1 minute of music "MahBootay" by Laura Love

For my one minute of music, I chose "Mahbootay," because it reminds me of the important things in my life. Firstly, I think the lyrics are funny and light, and I had a great time laughing at them as a kid and singing along.

Although the song is simple and fun on the surface, if you think about the lyrics, the underlying message is a very positive one. Listening to this song reminds me of the times I sang and danced to this song with my family of 6 all crammed into the car, too busy singing to complain about the little things (like always being the one that had to double buckle). Also it reminds me to love and take care of myself as well.

I love how Laura keeps the groove simple, and the instrumentation and arrangement techniques are unique. This album is one of the albums I listen to a lot, but very unlike the other music I gravitate towards.

Eve (re Silvio re Eyglo)

note: Response to Eyglo’s reply on Silvio’s post here, since I'm still having difficulty with the response button on blogger....

I like the idea of Sound as lead explorer in music. It is a more natural explorer into the abstract than words/philosophies. I think music can take us into unexplored territory that words/narrative didn’t think to go if we’re not constantly trying to build linear narrative with it. The mind naturally looks over its shoulder, collecting moments and stringing them together into a time line, so maybe not starting the musical creative process with the way words like to work benefits the music process and offers more surprising results. 

One Minute of Music

Chris Potter - Train

From: Follow the Red Line - 2007

https://open.spotify.com/track/4tX42fyMF1aIr28PayMrYp

This song was the first track off the first album I ever had by a living jazz musician.

One Minute of Music: Prokofiev's String Quartet No. 1

Hello,

Here is my minute of music: Prokofiev's String Quartet No. 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TRIQP7WNkc

One Minute of Music: Elgar's Cello Concerto

This is one of my favourite pieces of music, particularly the first movement of course for the famous cello solo at the beginning.  This version is played by Jacqueline Du Pre - I think it's hard to top her performance and passion.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUgdbqt2ON0

Eve Beglarian: The Suspension Of Disbelief

It was with great pleasure and interest that I followed Eve Beglarian‘s presentation. I was struck by her energy and dedication and her artistic curiosity marked a true spirit of exploration in her work. She manages to cover new ground and drive towards forms of artistic expression that are both novel and contemporary by exploring specific topics that are close to her heart.

I was specifically impressed by her current work-in-progress for the Metropolitan Museum. Whichever form it will take, I believe it will be very powerful and get the message across. Much like in film music the inhibition threshold for the audience to accept the music is much lower, when it’s used incidentally. Although considered by some as detrimental to the art form, Eve Beglarian is herself able to reach her audience more directly by composing music for a specific use-case.

When the message behind our work is important to us, we have to make sure that it is as clear as possible. Within our music most people don‘t hear nearly as much as we do. Even other composers can interpret our intentions quite differently. Consequentially we should try to remove as many sources of ambiguity in our process as possible.

In „A book of days“ I would like to critique Eve Beglarian’s process to some extend. Even though the specific origin of her sounds might be interesting to us composers, the final outcome of her pieces might not be as meaningful to the prospective audience. The semantic function of these sounds is hard to translate into expressive abstract music and the audience may have a hard time suspending disbelief. In other words, the audience is asked to relate emotionally to the musical value contained in what they usually perceive as the noisy texture of everyday life.

If we want to so so as composers it would be useful to learn some lessons from the producers of Hip-Hop, Jungle, contemporary EDM and other electronic music genres. While this music may not conform to the level of abstraction that we aspire to, it may nevertheless shed light on some effective use-cases of this acoustic mosaic style.

Another factor to consider in this discussion is that tape as the instrument effectively circumvents the performer as the messenger of the artistic vision. A lot of complex music is more accessible if heard live and consequently less so when being played only from tape.

I addition I’d like to raise the argument that the usage of tape as the main instrument should come at the expense of being less active in the creative decision process. We miss the procedural nuances of choosing sounds by believing that the sounds themselves inspire the process. This is not to say that Eve Beglarian herself is being passive in the process. Instead, I mean to raise awareness among us composers, as we try to use similar techniques in our work.

