Category: Creativity

Creating something every day for 365 days

Back to work, kind of

Posted on by Dale

With a clear evening for the first time in a long time, I did a little tidying up (tidying up being a time-honored Lichtenbergian tactic); changed one thing in the GHP video and exported, DVD’d, and burned three copies; had supper; and finally, finally, made myself sit down, turn off the web and email, and put some notes on paper.

I was not very successful. I returned to the opening theme of the symphony and played with that for a while. I played with some chord structures for a while. I played with a few countermotives for a while. I looked at my Fragmentary Exercises and plopped down one measure that might pass as a half-assed attempt.

I wasn’t wearing a hole in that psychic wall, I was just wearing out. So I stopped. But at least I got something on paper, whether it’s worth anything or not.

In other news, I took one of those CDs sitting in a stack on the left-hand side of my table and have been listening to it for a couple of days in the car. This one is the untitled Mercury Living Presence re-release of Howard Hanson and the Eastman-Rochester Orchestra playing some mid-century American greats.

Meh.

Sorry, none of it does anything for me. It’s all very daring for its time: Colin McPhee’s faux-gamelan Tabuh-Tabuhan: Toccata for Orchestra; Roger Sessions’ The Black Maskers, with its crashing seconds and clusters; Virgil Thomson’s Symphony on a Hymn Tune, which has passages of great lyrical beauty, which he insisted on undermining with bizarrely acerbic passages of snark.

But none of it sticks in my head, even after two days of listening. It just registers as so much fashionable claptrap from the 1930s. Into the giveaway pile it goes.

Next: John Adams’ Gnarly Buttons and John’s book of alleged dances. I remember them as being too determinedly “modern,” as if Adams was trying desperately to show the musical establishment that he could resist the siren call of tonality. We’ll see.

As savvy as the Obama team has been about the 21st century, I find it incredible that they didn’t have the John Williams piece performed at the inauguration all ready to roll out on iTunes by 12:01 pm, January 20. I know I said I wasn’t buying anything at least until June, and I haven’t, but I would break my vow in a heartbeat if it were available on iTunes.

An approving look back

Posted on by Dale

After yesterday’s epic cleaning/therapy, it was serendipitous that the first thing iTunes chose to play this morning was Am Südpol, denkt man, es ist heiß. This was the “penguin opera” I wrote back in 2004 for a competition for the opera company in Cologne, Germany.

The libretto was based on a popular German children’s book about penguins who live for opera and the annual visit of the Opera Boat. It was a totally engaging little story, with Scene 1 introducing us to Uncle Otto, his niece (who hates opera, she says), and the young boy penguin; Scene 2 with the opera company as they squabble over roles in La Traviata; Scene 3 in the opera house and the hilarious opera-gone-wrong; and Scene 4 back on the ice, with young Lottie recognizing how much she loves both opera and the boy penguin.

The big finale is all about how Musik fills our lives and is a huge gift, even at the South Pole. Since I began the opera with a Latin overture (keeping with the title’s erroneous claim that it’s hot at the South Pole), I made the finale a bumptious calypso number, ending with everyone onstage dancing in sombreros and sunglasses passed up to them by the ever-rebellious orchestra.

I say all this to say that listening to it again this morning, I was delighted with my work, the entire piece. (I didn’t win the competition, needless to say, but boy did I learn a lot.) The finale is especially engaging, and I offer it to you here: Am Sudpol finale

What’s my point? It was a boost to my self-image, another little nudge to get back to work on something, anything, because when I’m at the top of my form, I’m quite good.

(We will ignore for the time being the flipside, that I’ll never write anything that good again.)

New Year’s Day

Posted on by Dale

I have only one resolution of any import, and I’ll get to that in a moment. In the meantime, I was very unsocial last night, turning down a couple of very kind invitations and issuing none of my own. This is what I did while waiting for the New Year:

One of my Lichtenbergian goals last year, and the only one repeated for this year, is to start painting again. I say again as if my cessation were a recent event, but it has been years since I used any of my art supplies. And the last time I did “art,” rather than costume or set designs, has to be nearly 30 years ago.

