Author: admin

On the Battlefield

On the Battlefield was inspired by the memory of a visit I made to the Vicksburg National Military Park during my journey down the Mississippi River in 2009.

The November afternoon I was there, I ended up in a miserable long-distance phone argument with my then-lover in Athens. The site of one of the iconic struggles of the war between the states felt entirely personal and intimate to me that afternoon.

Six years later, I spent an afternoon at that same battlefield with my friend and collaborator Matt Petty as he filmed the footage he used to make the video for On the Battlefield.

On the Battlefield is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can watch and listen to Matt’s trombone version by visiting 23 November.

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The piece can be performed by any brass or wind player. You can play back my spoken part or mute it to perform with a live actor, male or female. Whatever you play into Ableton Live will be transformed simultaneously into clusters and also a drone. I have not composed your music: you will want to respond to the text, the visuals, and the live processing. It’s possible you will want to be thinking of “taps” as you play, but you definitely won’t want to be corny about it.

In order for the Ableton session to work properly, you probably need the full version of Live. You will also need to download and install the free plugins you can find here.

You will want to switch the monitor buttons to IN on the first two tracks, called CLUSTERS and DRONE, and make sure your playing levels do not cover the spoken voice. The video is embedded in the Live session; in order for the video to display, you need to be in Arrangement view, not Session view.

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To purchase the Ableton session needed to perform the piece, please click the button below. And thank you for supporting this low-key way of publishing:

Open Secrets

Open Secrets was a semester-long project in spring of 1999 at RPI sponsored by Chris Jaffe, in which architect Malcolm Holzman and I worked with teachers and students in architecture and intermedia on “an investigation of the relationships between acoustics, architecture, and music and an exploration of spaces, both secret and revealed, natural and mediated.”

The core idea was to play with visually and sonically encoded versions of a text from Hebrews: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

It was a crazily ambitious and fun project! There’s a 1999-era website devoted to documenting our work together. It could use some updating, but it’ll give you an idea.

A musical translation of the Morse code version of the text was played by Kathy Supové on toy piano in an anechoic chamber hidden beneath a ramp.

You had to be there.

That score was turned into a cool little music video by Duff Dufresne, and can be seen and heard in A Book of Days, on 18 November. If you’d like to play the piece, in or out of an anechoic chamber, please get in touch with me!

Five Things

Five Things was written on 23 October 2001. The text is Thomas Cleary’s translation of a Song Dynasty (10th to 13th century) letter to a Zen Master Xiang:

• What has been long neglected cannot be restored immediately.

• Ills that have been accumulating for a long time cannot be cleared away immediately.

• One cannot enjoy oneself forever.

• Human emotions cannot be just.

• Calamity cannot be avoided by trying to run away from it.

Anyone who has realized these five things can be in the world without misery.

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Five Things is November 14th in my ongoing project A Book of Days. Please go there to hear a live recording by the Robin Cox Ensemble on clarinet, cello, and woodblock, with me doing the text.

Judson Wright has made an animation that can be projected in performances of the piece. Contact me for more details.

Here is a score of the piece in pdf format. I can supply you with different transpositions and clefs, as needed.

To purchase performance materials, please click on the paypal button below:

Machaut in the Age of Motown

Machaut in the Age of Motown (2005) is a transcribed mashup of two pre-existing works: The Bells, written by Marvin Gaye (1970) as sung by The Originals, and Tels rit from the Remede de Fortune (1340) written by Guillaume de Machaut as sung by the Project Ars Nova Ensemble. It’s the fifth piece in a series called Machaut in the Machine Age, which I have been making every now and then since 1986 in response to the music and poetry of Guillaume de Machaut, the fabulous 14th century French composer.

Originally scored for soprano sax, clarinet, violin, bass, bells, vibes, piano, and drumset, I am happy to adapt the piece for your forces. You can download the score and listen to a live performance:

And you can listen to the original mashup of Marvin and Machaut on 7 November in A Book of Days.

Farther from the Heart

Oh, I’m sad for never knowing courage,
And I’m sad for the stilling of fear.
Close to the sun now and farther from the heart.
I think that my end must be near.

>I linger too long at a picnic
’cause a picnic’s gayer than me.
And I hold to the edge of the table
’cause the table’s stronger than me.
And I lean on anyone’s shoulder
Because anyone’s warmer than me.