Eve Beglarian - Composer´s Forum (Alberto Anaya)

Last Monday at Composers Forum we received a very distinguished guest. Eve Beglarian is an example of how personal and professional life have both an impact on your voice and your work as a composer. Born in a music family and raised between music and musicians, she studied in Princeton and then went to Colombia to continue studying, but refused to make a thesis there mainly for two reasons. First, she did not like it there, and second, with her father’s figure in mind, who was Dean of Music and Performing Arts Department at USC, she did not want to end up subdued into the academic world.

Once she was in her twenties and decided to become a composer, she got into audio books in New York as an starting point for developing a career out of composing. It is not surprising that part of her work fits in time and form her “Daily Meditations” (a musical format similar to audio books). She told us that buying ProTools with the money she earned from audio books was a true milestone in her life, so we can imagine how things have changed from that time to this days…

Inspired by Alvin Lucier´s masterpiece I’m sitting in a room, her musical influences vary from serial music to controlled random processes. In her music, she combines the background of having grown up in America within the pop culture with some musical processes from one of the main part of the legacy of contemporary music in the USA, which is minimalism. However, her pieces are relatively short in duration to fit the basic fundamentals of minimalism in its purest conception, so she combines some process of continuous music transformation with tonal groovy lines played by instruments in the background.

In pump music, the piece I liked the most from what we were shown, she uses very cleverly the instruments and makes them imitate certain parts of the spectrum from the object trouvé (the pump) while using the tonal rhythmic groovy patterns that she “just feels” with structural purposes. 

Finally, the most striking moment of the evening took place when she showed us a draft from a very personal project. Poulenc´s flute sonata in an audio guide introduces us in the Metropolitan Museum, then Eve is reading an article about a 14 years old girl and a 40 years old man, same shit different day, but then the article gives way to a section in which we can hear a music dialogue between a man and a woman with the audio taken from a porn clip. In this section Eve blends nicely the digital world of sound processing (oppressing the man’s voice with a vocoder for instance) and the “analog” music world (at the end the female voice is accompanied by a piano with all the other sounds faded out), so she empowers the woman in the piece, who at the end it turned out to be her in the voice of a relevant person in the MET.

The people that know me know that I am not a fan of stories enclosed to pieces of music whose composers (allegedly) want them to be just music. However, in this case I think the audience should know the story behind, maybe with anonymous characters, but they should know the story because music (and pretty much the art in general) is a very good channel to send this kind of messages to the world.  

albertoanayamusic.com

1 Minute of music: Ravel String Quartet in Fmajor II.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2KUTa6P6lM

Ravel 1903

1 minute of favourite music

Sorry its a little late. My minute of music was Janacek's 2nd string quartet Mvt. 3. it has a really cool 5/4 tempo change bar after a nice dance section. I really love to see how different quartets interpret this section:

https://youtu.be/UE_5GOjO6pA?t=694
 

Response to Shao-Ting's "Francisco Núñez: A Musical Utopia Not Far Away"

Note: I believe commenting on posts has been restricted in some manner, so I am writing this post to supplant my comment
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I think it's easy to fall for the self-aggrandizing schema that the high-brow composition community traditionally espouses. Ultimately, music is a universal collaborative effort - isolating ourselves as composers in any regard is a foolish endeavour.

Actively performing music is something that is definitely important - as great as the dream of earning a living from composing exclusively seems, removing ourselves from where we began as musicians is silly. Finding the perfect equilibrium between the introvert's compositional practice and that of the extroversion of performance is a delicate balancing act that will always be a struggle to some degree.

Response to Daniel Farrell's Nuñez post

Response to Daniel Farrell's post here, since I'm still having difficulty with the response button on blogger....

I'm not sure what "artistic duty" is... but I was thinking what a beautiful and much needed flush of joy Nuñez is bringing to the world through music. I don't think music changes the (!) world but it does respond to the moment, maybe softens/heightens peoples everyday experience.

I like that Nuñez is able to see greatness in many genres, I think that speaks to his ability to respond to the moment authentically.

