurs but quiet sound produces a quite difference experience.
2.) At one point, the light is referred to as “Jesus Light”. What is expressed here, then, is not malevolence at all, but the inescapable light that penetrates and reveals all. One would naturally feel discomfort in its presence, were it not the very source of refuge from its own glare.
3.) Maybe one’s experience of a landscape, whether natural or man-made, is always subjective; what suggested a dichotomy to me (or a sort of antagonistic yin-yang) may not actually be so. I was able to – briefly – sit against the wall and shut my eyes against the brightness, and experience the sound aspect differently, and more peacefully. Another person might “see” the whole piece (or be able to enter into it) in an alternate, but equally meaningful, way.
Cloudless, windless, few clouds, no wind, half cloud cover, slight wind, cloudless, slight to moderate wind, few clouds, no wind, three-quarter cloud cover, slight wind, few clouds, no wind, few clouds, no wind, quarter cloud cover, slight wind, three-quarter cloud cover, no wind, few clouds, no wind, half cloud cover, slight wind, no clouds, moderate wind…
This is a place to linger. Delicate percussion (wind snapping a rope against a flagpole) sounds randomly and as if from a great distance; speaking of picturesque, wide landscapes. Gentle voices proclaim the condition of the cloud cover and of the wind; the timbre is both calming and sensuous.
This is not a place to linger. There is no place to sit or relax. The while light is glaring, unfriendly. The landscape on the wall – made with hundreds of push-pins in the shape of mountains and valleys – is bleached white, the color of the wall, as if scorched by a malevolent sun and then left to disintegrate over eons in a world without life. There is a table in the center of the room, but it emits more garish light and offers nothing but desiccated, abstracted branches (cut from paper with black outlines showing) and skeletal remains of more branches (painted white, again) on the floor below.
The audio is based on the natural, and is friendly, welcoming. The visual is based on the natural, and is unfriendly, even hostile. This is of course the world we live in: “nature” is both a calming balm for the soul and the abode of predators and parasites. This installation is about this, though dividing the experience so that one feels the benevolence with one sense (hearing) and the horrible with another (sight).
But there is more to it than that. The accompanying flier suggests some alternate readings.
1.) The landscape of branches and push-pins is derived from a specific location, and suggestive of memory of that location: perhaps one’s remembrance of a particular place and time diminishes over time, becoming washed out, fading to white, as it were. The glaring light is simply the absence of color, as the memory disappears; diminution of sound also occurs but quiet sound produces a quite difference experience.
2.) At one point, the light is referred to as “Jesus Light”. What is expressed here, then, is not malevolence at all, but the inescapable light that penetrates and reveals all. One would naturally feel discomfort in its presence, were it not the very source of refuge from its own glare.
3.) Maybe one’s experience of a landscape, whether natural or man-made, is always subjective; what suggested a dichotomy to me (or a sort of antagonistic yin-yang) may not actually be so. I was able to – briefly – sit against the wall and shut my eyes against the brightness, and experience the sound aspect differently, and more peacefully. Another person might “see” the whole piece (or be able to enter into it) in an alternate, but equally meaningful, way.
Cloudless, windless, few clouds, no wind, half cloud cover, slight wind, cloudless, slight to moderate wind, few clouds, no wind, three-quarter cloud cover, slight wind, few clouds, no wind, few clouds, no wind, quarter cloud cover, slight wind, three-quarter cloud cover, no wind, few clouds, no wind, half cloud cover, slight wind, no clouds, moderate wind…
CD Reviews: Another Seattle Music Scene - Sunn O))), Double Yoko, Deep Listening Band
Three Seattle-connected CDs I've heard recently that have little to do with that more famous (1990’s) “Seattle scene”…
Sunn O))) – Monoliths and Dimensions
This caught me completely by surprise. I was looking for “drone music” in the online catalogue of the public library, hoping to find something in the manner of Phill Niblock that I didn’t happen to have heard. I came across this, and clicked on it just to see what it was – the unpronounceable name had piqued my interest. The notes said that it was “drone metal”. At this point, the reader will have to imagine a question mark and an exclamation point, both about two feet high, swirling in the air above my head. A fusion between drone and metal…!? Two incompatible genres if there ever were: non-commercial, unpredictable and seemingly motionless vs. highly commercial, stereotyped, belligerent…
I checked out the CD.
I listened to some of it in the car driving home from the library. It’s not exactly drone music in that it’s not really based on microtones and sustained pitches that seem not to move. However, unlike any other rock-based music that I’ve heard, it is played as slowly as possible – usually letting each guitar chord ring until it fades to near nothing (or, with the use of a limiter, doesn’t fade) before the next one is played. It has the overall aesthetic of drone music. A careful listening reveals standard rock chord progressions, at least in places. However, the time frame is altered. The slow (sometimes almost infinitely slow) tempo, and the notable absence of drums, obscure the rhythm – in fact, the “beat” is usually discarded in favor of a more impressionist wash of sound. In track two, all motion ceases twice, letting a single chime ring out. But, it all still qualifies as “metal” because of the heavy fuzz guitars, deep dark bass, and distorted vocals (sometimes with a growly “sore throat” whisper that’s only possible because of high amplification). Incidentally, those vocals are usually subsumed into the instrumental strata and are seldom understandable – and the lyrics (for those who bother to read the insert) are, mostly, refreshingly free of the usual head-banger twaddle about torture and demons.
There are little surprises here and there. During the first long track, I was sure that I was hearing a kind of "avant-garde" scratchy/noisy treble sound that is usually made with a violin (i.e. in some of Xenakis’ chamber music or Ligeti’s String Quartet no. 2). I assumed they were doing it with a guitar. But in the fourth (instrumental) track, another long one, there was no mistaking it: there are other instruments here besides the “rock band”. First, an accordion picks up the overtones of several of the guitar’s chords as they fade out (okay, the keyboard player could be doing that) but then there’s that modal trombone solo that appears… I glanced again at the notes on the insert – there is a whole list of well-known Seattle experimental and “new music” artists who took part in this recording. So, as I thought, this is not just another dime a dozen “heavy metal” CD…
Double Yoko
This is a collaboration between Beth Fleenor (see my 3/27/13 posting) and Paris Hurley. I saw their performance as this “band” a couple of years ago (see my 10/3/10 posting in my old blog), and picked up this CD at Beth’s concert (as clarinetist for Tim Root’s “Kerplunk!” project) on 3/22/13. This is not a commercially available CD, so anyone who’s interested should probably contact one of the two “Yokos”. (Yoki?) However, it is so worth listening to that I decided to review it here. It needs the exposure, though fat chance that my blog will help it much…
“Double Yoko” of course is a pun on “double yolk”. When playing together, they do seem to be two in one shell, as it were. One plays a riff, or just a single note, and the other spins an intricate and beautiful web from it, and then the roles are abruptly reversed with no pause in between…
This is a recording of seven untitled tracks made in a radio studio, for a late night “Sonarchy” live experimental music broadcast. Beth Fleenor plays clarinet and (sometimes) sings; Paris Hurley plays violin in the foreground and does tricks with old cassette players in the background. Track one begins with one of the old cassette recordings, an unidentified plucked stringed instrument (sounding like a cross between a guitar and a koto); Beth picks it up with Balkan/Navajo-tinged vocals (interesting combination!) and it goes from there. There are occasional references to the free-jazz roots of the music; track three, for example, allows a couple of animalistic screech-honk fracases over an increasingly insistent drone from Paris’ violin; later these are recycled quietly (as recorded from one of Paris’ cassette machines) under gentler murmurs by both players. Generally, though, this is “new music” at its most amiable. There are modal melodies, usually on the verge of breaking into a full-scale “classical” major key; there are little touches of Klezmer and Appalachian fiddling; there are bird-like chirps from a greatly stretched and speeded-up cassette of (probably) folk music; there are charming bells and phantom glockenspiels and snippets of radio broadcasts. The mixture is eclectic and sparse, but virtually every moment smiles at the listener. I recommend it for anyone who still thinks that experimental music has to be dark and doom-laden (it actually seldom is, but that's another matter).