Jane Bowles

I have been mulling over this 1942 poem by Jane Bowles since I first encountered it in 2000. I think the poem is unbearably sad: the embodiment of a specific kind of mid-20th-century female unhappiness. I do not live this life, but I am very conscious of having escaped it.

The song showed up unannounced one day while I was in residence at Ucross in the spring of 2016.

Farther from the Heart is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to my recording by visiting 3 November.

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Here’s the vocal score at the transposition that works best for me. I am happy to supply you with a different transposition, just let me know what you need when you order the materials below.

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And thank you for supporting this low-key way of publishing.

Getting to Know the Weather

Getting to Know the Weather was inspired by Pamela Painter’s short story of the same name, which tells of a woman embarking on a job search after a divorce in midlife. I read the story and wrote the piece while going through my own divorce (and coming out process) in my late twenties.

The weather of my piece is Chromatic Lydian, which was considered by Plato to be too sensual and lax to be suitable for the education of guardians. Getting to Know the Weather composes out the kind of non-systematized, non-superimposing fooling around one sometimes does with new material and situations. The piece was originally written for saxophone player Marshall Taylor and dedicated to him with respect and affection.

Getting to Know the Weather is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to David Steele’s bass clarinet version by visiting 27 October.

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Getting to Know the Weather was originally written for baritone saxophone. That version is available from Dorn Publications. Here is a version for bass clarinet. I can supply other transpositions: just let me know what you need what you order the piece.

The instrumental part should be played like the bass line in a funk tune. If you play it solo, you will want to viscerally imagine a beat in your mind as you play the piece, and reflect the groove in your playing. If you perform with a drummer, please invent a groove together that makes it as fun as possible to play the piece. I can supply a modified version of James Brown’s Funky Drummer groove with some additional kitchen percussion if you want to work with a pre-recorded track, or of course you can feel free to make your own.

If you want to add an octave doubler or other processing to the instrumental sound, that’s fine with me. In any case, you probably want to amplify the instrumental player.

I have notated the score in chromatic Lydian throughout, though you will quickly hear that sections of the piece could be notated in F# minor or in A major. I hope that consistency of notation will outweigh whatever initial difficulties you might have with the unorthodox spelling.

Dynamics have generally not been notated since they grow naturally out of your playing. Start soft, get loud, and end quietly within a generally loud level throughout.

And don’t play it too fast: it’s sexier slower.

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And thank you for supporting this low-key way of publishing:

What Justice Looks Like

What Justice Looks Like was written for Payton MacDonald to perform at South Pass City as part of his Sonic Divide project. Esther Hobart Morris (1814-1902) served as Justice of the Peace there in 1870, during the Gold Rush, right after women were given the vote in Wyoming Territory. After her term was over, she had her husband arrested for assault and battery. She eventually left both him and South Pass City, becoming an activist for women’s rights nationally.

What Justice Looks Like is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to my recording by visiting Valentine’s Day, which is the day when Esther was sworn in as Justice of the Peace.

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Here’s the vocal score at the transposition that works best for me. I am happy to supply you with a different transposition, just let me know what you need when you click the donation button below.

I think you want to think of this piece as an intimate invocation to Esther. You’ll want to find the transposition that lets both the lowest and the highest notes of the (rangy) vocal line be vulnerable and loving. You are welcome to do the piece slower (or faster) than the marked tempo if you like, and you don’t need to stick too precisely to the notated rhythms as long as the phrases stay coherent.

You can do it as a solo vocal piece, or you can invent a rhythmic accompaniment that helps you express the piece, adding extra bars of rest between verses for improvisational flourishes as you prefer. If you like a drone, feel free to use one. For the demo, I used Henry Lowengard’s excellent iPhone app, Srutibox, in just intonation mode. And I added a couple of totally optional samples from “Suffragette City”, which I’ll send you if you want them.

And thank you for supporting this low-key way of publishing:

not enough to admire

It is not enough to admire the art of North American Indians; Western man must rediscover the spiritual sources of this art in himself. And until this is done, the power of the sacred will remain out of reach, and the anxiety of Western man living in time will continue to haunt his soul.
Jane Ash Poitras (Cree-Chipewyan)
in Plains Indian Drawings 1865-1935
ed. Janet Catherine Berlo
page 69
Black Hawk Dream or Vision of Himself Changed to a Destroyer or Riding a Buffalo Eagle (1880-81)
Black Hawk (Sans Arc Lakota)
Dream or Vision of Himself Changed to a Destroyer or Riding a Buffalo Eagle (1880-81)