Francisco Nuñez: The Composer’s Quest for Greatness

Francisco Nuñez: The Composer’s Quest for Greatness       

-Daniel Farrell

          One of the most interesting concepts that Francisco Nuñez revealed to Forum this week was in the form of a simple off-handed comment. During the discussion, he jokingly explained how many composers get commissioned by prestigious ensembles asking for incredible craftmanship and political insight while only giving $3000, and yet he himself was paid $50,000 to write a Latin dance pop song. While obviously this comment was made in jest, it does reveal a potential reality for many composers. All composers (and artists in general) want to create great art; art with lasting impact. Do we perhaps limit ourselves in this endeavor, by seeking to be provocative, insightful, or meaningful? It may be a difficult concept to us – living in a hyperconnected and politically aware world today – but if we journey back to the great “classics” of the music realm, we may discover that this quest for greatness took an entirely different path.

It seems all too common, but greatness in art often appears to be a result of happenstance; maybe even pure chance. We as musicians revere the works of Bach and Mozart for example, yet very few of their works were designed to be “great” with lasting impact. For Bach, his music served a practical purpose: to be included in worship and as work for the Church (his lasting patron). In actual fact, Bach did not enjoy greatness in his time – only being rediscovered later by Mendelssohn. Mozart also served a patron and the majority of his music was created with the sole purpose of entertainment, could it be not too inaccurate to say that Mozart was the Beyoncé of his time? Few composes were ever aware of their greatness and did not compose music with the purpose of insightful commentary on contemporary life. That concept seems entirely a product of the 20th century and now the 21st century.

Nuñez’s concept that music does not always have to evoke some insightful and provocative meaning is refreshing, and his acceptance that sometimes music just needs to make people happy and give them energy to dance is great to hear. It may even appear alien to our modern composer sensibilities, but his concept of music actually falls in line with music’s purpose for the thousands of years prior to around 1910. Does this mean composers should abandon our artistic duty (and I say that lightly) to reveal to our audience social commentary and political insight? Certainly not! But does it mean that all great art – great music – must make those insights?

Perhaps it is the ego of the modern composer’s mind to credit Schoenberg as more musically important to the 20th century than The Beetles – but with the aid of musicians like Nuñez, I expect to see a greater appreciation appearing for music whose purpose is sometimes to just put a smile on someone’s face and a beat in their feet. To be musically provocative is important – but it garners no more credit for greatness then to simply be musically fun.

           

Francisco Núñez: A Musical Utopia Not Far Away

Francisco Núñez: A Musical Utopia Not Far Away

Francisco Núñez’s speech was very inspiring not only due to his successful career in music, but also in his willingness to care for all humans with different colors and background, especially children. Born as a white Latino in Haiti, Francisco was relatively the minority, and music has always been his way to communicate with the world. “Equalizer” as he called it, is the way that distinctive cultures can bridge with each other.

Just like me, Francisco wasn’t fond of teaching kids, let alone composing for them. We tend to view art in a hierarchy aspect unconsciously, seeing children music as “low” art in juxtaposition with orchestral music. Actually, children music can be much more sophisticated than we assume, evidently shown in the footage of the children choir traveling to Japan to perform, where the children memorized all the lyrics, notes, and body gestures and still executing it perfectly.

Looking in a bigger perspective, I think it is relieving to see that humanity has made quite a progress and is getting better day by day. In the so called Classic Period, there are just a few, if any composition for children. Even until the early 1900s, girls are not allowed to sing in public.

Despite the recent success in breaking the barrier, Francisco still encountered trouble finding other composers who are willing to write for children. Also, he mentioned that New York Times refused to write a review for the children choir beforehand, showing that the enlightenment of humanity indeed requires a pusher to stand against the conservatives.

What impresses me the most is that in Francisco’s choir, he accepts every children from the diverse neighborhood that went to the audition, an approximately of 2000 kids in total, and then combine them into a choir. That to me shows a lot of his strong belief in that music should not be restrict only to certain social status, such as races, groups, sex, or even those who are more “talented”. Music seems a lot less complex and like an Utopia through Francisco’s envision.