Deep Listening Band – Great Howl at Town Haul
…I was there…!
They recorded DLB’s 1/19/11 concert where I was in the audience, and this is that recording, slightly edited. What follows is not a conventional concert review. The improvisatory, stream of consciousness, ambient and environmental nature of the music makes that impossible. Instead, this will be a “nonsense” poem in the manner of Finnegan’s Wake (this is actually an edited version of what I wrote after seeing the concert). I’m no James Joyce, but I’ve attempted to write similar material before – the “technique” for composing this word salad is rather like aleatory/improvisational music, involving both intuition and random chance).
Pointillistic spstuttering, trombone, voice and left, center left, righaccorion is tunedt. Oscillating dr diverse music, arts one (likthe deep listeninge siren but slower). Voldifferent from preparedume grows. Drone resolvesfrozen imDownstairs at Townprovisation, said into harmonics, multiphonrepresented in deepics (buzz) on trombonics. Wlong revereration time busy schedule ofooshes are last vestiges of speach performer arspeutters. Drone only now, seven limit system very beautiful “environmenleft hand andtal” sound. Minor key, dramany more instrumentsone on tonic; trombone onwe improvise together 3rd, 4th, 5th, generous (outinner) spaces and flat 7th. Influential unifying presence. Bell sounds from… where? Adjustable didgeridoo made Tintinnabulation. Bird ca(ck)lls, from… where? Electrand found metalonic glissando upwards. After Bells, bass trombone, diwhistling that providedgeridoo effect, low regiwas very darkster on piano. Fade to s45 second reverberationilence. Wavesounds trafThe recording enginesix two-story columnser, fic outside, audience coavailable, then silence. Surround piano – one noearly up, andte, 7th on in tromanombone, 2nd was very darkand major 3rd long blockbeautiful voist and ise andof Steve Reichian soundcistern available for. Fades, trombone mutes, ces minor 2nds, disquiet and helpedsonance, microtones, vocarecording studio! al byon the cornerpianwere all sist. Dissolves into pogreat depth toints and sputters, randsimontaneously by allom notes and noises. Toy anianessential processmals (all thbusy schedule ofree players, pianispace, in effect, ist first) digital sounds (anfoot diameter spaced listening devicesqueaks) from these dis jointed pipetoys produce humorous mishleft handculture center itandmash when processed right and scalisten intensely tottered, space sounds, ironically nrepresented in Deepo irony! Teletuon letubbies. Bye bye! (riall three composerssing notintonation). Fractral along althoughts of children’s songs for(four)most gagaku. Clicks and clatters, stAl todoock sci-fi, duck-calls, mothe nhood of distingext daynightkeys, vocalisms, howls. Blwell handles whistlingow through conch shover the last, use edge to performingconch shell as percussiomposers. The instrumentstutter scatters sounelaborate window treatmentd, adds pitto one anotherches. Loud! Wave of white noisand attentiveness differente, recedes, leavinfor conversion intog didgeridoo onAs we improvilectures, meetings, andse trombone, tranquility – then (Messiaen) aphand. The voice,ocalyptic bass trombone snintermingle. Seating of rhythm, movea collective music. s tuaccordion tunacoustic resonance of organization and relies ed differently from intimate, curved, othernstruments, betrying to seecomes free jazz. Pianist plays bell, comand off toputer scatters bell sound, acabfor dozens oflats for ecoround onec twodds threees, sharpitches, flatones, bell becommany more intenstrumentses maspace to manyny bells in different retransformative spatial modulations, gisters. Quiet! Tone clustarps, cleaning toolters indiverse music, artshighest registthe big dayer of piano again st chordrochanged by interactionne and bells, fades. S(ilenquie)till. End.
If anyone could read all of that, they’d realize that the music made by Pauline Oliveros (accordon), Stuart Dempster (trombone) and David Gamper (piano) – collectively called Deep Listening Band – is improvisational, and augmented by live computer processing. A single note (or effect) played by one player results in a refractive cavalcade of echoes from all directions, often changing in pitch. The result is alternately meditative or chaotic (sometimes both at the same time!). There is a humorous moment when they play toys as instruments: the squeaks, digital noises, bye-bye!s, and whistles from stuffed animals, teletubbies, etc., join into the computerized conversational soundscape. (This actually goes deliberately over-the-top when Halloween witch-cackles join the fray.) Titles were added for the CD: like the title of the CD, most are puns on the name of the performance venue (Town Hall, Seattle) and the word “howl” – though there is little on the CD that brings to mind a “howl”. (The exception might be the piece “Great Horned Howl”, which includes the aforementioned funny/scary sounds.) At any rate, this is a generally grand-ambient soundscape, with little bits of unexpected wit, and it is well worth a listen (or several).
…I was there…!
Sunn O))) – Monoliths and Dimensions
This caught me completely by surprise. I was looking for “drone music” in the online catalogue of the public library, hoping to find something in the manner of Phill Niblock that I didn’t happen to have heard. I came across this, and clicked on it just to see what it was – the unpronounceable name had piqued my interest. The notes said that it was “drone metal”. At this point, the reader will have to imagine a question mark and an exclamation point, both about two feet high, swirling in the air above my head. A fusion between drone and metal…!? Two incompatible genres if there ever were: non-commercial, unpredictable and seemingly motionless vs. highly commercial, stereotyped, belligerent…
I checked out the CD.
I listened to some of it in the car driving home from the library. It’s not exactly drone music in that it’s not really based on microtones and sustained pitches that seem not to move. However, unlike any other rock-based music that I’ve heard, it is played as slowly as possible – usually letting each guitar chord ring until it fades to near nothing (or, with the use of a limiter, doesn’t fade) before the next one is played. It has the overall aesthetic of drone music. A careful listening reveals standard rock chord progressions, at least in places. However, the time frame is altered. The slow (sometimes almost infinitely slow) tempo, and the notable absence of drums, obscure the rhythm – in fact, the “beat” is usually discarded in favor of a more impressionist wash of sound. In track two, all motion ceases twice, letting a single chime ring out. But, it all still qualifies as “metal” because of the heavy fuzz guitars, deep dark bass, and distorted vocals (sometimes with a growly “sore throat” whisper that’s only possible because of high amplification). Incidentally, those vocals are usually subsumed into the instrumental strata and are seldom understandable – and the lyrics (for those who bother to read the insert) are, mostly, refreshingly free of the usual head-banger twaddle about torture and demons.
