A Brief History Of Electronic Music: Keith Fullerton Whitman In Concert

Quite in contrast with the last piece shared, this is a little live improv from "electronic musician/composer" Keith Fullerton Whitman as shared by NPR Music. I personally think it is very hip and interesting, but I am curious as to what others of you think about this kind of thing. So let the conversation begin!

Live recording of Keith Fullerton Whitman at the High Zero Festival

And here are some other performances from the High Zero Festival, but I havent had a chance to listen to any others yet.

Enjoy!

The Legend of Zelda: Symphonic Poem

I know there are a few individuals other than myself in our class who are slightly obsessed with Zelda and its music, so I thought I'd share this fascinating creation: The Legend of Zelda in Symphonic Poem form!

I haven't had much time to look too deeply into it yet, but I've listened to snippets from most of the movements and have gleaned that, in the very least, it is quite a progressive arrangement (courtesy of Jonne Valtonen). There are some interesting comments at the bottom of this page, which also contains Youtube videos of the 5 movements performed live by Symphonic Legends in Germany.

Here's the first movement:



They even have a full choir! The fourth movement begins with a very lovely vocal solo (some of you may recognize the Light Spirit's Theme from Twilight Princess).



Just from what I've listened to, this arrangement seems to contain numerous juxtapositions and settings of themes, which actually seems to be a contributing factor to some of the commentators' opinions of disfavor - I, however, think it's an interesting and perhaps necessary approach to arranging a work that's already been done so many times. Regardless, I believe that it's important to bring a genre like video game music into the concert hall, through any compositional means!

Hopefully this will serve as some interesting listening even for those of you who are not specifically Zelda fans!

Claude Vivier

For the solo piece I am currently working on, I decided to choose an instrument that I have always thought was quite beautiful but never really learned much about: the cello. I've always thought the cello was one of the orchestra greatest instruments.
As part of my research, Dr. Suter recommended to me the work of Claude Vivier(1948-1983). Vivier was a Canadian composer born to unknown parents in Montreal. Before pursuing his interest in music, he was on path to a career in the priesthood, attending boarding schools from the age of thirteen to the age of eighteen when he was asked to leave. Then he began his studies in music and within a few years had already gained a reputation. Vivier began to be inspired by different music he discovered in his travels to Europe and Japan. In 1983, he was stabbed to death in Paris before finishing his final work, Glaubst du an die Unsterblichkeit der Seele.
As I am researching works performed on the cello, I found Vivier's Piece Pour Violoncelle et Piano. What I found very useful about this piece was his ability to make use of the cello's full range. Not only does he use its wonderful lower register we're all familiar with, but he uses a lot of harmonics as well that I had not heard before on the instrument. I was not aware of just how dynamic an instrument the cello really is. Although I'm not sure I will want to use the harmonics in the piece I'm currently working on as they can sound a bit whiny and unsettling, it got me thinking about the possibility of exploring the stranger side of the instrument as well as the beautiful. And I'm not just talking about the cello but other instruments I'll work with in the future as well. It just opened up my eyes a bit that there is probably a great deal I don't know about the range of unexpected sounds that may be produced with certain instruments we're all familiar with.
Unfortunately, I was unable to find a YouTube performance of the piece.

Neo-Baroque/Neo-Classical

I'm currently in the midst of writing a neo-baroqueish piece for flute and found this guitar player/composer to be particularly helpful to my process. Yngwie Malmsteen is a household name amongst guitar players but his musicianship goes far beyond the world of popular music. Check out some videos of him playing with the Japanese Philharmonic. Mind you, he composed and scored everything.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtP1B_U-ia8&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXsSXeaGQxw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omjHXGhEa50&feature=related

The Music of George Crumb

_{Fig. 1: George Crumb!}

One of my favorite composers, whose music I can turn to time and time again for inspiration and listening pleasure, is George Crumb. Crumb (b. 1929) is an American composer often labeled as avant-garde, a genre essentially devoted to pushing boundaries and expanding what is traditionally even thought of as “music.” Unless you are a devout lover of the avant-garde, however, I sometimes fear that this label carries a certain stigma about it, namely that creations of the avant-garde may be too difficult to understand by the average listener, or worse yet, that they are not even worth the time it would take to try to understand them.

I don’t deny that avant-garde music can be shocking, but certainly it is worth far more than an immediate rejection by those who find that it irredeemably tests their personal definition of “music.” The first work of Crumb’s that I ever heard was Black Angels (1970) for electric (or amplified) string quartet, and my first reaction to the slicing wails fleeing from my computer speakers was also one of shock. Seeing the score later definitely opened my eyes; Crumb is one of those composers whose scores will revolutionize your perspective of each work. Most of his scores are beautifully handcrafted and explore a phenomenal range of extended techniques or external effects independent of the instrumentation (such as vocalizations by non-vocal performers). Without looking at the score of Black Angels or reading the program notes, it’s highly doubtful that a listener could detect, for example, the numerology woven into the construction of the piece through Crumb’s emphasis of the numbers 7 and 13. Seeing this particular score also increased my appreciation of the numerous extended techniques demanded of the quartet. Here is Part I: Departure of this work.