Francisco also mentioned that musician should also be entrepreneurs, as we are always thriving to find our next gig. This is something that I often overlook due to devoting all my times composing and searching for creative ideas. Sometimes I feel working as an entrepreneur kinds of contradicts with the artistic nature of me being a composer, even though down inside I know that I must learn to merge the traits of the two occupation in order to make it far into the industry.

In general, the take away from this seminar is definitely the importance of education. What Francisco said was sadly true. Nearly everyone wants to compose music while no one passes down the knowledge to the next generation. I feel that Francisco sees it more than just a job, but also as the responsibility of a musician. Furthermore, through preparing for the curriculum and teaching, one certainly can improve a great deal in terms of musicianship. Francisco ends the speech encouraging us to find the common aspect between others and yourself, and live as a great human being.

Eve Beglarian: Context in Music

Eve Beglarian’s presentation interested me for a few reasons. First of all, I’m always appreciative to hear from a queer female composer, someone like me who who has managed to make a living in music.

But what I found most fascinating was the role that context played in Beglarian’s musical output. To be fair, I find that context plays a role in how we experience any piece of music. Knowing that Tchaikovsky wrote Symphony Pathetique as a sort of goodbye and died shortly after, for example, or learning that the instrumentation for Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la Fin du Temps was determined by the instrument they had available in the concentration camp where he was confined, have a profound effect on our reception of a piece.

That said, not every composer uses context as a deliberate tool the way Beglarian does. Her musical exploration of the Mississippi is an exercise in musical context. Throughout River Project, Beglarian responded to the sounds she encountered along the Mississippi river with her music, sometimes incorporating field recordings. In “Pump Music,” for example, the conception of the piece sprang from the odd “harmonic series” produced by a lonely pump on the Mississippi river. Had she not told us about the pump and the whole Mississippi project, I would have thought of the piece completely differently. And had she not encountered the pump on her trip, the piece would never have materialized. Furthermore, the whole conception of River Project seems to me to be an effort to use music to contextualize the Mississippi within America during a modern Great Depression, and after the election of the first black President. In this way, Beglarian’s music, though very personal, comes about via a response to found sounds and the environment in which the composer finds herself.

Perhaps even more striking than context in River Project was the role context played in her piece about sexual assault. The more she revealed about the sources of the sounds in the piece, the more developed my reaction to the piece. Beglarian began by placing the painting in the Met, “Therese Dreaming,” and by extension her piece as a response to it, in the context of the Me Too movement. That was the first layer. Then, she explained the article about the pedophilic summer camp flute teacher, and the fact that she used his recording in the piece. Then there was the French child pornography. When she explained that it was real, my gut reaction to the piece was stronger and very different than it would have been had there just been stimulated sexual noises. After she shared her personal story of sexual assault, I found that my reaction to the piece was even more nuanced and emotional than it was before I knew that about her.

To further the idea of context, I really hope that she develops the piece as a sound installation at the Met like she had mentioned. To give the piece a spatial as well as cultural context would completely change how we experience it, and I would find it fascinating to listen to it in front of the painting that initially inspired it.

The Taming of the Child

Last Monday, we had the privilege of hearing award-winning and all around cool guy Francisco Núñez discuss his ventures into the world of youth education and the ideas of elitism and racism in the arts. I greatly enjoyed the talk, yet was rather jealous of his abilities with children. I myself taught music to young children for a semester and it was, frankly, a nightmare.

Each new student (aged 7-13 or so (never got the opportunity to teach adults (unfortunately))) always went through the same progression. For the first lesson or two, the child was quiet, respectful, and appreciative of our lesson time. By about the 4th lesson or so, the student would have become a completely different person. They walk into the classroom throwing their books around and demanding that I let them have my phone so that they can play games on it. Or for instance, I would suggest moving ahead to new pieces and instead of humbly agreeing, they would yell and stamp and try to write on me with my pen.

