Christian Wolff and V for Vendetta

Today has been quite an interesting day. Among other things, I finally talked to the bass-bariton I mentioned yesterday, the guy who's going to sing my piece. He's a really nice person and he was very willing to work on this, which is great. Now I have two musicians that re very interested in the piece... I need to write something that's up to the task! I am already full of ideas, which is good, for a change, other pieces have not come out this way. I hope these ideas are good ones, though.

Also today, all the students of composition were invited to attend the rehearsals of some pieces by Christian Wolff that will be performed tomorrow and on Friday at the Conservatoire. Mr. Wolff himself was there and some of the composition students actually performed on the pieces. The pieces rehearsed were Pulse, another one which I don't remember the title, and Changing the System. After that I stayed with other musicians to rehearse Excercises 1, 8 and 15, which we will rehearse tomorrow with public as well. 

Christian Wolff 

(of course, I do not own the rights to this image)

The general idea behind the music of Christian Wolff is how musicians intercat with each other during the performance of a piece, and how a piece of music is actually not finished when the composer finishes writing it, but when it is performed. For Wolff, the performer has a very important role in the process of composition of the piece. Most of his scores haver very few indications (on Edges the only indications are the articulations, and even they are not completely accurate, nor is the performer forced to play all of them), and the performer has to decide, both individually and together with the ensemble and following the (few) parameters stated on the score, how to interpret what is written. Every interpretation of the piece is different, even by the same performers. 

When we were rehearsing the Excercises (where the performer is only given the pitches to be played, but not the tempo, rhythm, articulations, etc., and the only indication given is that unison among all the performers should be the ideal, but is not compulsory) a very funny thing happened. We would all begin more or less playing together (you should not previously agree on a starting tempo either), and suddenly one of us would want to go faster, or slower, or louder, etc, and either the rest of us would follow, or not, and when we didn't, the person that started this change would have to return to what the rest was doing. So this musical dialogue between us took place, where people proposed things that either were accepted or rejected, and this process enriched the music greatly. When we tried to play the pieces again, different things happened. It was beautiful.

After the rehearsal, I went to a friend's house and watched V for Vendetta. He had never seen it, but it was my 10th time watching it, I think. It's one of my favorite films. But now, after having this experience with Christian Wolff's music, I thought I could relate even more closely to his ideas. I recognize in his music, the urge to make people come together and build something together, to make people realize that they can be agents of change in this world of injustice. Performing his music, you can decide what to do, what to play, what not to play, you don't have a tyrant composer giving you all the parameters and hitting you with a wooden ruler every time you play a false note, or do a pianissimo instead of a mezzo piano. He gives you the freedom to participate in this creation, he gives you ideas, not laws, he proposes what you could do, but does not force you to do it. What he does, though, is gently ask you to commit yourself to make the piece come to life in the best possible way, which I think should be the aim of any person leading a nation. Not set laws and punishments, xenophobic slogans and containment policies, but rather seek to create an environment of justice, of understanding, of acceptance, of love and compassion between people. 

A crowd dressed with the Guy Fawkes mask,

the symbol of V, the main character in the film.

All the best you you! 

Vocal project

Well, yes, I know that I am already writing a vocal piece (the one for the competition in Chile, for soprano, clarinet, violin, cello and piano), but there is this other project going on at the Royal Conservatoire that is organized by the composition department together with the vocal department. All the first years are required to write a piece for solo voice and one instrument. The piece does not have to be very long, the teachers said maybe 7 minutes maximum in duration. 

I am planning to write a piece for bass-baritone (if I ever talk to him, because I haven't been able to find the right moment to approach him) and piano (who already agreed to perform). I want to do something that uses tonal chords in such a way that they are not perceived as such, mainly by extending them or by adding sonorities to them. I think it can be a very nice piece to perform, and this bass-baritone has a really nice voice, at least when he speaks, very deep and warm. I think it can work for a very dark, ambiental piece, where strange sounds appear and disappear and everything is very vague. 