_{Fig. 2: George Crumb, Black Angels, Part I: Departure}

If you listen closely after the 4’30” mark, you’ll be able to hear several quotes of Dies Irae (which are also helpfully identified in the score).

This brings me to another point that became clear to me as I analyzed more of Crumb’s work: in addition to his extended or unusual techniques, he also uses less radical methods such as traditional forms and musical quotations. In Black Angels, for example, Pavana Lachrymae section references the traditional pavane, a slow, processional dance; and as I mentioned before, Dies Irae is also later quoted.

For these reasons alone I find it difficult to pigeonhole Crumb as solely avant-garde. His compositional style may be better described as a synthesis of tradition and innovation.

Above all, what appeals to me is the organic nature of his music. Crumb is very much concerned with the “sound spaces” in which compositions grow, and often this is assisted by his unique and exotic instrumentations and prevalent use of extended techniques. This is likely the most significant reason that his music is such a great inspiration to me (this, and his remarkable ability of text expression and depiction, in his lyric settings). One of my favorite moments in Ancient Voices of Children is in the fourth movement, in the beginning of which he creates a beautiful texture over a low marimba drone with a gentle melody for the soprano and an interesting timbral exchange between a harmonica and a vocal effect from the percussionists. (Sorry, I can’t find a Youtube sample of this, but a recording should be available on Naxos.)

Processional (the piece on our midterm listening!) is the first piano piece by Crumb I’ve heard that does not delve into inside-piano techniques. It is essentially structured as A B A’ B’: the first section contains a constant rhythmic pulse and motivic groups that emerge over this texture, gradually growing more complex, and the second section features percussive block chords leaping through the piano’s registers and interesting echo effects created through sharp decrescendos or rapid descents or ascents. The first six notes of this work function as an underlying harmonic structure throughout the rest of the piece, although this set undergoes several modulations, and it tends to imply parts of a wholetone scale (the intervallic relationship is M2, M2, M2, m3, M2, M2, M2 and because of the m3 leap, it actually seems to capture one half of each wholetone scale, i.e. Gb, Ab, Bb, Db, Eb, F). The only extended technique that this piece utilizes is the creation of harmonics in the “B” sections by silently depressing the exact chord that is played by the other hand, except in a different register. The result is subtle, but contributes to that kind of “echo effect” that recurs throughout these sections. Here’s a sample from the score where this technique occurs (also demonstrating Crumb’s pristine hand notation):

_{Fig. 3: George Crumb’s Processional; page 3, end of system 2}

Overall, Processional successfully explores the colors of the piano through sections of contrasting articulation and harmonic palettes.

I could rave on and on about George Crumb, but I’ll refrain for now. If you are interested in taking a look at his other works, I highly recommend Quest and Unto the Hills, for starters. I also own the score to Ancient Voices of Children if you would like to see an example in person of his beautiful craftsmanship. Happy listening!

Inter-Library Loan

As you begin looking for scores to study, you will undoubtedly notice Redlands has a pathetically small music library. But have no fear! Inter-Library Loan is here.

Basically, Inter-Library Loan (or ILL for short) is a system where we can check out books from other libraries around the country through our own library. This is extremely helpful for specialty items (like scores), hard-to-finds, and out-of-prints. Between all of the collegiate libraries that participate, you are almost guaranteed to find what you are looking for if it was ever published. The down side is, it can sometimes take weeks, even months to receive your items. I know I have outstanding requests from over a year ago that are still not filled, but that is rare.

First you need to find your score at one of these other libraries. What you need to do is go to http://www.redlands.edu/library.asp, and select Databases by Title. Then select the letter W, and find the database called WorldCat. There are a few other ways to find ILL stuff, but this is the only one I have ever used and it works well. Click on FirstSearch, to the right of the word "WorldCat"; this will take you to a log-in page where you input your Redlands information. Now you will see the WorldCat search page. This will look and function just like a normal library search system. Once you have a list of your findings, select the score (or recording, or book or whatever you are looking for) that you are interested in. Now, this is the most important step. Once you click on the item, you will see a page with a bunch of useless information like publisher, date, language, etc. However, there is one very un-useless piece of informat on this page which will make it possible for your item to be located. This is theAccession Number, and starts with the letters OCLC. Copy "OCLC" and the fowling numbers.

