Roger Bourland
writes about music and life

In an area known as “Music Education” which, for Schools, Conservatories, and Departments of Music means K through 12, there appears to be a national problem. Potentially gifted teachers may not always be the best performers: sometimes yes, sometimes no–and vice versa. So the question arises: if instrumental lessons are required of all future K-12 teachers, from who can they study? Teachers have limits on the size of their studios, and insist on the best student performers; taking a music education “major” who is below the level of many students that were just denied due to lack of space, seems unfair to all those that were rejected, but better performers.

One solution is to have music education majors come from the performers already admitted who are already at a high performance level. Another is to have doctoral students teach the undergraduate MusEd majors. The problem with that is the perceived “upstairs-downstairs” of it all. The best solution is to just hire more teachers; but if you add one more for every instrument in the orchestra, that is a LOT more faculty–That is quite a challenge in slimming-down times.

There are stories of famously fabulous teachers who never performed, and amazing musicians or composers who are terrible teachers.

It’s a puzzlement.

I struggle writing my book analyzing songs by Rufus Wainwright because I keep forgetting who I am writing the book for. I simplify the language so that regular music lovers can appreciate it, but then I address issues that are more appropriate to graduate music analysis seminars for composers or music theorists.

What is it that non-musicians want to know about music? I fear that these music lovers don’t know the questions to ask––so I need to ask interesting questions.

What do classical musicians want to get out of a book that analyzes songs by a pop songwriter? My guess is that we want to see that there are similar compositional methods a classical composer might use, showing up somewhere in the music. Good voice leading along with an organic use of a theme in a pop piece impresses a classical musician.

Who am I writing for? Both audiences.

Sigh.

[Early American doll, photo by RB]

[A commercial for my students.]

This is National Coming Out Week, also known as LGBT Awareness Week. Coming out is short for coming out of the closet, meaning bringing out into the open something that has been hidden away. I encourage my students to be compassionate when a friend “comes out” to them–coming out is very traumatic for some people; for others it’s not an issue.

The empathy muscle used in supporting a friend coming out as a gay or lesbian person, is also put to use in other personal confessions that have nothing to do with sexual preference. Imagine the following confessions that one person might make to another:

“I’m pregnant.”
“I’m going to get married.”
“My husband is cheating on me.”
“I have cancer.”
“I didn’t get into Harvard.”
“I love you.”

Each of these scenarios is a type of coming out. As the person listening and as a good friend, you’ll be there for them, realizing how difficult it must have been to make this confession.

On the other hand, coming out feels good–letting the world–or perhaps just a close friend–know who you are. As my old pal and collaborator John Hall wrote in our “Flashpoint/Stonewall:”

“Your difference is your strength, you see.
Come out! Come out! for all to see.”

[Illustration by Keith Haring]

I found several times this week that making a call can save weeks of email volleys. Long emails, and especially ones that are a bit confusing or unclear can be cleared up in a minute with a quick phone call. I must say that I love email for quick memos, notes and efficient communication, but sometimes it just doesn’t work for more complicated business transactions. I have to say that I use the phone less than I ever have these days, but am thinking it’s a bad trend. Talking, or — gosh — even VISITING someone else in person is truly a good thing and one we shouldn’t give up quite so quickly. Peter Sellars brags that he doesn’t use a phone; he prefers to GO and visit the person whenever possible. Well, Peter, that’s not possible for all of us, so why not settle for second best?

This week I have been lecturing about the technique and rules regarding music notation. The angles, shading, background, lengths, proportions and stem direction. I explained the ever fascinating and source of the way music notation looks, the crow quill pen.

Sadly, I had to emulate the flowing nature of that great pen with a magic marker for a white board, which was frustrating at best. I promised them that we would move to computer notation soon enough, but I wanted them to know how to notate by hand.

There I was on the stage, lecturing 90 students with my round glasses, drawing notes and clefs and other musical symbols on the board–hmm, some day that will be quite a quaint image.

This is what the crow quill pen looks like in the hands of J.S. Bach.

Every once in a while I get a hankering for Swedish crepes at IHOP. The servers are beyond friendly, ready to do anything to make you happier and fatter.

I love the one in my neighborhood because it’s the one where the Buffalo Springfield was formed. And I think, “hmm, did Neil Young and Stephen Stills sit at this booth once? Did Richie Furray and Dewey Martin laugh and eat pancakes at this table? Did Bruce Palmer sit alone at this table?

What time of day did they come in? Were they all smoking? What were they wearing? Did they laugh a lot? Did they sing to each other? How old would you say they were?– I ask these questions to my imaginary guide to this Historic Hollywood Hangout.