With this I also have a sort of dilemma, because I don't know whether to use text or not. I would really like to use some text, because I think it adds much meaning to a piece, even if it is very short. But on the other hand I think it can become too concrete, too on-your-face. I partly think to solve this by using a text that is not in one of the typical European languages like English, Spanish, German, French, Latin, Italian, etc. 

I found this beautiful quotation from the Brhadaranyaka Upanisad, one of the many sacred texts in the Hindu tradition. The quotation was also used for the music on the final scene in Matrix: Revolutions (the Matrix series being some of my favorite movies), when Neo has his epic fight with Mr. Smith (my favorite character in the series). 

First in IAST:

oṁ asato mā sad gamaya

tamaso mā jyotir gamaya

mṛtyor mā amṛtaṁ gamaya

oṁ śānti śānti śāntiḥ – bṛhadāraṇyaka upaniṣad 1.3.28

Then in devanagari:

ॐ असतोमा सद्गमय ।

तमसोमा ज्योतिर्गमय ।

मृत्योर्मामृतं गमय ।।

ॐ शान्ति शान्ति शान्तिः ।। – बृहदारण्यक उपनिषद् 1.3.28.

And lastly a translation to English:

Lead Us From the Unreal To the Real,

Lead Us From Darkness To Light,

Lead Us From Death To Immortality,

Let There Be Peace Peace Peace. – Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 1.3.28.

(The source of all this is Wikipedia, of course)

A screenshot from the final battle in Matrix: Revolutions

I think it is a really beautiful text, and I like very much what it says. I have to think more if this is an appropriate text for the kind of piece I want to write... Now that I think of it, the whole piece could be a very slow transition by the piano from the lowest register to the highest, while the bass-baritone sings this prayer as a sort of mantra, symbolizing the process of becoming enlightened, of going from Death to Immortality... hmm hmmm many things to think about.

I leave you all with what I am listening at the moment... 

Orlandi di Lasso - Missa pro defunctis

Some piano music

(Artwork by Banksy)

Some friends of mine on Facebook have been posting this video, and I thought I might share it here.

An artist in Santiago de Chile placed pianos around the city (I'm supposing mainly downtown) so that people could play them. Apart from one that was destroyed (no one knows by whom), the pianos are still there and people play them.

The video is of a homeless man, covered with his 101 dalmatians blanket, playing some tunes on the piano. 

It shocked me not because he was a homeless man and he was playing the piano, but at how no one (included myself) would have expected that a homeless man knew how to play the piano. What shocked me wa the comments, saying "oh this is amazing!" as if it was an orangutan dancing ballet or an elephant performing the Haydn trumpet conerto. I think we tend to see homeless people as something less than human, as less worthy in some way of living in the same world as we do. I remember that I went with my school on some days to give "breakfast" to the homeless at 7.00 am, I did it maybe 3 or 4 times, I don't remember, but I thought it was so humiliating for them. I must recognize I don't know if they appreciated the sandwiches we gave them, maybe they did, but it was the fact that most of them were sleeping at that hour, and we had to wake them up, in the cold morning, to give them tea or coffee and sandwiches. I don't know, I've always felt that we treat these people as though they are less human, chasing them away from our doors, waking them up to give them sandwiches, throwing our leftovers at them. 

I think this video is very important because it can help more people see the homeless as human beings. This man was not always homeless, he has a story behind him, he suffers, he loves, he feels cold, he feels hot, he dreams at night, there is nothing different between him and us, he is part of us. 

He does not have a house, you say? But, do we have one ourselves? Do we actually own anything? Music teaches us this: we do not own anything. How can you own a G minor chord? It doesn't exist, neither does the Rachmaninov 2nd piano concerto, beutiful as it is, exist. Only while you listen to it it exists. 

