trombone – Eve Beglarian

LIGHTEN UP

LIGHTEN UP is a new, evening length multimedia song cycle created by New York composer Eve Beglarian and Louisiana video artist Matthew Petty. This 80 minute concert combines live music and video projections with lighting and set elements that invoke the force and imagery of the visual artists it honors.

Initially inspired by the life and work of Houston’s Flower Man, LIGHTEN UP explores the visions of visual artists whose life and work re-shape the American Dream in imaginative, powerful, and healing ways. While sometimes called “outsider artists,” these artists’ work springs from sources deep in the ground of the places they live, and inside their deepest selves.

LIGHTEN UP is more a fantasia on the work of these visionary artists than a conventional documentary. Matt Petty’s videos include footage of the work of Cleveland Turner, aka the Flower Man, Pastor Juanita Leonard, Prophet Isaiah Robertson, Jeff McKissack (the Orange Show), Kenny Hill (Chauvin), Dr. Charles Smith, and others. Eve Beglarian’s music sets texts by Louise Glück, Ezekiel, and Reverend Milton Brunson as well as the artists themselves. The piece also explores the way Eve’s and Matt’s lives have been transformed by their relationships with these artists and their work.

The music is performed live by the LIGHTEN UP quartet comprised of James Allen (keys and vocals), David Steele (clarinets and other reeds), Matt (trombone and vocals), and Eve (vocals and electronics).

Eve and Matt began working on LIGHTEN UP in the spring of 2015, under the auspices of the Marion International Fellowship for the Visual and Performing Arts. This year-long development and travel grant culminated in a workshop showing of a first version of LIGHTEN UP performed by the quartet of Eve, James, David, and Matt at the Alley Theatre in Houston, TX in June 2016.

Please click on the titles below to experience three of the existing pieces in LIGHTEN UP.

Dust

footage: Prophet Isaiah Robertson’s home and church, Niagara Falls, NY | Aug 2015 text: Ezekiel • music & vocals: Eve Beglarian • video: Matt Petty

All U Got 2 Do

footage: parishioners at Juanita Leonard’s Church, Montgomery, LA & St. Matthew’s MB Church, Houston | Oct & Dec 2015 & May 2016 • text: Reverend Milton Brunson • music: Eve Beglarian (and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis) • clarinet: David Steele • video: Matt Petty

Enter In To My Heart

footage: Kenny Hill’s Chauvin Sculpture Garden, Chauvin, LA | Dec 2015 & Mar 2016 • music: anonymous harmonica player in New Orleans | Dec 2015 processed and mixed by Eve Beglarian and Matt Petty • video: Matt Petty

LIGHTEN UP: Artist Biographies

According to the Los Angeles Times, composer and performer Eve Beglarian is an idealistic rebel and a musical sensualist. She was awarded the 2015 Robert Rauschenberg Prize from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts for her “innovation, risk-taking, and experimentation.”

Beglarian’s current projects include LIGHTEN UP, a multimedia music-theater piece about visionary visual artists in America; a new collaboration with writer/actor Karen Kandel about women in Vicksburg; the long-term undertaking A Book of Days, text/music/visuals, one for each day of the year; and BRIM, the ensemble she has created to perform the repertoire she has created in response to her 2009 journey down the Mississippi River by kayak and bicycle.

Recordings of Eve’s music are available on ECM, Koch, New World, Canteloupe, Innova, Naxos, Kill Rock Stars, CDBaby, and Bandcamp.

New York Times profile

Sister Juanita Leonard was born at the Huey P. Long Charity Hospital in Alexandria, Louisiana and has been a Louisiana resident all her life. She currently resides in Montgomery, Louisiana (population 795) where she owns and operates Closer to Christ Ministries, a roadside church located off of Highway 71, that she built herself from salvaged materials. Sister Juanita focuses on serving the homeless, sick, and poverty- stricken members of the community, as well as released prisoners, and at-risk children. She provides daily free meals from her home and healing services for those in need, and has done so since 2001.

As an artist, Sister Juanita has been painting since she was 17 years old. Her artwork has expanded into other forms including sculptures, architecture, quilting, hat-making, and basket weaving. Her work has been featured in numerous shows and museums across the state of Louisiana, as well as the The Pennsylvania Museum of Art, in Erie, PA; The Morris Museum of Art in Augusta, GA; and Roff Gravesâ€™ Gallery in Lodi, CA. She has been awarded the title of Recognized Tradition Bearer by the State of Louisiana in 2016, and has also appeared in two books including Juanita Leonardâ€™s Hard Times Bus by Jason Neville, and When the Spirit Speaks: Self-Taught Art of the South by Margaret Day. Additionally, Sister Juanita has appeared in publications by Louisiana Public Broadcasting, CBS, Raw Vision Magazine, The Folk Art Messenger, SPACES Archives, and The American Folk Art Museum.