So I dragged out all my stuff and got to work. I have in mind for the coming year a couple of series, and I’m thinking about just painting a plain coffee mug over and over until I have control of the media again. For last night, I decided just to play with color and brush and surface, just to get back in my fingers how the stuff works. (My medium at the moment is gouache, a kind of thick tempera, also known as designer’s colors.) I also had another agenda, but that remains secret for the moment.

It’s interesting to me how much some of the stuff looks like what I was producing in high school. This is not a good thing, of course, but maybe I can catch up with the rest of my life as I go along. It was fun to do, and I have enough art supplies to last for a lot of exploration (vide infra).

It has not escaped my notice, either, how mutually incompatible my composing and my painting are, not only in time, but also in space. Both require me to cover a sizable surface, and in my case it’s the same surface: my drafting table. Oh well, let one be a distraction for the other, I say.

I normally do not bother with New Year’s resolutions. They have always implied that you spent at least part of the past year in some kind of existentialist bad faith, from which you awaken somewhere around Christmas and, in a fit of newfound self-awareness, make decisions about how you are going to change. More bad faith, as far as I’m concerned.

Still, a couple of days ago I decided to try an experiment, which we will call a resolution. I think I was getting dressed, and I began to pay attention to my shirts. Over the holidays, I’ve worn essentially t-shirts and henleys or sweaters, so all of my shirts are clean and hanging up. There’s an enormous number of them. I have, and I’m going to allow myself enough bad faith not to go count them, over 30. I can take a dozen shirts to the cleaners and not break a sweat about having something to wear to work for a week or even two, any season of the year.

Likewise, I have enough Christmas ties to start at Thanksgiving and wear one a day until school is out without repeating myself. And that’s just a subset of my total tie collection.

Books? Just the unread ones by my bed would probably carry me through the rest of the year. Working my way around the house, I could catalog for you the surplus materiel available to me in any area of my life.

So that’s when I decided to try an experiment: how long can I go without buying anything?

I don’t need anything, as evidenced by the very short tour of possessions above. By any standard on this planet, I am comfortable beyond the imagination of most of the six billion people who live here. I certainly have spent a great deal on the labyrinth, all of it on my credit card, and I need to exercise restraint in order to pay that off in a timely manner. And I think it will probably be salutary to force myself to confront every desire that would normally have me reaching for the 1-Click button at Amazon.

Clearly, I am talking about discretionary spending here. Yes, I will continue to buy groceries and pay my bills (which I ought to be doing right now instead of philosophizing here). I will maintain the car and the house, etc., etc., etc. But books, music, software, art supplies, clothing, all those fun things that encrust my life, and quite honestly I enjoy, I won’t be buying any.

My goal is to see if I can make it to June. Stay tuned.

Musings

Posted on by Dale

I don’t have a coherent post to offer today, just random thoughts.

I’ve been having a recurring dream for the past few days. It’s annoying and I can’t figure out why I’m fixating on this particular image. It involves the Union Jack and its components somehow: I am usually trying to explain the pieces, or assemble the pieces, or explain how to assemble the pieces, or something. I’m not clear on what’s going on, and I’m thinking the dream itself is not very linear.

Sometimes a little girl is involved (hush, Jeff), sometimes a large group (hush, Jobie). The overriding feeling is one of frustration, but since I don’t have any clear (waking) idea of what I’m trying to accomplish, I’m not sure what the frustration is about. It’s entirely possible that not knowing what I’m trying to do in the dream is the frustration.

The easy symbolism is that it’s a metaphor for my composing. I know what the pieces are and have some idea of how they go together, but I don’t know enough to actually assemble them. What the little girl has to do with it, I have no idea. It’s like Faulkner’s Little Sister Death that I mentioned the other night at the Lichtenbergian Annual Meeting: in the face of some college student’s question, he claimed not even to remember the character in The Sound and the Fury. (I think I placed her in Absalom, Absalom at the meeting, but I got the character Quentin Compson right.)

