Archive for March, 2008

Flying Burrito Bros: Christine’s Tune

Wednesday, March 19th, 2008

What a find! An historically interesting lipsync performance of “Christine’s Tune” by Gram Parsons and Chris Hillman on the Flying Burrito Brothers first album. Gram is very silly (or drunk) in this video and Chris is having a great time. We see the infamous Sneaky Pete Kleinow on steel guitar, as well as Chris Ethridge […]

Ties

Wednesday, March 19th, 2008

.
I have a long affection for ties even though I don’t wear them any longer. During high school and college, I hitch hiked a lot. My standard garb was jeans, a sport coat, and a tie loose around my neck. When I first got the job at UCLA in 1983 I wore ties. My students […]

Handel: Every Valley Shall Be Exalted (and then some)

Tuesday, March 18th, 2008

Juliana Gondek made me bring this to your attention. She wants you to look at the comments on the YouTube original if you like the arrangment.

Musical? or Opera? Operical!

Tuesday, March 18th, 2008

I discussed the three options for musical drama these days a few weeks back, trying to decide what HOMER is — a musical, an opera, or a musical drama. The script calls it a musical drama, but when I asked Mel what he called it at our reading last week, “it’s a musical” — I […]

Two thirds through the school year

Monday, March 17th, 2008

For those of us working in academia, as those of you not may remember, our years are divided up by the academic terms. At UCLA we are on the quarter system where we have three 10-week terms per year (wait, shouldn’t that be a tri-mester?), and the second quarter is about over. This week is […]

60s Youngsters who think they are wise

Sunday, March 16th, 2008

Here is a video of Stephen Stills on the Dick Cavett Show. Wow! What a circle of stars. Sitting next to him are Joni Mitchell and David Crosby, and I saw Grace Slick, Jorma Kaukonen and Marty Balin (?) from the Jefferson Airplane.
In my life as a folk singer I loved to sing this […]

Homer preview: Someday Soon

Saturday, March 15th, 2008

.

“Someday Soon” (first draft of accompaniment)
Music by Roger Bourland
Words by Mel Shapiro
from “Homer in Cyberspace
It is customary, at least on older operas, to have a passacaglia or ground bass at some point. OK, my piece is kind of opera kind of musical, but I couldn’t resist having one in HOMER. So here it […]

I like short concerts

Friday, March 14th, 2008

Last night Mark and I went to hear the UCLA Philharmonia perform. The first half was Webern’s 6 Pieces for Orchestra followed by the Mahler “Songs of a Wayfarer.” The second half was the Beethoven Eroica. I was thrilled Mark agreed to my usual plan of staying for half the concert. I know the eroica […]

Music as a weapon

Thursday, March 13th, 2008

I remember living in slums (now expensive condos) in Boston while going to the New England Conservatory. My apartment building shared an alley with drug dealers and prostitutes, so we heard a LOT of noise in those days. The second day I lived there the abandoned place across the street where many of those people […]

Having a retreat

Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

From time to time organizations decide to have a “retreat” where members of the company or department get out of their usual surroundings and get out of town. Once out of town, and with usually long hours of discussion ahead of them, participants are able to open up and talk extensively with each other, brainstorm, […]

Stravinsky returns

Tuesday, March 11th, 2008

[I am sitting quietly doing my morning Sudoku puzzle, drinking coffee. It’s 5:30 in the morning. I look up and smell the air: tobacco? patchoulli? old scotch? And an ovoid figure hovers into the room and slowly comes into focus. It is Igor Stravinsky, with sun glasses in a kind of safari outfit with sunglasses, […]

Hearing music in progress

Monday, March 10th, 2008

One of the greatest tragedies for a composer is to not hear their music performed live. Charles Ives could have been even more formidable had he heard more of his music, especially the music he took chances with. In college, the biggest hole in my education was brass ensemble. I had written a wild five […]