I just think we tend to marginalize that which we do not understand. We cannot imagine why someone would not have a house, we shudder to think how it might be to sleep under a bridge: the thought of it is terrifying, so we push them away from our sight, we sweep them under the carpet, where no one will see them. We do this with everything that scares us, everything that we don't understand. Art is an example, emotions are an example, God is an example. We try to simplify them, to make them measurable, we mutilate them so that they fit our rigid strucutres and, when they don't, we just discard them, we throw them sandwiches from the window of our cars. 

Ars poetica

The artist is the Prophet.

The artist goes into the world beyond this world.

The artist is not a creator, but a discoverer.

The artist is not a lonely ranger, sitting at the top of the mountain, talking alone to some God. 

The artist is the voice that screams in the desert.

The artist is felt deep inside, the anguish, the pain, the desire, the yearning.

The artist finds order in chaos.

The artist exists.

No work of art should be made that does not contain the last drop of blood.

No work of art should be made that does not plunge the spectator into madness.

No work of art should be made.

The artist shall die some day, but not while there is so much pain in the world.

The artist is not the Messiah, nor does s/he herald him.

The artist just cannot cope with the visions.

The artist lies within you.

We do not listen to the artist.

We do not want to listen to the artist.

We were always told not to listen to the artist.

The artist is dangerous.

The artist is not quantifiable.

The artist is unpredictable.

The artist is honest.

The artist does not pretend to be someone else.

We were told that what we do is wrong.

We were told to fill in the lines.

No work of art should be made that follows the lines.

No work of art should be made in the dark corridors of this great old cathedral.

No work of art should be made without the screams of the thousands of souls in the deep corners of the world.

The artist will hold you on your last moments.

The artist will not tell you what you want to listen.

The artist will be unpleasant.

The artist should be unpleasant.

But, in the end, you will know the truth.

In the end, you will realize.

There is nothing more important than this.

Painting by Käthe Kollwitz

Rehearsal of my music

Today we had the first rehearsal of a piece of mine that will be performed on December 9th at the Korzo Theater here in The Hague. 4 friends of mine are performing in it. It's for singer (in this case a tenor), double bass, timpani, temple blocks and tam tam. I was really really pleased with how the rehearsal went. I began conducting them during the first readings of it, and then they went off by themselves and I could just enjoy listening to it. They were all really good and also they liked the piece and it showed, so I was really excited. I almost cried at some point, but I managed to hold myself... didn't want to lose my dignity.

The text is from my favorite poet of all, Allen Ginsberg. I hope I'm not breaking some copyright law by using his text. To be fair, the entrance to the concert is free, I'm not making ANY money from this piece and I clearly state that the text is his (at least in the score, up to now, if there is any program to the concert, I intend to make it clear there also). The poem is a small haiku:

another year

has past - the world

is no different

I like very much the slow tempo it has, also it conveys so much with so few words (as a good haiku should). I won't go into what I think it means because I don't want to kill it. But in my piece I wanted to use this sense of pauses it gives, and also use a very slow tempo. I chose to use two melodic instruments and percussion because it also gives this sensation of emptiness, especially the temple blocks for me are very important, I imagine a huge stone temple and some monk aloe in the center playing them to invoke some mysterious god, while rain falls outside. 

This image reflects somehow the idea I wanted for my piece, although I must confess I didn't imagine a Gothic cathedral, it's more the mood and the idea of a huge empty space. Artwork by inetgrafx, link here, of course I do not own the art work and this person has very interesting stuff, you should check it out if you liked this. 

I would like to end today's post with a quote from a book I'm reading now. It's called "Reason, Faith and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate" by Terry Eagleton. A friend recommended it to me, and I thank him very much for that since it has given me a very different insight on this topìc which I find so interesting. 

In claiming the world as our own, we find that we have ended up possessing a lump of dead matter. In asserting our free spirits, we have reduced our own bodies to pieces of mechanism.

Nos dha! Dobranoc! Bonne nuit! Buenas noches! (It's already 0.30 as I post this... so now to bed!)