While this was tolerable at the worst, I completely lost it when I had to teach groups of these children. While I was able to get some form of focus in one-on-one lessons, I lost control of them when there were multiple little humans in the room who, for example, thought it would be hilarious to call me a poop-face on the white board while I was explaining, for the 5th time that the musical alphabet does not in fact keep going to Z. I told myself then that I would never do group lessons like this ever again. It truly took a toll on me and made me feel like the art that I grew up with and loved dearly was being mocked and wasted.

This experience rather made me realize that there is a shaky balance between being a "cool teacher" and a teacher who gets pushed around. One of the more successful teachers at the company never laughed at children's jokes, never sat next to children at the piano, and never entertained any distracted actions by the child. I suppose it's the (hopefully false) dichotomy between being liked and respected.

While I was not able to see Francisco Núñez's rehearsal/teaching style, I can assume that he has found the proper balance between being cool and strict.
It also conjures the idea that he touched on briefly of pride. One of the reasons I felt so disgruntled was that I felt that I had really important things to say about music and theory and composition and philosophy. I still struggle with the feeling that I haven't yet gotten the chance to express my thoughts on these subjects to a receptive audience. Perhaps I can learn from Núñez's inspirational example and understand that music education has to begin somewhere.
A pyramid cannot be formed from the top down.

It was also very surprising (and disturbing) to hear about the animosity and disgusting, blatant racism that Núñez spoke of concerning the competitions to which he took his mixed-race choir. The idea that a person is any less capable of singing and performing based on something as topical as skin color is both confusing and infuriating. While much of this racism has become less obvious in modern days, that doesn't mean that it has disappeared or been resolved. We learn from psychology courses that one of the best ways to root out racist, divisive thoughts is to spend time cooperating with the other race. I can't think of a better way to do this than in a mixed choir setting, expressing art together towards a common goal.

Francisco Núñez: Seeing children as worthy contributors to the music-making process

The element of Francisco Núñez’s presentation that struck me the most was his perspective of children as legitimate and worthy contributors to the music-making process (be it composition, performing, or directing/visioning). For some strange reason I (and perhaps others can relate to this as well) was conditioned into believing there was a line between professional/serious musicians and amateur/non-serious musicians, and that line was determined on many factors, one of them being age. As Francisco mentioned in his experience of working with his youth choir, he found composers to be skeptical in writing music for children, and additionally reviewers unwilling to review children’s music performances. This ties into a larger mindset that children can’t be serious, professional, or worthy contributors of the music-making process in either active composition or performance. In other words, the world of professional music has an age limit. Those who in some instances don’t meet it are then perceived as prodigies where their age is more of a spectacle than their actual talent and or artistry. I was not aware that I had been carrying the same mindset until I heard Francisco speak about it. As a music composition student focusing in songwriting, I certainly never even considered the idea of writing music/songs for children, it was something that had not crossed my mind.

When Francisco played the video of the performance of his piece “Liminalities”, what left the biggest impression on me was the fact that it felt so far away from what I imagined to be a ‘children’s choir performance’ (whatever that may be). In the performance, the music didn’t feel like typical ‘children’s music’, and the performance certainly didn’t feel ‘child-like’. There was an incredibly maturity, musicality and artistry in the performance that surprised me, only because it was performed by children. This again reinforced the misperception I held of qualities such as maturity, artistry and/or musicality not being applicable to the realm of ‘children’s performance’, which is clearly just not the case.

Something else Francisco brought up was his rule of memorizing all music. He stated that when music performers read their music in the performance it ‘kills’ the music by setting up a barrier which creates a sort of distance between audience and performer. His belief was that when music is memorized, and can be performed to the audience without this barrier, it leads to more ‘direct communication’, and consequently also significantly reduces the distance between audience and performer. As someone who has performed in both a classical and contemporary context I have held on dearly to all sheet-music because of my poor memory, but the distance it creates consequently allows the performer to stay in their own bubble and not engage or ‘directly’ communicate with the audience. I was glad that he brought this up as I found this valuable reminder of the importance of memorizing music when applicable and possible as it can radically change the audience’s experience of the music and allow for much more deeper and effective communication of the music.