There are little surprises here and there. During the first long track, I was sure that I was hearing a kind of "avant-garde" scratchy/noisy treble sound that is usually made with a violin (i.e. in some of Xenakis’ chamber music or Ligeti’s String Quartet no. 2). I assumed they were doing it with a guitar. But in the fourth (instrumental) track, another long one, there was no mistaking it: there are other instruments here besides the “rock band”. First, an accordion picks up the overtones of several of the guitar’s chords as they fade out (okay, the keyboard player could be doing that) but then there’s that modal trombone solo that appears… I glanced again at the notes on the insert – there is a whole list of well-known Seattle experimental and “new music” artists who took part in this recording. So, as I thought, this is not just another dime a dozen “heavy metal” CD…
Double Yoko
This is a collaboration between Beth Fleenor (see my 3/27/13 posting) and Paris Hurley. I saw their performance as this “band” a couple of years ago (see my 10/3/10 posting in my old blog), and picked up this CD at Beth’s concert (as clarinetist for Tim Root’s “Kerplunk!” project) on 3/22/13. This is not a commercially available CD, so anyone who’s interested should probably contact one of the two “Yokos”. (Yoki?) However, it is so worth listening to that I decided to review it here. It needs the exposure, though fat chance that my blog will help it much…
“Double Yoko” of course is a pun on “double yolk”. When playing together, they do seem to be two in one shell, as it were. One plays a riff, or just a single note, and the other spins an intricate and beautiful web from it, and then the roles are abruptly reversed with no pause in between…
This is a recording of seven untitled tracks made in a radio studio, for a late night “Sonarchy” live experimental music broadcast. Beth Fleenor plays clarinet and (sometimes) sings; Paris Hurley plays violin in the foreground and does tricks with old cassette players in the background. Track one begins with one of the old cassette recordings, an unidentified plucked stringed instrument (sounding like a cross between a guitar and a koto); Beth picks it up with Balkan/Navajo-tinged vocals (interesting combination!) and it goes from there. There are occasional references to the free-jazz roots of the music; track three, for example, allows a couple of animalistic screech-honk fracases over an increasingly insistent drone from Paris’ violin; later these are recycled quietly (as recorded from one of Paris’ cassette machines) under gentler murmurs by both players. Generally, though, this is “new music” at its most amiable. There are modal melodies, usually on the verge of breaking into a full-scale “classical” major key; there are little touches of Klezmer and Appalachian fiddling; there are bird-like chirps from a greatly stretched and speeded-up cassette of (probably) folk music; there are charming bells and phantom glockenspiels and snippets of radio broadcasts. The mixture is eclectic and sparse, but virtually every moment smiles at the listener. I recommend it for anyone who still thinks that experimental music has to be dark and doom-laden (it actually seldom is, but that's another matter).
Deep Listening Band – Great Howl at Town Haul
…I was there…!
They recorded DLB’s 1/19/11 concert where I was in the audience, and this is that recording, slightly edited. What follows is not a conventional concert review. The improvisatory, stream of consciousness, ambient and environmental nature of the music makes that impossible. Instead, this will be a “nonsense” poem in the manner of Finnegan’s Wake (this is actually an edited version of what I wrote after seeing the concert). I’m no James Joyce, but I’ve attempted to write similar material before – the “technique” for composing this word salad is rather like aleatory/improvisational music, involving both intuition and random chance).
Pointillistic spstuttering, trombone, voice and left, center left, righaccorion is tunedt. Oscillating dr diverse music, arts one (likthe deep listeninge siren but slower). Voldifferent from preparedume grows. Drone resolvesfrozen imDownstairs at Townprovisation, said into harmonics, multiphonrepresented in deepics (buzz) on trombonics. Wlong revereration time busy schedule ofooshes are last vestiges of speach performer arspeutters. Drone only now, seven limit system very beautiful “environmenleft hand andtal” sound. Minor key, dramany more instrumentsone on tonic; trombone onwe improvise together 3rd, 4th, 5th, generous (outinner) spaces and flat 7th. Influential unifying presence. Bell sounds from… where? Adjustable didgeridoo made Tintinnabulation. Bird ca(ck)lls, from… where? Electrand found metalonic glissando upwards. After Bells, bass trombone, diwhistling that providedgeridoo effect, low regiwas very darkster on piano. Fade to s45 second reverberationilence. Wavesounds trafThe recording enginesix two-story columnser, fic outside, audience coavailable, then silence. Surround piano – one noearly up, andte, 7th on in tromanombone, 2nd was very darkand major 3rd long blockbeautiful voist and ise andof Steve Reichian soundcistern available for. Fades, trombone mutes, ces minor 2nds, disquiet and helpedsonance, microtones, vocarecording studio! al byon the cornerpianwere all sist. Dissolves into pogreat depth toints and sputters, randsimontaneously by allom notes and noises. Toy anianessential processmals (all thbusy schedule ofree players, pianispace, in effect, ist first) digital sounds (anfoot diameter spaced listening devicesqueaks) from these dis jointed pipetoys produce humorous mishleft handculture center itandmash when processed right and scalisten intensely tottered, space sounds, ironically nrepresented in Deepo irony! Teletuon letubbies. Bye bye! (riall three composerssing notintonation). Fractral along althoughts of children’s songs for(four)most gagaku. Clicks and clatters, stAl todoock sci-fi, duck-calls, mothe nhood of distingext daynightkeys, vocalisms, howls. Blwell handles whistlingow through conch shover the last, use edge to performingconch shell as percussiomposers. The instrumentstutter scatters sounelaborate window treatmentd, adds pitto one anotherches. Loud! Wave of white noisand attentiveness differente, recedes, leavinfor conversion intog didgeridoo onAs we improvilectures, meetings, andse trombone, tranquility – then (Messiaen) aphand. The voice,ocalyptic bass trombone snintermingle. Seating of rhythm, movea collective music. s tuaccordion tunacoustic resonance of organization and relies ed differently from intimate, curved, othernstruments, betrying to seecomes free jazz. Pianist plays bell, comand off toputer scatters bell sound, acabfor dozens oflats for ecoround onec twodds threees, sharpitches, flatones, bell becommany more intenstrumentses maspace to manyny bells in different retransformative spatial modulations, gisters. Quiet! Tone clustarps, cleaning toolters indiverse music, artshighest registthe big dayer of piano again st chordrochanged by interactionne and bells, fades. S(ilenquie)till. End.
If anyone could read all of that, they’d realize that the music made by Pauline Oliveros (accordon), Stuart Dempster (trombone) and David Gamper (piano) – collectively called Deep Listening Band – is improvisational, and augmented by live computer processing. A single note (or effect) played by one player results in a refractive cavalcade of echoes from all directions, often changing in pitch. The result is alternately meditative or chaotic (sometimes both at the same time!). There is a humorous moment when they play toys as instruments: the squeaks, digital noises, bye-bye!s, and whistles from stuffed animals, teletubbies, etc., join into the computerized conversational soundscape. (This actually goes deliberately over-the-top when Halloween witch-cackles join the fray.) Titles were added for the CD: like the title of the CD, most are puns on the name of the performance venue (Town Hall, Seattle) and the word “howl” – though there is little on the CD that brings to mind a “howl”. (The exception might be the piece “Great Horned Howl”, which includes the aforementioned funny/scary sounds.) At any rate, this is a generally grand-ambient soundscape, with little bits of unexpected wit, and it is well worth a listen (or several).
…I was there…!
Monday, April 8, 2013
Beautiful blast from the bardic past: Benjamin Bagby’s “Beowulf”
Benjamin Bagby, singer, multi-instrumentalist, musicologist, and one of the founding members of the early music group Sequentia, brought his one-man performance of his reconstruction of “Beowulf” (as it would have been originally performed) to Seattle’s Town Hall on Saturday, April 6th.
“If you’re expecting Game of Thrones, sorry,” said the MC, Laurence W. Herron, the president of the (Seattle) Early Music Guild. “It’s better than that. No CGI monsters. It will be a theater of the mind, as it would have been performed more than a thousand years ago in the mead halls of Medieval Britain.”
Please turn off all cell phones or risk the vengeance of Grendel’s claw.
Exactly how “authentic” it was, of course, will never really be known. We have to be content with an educated guess – though this guess was very well educated. Mr. Bagby’s bardic instrument was probably as close as we can come after this many centuries. It is a copy of a small harp found in a 7th –century Germanic tomb. The tuning – a pentatonic minor (i.e. A, C, D, E, G, A) was another educated guess, though based on known music theory from the time. I’ve heard the same scale in other early music, as well as in some surviving ancient music from elsewhere in the world (Ethiopia, China).
In contrast to other still-extant bard-like traditions (such as the epics recited to the accompaniment of the Turkish tar or the Japanese biwa), Mr. Bagby used the harp for little (if any) sound effects – there was not even a galloping rhythm to indicate horses. Rather, it created an ever-changing (yet at the same time unchanging) underpinning of partly melodic indications of mood: fast and rhythmic for happy situations; slower for sad or solemn moments (there were a lot of the latter); fast but disjointed for scary or exciting scenes; occasional complete pauses for the punch-line of a joke.