Copland, Poulenc and Mendelssohn in The Hague

On Friday night I went with some friends to the Dr. Anton Philipszaal to watch the Residentie Orkest perform Appalachian Spring by Aaron Copland, the Concerto for Two Pianos by Francis Poulenc and the Scottish Symphony by Felix Mendelssohn. It was a nice concert, the repertoire was in general on the agreeable side and the orchestra was decent. I must only complain a bit of the acoustics of the hall. It was the first time I ever sat on the right-hand side balcony and I could barely hear a thing, I thought the pianists played very softly in the concerto, but it was more a problem of the hall. It is a real pity.

A rather epic depiction of Copland composing

I have never been a great fan of Copland, not because I dislike him personally, it's just that I have never been able to relate to his music. He is considered to be one of the most important figures in the development of a clearly American style of composing, which I think is really important, because it means that finally the so-called New World began having its own views of the European cultural legacy. For this I respect him very much and it is also an inspiration to me, since I am also a citizen of the lands beyond the Atlantic (I was born in Venezuela) and I still think we have a long way to go in speaking with our own voice, in recognizing the value of our own culture.

Peace to all! 

Some old music today

Well, today I haven't done much... but I decided I will post some of my old music so that any hypothetical reader of this blog can see what other things I have done in the past.

Here is a MIDI version of the first movement of my Piano Sonata. I wrote it this winter (Northern winter, that is during December - January) in Poland, while I studied in Łódź (you pronounce it like "woodge") with Prof. Zygmunt Krauze. I consider this piece to be one of the few things that I've written that actually reflects what I wanted to do. It is exactly as it should be.

This is Łódź, a view from ul. Pomorska to the church I could always see from my room.

Here you can listen to the longest piece I've written up to now. It was a commission from the Crested Butte Music Festival in Colorado, USA. The piece was performed by the American String Quartet... yes I cannot believe that either, but as Justin Bieber said, never say never. I really like this piece also, although you can tell is a little bit more immature (it certainly is more tonal anyway).

Feel free to listen to the other tracks in my SoundCloud.

And now so that you don't get any more bored, I just wanted to share some poetry. It's one of the Holy Sonnets by John Donne. It appears also as an aria at the end of act I of Doctor Atomic, by John Adams, one of my 2 favorite operas (the other one is Turandot). You can see the performance here.

Batter my heart, three-person'd God, for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp'd town to another due,
Labor to admit you, but oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captiv'd, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be lov'd fain,
But am betroth'd unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

(I apologize since I copied the poem from another website and I didn't realize it still had the white background and was barely readable...)

Had lesson today...

I had a really nice lesson today. I arrived with 3 doodle-things to my teacher's house and we spent I think more time than what was initially planned discussing them. I must say it was MUCH more than I expected, but it was amazing since I got very interesting insights on how to deal with musical material. I will make a sort of list with them in any order to be more organized.

• Inner silence: It is very important to hear yourself, to be attentive of the ideas that come into your mind. Listen to them carefully and then try as hard as you can to write them as precisely as possible. It doesn't matter if this process takes months and thousands of sketches, the aim should always be to write what you imagined and develop it.
• Intuition v/s systems: I relate very much to this. There has to be a balance between inspiration and work, not all the ideas come naturally, and in general inspiration is not constant, it comes and goes. Personally, I always think that it is best to begin with an intuitive musical idea and then systematically develop it (systematically not necessarily meaning to develop it according to mathematical formulas but to work with it in a more methodical way than just sitting down and writing whatever comes to mind).
• Analyzing other composers' works, especially the ones you like most: When you see how others before you dealt with the same problems you are dealing with now, you can always get ideas. For example, now with my vocal piece my teacher recommended that I should listen to some Romantic lieder and chamber music, as well as analyzing some Messiaen, for this could make me realize how other composers dealt with ideas of rhythm, accompaniment, instrumentation, harmony, melody, etc.
• Combining scales to obtain more interesting harmonic material: This is already more specific, but the idea comes from the fact that I wanted to use an octatonic scale for the harmonies in the first part of my piece, which ended up being really dull and boring. My teacher suggested to superimpose or combine it with different scales, similar to what Messiaen did in some of his works, to give more interest to the harmonies.
• Simple structures: Well, this is actually not something we discussed today with my teacher, it's rather something Magnus Lindberg said in a masterclass I attended (as audience) here in The Hague at the Dr. Anton Philipszaal. He said something along the lines of: crazy music should have a very simple form. His music in general has really simple form, which I think is a really positive aspect of it, since it is much easier for the composer to manage very complex harmonic, melodic and rhythmic ideas (among others) and it is easier for the audience to process the music. Everybody wins. I quite liked his pieces, especially Seht die Sonne, of which he showed us some fragments.