As for the Lichtenbergian Annual Meeting, let’s just say that I was the essential Lichtenbergian: of the seven goals that I had listed at last year’s meeting, I had accomplished not one. The ones I can remember are picking up painting again; completing the symphony; completing the songs for A Day in the Moonlight; writing a trio for piano, trombone and saxophone; and getting some pieces done for a couple of choral competitions. There were two more, but I can’t remember even what they are.

I put off working on Moonlight to work on the symphony. That was scuttled when Czarkowski decided not to return to GHP. I didn’t have time during the summer to work on the trio, and no drive to work on the choral works, and then everything was subordinated to the labyrinth. So there you go.

All the non-Lichtenbergians in my life ask if I just rolled them all over to next year, and the answer is, of course, no. I’m pulling back in a lot of ways. Fewer goals, smaller goals, baby steps. Who knows? Perhaps the symphony will come bursting out of me in January, but I’m not planning for it.

Too much music

Posted on by Dale

There is too much music. Not mine, of course. Of that stuff, there’s not nearly enough. (The other day, a student asked me how much music I’ve written. According to iTunes, less than two hours worth. Feh.)

No, there’s too much music out there. I say this because as part of my fragmentary composition exercises, I went to iTunes to listen to the opening of Vaughan Williams’ 2nd Symphony, “London.” I don’t own it, and considered buying it, but then I got sidetracked by his 7th, “Sinfonia Antarctica,” a stark work. I bought it, along with his 8th. Then I got distracted by the fact that a movement from Philip Glass’s 4th Symphony, “Heroes,” was the top ringtone.

I knew I owned that, but it was not in my iTunes collection, and then I couldn’t find it on the shelf. So I bought it.

At this point, I think my iTunes collection is officially bigger than my old iPod. And I’m OK with that. The new iPod Classic will store 120GB of music, but the fact is I don’t have that kind of space on my hard drive. I could put it on my external drive, but then my music wouldn’t travel with me on my laptop.

But that’s not what I mean by “too much music.” There’s just too much to listen to and to learn and to know. Right now on my desk are two stacks of CDs, waiting for me to listen to them again and get to know them:

  • Michael Harrison, Revelation, a microtonal thing, I think.
  • Brian Eno, Discreet Music
  • Philip Glass, Symphony No. 8
  • Philip Glass, Symphony No. 3
  • Einojuhani Rautavaara, Angel of Dusk (concerto for double bass)/Symphony No. 2/A Finnish Myth/Fiddlers, one of my favorites of the Baltic group
  • Peter Sculthorpe, Sun Music, Australian composer
  • Michael Danna, Skys, new age, I think
  • Erik Satie, Homage to Satie, his greatest hits
  • Music for Quiet Listening, a “Mercury Living Presence” reissue, featuring music commissioned back in the late 50s/early 60s by one Edward B. Benjamin, the Edward B. Benjamin Award for Restful Music, who apparently like me didn’t truck with the newfangled crap being taught in conservatories at the time
  • another, untitled “Mercury Living Presence” reissue, featuring works by Colin McPhee, Roger Sessions, and Virgil Thomson
  • John Adams, Gnarly Buttons/John’s Book of Alleged Dances
  • Robert Baksa, Flute Sonata/Woodwind Quintet No.1/Quartet for Piano and Winds
  • Sergei Prokofiev, Piano Concerto No. 1 & 3/Bela Bartok, Piano Concerto No. 3

All of these I have listened to once, maybe twice. None have been imported into iTunes. And I just bought three new works to listen to. And I think there’s a small stack of CDs in my van that I’m supposed to be listening to.

The point is that I want to learn this music, especially the stuff that doesn’t appeal to me right away. I want to know it like I know the Beethoven symphonies, to anticipate what comes next. Sometimes that’s nearly impossible with the more atonal “modern” stuff, and sometimes I give up. But mostly I can learn almost anything. So why is there this huge stack on my desk? And why are there even more stacked over by my CD shelving?

It’s lunchtime.

Composing, 12//07/08

Posted on by Dale

I’m trying to get my brain back into “composer” mode, and to do that I’m putting myself back on a schedule, Sunday mornings and Tuesday evenings.