Yes, there are jokes in Beowulf. Some of them – no doubt helped by Mr. Bagby’s comic timing, are still funny. But, of course, there is a lot more there too. Mr. Bagby recited roughly the first third of the epic, telling how the monster Grendel, a descendant of Cain, turned the Hall of Heorot into a scene of carnage (not once, but multiple times) and how the hero Beowulf came from across the sea to defeat him – with his bare hands, since it would be dishonorable to use a weapon against a monster who does not use one. It’s quite a swashbuckling, heroic tale. Culturally there are some differences from more recent tales of the same (albeit reworked) genre (i.e. The Lord of the Rings or even Star Wars) – contemporary authors would probably spend more time talking about the battle itself and less describing the gifts given to Beowulf after his victory (even if these are important later in the story). The language also has a different “sound” from modern English, though some words and even phrases are still recognizable. It still retains its Germanic “CH” sounds, for example; and to the modern ear (mine, at least), the king's name, Hrothgar, sounds more like a name for a monster than “Grendel” does.
Above all, though, “Beowulf” is a poem. Its power resides in its recitation as a poem. Here is where Mr. Bagby’s performance comes to the fore. He delivered much of it as an actor might deliver a Shakespearean monologue, with or without the harp; and his narration was enhanced by dramatic facial expressions and animated gestures. At key point he would chant or break into a fully melodic song, often a long melisma on a single emphatic syllable. (Those songs often provided melodic tension with the simplest of means: by continuously ending on the fourth tone of the scale while the harp insisted that the first tone was the tonic.) He has a beautiful, clear voice, with enough resonance to fill the large hall with sound despite that neither he nor his harp was amplified. By the end he (and Beowulf) had woven a spell that transported the audience to another age, both heroic and barbaric. It was an experience that I will not soon forget.
“If you’re expecting Game of Thrones, sorry,” said the MC, Laurence W. Herron, the president of the (Seattle) Early Music Guild. “It’s better than that. No CGI monsters. It will be a theater of the mind, as it would have been performed more than a thousand years ago in the mead halls of Medieval Britain.”
Please turn off all cell phones or risk the vengeance of Grendel’s claw.
Exactly how “authentic” it was, of course, will never really be known. We have to be content with an educated guess – though this guess was very well educated. Mr. Bagby’s bardic instrument was probably as close as we can come after this many centuries. It is a copy of a small harp found in a 7th –century Germanic tomb. The tuning – a pentatonic minor (i.e. A, C, D, E, G, A) was another educated guess, though based on known music theory from the time. I’ve heard the same scale in other early music, as well as in some surviving ancient music from elsewhere in the world (Ethiopia, China).
In contrast to other still-extant bard-like traditions (such as the epics recited to the accompaniment of the Turkish tar or the Japanese biwa), Mr. Bagby used the harp for little (if any) sound effects – there was not even a galloping rhythm to indicate horses. Rather, it created an ever-changing (yet at the same time unchanging) underpinning of partly melodic indications of mood: fast and rhythmic for happy situations; slower for sad or solemn moments (there were a lot of the latter); fast but disjointed for scary or exciting scenes; occasional complete pauses for the punch-line of a joke.
Yes, there are jokes in Beowulf. Some of them – no doubt helped by Mr. Bagby’s comic timing, are still funny. But, of course, there is a lot more there too. Mr. Bagby recited roughly the first third of the epic, telling how the monster Grendel, a descendant of Cain, turned the Hall of Heorot into a scene of carnage (not once, but multiple times) and how the hero Beowulf came from across the sea to defeat him – with his bare hands, since it would be dishonorable to use a weapon against a monster who does not use one. It’s quite a swashbuckling, heroic tale. Culturally there are some differences from more recent tales of the same (albeit reworked) genre (i.e. The Lord of the Rings or even Star Wars) – contemporary authors would probably spend more time talking about the battle itself and less describing the gifts given to Beowulf after his victory (even if these are important later in the story). The language also has a different “sound” from modern English, though some words and even phrases are still recognizable. It still retains its Germanic “CH” sounds, for example; and to the modern ear (mine, at least), the king's name, Hrothgar, sounds more like a name for a monster than “Grendel” does.
Above all, though, “Beowulf” is a poem. Its power resides in its recitation as a poem. Here is where Mr. Bagby’s performance comes to the fore. He delivered much of it as an actor might deliver a Shakespearean monologue, with or without the harp; and his narration was enhanced by dramatic facial expressions and animated gestures. At key point he would chant or break into a fully melodic song, often a long melisma on a single emphatic syllable. (Those songs often provided melodic tension with the simplest of means: by continuously ending on the fourth tone of the scale while the harp insisted that the first tone was the tonic.) He has a beautiful, clear voice, with enough resonance to fill the large hall with sound despite that neither he nor his harp was amplified. By the end he (and Beowulf) had woven a spell that transported the audience to another age, both heroic and barbaric. It was an experience that I will not soon forget.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Kerplunk goes nihilist: Tim Root's performance piece at Good Shepherd Center, 3/22/13
About five minutes before arriving at the venue for this performance, I suddenly had a recollection of that most horrific and blood-curdling moment in all of mainstream cinema, the chest-bursting scene in “Alien”. I don’t know why this abruptly came to mind (I actually still can’t watch the scene all the way through), though it turns out to have connections, at least in mood, to the performance of “Kerplunk!”.
Both the music and the stage setting had an emphasis on the macabre. Beth Fleenor vocalized and played clarinet next to a gruesome sign labeled “severed leg”, and often froze with a happy/creepy expression that was both a grimace and a smile (“Welcome to my nightmare!”). Eric Barber, likewise, played sax behind what was obviously meant to look like a blood-splattered television screen, as if the horror show were no longer contained (safely) within the video. The other three players (Bill Horist, guitar; Naomi Siegel, trombone; and Tim Root, keyboards and electronics) were more in the background, at least visually, though their playing was obviously part of the texture of the whole. Yet, ironically, the whole piece was based on the children's game "Kerplunk".
Composer Tim Root stated that the piece would be between thirty and forty minutes because it was partly improvised (it was closer to fifty-five). Then it began with Ms. Siegel rolling croquet balls (?) down an amplified chute, followed by a spate of strange vocalizations (from all players) and sampled sounds from a prepared piano. The piece was in several sections. For most of the first, Ms. Fleenor carried on a stream of consciousness monologue with details about eyes that had been plucked out, agonizing pain, a bad smell, and (longer) about the aforementioned severed leg. Some of the tension of this was relieved when she paused to sing in the manner of Meredith Monk, or to draw straws out from a cylinder set up with random items held in place by the straws (like the game). In the second section, Ms. Siegel came out from the shadows to continue the monologue, now with themes of both existentialism and regret, and just a little of the gore from the first part. Her voice, and perhaps the character she was playing, were much more soothing – though the background music began to recycle samples from earlier sections. An interlude of sorts was provided when Mr. Horist set down his guitar and played a home-made (?) instrument that looked (and sounded) like a cross between a sitar and a very large pi-pa. During this, the others alternately played modal melodies or ruminated about calculating what is incalculable and/or dissecting a dog. Sampled snippets of previous material continued to flutter about. Ms. Siegel danced slowly with her trombone on a couple of bags filled with packing peanuts (?) to give a crackling, snapping sound. All climaxed in a dissonant spasm of freeform improvisation – though the first attempt at this build-up was abruptly halted by Mr. Root shouting “Freeze!”; and then the piece ended with drones – quietly – after Ms. Fleenor had removed the last straw, and the last objects dropped (disappointingly noiselessly) to the bottom of the cylinder.