More coffee please.

Here is a video of a 1967 performance in Monterey of the Springfield’s biggest hit, “For What It’s Worth”. David Crosby is playing along. I don’t see Neil Young or Bruce Palmer. Richie Furay is looking exceedingly preppy and perky here.

After going through several rooms filled with musical instruments, we have discovered a wide variety of instruments in various conditions and of widely varying value. I was deighted that several instruments previously thought to have been missing were found.

This week we found a blue baritone saxophone. It will go with the milk green UCLA Les Paul guitar that we found this summer. We found a Wagner tuba in fairly good shape and two more that had been poorly repaired decades ago; a rediscovered a set of instruments given to us by the late Jack Lord (Hawaii Five-0), including 3 old Martin guitars, 3 old 4-string banjos, and 2 wonderful old mandolins–a “The Martin” and a Washburn; a treasure trove of historic autoharps; and a number of clarinets that even our clarinet teacher didn’t know about. As I reported a few weeks ago, going through all these instruments with the faculty has been like going through your grandparents’ attic. Everyone loved it.

As I reported these wonderful finds to the faculty in our meeting yesterday, I saw the voice faculty looking glum. Michael Dean spoke up: “Did you find any tenors?” The faculty roared with laughter.

One of the hilarious things about the recent Pixar movie UP is the leitmotiv of someone saying “squirrel!” which, as all dog owners know, drives a dog crazy. For those of you that didn’t see UP, here is a clip that features the squirrel moments. You’ll notice the dog collars that they wear. Those collars translate what the dogs are thinking into English. I love this because I often translate what our dogs say to our visitors.

As Daniel and I have laughed and joked about this for weeks, wouldn’t you know that one of our parrots, Aiko, picked it up. Last night I roared with laughter and Aiko yelled “Squirrel! Squirrel” Both dogs came thundering through the house and tearing into the backyard, outraged that a squirrel would have the audacity to encroach on their domain. Aiko then said “SIT! SIT!! Good dog.”

Jennifer Snow and I went to the grand opening of Steinway & Sons new west coast store in West Hollywood (call it Beverly Hills adjacent) last night. It is in an amazing neighborhood and is a wonderful store. There is a loft upstairs that functions as a little concert space. We visited with the store owner, Gavin English, who is very excited about the store and being a new Angelino. Ron Losby, the President of Steinway, USA, was there feeling a bit homesick for his old stomping grounds. I comforted him by saying if he ever retires, I’m sure LA would welcome him back.

The store was filled with all kinds of pianists from all over Los Angeles, all looking vaguely familiar. There was champagne and tasty wine for all.

After the ribbon cutting ceremony, Gavin welcomed and thanked everyone, then introduced his long time colleague, David Benoit who played two numbers. The first was a lovely, catchy love song for his wife. The second was a tribute to Dave Brubeck, who just turned 88 yesterday (”an appropriate age for today”) and played a kick-ass up tempo rendition of “Blue Rondo a la Turk.” I was in heaven. Benoit, with his impressive white grey hair, almost looked a bit like Brubeck.

I only regret that I didn’t get to meet the gentlemen who owns Steinway, who was skittering around the store the whole time looking wonderfully eccentric, and a bit like Truman Capote.

A lovely event.

Although I have praised UCLA’s decision to be three separate music departments, sometimes it’s a pain in the butt. Take, for instance, our new terrific core class. There are six musicianship sections, divided by their musical abilities. On Tuesday I discovered that there are actually 18 sections. Each of the six sections has three subsections dependent upon their department. So, while AJ Racy was lecturing on trance and ecstacy in music, yours truly got to sit outside the lecture hall, enrolling students into their damn sections. “What department are you? What section are you in? What is your PTE number? Uh, ok, let me find it. Ok, here it is. Now what it your student ID” and I had to do that 90 times. Sheesh. As Monty Python says: MY BRAIN HURTS.

As it has been the beginning of classes (yes, we begin later than most), there are constant fires burning everywhere that the Chair gets to put out. After Monday and Tuesday I was emotionally exhausted. I have decided to take Wednesdays off and work from home to get me through the week.

Yesterday I caught up on zillions of overdue emails, creating committees, and making reports. Today, I go from 10 am through 8 pm. Friday is our first faculty meeting, and I have to do our taxes this weekend.

I flash forward to my retirement and won’t miss busy times like this. I think about being a composer and wonder how in the past I’ve composed a musical or a film score while teaching and being chair. I guess that where there’s a will, there’s a way. I look forward to a bit less busyness.