What’s Christmas without frankincense? I wrote this for Meg Reichardt’s annual Holiday Recording Party, and recorded it with Brian Dewan at the controls. It marks my debut on the bass recorder. Here’s the first page, and you can listen to it here.

For the first issue of Typo, a stereoscopic word ladder.

The apparently tireless Norman Conquest (aka Derek Pell) has started a new magazine. It’s called TYPO, which he describes as a “Journal of Lettrism, Surrealist Semantics, and Constrained Design.” He and Farewell Debut are the editors, and I’m on the masthead for “Special Collections.” I contributed a stereoscopic word ladder, as well as brief articles on Masonic cipher rituals, mnemonic alphabets, and monograms from the Italian Renaissance. You’ll also find delightful material on asemic poetry, French graffiti, summantics, Dada typography, and other topics from Marc-Alain Barbot, Tom Barrett, Michael Betancourt, Isabelle B.L, Restif de la Bretonne, Mamie Caton, Caroline Crépiat, Art Dandy, Ange Degheest, Jean-Pierre Duffour, Luc Fierens, Jack Granath, Isidore Isou, Amy Kurman, Claude Nicolas Ledoux, Giambattista Palatino, Raymond Queneau, Reese Saxment, Karen Shaw, Corinne Taunay, John J. Trause, Tristan Tzara, Cal Wenby, and Femke van der Wijk.

And you can find it on Amazon!

There’s an interview with Derek Pell here, and a review here.

This is the centennial of the death of Marcel Proust (November 18, 1922). Here, then, is my version of In Search of Lost Time, from Shorten the Classics. It saves Marcel a lot of work.

Here’s a list of my music for various ensembles, in ascending number of instruments. There’s no point in giving dates, since I’ve often reworked them:

ZERO

Eleven Silent Études

ONE

FLUTE
Wall Piece

PSALTERY
Oh

ZITHER (MICROTONAL)
Melody in A
Interlude in C
Study in wet tuning (diatonic)
Study in wet tuning (chromatic)

TWO

SLIDE WHISTLE AND TROMBONE
Duet for Slide Whistle and Trombone

GARKLEIN RECORDER AND TUBA
Duet for Garklein Recorder and Tuba

Bb TIN WHISTLE AND PERCUSSION
Hiatus

TWO VIOLINS
Six Violin Duets

VIOLIN AND ‘CELLO (OR KEYBOARD)
A Slot Machine for Wooden Nickels (7 pieces)

TENOR RECORDER AND VIOLA (OR KEYBOARD)
Maybe Those Hornets Would Like These Posies (11 pieces)

SHOFAR AND VIOLA
Shofar Bells

TWO MONOCHORDS
Music for Two Monochords: Primes
Music for Two Monochords: Sixes and Sevens
Music for Two Monochords: Elevens
Music for Two Monochords: Sophie Germain and Safe Primes

TUBA AND PIANO
Cinderella’s Glass Eye
When Life Gives You Lemons, You Save a Dollar

BASS RECORDER AND PIANO
Casting Pearls Before Oysters

VIOLIN AND PIANO
Salvo

GLOCKENSPIEL (OR VIBRAPHONE) AND PIANO
Gegenschein

VIOLA AND KEYBOARD
A Grim Reckoning
Doze
Kibosh
Lullabilious
Nocebo
Onus
Parget
Qualm
Respite
Stint
Zibeline

THREE

TWO MELODY INSTRUMENTS AND KEYBOARD
Crimp

SOPRANINO RECORDER, PIANO, AND DESK BELL
Yet

FLUTE, ‘CELLO, AND PIANO
Two Moments

FOUR

FLUTE, ‘CELLO, AND PIANO 4-HANDS
Squall

FLUTE, CLARINET, BASSOON, AND OFFSTAGE VIOLIN
Trio

TREMOLOA, VIOLA, TUBA, AND GUITAR
Twilight in the Sinkhole

VIOLA, BARITONE HORN, TUBA, AND GUITAR
The Fussbudgets’ Ball

STRING QUARTET
<1: AH YOUTH. A few pieces from my teens that I thought worth saving.
1: EDDIE UNCHAINED. A suite drawn from my ventriloquial musical of that name.
2: ROUNDS. Four rounds.
3: ARETINO IN SOLRÉSOL. Five sonnets by Piero Aretino in the universal musical language Solrésol.
4: CHORALES. Fourteen brief chorales.
5: TROWIE TUNES. Harmonizations of five “trowie tunes” from the Shetland Islands.
6: PALINDROMES. Palindromic rounds, with added bass lines, descant parts, and other embellishments.
7: VIOLAS. A chorale, round, and finale for four violas.
8: THE MUSIC OF THE SPHERES. An extension of a brief realization of the music of the spheres by Athanasius Kircher.
9: VIOLAS AND CELLOS. Four movements for two violas and two cellos.
10: SONGBOOK. Arrangements of songs from The Doug Skinner Songbook.
11: IN THREE PARTS. A revision of a quartet I wrote back in 1988.
12: MOZART’S HARLEQUIN. Mozart wrote music for a Harlequinade, but only the violin part remains; I provide the rest.
13: OPEN STRINGS. Music for retuned open strings.
14: ‘CELLOS. Four movements for four cellos.
15: ON MELODY IN SPEECH. Harmonizations of 19th century transcriptions of speech.
16: PIANO PIECES. Arrangements of some of my piano pieces.
17: LOCKDOWN. Two movements written during the pandemic.
18: BARON AARON. Based on interstitial music for an album of readings.

SIX

THREE TRUMPETS AND THREE TROMBONES
Prologue

SEVEN

SIX GAME CALLS AND BUZZER
Music for Six Game Calls and Buzzer

NINE

CHAMBER ORCHESTRA (flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, 2 violins, viola, ‘cello, bass)
Grout

In this brief video, Caroline Crépiat describes her book Le Chat Noir Exposed, which I had the honor of translating last year. Watch Caroline! Read her book!

I had the honor of translating Corinne Taunay’s booklet Marcel Duchamp: Paris Air in New York, now available from Black Scat Books on Amazon.

Marcel Duchamp‘s exile in New York, in 1915-1917, brought him sudden fame and changed the course of his career. Corinne Taunay’s lively and witty study describes the scandals of Nude Descending a Staircase and Fountain, the creation of the first readymades, and the evolution of Duchamp’s artistic strategies. With 19 illustrations in black and white and in color.

Corinne Taunay is a visual artist and art historian who has contributed to many publications in Europe and the US.

Some music for psaltery and harpsichord: a diatonic melody with chromatic accompaniment.

The new expanded edition of Merde à la Belle Époque is now available from Black Scat Books! I’ve selected, translated, annotated, and introduced scatological songs, stories, poems, and playlets from some of the most inventive and eccentric writers of the golden age of Parisian Bohemia: Alphonse Allais, George Auriol, Georges Courteline, Charles Cros, J. Eschbach, André Gill, Edmond Haraucourt, Vincent Hyspa, Alfred Jarry, Jules Jouy, Maurice Mac-Nab, Armand Masson, Arthur Rimbaud, Rodolphe Salis, Erik Satie, and Henry Somm. Included is a complete translation of Jouy’s relentlessly pottymouth paper Le Journal des Merdeux, which was quickly seized by the police.

This collection was first published as a chapbook in 2014, and now has more stuff in it. It’s designed by Norman Conquest, and is available on Amazon.