August 31, 2018
Visiting artist=enrichment w/o commitment, for both visitor and visited. ‘Just visiting.’
August 29, 2018
What used to feel like hard technical work sometimes feels like nothing by now. Does this mean I’m better at the task at hand, or do I need to re-start by aiming for something I know for sure I can’t do—or can’t do without considerable re-questioning of what seem like fundamental fluencies? Can we scan the keys or gauge the breath or re-balance the bow arm to find entirely unheard-of precedents?
…After many years, still trying to find a viewpoint that renews, even if only for a few beguiling musical seconds…
Let it fall apart; don’t put it back together—at least not the same way.
Weak, tired; ‘breathe’ through wrists.
How does a composer capture states of ‘vulnerability,’ ‘fear,’ ‘shutdown,’ among others, when performing arts teaching promotes what could be described as ‘power’ or ‘strength’? Is the composer’s ‘strength’ a contradiction, then? Is the expressive ‘power’ available through the practice of writing music tantamount to the ability to express ‘weakness’ along with a a full gamut of possible evocations of perceived emotional states? The next question: what technical preparation and set of tools is needed in order to achieve this flexibility?
August 23, 2018
Write what you want and must…but make sure you ‘teach to the test.’ (sardonic)
August 23-30, 2018
Quartets, Set 3:
Hit bottom, hit wood. (August 30, 2018; for the pianist)
Small adjustments; new universes. (August 29, 2018)
Analog composer; digital performer. (August 23, 2018, on the composer/pianist)
August 22, 2018
NEVER underestimate the intelligence of an audience. By the same token, ALWAYS attend to how you say what you say musically. Don’t expect understanding if you garble your words. Communicate, converse.
August 21, 2018
Don’t fear your own ideas. Accept or embrace them enough to figure out their maximal effectiveness. ‘What’ matters, but ‘how’ matters more.
August 19-20, 2018
Quartets, Set 2:
Under rocks: possible ideas. (August 20, 2018)
Difficult issues; careful solutions. (August 20, 2018)
Rejuvenate each musical moment. (August 19, 2018)
Don’t overlook musicians’ needs. (August 19, 2018)
Hand-weight; chords activate. (August 19, 2018)
To juxtapose: to develop. (August 19, 2018)
August 16, 2018
Be a schlock absorber. Internalize any material that works; do your thing with it.
August 12, 2018
Program notes and maxims/aphorisms have a common goal: the quick capture of fundamentally musical, non-verbal observations in a few well-chosen words. Tough to achieve.
August 11, 2018
Save or write down all your ideas. Plant seeds. Weed later.
August 8, 2018
In an earnest search for meaning, does your music really signify much? Isn’t it just sound, sense, sensation? Otherwise unattached?
August 7, 2018
Composers humanize and catalyze simply by doing what they do. Abstract or concrete—in the sky or down to earth—composing music is inherently peaceful unless or until the sounds are misapplied. Consider your work as a composer a particular type of activism: you are hearing humanity, documenting experience by shaping sound. (with a bow to TJ Anderson Jr on his 90th birthday)
I’ve stopped composing—for a few minutes.
August 7-8, 2018
Quartets, Set 1:
Inhale/collect; exhale/unleash. (August 8, 2018)
Humanize: write music, perform. (August 8, 2018)
Keyboard, mind, ears, two hands. (August 7, 2018)
Meditate rather than medicate. (August 7, 2018)
August 6, 2018
That new work of yours is a little like a new human being. You feed it, care for it, put it to sleep, then it wakes up and you have to feed it again. After repeated feedings in the form of tweaking, sleeping, re-thinking, perhaps it can finally rest.