Once you have done that, go back to the Redlands Library homepage and select Interlibrary Loan. Now select the appropriate link for your media type (if score, select musical score...obviously). Fill in all of the asterisked information on the form. Most Importantly, paste your OCLC number in some line that you are not filling out, like publisher, edition, volume, or date. Now click submit, and you're done!

Redlands is currently working with a beta version of Illiad, which is much easier to use and keep track of. The process is much the same, you still need to look up your the piece on your own and paste the OCLC number. I have not used Illiad yet, so I can not attest to its effectiveness, but I assume either way will get the job done.

Now go find some scores! and please feel free to ask me any questions about ILL...I use it a lot!

What in the world is an Eigenharp?

The Eigenharp is an electronic musical instrument that is part percussive in nature, part wind in nature. Best of my knowledge it is essentially a MIDI controller, where you load sounds into the instrument via a computer, then play whatever sound your heart desires. Basically its a magical bassoon-guitar-synthesizer-drum machine machine.

The following information is stolen from Wikipedia:

The distinctive characteristics of all of the instruments are:

• A matrix of velocity sensitive multi-expressive keys, each of which act like a 4-way analog joystick. This allows the simultaneous pitch bend and modulation (or other parameters) of each played note individually.
• A stick-like vertical form factor akin to a sitar for the larger models or a flute in the smaller ones.
• A built-in wind controller, giving the larger versions of the instrument an appearance similar to a bassoon.
• One or two ribbon controller strips
• Macintosh-based control software, with an early Windows version now available.

Additionally, the larger models have:

• A series of percussion keys
• A built-in step sequencer with indicator LEDs for each key.

Models:

Alpha

1 breath pipe, 120 key matrix, 12 percussion keys, 2 ribbon controller strips on the sides, a microphone input and a headphone output

Tau

1 breath pipe, 72 key matrix, 12 percussion keys, 1 ribbon controller strip on the back and a headphone output

Pico

1 breath pipe, 18 key matrix and 1 ribbon controller strip on the front

and none of that will make sense without watching the following video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcVqJh0qEMc

(I'm not tech-savy enough for that to be a link, so copy and paste)

cheers,

-Scott

Better Composer, Inc.

Sooooooo.... lets talk about one of those thing that no one wants to talk about. No, I'm not talking about that rash on your leg; I'm talking about what you can do to better yourself as a composer.

For myself personally, one thing in particular I would like to improve upon is my palate of instrumental tonal colors. By that I mean upon starting a piece, I usually start out at the piano (not that I am a fantastic piano player, buy its guitar or piano for me, and I feel more "at home" at the piano); assuming I haven't yet chosen what I'm writing for, I plunk around with a general feel (this pattern, this mood, this register etc.) until something sticks. I would like to go from that to thinking, "that would sound good on a flute" or "that would sound horrible if played in this register of the clarinet so lets move if down an octave".

Having not played in a wind ensemble for quite some time (i.e. since grade school) I sometimes feel that has helped me because I have no bad habits when it comes to composition, but I don't really have good ones, either.

What are your goals for improvement?

Using form

"You recently mentioned how knowing more about form has influenced your work; discuss this, and any changes in thinking or process that knowing and thinking more about formal outlay have engendered in your own work."

I recently passed form and analysis for the first time after my third attempt. The biggest revelation was that repetition is necessary for a piece to be coherent.

All my previous pieces were completely disoriented because they would contain multitudes of thematic material, only it was not organized and different every time. I learned that I need to repeat "phrases" or ideas in my music. The only way to really make something important is to repeat it, this lets the listener know it's important and sets it out from the rest of the piece. To be quite honest this has made composition much easier because when I write something for a piece, I already have at least double the length because I know it will have to be in the piece again. One thing to make sure of is unless you're going for a minimalistic sound, remember to vary during repetition.

A piece that stands out

"Over the past year, you've heard a lot of new music-- be it in your own score study, concerts, or studio class. Is there a piece that stands out to you as a work that you really learned from, or took something from? Discuss such a piece and how it influenced you, your work, or your views on music."

Igor Stravinsky's Rite of Spring has definitely been the largest influence on me in the past year. This is mainly due to a paper I wrote on the piece for my music history class. It showed me how to write outside the time signature. I still put everything in a somewhat normal time signature be it 4/4 or 5/8 but I do not bind the music to measured phrases based on the time signature. The time signature is only there for rehearsal purposes, but in no way should be obviously apparent through listening. It has been very freeing.

This also ended up applying to the tonality of my pieces in an almost opposite way. I no longer write in a key signature because of the implication. If it happens to fall into a key for a short amount of time then I'm fine with it, but I don't bother to put up a key signature because soon enough I will throw in something different.