Further, as I listen to music in iTunes or elsewhere, I pay attention to structure, orchestration, etc., and make a note. I’m assigning these notes as “fragment exercises” for the duration. In other words, I’m not actually composing right now, I’m just using other people’s stuff as a model. In other other words, I’m copying. Think of it as a Renzuli phase II lesson. I certainly am.

My goal is simply to slap something up, to pour out the garbage and learn from hearing the stuff.

So, today’s fragment number 1 was “string arpeggios, agitato.” I think I was listening to the soundtrack for Pride & Prejudice.

(UPDATE: Each mp3 contains measures and measures of empty space at the end. Feel free to stop it and move on when the music stops. However, #3 does have one measure of silence after the first phrase. And I don’t know why #2 sounds so choppy.)

Here’s the mp3.

You will of course be alert to my dilemma this morning: this is actually pretty good. Do I keep working on it, only to bog down later, or just toss it aside and keep going? I worked a while on it, but decided to stop and move on. After all, the good work always waits.

Fragment number 2: “meandering chromatic piano line, high string accompaniment.” Again, I think this was the Pride & Prejudice soundtrack: mp3

Fragment number 3: “open fifths in strings, whole notes; countermelody in cellos/basses.” From the opening of Vaughan Williams’ Symphony #2, “London”: mp3

Fragments 2 and 3 are not as successful, but I think I got some interesting bits, like one measure or so in each. That’s all I’m after.

And so my morning ended.

So…

Posted on by Dale

The question arises, what have I been up to? I clearly have not been blogging.

Mostly that’s because I don’t have a lot to say. Actually, I might have a lot to say, but none of it is very coherent these days. Much tumbling through the brain, large galactical dust clouds, but no planets forming.

However, I can report on my latest acquisition(s).

First and foremost, I have bought a painting by Dianne Mize, my painting instructor from GHP in 1970. She and I have agreed never to mention how many years ago that was, and I’ll thank you to do the same.

Here’s the painting:

click to see Dianne’s original blog post

Dianne had sent me an invitation to the exhibit opening at the Tekakwitha Gallery in Helen, GA, but since it was November 1, the Saturday evening performance of Coriolanus at NCTC, I couldn’t go. When she sent an email saying the show had been held over until Christmas, I made plans to get there.

Ginny readily agreed to my idea of returning from Virginia via Helen so we could stop to see Dianne’s work. I had already decided that I would just pick one and charge it, so when Ginny offered to make me a Christmas present of whatever one I wanted, I accepted.

I also considered this painting:

click to see Dianne’s original blog post

It was a tough choice, obviously. I may have to have the cows later. I chose the landscape because of its subject matter. I love places like this. It reminds me of a couple of places from my life, and each of them was from a time of great happiness.

One is Snake Creek over on Parks Avenue. When I was a child, we would play there constantly, plashing in the water and running through the “woods” in that narrow strip that runs along the curve of the street. It was and is a beautiful green space.

Another is a park on the outskirts of Athens by the river. I didn’t get to go there a lot, but I remember one time, the spring of my junior year, when Kevin Reid, Cathy McQuaig, and I went for an afternoon picnic there. Kevin had become my closest friend after showing up that semester, he had dropped out of Griffin High School and just come on to UGA, and all three of us were close from working both in the costume shop and in Period Dance.

Kevin and I were a lot alike: young, precocious, serious, ferociously curious, intense readers. I know I was in love with him, and he with me, in the way young men are that verges on the physical. (Jobie, remember that piece I read out loud this summer? It was Kevin that gave my reading that passion.)

He’s dead now, of AIDS, back in the late 80s I think. I didn’t know this until last year when Ginny and I went to LA and had a reunion of a bunch of UGA theatre folk from that time. I had put together a video of all the Period Dance photos, and when we came to one of Kevin, that’s when someone told me of his death. It still hurts me, as I type this even, how I lost touch with him, and then lost him entirely.

As we sat by the river that afternoon in 1975, we knew we were enjoying a halcyon moment, and we even verbalized it. I think we knew that we would lose each other to Time, and we hugged our happiness to us even as the sun set.

That’s why I bought the landscape.