 

Bear's Heart Troops Amassed Against a Cheyenne Village (1876-77)
Bear’s Heart (Cheyenne)
Troops Amassed Against a Cheyenne Village (1876-77)

 

Red Horse (Minneconjou Lakota Sioux, 1822-1907), Untitled from the Red Horse Pictographic Account of the Battle of the Little Bighorn, 1881. Graphite, colored pencil, and ink. NAA MS 2367A_08569900. National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
Red Horse (Minneconjou Lakota Sioux, 1822-1907), Untitled from the Red Horse Pictographic Account of the Battle of the Little Bighorn, 1881. Graphite, colored pencil, and ink. NAA MS 2367A_08569900. National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution

 

Julian Scott Ledger Artist B Twelve High-Ranking Kiowa Men (1880)
Julian Scott Ledger Artist B
Twelve High-Ranking Kiowa Men (1880)

following the trail

tensleep
Highway 16 in the Cloud Peak Wilderness

Point at Genesis all you like, but I don’t believe God created Wyoming for humans to live in. It is marvelous handiwork nonetheless! Aesthetically, from the comfort of a car with a full tank of gas, especially if it has heated seats and a good sound system, there’s no better road trip than across Highway 16 on the Cloud Peak Highway and through the Wind River Range.

Oregon Trail
the Oregon Trail just south of Casper, WY

The actual Oregon Trail is somewhat south of that route, through a broad river valley created by the North Platte and the Sweetwater, crossing the Continental Divide at South Pass. It’s an ancient Native American route between east and west, created by water, as all the best routes are, and it’s certainly more practical than the route Lewis and Clark took in the early 19th century!

southpasscity
South Pass City on 3 April 2016

Willow Creek is the the little stream that feeds the Gold Rush town of South Pass City. If this creek started six miles further west, that water would end up in the Colorado River heading southwest to grow lettuce in the Imperial Valley and water lawns in Los Angeles. If it were further north, it would eventually join the Columbia River and flow past Portland to the Pacific.

Willow Creek in South Pass City
Willow Creek in South Pass City

Instead, it joins the Sweetwater River, and then the North Platte at Alcova, WY, the Platte itself at Brady, NE, the Missouri at Nebraska City, the Mississippi at St. Louis, and then flows all the way down to the Gulf of Mexico. Sitting by the side of the creek this weekend, I imagined I could feel the gravitational pull towards the east and the south. This water is urging me to New Orleans, and I have to fight to imagine heading up and over the Continental Divide out to the West.

When I paddled through the Chain of Rocks six years ago, a real but vanishingly small percentage of the water I was flowing with came from Willow Creek in South Pass City.

That is a miraculous thing.

Willow Creek downstream flow
Willow Creek downstream flow

The scale of Wyoming is not human scale. England, that green and pleasant land, is human scale. Even Vermont is human scale, by comparison with Wyoming. Vermont is brutal in winter, certainly you can die of exposure or whatever, but there’s a sense that you as an individual human being can somehow find shelter, build a little nest in a ravine somewhere to protect yourself from the wind and snow and wild beasts. I do not feel that way in Wyoming. It is quite clear that I could die out here very easily. It is very beautiful, but it is not a green and pleasant land.

near Atlantic City, WY
near Atlantic City, WY

Perhaps when the buffalo were here, it felt different? Then there was a plentiful source of food, clothing, and even shelter just from that one animal, and small bands of humans could survive and even thrive by living on the wealth that the buffalo created for them.

But now the buffalo are gone. And the overriding feeling I am left with as an individual traveling alone in this landscape is exposure and vulnerability. Those feelings lead to awe, I have to say, when I think of a half million immigrants struggling across this landscape in wagons and handcarts. There’s something both terrible and thrilling about the ferocious fragility of human ambition: what were the desperate dreams of the people who embarked on this journey, what was so unbearable about the places and the situations they were escaping from?

The Oregon Trail at South Pass, WY
the Oregon Trail at South Pass, WY

on being armenian

Grant Beglarian

A couple of months ago, I found a cassette copy of a radio talk my father gave in 1975 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, which is traditionally remembered on April 24th each year. (On that day in 1915, the Ottoman authorities arrested hundreds of Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople and deported and killed many of them. It was one small outburst in a “nation-building” project that began in the 1890s and continued into the 1920s.)

As a second-generation half-member of the far-flung diaspora created by these events, I know I have been formed by them, even though I will never know the details of my grandparents’ and aunts’ and uncles’ and cousins’ stories.