It was all pretty entertaining, though in the end I wasn’t quite certain exactly what I had seen or heard (that was probably the point). Certainly there was an air of death and Kafkaesque horror about it, including more than a trace of gallows humor. Obviously this was a function of the words, but the instrumental sounds themselves often had a sinister edge – particularly the sampled prepared piano, which (with its amplification) was much louder than it “should” have been and gave a kind of hollow, scary resonance. The entire work was probably “about” mortality in the way that “Finnegan’s Wake” is about dreams and the subconscious, or “The Lord of the Rings” is “about” Christianity, friendship, existentialism, environmentalism, and WWII (of course it isn’t “about” any of these, but it is also about all of them). The metaphor of things dropping (beginning with the balls in the tube and ending with the objects falling to the bottom of the cylinder) was simply about everything ending, and it seems that it was an ending where all of reality drops into a bucket of gore and is never heard from again. No possibility of redemption was offered, and therein lies its nihilistic tragedy.
After a short intermission, the “band” played two free improvisations. The first started with grumbly drones and evolved into a chaotic free-for-all (ending with a sudden hush and some Balkan-inspired vocals from Ms. Fleenor). It quit before Mr. Horist had a chance to play the cymbal that he’d been diligently threading through his guitar strings for a minute or two beforehand. The second (“Let’s play a short one for the road!”) began with a one-note trombone flourish (“Wow – that was short!”) and then began again, loud, and settled back into quiet drones. All in all, these were lighter pieces that provided a welcome contrast to the darkness of “Kerplunk!”.
Both the music and the stage setting had an emphasis on the macabre. Beth Fleenor vocalized and played clarinet next to a gruesome sign labeled “severed leg”, and often froze with a happy/creepy expression that was both a grimace and a smile (“Welcome to my nightmare!”). Eric Barber, likewise, played sax behind what was obviously meant to look like a blood-splattered television screen, as if the horror show were no longer contained (safely) within the video. The other three players (Bill Horist, guitar; Naomi Siegel, trombone; and Tim Root, keyboards and electronics) were more in the background, at least visually, though their playing was obviously part of the texture of the whole. Yet, ironically, the whole piece was based on the children's game "Kerplunk".
Composer Tim Root stated that the piece would be between thirty and forty minutes because it was partly improvised (it was closer to fifty-five). Then it began with Ms. Siegel rolling croquet balls (?) down an amplified chute, followed by a spate of strange vocalizations (from all players) and sampled sounds from a prepared piano. The piece was in several sections. For most of the first, Ms. Fleenor carried on a stream of consciousness monologue with details about eyes that had been plucked out, agonizing pain, a bad smell, and (longer) about the aforementioned severed leg. Some of the tension of this was relieved when she paused to sing in the manner of Meredith Monk, or to draw straws out from a cylinder set up with random items held in place by the straws (like the game). In the second section, Ms. Siegel came out from the shadows to continue the monologue, now with themes of both existentialism and regret, and just a little of the gore from the first part. Her voice, and perhaps the character she was playing, were much more soothing – though the background music began to recycle samples from earlier sections. An interlude of sorts was provided when Mr. Horist set down his guitar and played a home-made (?) instrument that looked (and sounded) like a cross between a sitar and a very large pi-pa. During this, the others alternately played modal melodies or ruminated about calculating what is incalculable and/or dissecting a dog. Sampled snippets of previous material continued to flutter about. Ms. Siegel danced slowly with her trombone on a couple of bags filled with packing peanuts (?) to give a crackling, snapping sound. All climaxed in a dissonant spasm of freeform improvisation – though the first attempt at this build-up was abruptly halted by Mr. Root shouting “Freeze!”; and then the piece ended with drones – quietly – after Ms. Fleenor had removed the last straw, and the last objects dropped (disappointingly noiselessly) to the bottom of the cylinder.
It was all pretty entertaining, though in the end I wasn’t quite certain exactly what I had seen or heard (that was probably the point). Certainly there was an air of death and Kafkaesque horror about it, including more than a trace of gallows humor. Obviously this was a function of the words, but the instrumental sounds themselves often had a sinister edge – particularly the sampled prepared piano, which (with its amplification) was much louder than it “should” have been and gave a kind of hollow, scary resonance. The entire work was probably “about” mortality in the way that “Finnegan’s Wake” is about dreams and the subconscious, or “The Lord of the Rings” is “about” Christianity, friendship, existentialism, environmentalism, and WWII (of course it isn’t “about” any of these, but it is also about all of them). The metaphor of things dropping (beginning with the balls in the tube and ending with the objects falling to the bottom of the cylinder) was simply about everything ending, and it seems that it was an ending where all of reality drops into a bucket of gore and is never heard from again. No possibility of redemption was offered, and therein lies its nihilistic tragedy.
After a short intermission, the “band” played two free improvisations. The first started with grumbly drones and evolved into a chaotic free-for-all (ending with a sudden hush and some Balkan-inspired vocals from Ms. Fleenor). It quit before Mr. Horist had a chance to play the cymbal that he’d been diligently threading through his guitar strings for a minute or two beforehand. The second (“Let’s play a short one for the road!”) began with a one-note trombone flourish (“Wow – that was short!”) and then began again, loud, and settled back into quiet drones. All in all, these were lighter pieces that provided a welcome contrast to the darkness of “Kerplunk!”.
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Radiophonic Abstract Expressionism: Amber Cortes’ “Signal to Noise” at Jack Straw Productions
I went to “see” this installation twice between the time it opened and when it closed, too soon, yesterday. I thought I should, finally, make a new posting in this blog and write about it…
“Imagine a space where all broadcasts are possible along a "radiophonic continuum," where voices and sounds mingle with spontaneous white noise, existing away from time and place, separate and uncontrolled and triumphant in their ephemeral power. This is the magic of radio. 4 imagined radio stations will be transmitted from four different radios, each station a testament to how freeform radio space can be reimagined, re-purposed, and revitalized.” - Jack Straw Website
Walking into the room, first one hears the “noise” – accumulations of static and fuzzy voices squawking from four radios placed on stands. At first I thought that they were simply recordings, with the “radio fuzz” added digitally. Speaking with Ms. Cortes, however, told me otherwise: these are actual “radio stations”, broadcast only into the one room, and picked up with the small radios, tuned out slightly.
The content of these “stations”? Looped, from CD’s in the other room. One consisted of old broadcasts from KRAB, the (real) station that was run by Jack Straw in the 1960’s through the 1980’s. “Random” pictures and program listings – all organized in a regular grid on the wall – emphasized KRAB’s eclectic mix. Another station was a punk rock amalgam, complete with the expected witty and vulgar digs at society, the broadcast media, and particularly the FCC (presented with altered initials). The third, broadcast from a speaker behind the shell of an antique stand-up radio, was the “internet ephemera station”, dedicated (in the year 2030 or thereabouts) to preserving old sounds from the early days of electronic communications. The old radio emitted dial tones, busy signals, dial-up modems, and “your call cannot be completed as dialed”, as well as a soothing female voice announcing the origin of each sound. Lastly, there was a CB radio, adding bouts of static and rougher voices to the mix.
The idea was, of course, that the radio media needn’t be as regulated and monetized as what is usually found on the FM dial (one of the placards of the installation said this), and it might be fun just to imagine the possibilities of what actually could be (and in some cases is) broadcast outside of the mainstream. Apart from this, though, is the experience of the installation itself. This experience is, in some sense, similar to viewing wall-sized abstract expressionist paintings. The “non-mainstream” stations don’t match up, either in programming or any type of synchronization. What one hears, then, is a continually changing collage of sound – a sort of Jackson Pollock splatter of tone paint. Sometimes the sound/color is as loud and strident as a track by Merzbow (or a De Kooning painting); less frequently, it settles into a quieter murmur, more reminiscent of late pieces of John Cage (or Mark Rothko paintings). I found it fascinating to just sit there and listen in exactly the same way I would sit there and look at certain visual art.
