composer's notebook
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Friday, July 15, 2005
In Print
Among the clatter of pre-approved credit and all other assorted tree-killers in yesterday's mail was my very first issue of Sounding Board, the American Composers Forum newsletter. There on the front page was an article about a composer's first meanderings in the world of wind music, with my name on the byline. Needless to say, I wasn't exactly expecting that. The freakiness continued in that sounding board is actually quite a beautiful little publication. Nice paper, lovely design, well laid out .... there's even a cool graphic attached to the article—an artsy shot of a man's ear and closed eye, the man obviously caught in the throes of ecstatic listening, and a (french) horn, floating Magritte-style in space to his right. Nice.
To be completely honest, this wasn't a surprise, exactly. A few months ago the ACF contacted me about re-printing an article I wrote for the National Band Association, an enormous collection of wind directors, of which I am a fan ... a collection of extremely dedicated people, but alas, an organization saddled with an acronym more recognizable as something completely different. David Gregory, then president of the NBA (no, not that one, the band one) at the time I won their Merrill Jones Composition Award, had asked me to write something about Me, and the winning piece itself, for their member journal, and I was happy to oblige. How exactly the ACF came across the article to begin with is still a mystery, actually, and I prefer to keep it that way. Makes me seem ubiquitous and unavoidable in people's lives. Yes, let's say that.
After contacting the NBA powers-that-be (right, again, not Kobe Bryant) to make sure it was kosher, John Michel, Sounding Board's editor, went ahead and very kindly offered me an ACF membership (and thus, a SB subscription) as compensation of sorts—something I've been meaning to do anyway ever since it was called the Minnesota Composers Forum. The Northern-Midwest has not completely the ACF zeitgeist, however ... it's the only organization I can think of for whom browsing through their publications for available opportunities, grants, and fellowships makes me wish I lived in St. Paul.
Sunday, July 10, 2005
Aphex with horsehair
My Cantaloupe Music e-newsletter recently arrived with the news that they released the "ACOUSTICA: Alarm Will Sound Performs Aphex Twin" CD, mentioned elsewhere in these pages, for which I contributed arrangements of AT's "Fingerbib" and "Logon Rock Witch", and had a blast doing it.
An effusive snippet from the Cantaloupe newsletter:
Here at Bang on a Can and Cantaloupe Music, we love adventurous, risk-taking music no matter what bin it comes in at your local mega-record-store. That why we're especially excited about the latest Cantaloupe release - Acoustica: Alarm Will Sound performs Aphex Twin. This young 20-piece new music band, who the NY Times calls "the future of classical music," has, with a cadre of 10 arrangers, painstakingly recreated and rethought Aphex Twin's legendary electronic work for an all-acoustic band. From creative new transcription ideas to using non-standard "classical music" instruments to ensuring that all four drummers are kept busy with Aphex Twin's boundlessly intricate beats, this sounds like no CD you've heard before. Whet your palette with a FREE DOWNLOAD of one of the CD's tracks. Hear clips of the whole CD and buy it here.Here's where I wonder aloud whether passing along that link for the free download will get me into any trouble, as it is supposedly for newsletter subscribers only. Seeing how anyone can easily join that mailing list, I'm hoping the commandos will not be dropping down from their stealth bombers anytime soon.
The newsletter goes on to give details about July 24 at this summer's Lincoln Center Festival, when AWS will perform everything on the CD, live, at The Allen Room, the very beautiful space at the new Jazz at Lincoln Center facilities, harbored in what is otherwise considered by like-minded souls as the offensively-gargantuan and monolithic Time Warner Building. Nevertheless, the Allen Room is a terrific space—featuring an enormous wall of windows behind the performance area, overlooking Columbus Circle and the SW corner of Central Park. I was last there for SB's quartet + electronics piece, Veo Lux, and Steve's got pics up, for proof of hipness.
My vote for The Time Warner Building's only other impressive feature would be the Whole Foods in the basement. Oh! those never-ending bins of trail mix...