I’m inviting you to listen to my father’s words: in On Being Armenian, he manages to dream forward while honoring the past. I have posted his radio program as audio and with a transcription, and I have added some photographs, links, and notes to give you additional context. Please feel free to share this widely: I would love for his voice to be heard!

Machaut a Go-go

Machaut a Go-go adapts both the music and the lyrics of Machaut’s virelais “Moult sui de bonne heure nee” to the go-go style. Go-go is a jazzy offshoot of rap that fourished in Washington, D.C. a while ago. Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers were my main inspiration in adapting the style. Machaut a Go-go was written in 1991 for Kitty Brazelton and her nine-piece band, Dadadah. Kitty made the translation and adaptation of the Machaut lyrics, as well as helping immeasurably to shape the piece. Many thanks to her and the other members of Dadadah for their work and musicianship.

Machaut a Go-go can be performed with an introduction: a performance of the original virelais (for voice and harp or guitar) that is rudely interrupted by the drummer, who leads in the other musicians. Here is a scan of the original score to use if you want to do this introduction.

Machaut a Go-go is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to a Dadadah’s recording by visiting May 7th.

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You can download a score of the piece here. You can purchase performance materials by clicking the link below.

And thanks for supporting this low-key way of publishing!

No Delight in Sacrifice

No Delight in Sacrifice is a short response to my least favorite masterpiece, The Rite of Spring. I’ve taken materials from Stravinsky’s dazzling work and re-shaped them to stand against the glamorization of killing in the name of higher powers and for the joy of renewal and rebirth that spring embodies. The bassoon begins the piece with a plainchant version of Psalm 51 that was my guide in this re-composition: “For you have no delight in sacrifice; if I were to give a burnt-offering, you would not be pleased.”

No Delight in Sacrifice was commissioned by the Vermont Symphony Orchestra in celebration of their 80th Anniversary Season, and was premiered in Burlington on 6 December 2014 on a concert that included The Rite of Spring.

No Delight in Sacrifice is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to a recording of the premiere by visiting May 29th.

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You can download a score of the piece here. You can purchase performance materials by clicking the link below.

And thanks for supporting this low-key way of publishing!

Walking Music

Walking Music was originally written for an opera based on a Stephen King story called The Man in the Black Suit. This music accompanies a boy’s walk to the stream where he unexpectedly meets the devil. It’s a decorated arrangement of an old hymn of the sort the boy might have been humming as he walked. The hymn, called The King of Love, is a reworking of Psalm 23, set to an old Gaelic tune.

Several years after making the piece, I made an arrangement that can be played as part of the River Project. Thankfully, I did not meet the devil on my journey down the river(!) But I feel that the music captures something of the innocence I sometimes felt on the journey.

Walking Music is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to a live performance by BRIM and the Guidonian Hand visiting May 11th.

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The original version of this piece is for two singers, two guitars, chorus, string quartet, and optional stream ambience. The BRIM and Guidonian Hand version is for singer, violin, guitar, trombone quartet, and piano. You can download a score of that version here. If you would like a version that works for your ensemble, just let me know your needs.

And thanks for supporting this low-key way of publishing!

Machaut in the Machine Age I: Douce dame jolie

Machaut in the Machine Age I: Douce dame jolie is the first of a series of pieces that use the music of Machaut as a jumping-off point for various juxtapositions of his art with mine. This one was originally written in 1986 for Daniel Druckman (percussion) and Alan Feinberg (piano) as an opener for their duo recitals.

The Tisch School of the Arts commissioned an arrangement of the piece for flute, Bb clarinet, violin, cello, piano, percussion in 1990 so that choreographer Monica Levy could use it for a dance work.

Machaut in the Machine Age I: Douce dame jolie is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to the ensemble version by visiting March 17th.

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Here are scores for the two different versions of Machaut in the Machine Age I.

original duo version (pdf)

chamber ensemble version (pdf)

When you order the performance materials by clicking the button below, please let me know which version you need. The instrumentation can be changed beyond the two versions above, so talk to me if you have specific needs for your ensemble.

Thanks for supporting this low-key way of publishing!

Play Like a Girl in NYC!

Play Like a Girl will receive its New York premiere on Sunday 8 February at the DiMenna Center. Salome Scheidegger will play three variations of the 8 factorial possibilities, and I can’t wait to hear her do it.

See you there, I hope!