Archive for October, 2008

Musicircus

Friday, October 31st, 2008

I had no idea what to expect tonight at the Musicircus–the last time I participated in a similar event was in the Spring of 1995 at the University of Cincinnati, and tonight’s event was heavily modelled on that experience.  That concert was all new music, while tonight was much more eclectic.

I hope all the performers and the audience are as pleased as I am with the results.  Turning about 30 small  (and not-so-small) pieces into an hour-long celebration of music and the joy that it can bring was a very healthy activity for all of us, I think.  It was refreshing to see audience members I had never seen before along with many of our faithful fans, as well.

Organizing this kind of thing means that someone–tonight, me–has to lose the sense of spontaneity and discovery of the event.  It takes a lot of preparation to be so random.  All the same, there were some wonderful “moments:”

About a third of the way into Stockhausen’s Gesang der Junglinge, Krista Margrave and Melody Gum started an a capella version of “I’ll Fly Away.”

Kevin Coons’ fantastic vibraphone solo growing out of the texture of the evening.

The minute of silence–it was randomly chosen, but it came at just the right place in the hour to give some relief.

All the performances were fantastic, and it seemed like everyone had a good time… and I dare say John Cage made a few converts this evening.

Election

Tuesday, October 28th, 2008

I said this wouldn’t be a political site, and no political opinions are put forth in this post.  On the other hand, I have been having a blast tracking the mathematics in this election, and there are two cool sites that I’ve been enjoying.

http://www.evstrength.blogspot.com/ tracks the statewide polls and shows the path this election has taken.  It shows a state-by-state breakdown of which candidates can expect to get which electoral votes, and interestingly, allows you to compare the polls to the same date in 2004.

Also interesting is http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/, which uses about 10,000 simulated elections each day to project a winner.  I’d be really interested to learn more about their computer model for the election.

Living in a state that is polling so far for McCain that neither candidate has been here in weeks (we don’t even get that many TV ads), the statistics are much more interesting than the actual campaign… it makes me miss living in a swing state.

Opus 79

Monday, October 27th, 2008

This month, I actually had more of a chance to dig in to the sonata I’ve assigned myself.  I’m finding that the more I can do at the piano with each piece, the more I get to it… of course, we also had fall break, but the trend doesn’t bode well for Opus 106, which will be coming up in short order–March of next year.  Honestly, “Hammerklavier” has been looming on the horizon since the start of this project, but that was sort of the point all along.  I will not avoid the piece just because it is hard.

Back to the topic at hand, though, Opus 79.  What a little gem!  When I teach Forms next fall, we will be interested in this little piece.  Again, I should be reading Beethoven’s biographies along with this project, but it’s very interesting to me that just when much of his music was getting bigger he came up with these two littler sonatas.  Market forces, perhaps?

The first movement starts with a theme that feels like a rondo theme in a way, but the movement has nothing to do with that form.  If each of these sonatas is a different experiment, perhaps that is the idea in this one.  Not that it falls into the category of “sonata-rondo” like, say, the finale of the Schumann piano quintet, but more and more Beethoven seems to be trying to break out of the mold of the sonata, of writing music by formula.  I’ve always been taught that this was what Romantic composition was, but to see it in action is another thing entirely.  I think back–two years ago now!–to the Opus 2 sonatas that seem so much more “by the book,” as though Beethoven had read Caplin’s (amazing) book on Classical form.  At any rate, even though this piece is relatively small, it isn’t the same composer as those littler pieces.

The slow movement is fun, because I can nearly play it!  Again, one that will come up in Forms next year, because it is a wonderful example of a ternary form that also displays interesting motion (within the A sections) to the III chord in minor.

Then the real rondo–those triplets against the eighth-two-sixteenths are unforgettable, and I can again only admire the pianists who pull them off so smoothly.  I’ve been practicing that rhythm all month, and I hear it, but the hands don’t seem interested in playing it.  Too bad.