So, I'm really happy because I believe I have more ideas now, and much more to think about, which is always great. I leave you today with some Messiaen, I listened to this piece 2 times in a row just now, I'm getting a little bit obsessed by Messiaen:

Vingt regards - X. Regard de l'Esprit de Joie - Pierre-Laurent Aimard

Lots of questions

There's a composition competition taking place in Santiago de Chile, my city. The requirements are that it has to be a piece between 8 and 12 minutes long for soprano, clarinet, violin, cello and piano. Basically, Pierrot Lunaire without flute or Quatuor pour la fin du temps with added soprano.
I decided to participate, since I think it is possible for me to write a piece for this ensemble, and also because I've always wanted to participate in some competition in my city.
I chose the following text, which is in Mapudungun, one of the native languages of Chile, which I unfortunately don't speak but find extremely beautiful. The poet is Leonel Lienlaf. A translation follows the original text, I apologize if it's not so poetic, but I tried to get more the meaning than the poetry, also I'm translating from a translation (from Spanish to English), not from the original.

Ka Feipituan

Ka feipituan ñi mongelen,
ñi ülkantumeken
kachill kiñe trayen.

Ramtuafin ti antü
chew küpaimi?
rupale tripantu
ka feipituan.

Alepue mapu küpan pian
amulen, amulen
alüpu puan
doy ayeple wanglen.

I will repeat

I will repeat that I am alive
that I am singing
close to a spring
spring of blood.

I will ask the sun
where does it come from
and if the years go by
I will repeat the same thing.

I come from the lands of Alepue, I will say
I move forward, I move forward
I want to go very far
beyond the threshold of the stars.

I've been trying to write music to it for already two weeks, but nothing good has come out yet. I have lots of questions to think about.

The text is fairly long, how to maintain interest with such a long text during such a long period of time (10 minutes)?
How to structure the piece?
Would repetition be of any help here?
How to create tension without making the soprano scream or having a Chopin-like passage in the piano?
What chords to use? How to obtain the chords without having to resort to tonal stuff? (No, I don't want this piece to be tonal in the XIX century sense of the word).

I have many more questions, but these are the more basic ones, which I could summarize in "how do I write this piece?".
I have been listening to a lot of Messiaen and like very much how he works with very simple structures that organize very complex material. I relate very much to the ideas of order and simplicity that I perceive in his work. I think I can go more into that...

Yeah, there's a lot of confusion going on, I hope I can get things clearer and clearer with this. For now, I leave you with some real Mapuche music.

Grupo Araucanía - Wenceslao Coilla

Initial thoughts

I begin writing this blog already near the end of 2013, already two weeks into my third month at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague. It is the first time I ever study composition at an institution, aiming to obtain a title in this career.

My previous experience in composition was just writing what I liked, whenever I wanted, without having to justify myself in front of a teacher. This was good, for a time. Then I realized that I was becoming more and more self-centered and more and more naive musically at the same time. This led me to want to become more strict with myself and to meet other people that were interested in the things I was interested in, namely everything related to music. Thus, I ended up first in Poland and then here in the Netherlands, where I've met many talented people that know so much more about everything than I do, which has made me learn a lot of things and also want to continue exploring and learning new things.

This was kind of a short post that seems kind of silly, but I just felt I needed to introduce myself briefly before beginning to post more abstract things, which will come soon. I expect to post at least once a week.

Peace to all!