There are times when I’m a Christian
There are times when I’m a Jew
There are times when I’m an atheist
There are times I only think of you
There are times when I’m a Buddhist
There are times when I’m a Jain
But all I know is that
I really love you.
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One of my favorite songs, and this is a performance I had not heard. For you Carter family fans, this one is a must. Pay attention to the mercurial time between verses and lines. Beats are added and subtracted ad libitum.
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After a week of crafting possible cuts to our department’s budget, I drove up to the beautiful Lake Arrowhead area to attend an annual meeting, whose sole purpose is to give seed money to innovative curricular ideas. We arrived on Friday night; had cocktails and a lovely dinner, followed by a short meeting, and then we all retired to our rooms to finish reading the 36 proposals. Saturday morning and early afternoon were spent sitting around a large square table discussing each one.
As we finished early, I called Ronnie Rubin to see whether, by chance, she was in Palm Springs. I was tired of being cold and in the mountains. To my delight she was free and single. We went out for a lovely dinner, strolled down the main drag, I bought a new very cool rubber and stainless steel bracelet, and we drove home. I drove back to LA early on Sunday; Ronnie stayed to watch two more movies and returned at night.
I returned to grading 51 analyses by my students of pop songs of their choices, along with the YouTube link. I found I could only grade around 8 or 9 at a time, as listening, analyzing, and grading each song was exhausting. I have to admit that I loved the opportunity to assign and grade this project. The students learned from it as well.
At the same time, the midterm project for the class was to record and perform an original composition that features a falling bass line. It could be for (and was) for any instrumentation, and in any style. Then, they had to convert the file to an mp3, upload it to the class website, and then comment on each other’s pieces (which they did). Then in class this week, we listened to them all, and I gave brief critiques to each of the students. This was a delicate process as for most, this was the first time they had ever had a performance in front of peers. I consoled them before we began: “I know that for some of you, today might be like those dreams where you are naked in front of the class (or workmates) and can’t do anything about it. But hang in there.” The comments that the students made on the website were always helpful, collegial, encouraging and friendly.
I found out from several Chairs from other departments that I am teaching a heavy load for a Chair. One said she taught one course a year, another two courses: I teach 3 big classes along with 5 – 6 private composition students per term. I know that may sound light to some, but trying to do that and go to all the meetings one has to as Chair, can be overwhelming.
I am thrilled that I seem to be catching up. My To Do list is shorter. I think I can take this weekend off. Oh wait: I have a new choral piece to compose for the City of West Hollywood!
Onward.
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Today in my “music theory” class, composer and colleague Paul Chihara spoke to us about working in Hollywood, and showed four stages of the evolution of a musical cue. The cut the director gives the composer that will have SMPTE time code on it and little or no sound, nor sound effects; a version with a synthesizer mockup that sounds damned good already; a third version that has the full orchestral (no synth) version with no dialog or sound effects; and then the final version that has it all. He annotated it as we went along. Paul is charming and lovable, referring to himself as “an old man” (b.1938), but in spirit, he was likely the youngest one there.
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Matt is a real talent, has lots to offer and is someone to watch.
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Today I was invited to a graduate course in architecture taught by Visiting Professor, Benjamin Ball, of Ball Nogues Studio. Here is a sample of his work.
He has a class of young architect grad students, working in teams, each pitching their vision of what the space will be. Casey Reas, the Chair of Design Media Arts, critiqued the work from the point of view of a designer — made terrific comments. Ben, was the teacher and coordinator of the critique, so he spoke more frequently. I brought in the element of sound to the design. One team assumed that music goes up, so I went through each instrument of the orchestra explaining where the sound comes from predominantly.
I requested a sexy podium for my scholars: “I don’t want talks to come from professors on a rolled out old podium. I want them thoughtfully placed and surrounded by elements that would make them feel like a rock star. I encouraged them to imagine exactly where stereo speakers might be.
I want one of our big-voiced opera singers to process around the space as she sings. I want a sitar recital; Korean drumming ensemble; the gamelan; contemporary chamber music; traditional chamber music; short films, and the list goes on. The only challenge is “interfering” with night classes that might be going on. I’m sure we’ll work all this out.
I emphasized that we need to get permission to do this to this space, you can’t just start putting up fabulous colorful netting and not get insurance and liability issues and such, covered. I’ve made a call.
This will be a temporarly structure. One of the challenges is that its components be recyclable when the structure is dismantled.
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The best national anthem, IMHO.
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OMG
You go girls!
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On Wednesday I went to the opening of BELOVED UPON A TIME, a full length musical at Royce Hall with music by one our our graduate students, Adam Gilberti, who rose to the occasion a produced a wonderful set of songs. Having trouble sitting for long periods of times these days I only stayed for an hour, which looked as though it would go on for another three. All of our closest straight couple friends are white plus Korean, so I felt I had had enough Korean culture for one night.
On Thursday, Ronnie and I went to hear Esa Pekka’s terrific and farewell performances of OEDIPUS REX and SYMPHONY OF PSALMS. Bill Kraft and I groused in the corner at intermission, complaining about the same issue, which I’ll omit here. Suffice it to say, the music didn’t need long interludes of slowly paced verbal dreaming, which dear Peter added, IMHO (and Bill’s). Ronnie and I both had a half dozen oysters, moules frites, and a lovely cab before.
On Saturday, Daniel and I met several new friends at Howard’s home. It became apparent that their bond was AA. Each had tremendous depth and smarts. One told us of several pop veterans who are still in bad shape from too much drugs/booze; Interesting behind the scenes political stories (her father was in California govt) and how she has helped younger alcoholic children. Another was an Oscar winning behind the scenes sound man. When I said the phrase “perforated septum” he jumped in and said “I have one of those; from too much blow.” He amazed us with interesting stories from his life, near death experiences, hitting bottom scenarios, and professional achievements. They all seemed in very good places, having heard how low they had at one time been. Daniel and I didn’t refrain from having a few glasses of wine; they didn’t seem uncomfortable at all.
After what was probably the busiest week I’ve had all year, things are slowing down, and I’m catching up. Today I grade 50 pop song analyses (many of my students are out in Coachella Valley this weekend. OY! It’s hot in LA today, probably broiling out there.); double check a TA’s grading of some chord progressions, work on promotion letters for five faculty members, work on the teaching assignment for next year, and then go to an undergraduate composer concert at 5 pm. Then, I come home, have dinner, watch a movie and veg.
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We plowed through five decades of the three top selling singles — the last two decades got short shrift: no matter, they might as well have leapt to their feet singing along with Backstreet Boys or Kelly Clarkson.
We went from old to new. Few had heard of Bobby Darin, or the genre “bubblegum.” I kept wondering whether I had remembered it wrong. We looked at Madonna’s erota-spiritual “Like a prayer” but ran out of time for hearing “Boom Boom Pow.”
The class LOVED Gloria Gaynor singing “I will survive” and in that the words were on the screen in front of them, it turned into Karaoke at 10:15 am.
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