I’ve talked with some people in person about what set of pieces to tackle next.  Mariah Carrel-Coons, our accompanist at OPSU, jokingly suggested the Scarlatti sonatas.  More within my reach perhaps, as a pianist, but not quite what I had in mind.  Several pieces have suggested themselves to me.  The Mahler symphonies would be a heck of a trip, and I could spend two months on each, doing analysis in my spare time, as usual.  If I were to continue with Beethoven, the quartets would be the next logical direction–a section of his work largely unfamiliar to me, and a direction I would like to take as a composer.  The options are plentiful–the Ligeti Etudes for piano have been calling to me; I could take a tour through the Preludes of Chopin or Debussy, with a little less time for each piece.  Any suggestions?

Language

Saturday, October 18th, 2008

I’ve been polishing up my paper about Benjamin Britten’s settings of English texts that predate modern English (the youngest text is by John Donne, who scholars generally consider to be in the “Early Modern English” era, although a few scholars still argue that there isn’t any such thing).  It is amazing to me (though perhaps it shouldn’t be) that something that seems as static as language… really isn’t.  One of the best courses I took in graduate school was “The History of the English Language” with Terence Odlin–just absolutely fascinating.  It gets me to thinking about whether we can notice language drift in our own lifetimes.  I’m not just thinking of neologisms, or changes in vocabulary.  Of course those will take place… five years ago “blog” was some kind of word out of a Lewis Carroll poem.  I’m thinking of the kinds of pronunciation changes that occured between, say, Chaucer and Donne, or between Shakespeare and Samuel Johnson; or the huge grammatical shift that happened in the hundred years after 1066.  Is there anything like that happening now?

Topeka

Sunday, October 5th, 2008

This weekend, Becky and I went to Topeka, Kansas to take care of some personal business and made a mini-vacation out of it.  If you haven’t been to Topeka, you’re missing out!  We had never been there before, but we were pleasantly surprised by what we found.  In fact, I’ve decided that Kansas gets a bum rap.

We had an appointment in downtown Topeka, which was a little desolate, but on the whole very respectable for a state capital.  The statehouse is a big building–unfortunately, no time to go in, but it looked interesting.

Our next stop was an hour up the road in Manhattan, Kansas, the Little Apple.  To get there, we drove through the Flint Hills region in the late afternoon.  If you think Kansas is flat and boring, you haven’t seen this terrain–unlike anything back in Ohio.  It rolls and heaves, and there is even a scenic overlook on the road into Manhattan.  After our appointment, we wandered around town, which is home to Kansas State University.  If Craig Weston ever leaves his job teaching composition at Kansas State, I will be putting in my application.  Having spent both grad school and undergrad at big, public universities, K-State felt like home.  A used bookstore complete with cat where I picked up a couple of scores (Purcell and Britten) for a song.  The pep band was strolling around the commercial district getting everyone (except us) ready for the game tomorrow.  We left before the drinking got going, since that’s not really our thing, and since we had left Guymon at six a.m.

A nice night at the Country Inn and Suites in Topeka on Wanamaker Road.  I recommend it to anyone who can afford to not stay at the Motel 6.  Saturday was our first “fun” day, and Topeka showed off for us.  The city is clean, easy to get around and generally very friendly.  The Zoo, in Gage Park, was great–we were charged by the black leopard and you can get really close to most of the animals.  Lunch was at Glory Days Pizza, touted as the best in town, and for a couple of Donatos-deprived Columbusites, much appreciated.  The cheese was baked on over the toppings, and the sauce was excellent.  Becky is a pepperoni purist, which works for me.

Then in the evening came the highlight of the trip, for me.  We happened to be in town on a weekend when the Topeka Symphony Orchestra performed at its home at Washburn University.  The campus there is beautiful, and the hall wonderful.  The orchestra was fantastic–we talked to a cellist, and apparently, they get about six rehearsals for every concert.  We saw Beethoven, a Mozart horn concerto and Brahms’ second symphony.  Not a flawless performance, but a stirring one, all the same.  There were some sour moments in intonation, but the energy was right.  I wouldn’t complain about being able to subscribe to their season.

The concertmistress and the principal cello are married, both on faculty at Washburn and are a duo together–the Elaris Duo.  I picked up their CD after concert and WOW!  A great CD all around–such fantastic tone and blend.  The highlight of the disc for me is the Kodaly.  I asked them if they had ever done the Ravel Sonata for Violin and Cello, and they said they are considering it for their next recording.  A couple of dream performers to add to my list!  It makes a composer want to tackle that medium.