Raw Vision profileÂ Â | Â Folk Art Society of America profile

Matt Petty is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, and video artist based in Natchitoches, Louisiana. He is a graduate of Northwestern State University, where he received degrees in Music Education and Trombone Performance. Matt Petty uses low-fi gear to create music-based multimedia productions involving sound, video and live performance. Matt is an alumnus of New York’s Watermill Center, where he worked as a performing artist, collaborator, and technical assistant; and was influenced by artists such as theater director Robert Wilson, filmmaker Jim Jarmusch, and the American freak-folk band CocoRosie. He is also a founding member of the experimental-Americana ensemble Kisatchie Sound, with clarinetist and co-founder, David Steele; a group that creates music with a sense of place.

As a collaborative artist, Matt has worked with numerous visual artists and musicians across the U.S. performing concerts and making video pieces. He has screened experimental video in Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, California, New York, and Vermont. Additionally, Matt is the creator of the feature documentary, Sacred as Folk, about the life of Louisiana artist, Brother Michael David Elvestrom. Most recently, Matt is traveling across the country working with and documenting visionary artists for a grassroots multimedia collaboration with composer Eve Beglarian titled LIGHTEN UP, a project that promotes diversity and healing through art as a social practice. Additionally, Matt was one of 25 international artists selected as Lucas Artist Fellows in Music at Montalvo Arts Center, in Saratoga, CA. Matt currently serves as Adjunct Professor of Music and Fine Arts at Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, Louisiana. For more information, visit Matt’s Vimeo page.

ADDITIONAL COLLABORATORS

James Allen is the music director and organist at First St. Matthew’s Missionary Baptist Church in the Third Ward of Houston, Texas. A singer since the age of three, he graduated from Madison High School of Houston in 2003, and from Alcorn State University in Mississippi in 2008 with a Bachelor of Science in Music Performance. His home church is Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church. James has performed as a musician and collaborator with Eve Beglarian and Kisatchie Sound as part of LIGHTEN UP‘s workshop performance at The Alley Theater in Houston, Texas, in the Summer of 2016. Additionally, James works as a lifeguard and swim coach at the YMCA of Houston.

David Steele, a native of Houston, Texas, has been part of the music faculty at Northwestern State University since August 2012 where he teaches clarinet, woodwind methods, and fine arts. He is also a founding member of the chamber ensemble, Kisatchie Sound. While clarinet is his primary instrument, David plays the chalumeau, various woodwind instruments and several folk instruments. He plays an active role as a director, instructor, choreographer, and visual technician throughout the Louisiana/Mississippi Color Guard and Percussion Circuit for area marching bands and color guards. David studied at Northwestern State University, the University of New Mexico, and the University of North Texas. He has worked for Popejoy Hall, New Mexico’s premiere performing arts venue, in the Education and Outreach Department. His teachers include Dr. Malena McLaren, Mr. Keith Lemmons, and Dr. Kimberly Cole Luevano.

While at Northwestern State University, David performed with the university’s Wind Symphony, Symphony Orchestra, and Jazz Orchestra. He has played principal clarinet with the University of New Mexico’s Wind Symphony and Symphony Orchestra. While attending the University of North Texas, David performed and recorded with the U.N.T. Wind Symphony as principal clarinet under the direction of Dr. Eugene Corporon. Additionally, David has performed with several professional groups such as the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, Roswell Symphony Orchestra, Shreveport Symphony Orchestra, Texarkana Symphony Orchestra, South Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, the Many Chamber Orchestra, and the Northwestern Faculty Quintet. He has also performed as a musician, color guard performer, and visual artist at the Alley Theater in Houston, and as a woodwind specialist and technician in the pit-orchestras at Long Lake Camp of the Arts in New York. He is a recipient of the McCutchens Award for Musical Excellence, the Magale Award for Musical Excellence, the Bess McNeely Award for Outstanding Musical Performance, and the Albuquerque Community Education and Outreach Award.

As a recording artist, David has recorded with renowned brass players Joe Alessi, Sam Pilafian, Marshall Gilkes, and J.D. Shaw. He has recorded with composer, Eve Beglarian, and the chamber ensemble, Kisatchie Sound. David’s playing is featured in the sound track of the documentary film, Sacred as Folk. His playing and color guard choreography is featured in the multimedia production of LIGHTEN UP.Â

Christina Giannelli is a Houston-based lighting designer. Her work in Opera and Ballet lighting design has taken her around the world and gained her national recognition.Â She has been the Resident Lighting Designer for Houston Grand Opera, Cleveland-San Jose Ballet, Texas Ballet Theater, Houston Ballet and most recently for the Metropolitan Opera. Firmly committed to furthering the growth and development of the Arts in Houston, Ms. Giannelli has served on the Boards of Zocalo Artists Yard, Infernal Bridegroom Productions, the DiverseWorks Artists Board and is the founder and president of Dance Source Houston, a service organization that supports and promotes Contemporary Dance.Â She is also the co-proprietor of a guest house for visiting artists and innovators located in EaDo.

Island of the Sirens

The Island of the Sirens (2011) is a piece about defective transcription and the failures of translation.