Note to readers of this blog: It appears that "Blogger" has changed their formatting, and it is no longer possible to insert graphics in the same manner as I had been doing before. My apologies to those who liked the little abstract "bullets" at the start of each post.
“Imagine a space where all broadcasts are possible along a "radiophonic continuum," where voices and sounds mingle with spontaneous white noise, existing away from time and place, separate and uncontrolled and triumphant in their ephemeral power. This is the magic of radio. 4 imagined radio stations will be transmitted from four different radios, each station a testament to how freeform radio space can be reimagined, re-purposed, and revitalized.” - Jack Straw Website
Walking into the room, first one hears the “noise” – accumulations of static and fuzzy voices squawking from four radios placed on stands. At first I thought that they were simply recordings, with the “radio fuzz” added digitally. Speaking with Ms. Cortes, however, told me otherwise: these are actual “radio stations”, broadcast only into the one room, and picked up with the small radios, tuned out slightly.
The content of these “stations”? Looped, from CD’s in the other room. One consisted of old broadcasts from KRAB, the (real) station that was run by Jack Straw in the 1960’s through the 1980’s. “Random” pictures and program listings – all organized in a regular grid on the wall – emphasized KRAB’s eclectic mix. Another station was a punk rock amalgam, complete with the expected witty and vulgar digs at society, the broadcast media, and particularly the FCC (presented with altered initials). The third, broadcast from a speaker behind the shell of an antique stand-up radio, was the “internet ephemera station”, dedicated (in the year 2030 or thereabouts) to preserving old sounds from the early days of electronic communications. The old radio emitted dial tones, busy signals, dial-up modems, and “your call cannot be completed as dialed”, as well as a soothing female voice announcing the origin of each sound. Lastly, there was a CB radio, adding bouts of static and rougher voices to the mix.
The idea was, of course, that the radio media needn’t be as regulated and monetized as what is usually found on the FM dial (one of the placards of the installation said this), and it might be fun just to imagine the possibilities of what actually could be (and in some cases is) broadcast outside of the mainstream. Apart from this, though, is the experience of the installation itself. This experience is, in some sense, similar to viewing wall-sized abstract expressionist paintings. The “non-mainstream” stations don’t match up, either in programming or any type of synchronization. What one hears, then, is a continually changing collage of sound – a sort of Jackson Pollock splatter of tone paint. Sometimes the sound/color is as loud and strident as a track by Merzbow (or a De Kooning painting); less frequently, it settles into a quieter murmur, more reminiscent of late pieces of John Cage (or Mark Rothko paintings). I found it fascinating to just sit there and listen in exactly the same way I would sit there and look at certain visual art.
Note to readers of this blog: It appears that "Blogger" has changed their formatting, and it is no longer possible to insert graphics in the same manner as I had been doing before. My apologies to those who liked the little abstract "bullets" at the start of each post.
Monday, November 5, 2012
At long last: Review of my Concert with Wayne Lovegrove, Woodland Park Presbyterian Church, 10/20/2012
Actually, it’s difficult to have anything to say, because the concert was, roughly, perfect. That’s not to say that I didn’t make any mistakes – I had quite a few in my first piece, “Wind over Water” – but none of them detracted from the music. (Actually, I thought that my own playing during the first half wasn’t quite up to par, though Wayne’s was perfect; he said the same thing in reverse…)
For the first half, we alternated solo guitar pieces (by Wayne) and piano pieces (by me). One exception; Wayne played a drone on the organ to back up “Wind over water”. My longest piece was the nebulous, arrhythmic “SoundScrolls V” for piano and prerecorded sound – this had been a big hit at a Seattle Composers’ Salon in 2009, and oddly, at this concert, seems to have prompted a minor rush of listening to my piece SoundScrolls VII (which doesn’t even have a piano part) on my Soundcloud page. (SoundScrolls V is actually there; just scroll down.) Wayne followed this up with a complete contrast, a study in catchy, lilting rhythms called “Hop Along”. I followed with my own study in rhythms, the minimalist “Kijibato: Strange Repeating Bird”.
Wayne started the second half with “Open Skies”. This is one of my favorite of his pieces, showing how unexpectedly pretty a rhythm can be on a single note – it also does a surprise reverse of “classical” expectations in that the slower, more melodic sections are much louder than the fast rhythmic material. Most of the second half, though, was taken up by improvisations. First, I did a version of “Eco Slab Gong” (the slab gong is a variation on Tom Nunn’s “Space plate”) with prerecorded sound made from the same – a microphone and a speaker were placed about one millimeter from it; the microphone picked up its sympathetic vibrations as I played sounds of nature through the speaker). Wayne added some skitterings on the inside of the piano. The result was supposed to suggest a natural ambience (hence “Eco” Slab Gong) but at least one audience member commented afterwards that it sounded quite frightening (always a problem with experimental music in a culture conditioned by Hollywood, though of course I’m not the only one to have noticed an intermittent sense of menace in nature). We continued with “Oceanic Music”, an improvisation for guitar and crywire (a piano modification of my own invention that produces whale-like sounds) and a long improvisation in 6/8 time. We’ve done “this improvisation” before – Wayne sets up the “beat” with the help of a delay pedal and I have certain riffs that I play over it – but this time the result was more unified, with a sense of overall development. It almost sounded like a composed piece (either a plus or a minus depending on one’s view of improvised music). To my ear, at any rate, it sounded spectacular, particularly as it echoed in the grand acoustics of the church sanctuary.
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Seattle Symphony’s “Untitled: 1962” – How the future used to sound
That said, there was nothing boring or mundane in the performance. The concert was presented informally in the grand lobby of Benaroya Hall, with introductions by Ludovic Morlot (conductor), some videos, and room for the audience to walk around during the performance. Each piece was presented in its own space, so to speak – both physically (there was more than one stage set up for performance) and aurally, with a spoken introduction about the procedure used to compose and/or perform it. Those “procedures”, however, were usually not audible in the music. Without the visual cues (offered by the videos) and introductions, a listener wouldn’t know that the Xenakis piece was based on geometrical shapes and architecture, that each player followed his/her own tempo in the Feldman piece, or that the Cage and Brown pieces were based on the conductor choosing ensembles or sections of the score during the performance. This lack of “obviousness” led to the aforementioned homogeneity.
Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Upcoming Concerts (Fall 2012) and CALLING ALL AVANT-GARDE PIANISTS!!!
As for my compositions, I’ll be playing SoundScrolls V and a long version of “Kijibato – Strange Repeating Bird” – a minimalist piece based on the haunting call of a Japanese bird. I haven’t played the long version in concert since I was in Japan, twenty years ago. Both of these are piano pieces (“SoundScrolls V” uses prerecorded electronics as well); I’ll probably also do a version of “Eco Slab-Gong” for electronics and homemade percussion (obviously the “slab-gong”, and maybe something called “Berkeley bowls” – anyone who’s lived in Berkeley CA will get that joke). Wayne and I will also do some pieces together, including “Oceanic Music” for guitar and crywire, a piano modification of my own invention that plays whale songs.
This should be an interesting and beautiful concert, in a great acoustical space (I’ve played at the open mike there many times) and I’m looking forward to it. If you like music that’s both tranquil and edgy, “be there or be an equilateral quadrangular parallelogram.”
Here’s the skinny:
Concert of acoustic and experimental music
S. Eric Scribner, piano etc.
Wayne Lovegrove, guitar
Woodland Park Presbyterian Church
225 North 70th Street (off of Greenwood), Seattle
7:00 to 9:00 PM, Saturday, October 20, 2012
A free-will donation will be taken.
A scheduling snafu resulted in this concert being on the same night as a recital by a friend of mine, another pianist, Keith Eisenbrey. His concert starts an hour later and is only a few blocks away (at the Good Shepherd Center), so concertgoers to either of these concerts might like to check out the other.
