Archive for October, 2008

flu time

Sunday, October 19th, 2008

I’ve had the flu for four days now. I probably got it in the airport, or airplane coupled with not enough sleep. This time I was a good boy and stayed still at home, with only quick drives to get food. Otherwise my reality has been the achy all over no energy flu. I [...]

Loving Andy

Thursday, October 16th, 2008

I spent the weekend travelling to Andover, Massachusetts and visiting with my brother Andy (Andrew Rhodes Bourland), his wife Jeanne and her three daughters, and his three children of two marriages, two of the three wives, three dogs, and my husband. They have a fabulous home.
As we flew into Manchester, New Hampshire, out the [...]

Homer in Cyberspace: No one to wait for

Tuesday, October 14th, 2008

Moorea at sunset

The trickiest part of setting these lyrics for me was setting the name “Penelope” and saying “I love you.”
No One to Wait For
Music: Roger Bourland
Lyrics: Mel Shapiro
The Captain: Patrick Logotheti
No one to wait for
No endless longing
No one to worry for
Just someone belonging
To you
Someone who’s really here
Here at your side
Whispering in your ear
I love [...]

187 tunes from the beloved 12-tone masters

Friday, October 10th, 2008

A fun and funny commercial about the Second Viennese School.
Die Zwölftonmethode - totgeschwiegen und totgeredet, geliebt und verehrt, verhasst und verdammt - ist eine jener Mysterien der Musikgeschichte, die unser Leben wie kein anderes in den Bann ungeahnter tönender Dimensionen zu ziehen vermag. Lassen wir uns erklären, wie unser Alltag durch Anhörung der herausragenden atonalen [...]

More on chant

Wednesday, October 8th, 2008

I was very happy with my lecture yesterday. Rather than just teaching counterpoint — here are the rules –do this, don’t do that, avoid this, and don’t do this because it’s not in the style — I presented a variety of kinds of chants and analyzed how we would imitate it if we wanted to. [...]

Even better

Tuesday, October 7th, 2008

My parents have both had various facial skin cancers. It was only a matter of time before it was my turn. The phone rang and the caller ID said: SM UCLA Dermato. I knew it was Dr. Kim.
It is cancer. It’s the kind that is not life threatening and very slow growing basal cell carcinoma [...]

Teaching chant

Monday, October 6th, 2008

I’m teaching species counterpoint again, but this time, in addition to teaching chant, that is Gregorian (Christian) Chant, I’m exploring all the different kinds of chanting that exists in other sacred traditions. For that matter, I’m playing whale songs and wolf howls as examples of animals’ uncontrollable urge to sing. Here is a baby wolf: [...]