I started with a recording of a warning siren I heard in Plaquemine, Louisiana, while I was traveling down the Mississippi River in the autumn of 2009. I sliced the warning siren into eight layers of partials and then asked the computer to transcribe those eight recordings into musical notation. Because the computerâ€™s transcription algorithm was confused by the sounds, the resulting scores were quite strange. I recorded eight women singing these transcriptions, and mixed them in quasi-unison against the eight layers of electronically transformed siren. I then made three separate submixes of the electronics, which are fed into three sets of headphones for the backup performers, who can be instrumentalists or singers. The backup chorus is asked to perform in real time what they are hearing in their headphones, a task at which they will invariably fail to fulfill entirely successfully, creating yet more quasi-unison layers that deviate from the actual sound of the transformed siren.

The lead vocal, a setting of Rilkeâ€™s poem about the impossibility of describing an experience to those who havenâ€™t shared it, is the only notated music in the piece. It also incorporates elements I heard in the siren recording, filtered through my own biases and limitations.

When his hosts would ask him late in the evening
to tell of his voyages and the perils they brought,
the words came easily enough,
but he never knew

just how to convey the fear and with what startling
language to let them perceive, as he had,
that distant island turn to gold
across the blue and sudden stillness of the sea.

The sight of it announces a menace
different from the storm and fury
which had always signaled danger.
Silently it casts its spell upon the sailors.

They know that on that golden island
there is sometimes a singing–
and they lean on their oars, like blind men,
as though imprisoned

by the stillness. That quiet contains
all that is. It enters the ear
as if it were the other side
of the singing that no one resists.

Rainer Maria Rilke, from New Poems
Joanna Macy, Anita Barrow, translators

The Island of the Sirens was written for the New York ensemble loadbang, and is dedicated to the band with vast affection. The piece is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can hear the Ekmeles Vocal Ensemble‘s live performance on December 10th in A Book of Days. loadbang’sÂ premiere studio recording of the piece is available here.

In order to perform The Island of the Sirens, you need a lead singer who sings this score, along with three instrumentalists or singers, who listen to individual headphone tracks and imitate what theyâ€™re hearing as well as they can. The piece is set up already in Ableton Live, and after you click the donation button below, Iâ€™ll send you all the materials you need to perform the piece using Ableton or the DAW of your choice.

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 Mattâ€™s trombone version by visiting 23 November.

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. Itâ€™s possible you will want to be thinking of â€œtapsâ€ as you play, but you definitely wonâ€™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.

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:

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 onÂ 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 lateÂ twenties.

The weather of myÂ piece is Chromatic Lydian, which was considered by Plato to be too sensual and lax to be suitable for the education of guardians.Â 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 WeatherÂ is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. You can listen to David Steele’sÂ bass clarinet version by visiting 27 October.

Getting to Know the WeatherÂ 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 Brownâ€™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 instrumentalÂ sound, thatâ€™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 donâ€™t play it too fast: itâ€™s sexier slower.

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

Machaut a Go-go

Machaut a Go-go adapts both the music and the lyrics of Machaut’s virelais â€œMoult sui de bonne heure neeâ€ 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.

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!

Pump Music

Pump MusicÂ is inspired by a series of hand pumps I encountered in campsites while traveling down the Mississippi River in 2009. I recorded this pump at a campsite called Wanagan’s Landing, which was the place we stayed after the very first day of paddling, on 1 August 2009. It’s maybe ten miles down from the headwaters of the Mississippi River, in northern Minnesota.

I was struck not only by the raucous noise of the pump, but also by the unearthly melody of the afterglow as the water recedes back into the earth when you stop pumping. The melody is not a simple overtone series as you might expect, but some curious phenomenon emerging from the length and diameter of the pipe that I don’t have enough physics to understand.

Pump MusicÂ was commissioned for the Guidonian Hand and Mary RowellÂ by Meet the Composer/Commissioning Music USA, and is dedicated to them with vast affection.

Pump Music is part of my ongoing project, A Book of Days. To hear the premiere performance (at Roulette on 1 June 2012), please visit August 1st.

HereÂ is a score of the complete piece in pdf format.

After you click the donation button below, you’ll get all the necessary materials to perform the piece.

You can also readÂ this blog postÂ about 1 August 2009 ofÂ The River Project.

Osculati Fourniture

The title Osculati Fourniture comes from a mysterious query in a journal entry written by my mother, Joyce Heeney Beglarian, on 22 May 1981, while en route to Florence from Pisa. I cannot know why these two words came into her mind while riding along the autostrada, or what connection the phrase might have with shutters or Lucca, but it seems likely that the whole business has some obscure significance.

The music is a response to the gusheÂ Zirkesh-e Salmak in the dastgah of Shur,Â part of the repertoire of Persian classical music. Its relation to all this is perhaps osculate in some sense.

Osculati Fourniture is January 24th in my ongoing project A Book of Days. You can hear my performance of the piece by going to that day. In addition, there is a cool video of a performance featuring Kevork Mourad’s live drawings. The piece is dedicated with love to Yvan Greenberg, who I imagine might enjoy this little cabinet of oddities.

[and by the way, my shutter photo was taken in Pescia, not Lucca — but you get the idea…]

Here are some performing scores:

score in C (pdf)
alto flute transposition (pdf)

When you click the paypal button below, we will send you the pre-recorded tracks needed to perform the piece. We can also supply you with a performing score in any transposition or clef you’d like.