“Puerto Vallarta Alley” by Roger Bourland
When I applied for my sabbatical from the UCLA Department of Music, my employer, I had originally planned on starting an opera about a famous Mexican opera star who had an amazingly tragic life. A book on Rufus Wainwright shoved its way to the front burner and sits half-done on my computer. I have been releasing chunks of it on this blog. As both of these were my own projects and not commissions, they were displaced once several commissions came in.
- Commission for three chamber operas from the Thornton Wilder estate.
- Set of pieces for women’s chorus on the poet Francisco X Alarcón: “Alarcon Madrigals, Book 3” for Vox Femina, a women’s chorus in Los Angeles directed by Dr. Iris Levine.
- Music for the film “Cages“; I had originally scored half of the film, the other half being pre-existing songs to be licensed for use in the film. These songs have now been dropped in favor of an all-Bourland score.
Shoved to the back burner are the following projects:
- The Music of Rufus Wainwright (book) — sorry gang, my music comes first. I will salt away at this book and finish it before too very long.
- My opera “Duarte’s Wive’s”; a great story, I just have to figure out how to not compose a 19th century opera. The story is so embedded in the 19th century, that to take it out of that era makes it lose its identity. Stay tuned.
- 12 Songs for voice and piano; portraits of people who have been in my life. I have just about finished “harvesting” songs from old abandoned works, turning them into voice and piano works. Next I want to write an entirely new set of songs for voice and piano. I am entertaining writing the words myself, as these lyrics will be about people I have known who have taught me things, or made a strong impression on my — good or bad. It’s this ‘talking about people’ that Joni Mitchell used to do so brilliantly that I want to explore as a songwriter.
There are several other big seeds germinating that I won’t mention until they become real. Until then, I have more than enough to keep me busy.
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