Free improvisation
One of more of John Cage’s “Number Pieces” (One, One2, One5, and Four3 all use piano, though the latter has a couple of other instruments too – and there are some for “unspecified”; due to the nature of these pieces, several could be played simultaneously without creating cacophony.)
Terry Riley’s “In C” (has this ever been done on only pianos?)
Takemitsu's "Corona for Pianist(s)" – a graphic score. We shouldn't try to do it like the famous "London Version" by Roger Woodward (it also uses a harpsichord and an electric organ), but other versions are possible.
Both Keith Eisenbrey and Neal Kosaly-Meyer have pieces that just might be adaptable for multiple pianists...?
I’ll be sending out notices to my pianist friends, and anyone else interested (especially pianists) can let me know – my e-mail is listed under my profile in this blog.
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
A New Definition of Heavy Metal: Tempered Steel at Good Shepherd Center, 10/5/2012
L to R: Ffej, Frank Junk, Dennis Rea
Two brief acts opened the show. Noisepoetnobody improvised on 70’s and 80’s analogue synthesizers, making a sort of retro-psychedelia take on Phill Niblock and other drone music. “The Crutch Guy” played a homemade percussion instrument, a crutch fitted with strings, springs and a pickup – creating crunchy, noisy electroacoustic grooves, some of which (“at the risk of desecrating the Chapel”) had a decidedly hip-hop bent. Fun! I might add that I don’t think the Chapel was desecrated.
Symphony for Wood, Wind, and Phantom Bells: Abbey Aresty's "Paths II: The Music of Trees" in the University of Washington Arboretum
I say “expected” because I’d gone there specifically to experience these sounds (“It’s experiential music,” said another listener, punning on “experimental”). I’d been at the Arboretum a couple of days previously on a guided tour, and heard about it then – and a friend had e-mailed me the next day about it. Always intrigued by the intersection of art and nature (which is God’s art), I went.
“The Music of Trees” is a doctoral dissertation in composition by Abby Aresty. It consists of seven installations (or one very large-scale one); sounds repeated in a loop from speakers hidden in trees at various “stations” around the north end of the Arboretum. Sometimes there are additional visual or sound-producing elements as well.
“When you listen in a space long enough, you begin to cross thresholds. Your perspective shifts. In a quiet environment you can hear softer and softer sounds as your focus gradually intensifies. And if you listen carefully for a long enough period of time, you are bound to experience countless instances of natural musicality. Sometimes you will stumble into them unexpectedly.” – from Ms. Aresty’s notes for the project. I couldn’t have explained it any better, even for my own projects…
Like me, Ms. Aresty seems to find that music made from metallic sounds (gongs, piano with the pedal down) is the most evocative of natural sound. In my case, it is the long, lingering reverberations that die away into silence, that suggest both wide and open spaces and the surrounding echoes that one hears in a forest as any distant sound bounces off the myriad tree trunks. The second station is based on a similar idea. Water sounds – sounding from high in a cedar tree next to a little pond – are transformed suddenly into quite different water sounds, and then into a metallic drone; into a different metallic drone, and then back to water sounds. The entire “cycle” lasts about six minutes, then it all repeats. Again, the sounds were made from processed recordings of the same location – though I couldn’t hear the pond making any particular sound, so this could be regarded as an amplification of what is otherwise inaudible.
The third station (which was hard to find) brought back the idea of artificiality –the plastic tubes were present again in the branches fringing a seemingly hollowed out part of another cedar tree, and the sounds were based on (besides rain, again) a lawnmower. Again, the sounds were processed and not really recognizable from their sources, and this time I became aware of the meaning of the tubes. The sounds were coming out of their open ends. They were obviously attached to speakers at the other end, hidden somewhere in the tree…
The fourth station was based on rain in the forest, and provided a shimmering pointillism of rustling and distant gongs, echoing spaciously from several trees. Quite lovely.
With the sixth station, I entered the world of interactive music. A number of short trees, leafless at the human level, were hung with a web of cording, from which were suspended ten or so seed-pods (probably from the same trees) and an equal number of half-dollar sized metal finger-cymbals. This appeared at first to be merely an added visual element to the installation, but the finger-cymbals invited playing. I picked up a stick from the ground and struck the nearest one. The sound rang out, a surprisingly loud (but very tiny) ping! in the forest – and it blended perfectly with the prerecorded sound. I tried the others; all rang out similarly. The seed-pods made no audible sound. What of the prerecorded sound? Again, it was highly amplified bell-like shimmering, processed from (otherwise inaudible) dropping dried flower petals, probably onto a contact mike. “All the bells quiver in the light; light and therefore life.” – Olivier Messiaen. In this case, the bells quivered in the half-light of the tree-shade, and the sounds, of flowers, indicated the brevity of individual life of earth, and the continuity of life in a collective sense.
Finally, the seventh and last station was on the edge of what Ms. Aresty called the “outside world”; the world of traffic and other human-sound outside of the arboretum. The prerecorded sounds (from birdsong and a bicycle going by) were abstracted, unrecognizable – but they were not as continuous or ambient as those of the previous stations. They blended with the intermittent rumbles and roars of cars going by. I sat on the bench and listened to this and (at Ms. Aresty’s suggestion in the accompanying flier) the voices of people walking by on the footpath – and found myself drawn back into the everyday world, away from this oasis of tranquility.
After seeing an installation such as this, one is tempted to search for meanings. The flier provided some, certainly: the interaction of natural and man-made sound, the many layers of the arboretum's soundscape, an “exercise in silent reflection” which was both for the observer and the composer making the recordings that formed the basis for the whole composition. I would add some others, akin to those of my own “StormSound” music (though I don’t know if any of these were intended in this case). 1. The interaction of man and the environment (not just the sounds) – the tubes in the Camperdown Elms were a potent symbols of how we’ve messed with nature in not always benevolent ways. (There is, of course, the Biblical mandate to “subdue the earth”, but I think this is to make it bloom, not to obliterate it with pesticides, pollution and resultant global warming, and millions of miles of concrete). …And one could note, of course, that the arboretum itself is actually an artificial environment, no matter how “natural” it appears on the surface. 2. (Suggested by the occasional seeming discord) the hint that nature doesn't seem quite "right" anyway – something on planet earth seems to have “gone off” somehow (I won’t go into “evolution vs. creation” here – that's the silliest debate that's ever been voiced). Predators, parasites, viruses, and ghastly diseases exist, and are certainly not artificial; and we all know that vague sense of unease we can sometimes (though not always) experience in a natural place, regardless of the surrounding beauty. 3. Despite all of this, there is simply the aesthetic sense that trees, bark, leaves, flowers, and the sounds that they make as the wind blows through them, are often spellbindingly beautiful.
Paths II: The Music of Trees will run in the Washington Park Arboretum in October, Wednesdays from 3:00 to 6:00 PM, and weekends (Saturdays and Sundays) from 10:30 AM to 1:30 PM.
A couple of years ago, on a very hot day in August, I happened by the grove of walnut trees. They were filled with a continuous (and strangely musical) crackling and popping, like a simultaneous sound-infusion of irregular drumming, leaves crunching underfoot, and a monumental kettle of popcorn. I immediately stopped and looked for the source, which seemed to be from every direction – and found a bunch (herd? flock?) of squirrels – at least ten in each tree. Apparently the walnuts crack open in the heat, and the squirrels have a feast.
