Entries from July 2011
Index Cards (2)
July 9th, 2011 · 1 Comment
Tags: *Index Cards
Viola
July 9th, 2011 · Comments Off on Viola
A love song to the viola, lamenting that the poor instrument is usually relegated to offbeats, set to viola offbeats. The viola does play a solo at the end, though.
Prelude
July 9th, 2011 · Comments Off on Prelude
This bustling prelude is taken from the music I wrote for Bill Irwin’s show The Courtroom, back in 1985. And it starts out like this.
Hapax Legomenon
July 9th, 2011 · 1 Comment
I am intrigued by the hapax legomenon, a word that appears only once in a given work, author, or language. For a musical equivalent, I placed one F♯ against randomized 4-pitch diatonic arpeggios in C.
Index Cards (1)
July 8th, 2011 · Comments Off on Index Cards (1)
For many years, I’ve made pictures and collages on index cards. They were never meant to be shown; they’re a combination of sketchbook, waste of time, and insomnia therapy. They’re also a quick way to combine images and see what happens. However, I have projected some of them on “Carousel,” and on those occasions when […]
Tags: *Index Cards
The Song of the Hoop Snake
July 8th, 2011 · Comments Off on The Song of the Hoop Snake
A three-part palindromic round, modeled on everyone’s favorite mythical reptile, the hoop snake.
Eight Riddles
July 8th, 2011 · Comments Off on Eight Riddles
I had forgotten about these, and rediscovered them while going through some old papers. Eight riddles are set diatonically, traveling through the circle of fifths. My notes said that I planned to double them with violin. That might be nice.
The Musical Underbelly
July 8th, 2011 · Comments Off on The Musical Underbelly
In 2007, I was an artist in residence at NYC’s venerable downtown theater Dixon Place. I put together a program of musical curiosities, based on similar shows I’d done for the INFO FortFest and the Fortean Times UnConvention. The program included music by Rameau’s Nephew, Lewis Carroll, and the Count of Saint-Germain; an odd tune […]
This Honeycomb Matrix of Atoms Known as the Material World
July 7th, 2011 · Comments Off on This Honeycomb Matrix of Atoms Known as the Material World
André Breton once said that he wasn’t interested in music, because he couldn’t imagine representing the world with sound. I do disagree; and find diatonic cluster drones as good a symbol as any. This organ piece is one example; here’s how it begins.
Boris Vian for Anglophones
July 7th, 2011 · Comments Off on Boris Vian for Anglophones
“Boris Vian for Anglophones” appeared in Strange Attractor Journal 2 (2005), edited by Mark Pilkington. Vian is one of my favorite writers, and his work is still largely unknown to English speakers. I tried in this article to give some idea of his astonishing output, including the less familiar works — such as his songs […]