I like Dianne’s impressionistic style, her loose brushwork, and her sure sense of palette. I especially like her methods of working, and they are methods, which frustrates me when I am unable to develop similar methods for my own work in music.

However, I’m not going to whine. Let’s talk about what I am working on rather methodically, and that’s the labyrinth. I haven’t done anything since earlier in the week, of course, and now it’s raining, but I am beginning to see the endgame here.

I shall finish the curves on the pathway this week, working Tuesday and Thursday on that task. Tuesday afternoon, I order the topsoil, and with any luck will have that to play with this weekend. On Thursday, I will seek out stonecutters here in town, one of those granite countertop concerns over on the bypass, to see if they can cut the stones around the center in a more precise circular pattern. I also developed a fantasy today of checking out a four-foot piece of granite for the centerpiece. That wouldn’t be expensive at all, I’m sure.

With any kind of luck, I may have the labyrinth finished, if not this weekend, then the next. I will also be working then on coordinating the mise-en-scene of the entire backyard into something whole: columns, lighting, sculpture maybe? I don’t know. As Marc says, it seems I’m determined to become the Howard Finster of College Street.

It’s official

Posted on by Dale

I am hereby canceling the Quiet Strength meditation series. Trying to jumpstart my writing was a good idea, but merciful heavens what a truckload of treacle that book is!

Just scanning ahead to find a topic to write about this morning, again, trying to get something out of my head and onto the page, was enough to cause permanent pursing of the lips and raising of the brows.

  • People-pleasing
  • Crisis and pain in relationships: relationships are like crabs; they have to shed their shells to grow; and then they’re vulnerable… ::shivers down the spine::
  • Men as brothers: actually quotes Whitman and encourages us, as we are “trained to pursue women,” to “actively pursue friendships with men.” Come onto the raft, Huck, honey. (Yes, I know, but icky!)
  • Wordless language: I talk to the trees.
  • The True Work: SHA, anyone? How about a podcast sitcom?
  • Wounds into gifts: bang that drum, honey.
  • Zaniness: “one of the most endearing qualities of men is our zaniness”
  • Search for the sword
  • Removing my armor
  • Side-by-side intimacy
  • Body wisdom and sexuality
  • Howling

And we’ll leave it at that.

Meditation: The false self

Posted on by Dale

I’m bored in a hotel, so I’ve picked up an old draft of a post of one of those wounded warrior meditations. Sorry.

Part of my problem with my source material is that so much of it smacks too much of “such a worm as I,” albeit in a new agey way, which probably makes it even worse. Take today’s topic. Please. [/rimshot] The point seems to be that “as boys, we learned we had to find out who others wanted us to be,” and then we had to become that person. “Now,” though, we’re ready to become our “authentic” self.

Feh.

I know that a large part of growing up is figuring out what societal norms are, and we ignore those norms at our own peril. I’m sure most of my male readership, and probably the female as well, knows all too well the pain of not conforming. If I cared what my bucking those norms has cost me in my life, it would probably drive me mad. What, don’t you think, as I do, that one of the reasons NCTC never gained traction amongst the power elite in this town is because it was led by me? And I was, well, just a little bit off?

Who among us does not understand that we are many selves, that our true “self” is this amalgamation, did you know that amalgamation was synonymous with miscegenation many years ago?, of selves, and that we do not, can not show our “true self” to anyone because there’s not a single such persona to be shown?

Yes, I show different “selves” to different people. I share different things with different people. I’ve told things to Marc that I wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing with Jeff, and heaven knows Jeff and I have chatted about things in ways that would raise others’ eyebrows, and none of you knows the things I’ve told Ginny and withheld from you. And above all, there are the things that I’ve told no one, haven’t even put into private blog posts.

(Did you know there was such a thing? If you’re not the creator of a website, there could be all kinds of blogposts you never see, like little ghosts drifting between your reading, gazing knowingly out at you in your ignorance of the full measure of your host. So… back to your reading.)

So do I have a secret self? Dern tootin’. Does that make my public selves false? I cannot think how. I’m thinking that our wounded warriors have a problem with self in the first place. Grownups in the Lylesian sense don’t worry about that. (We worry about people finding our private blogposts.)