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Cage, Cage, and Cage Again (Part Three) – Seattle Composers’ Salon, Good Shepherd Center, 9/7/2012
First up: “Blankets and Bioluminescence” for violin, cello, piano, drum kit, and prerecorded sound, by Matthew James Briggs. Vaguely similar to some of my own “StormSound” music, this was a gigantic minimalist polyrhythm over a recording of crickets and other night sounds. The prerecorded sound started, and the piano added a rumbling bass chord (not really harmonious, but not really dissonant either). This repeated several times before the violin entered with a two-note melody. The ‘cello followed, with another two-note melody. The result was beautiful modal harmonies. Soon it became apparent that these three parts were actually on different rhythms, and gradually moving toward synchronization. (Another composition in a similar vein, though without the prerecorded nature sounds, is Steve Peters’ “Circular lullaby”.) Once the rhythms met up, they locked together in a repetitive phrase supported by the drums. The overall effect was quiet lovely – something of a mellow bit of techno/electronica (think Bonobo or FourTet) taken into a different genre (minimalism) and played on acoustic instruments. I would like to hear more of this.
Next: Eight of the 24 Preludes by Keith Eisenbrey (the composer at the piano). I’ve heard some of these before. The 19th (and early 20th) century references continue; these are brief melodic pieces in a tonal idiom, full of references to Chopin, Scriabin, and (somewhat less so) Debussy. These references do not “take over” the pieces, each is clearly original (not a copy or imitation) with mere hints of the older works. What Keith has created here is a brilliant continuation to the tradition of piano preludes. Each is in a different key. He stated beforehand that, in trying to figure out exactly what piano preludes were “about”, he eventually decided that it was nothing more – or less – than the key that they were written in (this is a much broader concept than it would appear at first; each key spreads out via various intervals into all other keys so that every key is merely a point on a continuum; working with keys in this light produces a sort of atonality-within-tonality or vice-versa). Added to this, each of these short pieces had a one-word title descriptive of its musical essence: “curvy”, “rapt”, “turbulent”, “bubbly”, etc. Each piece takes the ideas of its title and of its key, and crafts them (with, of course, melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic material) into a brief masterpiece, a brilliantly cut gem of sound. It makes me think that I should also work on composing some tonal miniatures, though my own compositional forays into this territory have not been nearly so successful…
[Between composers there was a raffle for CDs. I seldom win anything at raffles, though this time I won a recording of the Emerson String Quartet playing the three Mozart “Prussian” quartets. Turns out this is quite a CD, though I probably wouldn’t have picked it given a choice – and I’ll have to review it the next time I review of couple of CDs in this blog…!]
The last new piece: a scaled-down and mostly improvised version of a much longer (40-minute or so) piece for large ensemble, by John Teske. John is rapidly becoming something of a fixture in the thriving Seattle new-music scene, and this piece showed why. Generally of the “quiet music” genre (as opposed to “mellow”) and full of texturing vaguely reminiscent of the aleatory sections of early Takemitsu pieces, it was nonetheless strikingly original. Strings and wind instruments produced a constantly shifting web of barely-audible sound. In the afore-mentioned early Takemitsu (see, for example, the “Arc” for piano and orchestra), similar textures were used to create ever denser layers which reach a climax of unbearable intensity and then collapse into silence – here, in contrast, the silence was taken as a given. It didn’t need to be created (or collapsed into); it was already there, part of the fabric of the music itself. At the same time, it was not there because the instrumental haze obscured it. Part of the brilliance of the piece lay in this tension between implied and actual silence. For their part, the instrumental sounds were never those of “conventional” music, and consisted mostly of strange bowing techniques such as playing “extra” strings attached to the main strings of the instruments, or (for the winds) equally otherworldly overtone-blowing and taking the French horn apart and playing small parts of it as a whole instrument. The piece was about ten minutes long, but it could have been much longer – too bad I will not be able to attend the concert later this month where John and his ensemble will play the entire, long version.
Now, what about Cage? Continuing with the Cage centenary, Tom Baker (curator of the Composers’ Salons) had composed a performance-art piece in the manner of John Cage, which, like a lot of Cage’s work, was both profound and silly (in a good way) at the same time. Or, perhaps, profoundly silly. (Remember that the German word selig is directly related to the English word “silly” but translates as “blessed”…) It consisted of three singers singing “Happy Birthday John Cage”, a random number of times at their own speed, but silently, to themselves – and the audience members supposedly doing the same. The result was, of course, no audible music, so one could call it a birthday version of Cage’s (in)famous “4’33””. …And that’s about all that needs to be said.
Monday, September 10, 2012
Cage, Cage, and Cage Again (Part Two) – Pacific Rims Percussion Quartet @ Good Shepherd Center, 9/5/2012
At any rate, the first piece was the (supposedly satirical) “Credo in US”, for percussion (including coffee cans), piano (slightly modified, with a piece of metal laid across the strings to give it a more percussive sound) and a radio (static turned off and on to provide another texture). Mostly the piece was about rhythms, with a frenetic drive toward the climax. The title refers to both the U.S. and to “us”, and provides an ironic comment on American society (“I believe in US – forget anybody else!”, or “I believe in my country, not any higher purpose or goal, or even God…”) These are certainly damning statements, though nothing in the music itself indicates this level of venom. Whatever, it’s a fun piece to listen to (and, I’m sure, to perform, though like a lot of “modernist” music it takes intense concentration to get all of the counts right).
Sunday, September 9, 2012
Cage, Cage, and Cage Again (Part One) - Neal Kosaly-Meyer (and friends) @ Jack Straw Productions
Neal did not perform the entire twelve hours without a break, of course. “Interruptions”, in the form of other (shorter) Cage pieces, punctuated the concert at regular intervals. I only heard one of these since I did not stay for the entire piece (the audience was encouraged to come and go – a necessity for such a long work). William O. Smith played the Sonata for Clarinet (solo), an early piece in a serialist-souding style. It fit right in – the bare acoustics of the hall caused every sound of the clarinet to stand out sharply (and sometimes very loudly!) against the background quasi-silence – as if the clarinet “notes” were being reduced to pure sound, in the same manner as Neal’s recitations.
Other “punctuation marks” included Neal’s sung rendition of a brief part of Cage’s “Writing for the Second Time through Finnegan’s Wake”, without the amplification (though it sounded, probably intentionally, like more of “Empty Words”) and, during later parts of “Empty Words”, Roger Nelson reading from Cage’s “Indeterminacy” stories. Cage’s anecdotes are as well-known as his music, and listeners familiar with Cage’s work have probably heard at least some of these particular tales from the classic 1960’s recording. Some are funny, some are bizarre, and some seem to have no point at all – interspersed here they emphasized the idea of speech into pure sound, providing an understandable (until one listened too closely) counterpoint to Neal’s abstract vocalizations.
Altogether the performance was interesting and surprisingly relaxing. I listened to about six hours of it (on and off) and found myself refreshed.
Signing off for now – Cage Part Two will be posted shortly.
Friday, August 17, 2012
Installation Review: Outside In / Inside Out: The Inner Life of Jack (by Ellen Sollod and Johanna Melamed); Jack Straw Studios, Seattle
The image came into focus. Or rather, almost into focus; it remained fuzzy, soft-edged, dreamlike. It was, of course, of the street in front of the Jack Straw gallery, projected upside down and backwards onto the wall by the camera obscura – merely a hole in the wall with a lens. Such “darkened chambers” (translation of “camera obscura”) were mentioned in both Chinese and Greek sources from the 4th and 5th centuries B.C. (without the lens), so they probably existed prior to that. They are the ancestor of all of our cameras today. Usually they have been used for amusement, as an aid to drawing, or to prove scientific ideas such as that light travels in a straight line. Here, together with a stream-of-consciousness soundtrack, one was used to create a surreal, meditative atmosphere.
One topic is left to discuss. I thought, after I left, that the pedestrians and people in the cars I had seen go by (upside down) probably were not aware of the dreamworld unfolding only a few feet from them. This discussion could go several ways; we are all, of course, not usually aware of what is happening behind any given wall at any particular time. But also, it could be a metaphor for experimental music and media itself: such art is a complex, beautiful, and infinitely interesting world, yet (due to “blockage” by the mass media) a lot of people are simply unaware of it. Jack Straw Studios is doing what they can to rectify that situation.
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