Moving the blog action

Hey everyone,

I've realized that I never update this thing. I do, however, update my website instead, so from here on out that's the place to check for anything I may have posted on here. The website is www.nickwritesmusic.com. Thanks for all the good times,

Nick

Phase games, part one

This will probably end up actually being for vibraphone and piano. But I felt like posting this little sketch, because I think it's rad. Listen here.

Short Suite for Small Orchestra, First Movement

Check this out!

Eeee gads

I haven't done the internet thing in a while (this keeps happening), this time because I've been composing, traveling, and moved into a new flat and don't have internet yet. There are various tidbits of good news though. The London Contemporary Chamber Orchestra gave a workshop to my piece Short Suite for Small Orchestra, and dug it enough to play it on their October 17 concert here in London. It was also performed by the Stranded Ensemble on June 8, and people seemed to like it a lot.

I'm writing a second, much harder piece for chamber orchestra derived from the same harmony as the third movement of the short suite. And some of the rhythmic ideas from the first. But the overall shape will be more of a single, through composed crescendo. Should be interesting.

I think I mentioned this on here already, but in August I'm heading to Dartington, in Totnes, to compose a piece for chorus to be performed by EXAUDI, conducted by James Weeks. I'm just gathering some ideas for that now.

And reading a bunch of theory books to bolster a few ideas about harmony. I'm just beginning to explore Rameau's ideas, and understand just how different French and German thinking has become. And believe it or not I'm working on adding a bit more of the German ideas to my music...we'll see how that goes.

Remember When?

I got that letter saying ERM media wanted to put one of my pieces on one of their cds? Unfortunately I won't be able to do it, because they charge an inordinately large amount for recording.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the purpose of labels to pay for recording, and then they make money back by selling the product? Paying a lot (and way less than they wanted) for recording then selling it is something I can do myself. So what are they then, a distributor? Not if they're distributed by Naxos. I don't know much about business but I think if you've got a distributor, you aren't one. I believe all that's left for them to be is a middleman who takes money from people who don't know any better in return for basically nothing. Or I suppose you do get a recording, but again, you could do that on your own for far less.

Nonetheless it was nice to be noticed. Also, on that, anyone see the Ventura County Star yesterday?

Day off

I just put composite strings on my spruce top for the first time, and am a bit disappointed. The bass strings sound really thin. I've been told, however, they (unlike nylons) take up to 6 hours of playing to sound full. So hopefully they'll get better.

Also, I was at Foyle's yesterday and picked up a piece based on its title alone. It's called The Oceans of The Moon, by Carey Blyton (famous for writing Bananas in Pajamas), and is eight variations and a theme for guitar. And is a cool and fun little piece, even if it is on the "light music" side of things, whatever that means.

Email from ERM Media

Dear Maestro Norton,

It is with great pleasure that I inform you that your composition "DREAM LIGHTS (Riverbank)" was one of the scores chosen for the upcoming recording project MILLENNIUM PROJECT: MADE IN THE AMERICAS!

The amount of submissions was staggering with over 590 submitted!

Recording contracts and all paperwork will be sent out on Monday, March 23, 2009 and should arrive to you in approximately 2 - 4 business days. (We will also enclose a CD from Volume One of this terrific series!)

This is an extraordinary recording series! Radio and media play has never been higher with over 625 outlets worldwide and exposure is fantastic with worldwide distribution through Naxos.

The recording sessions will take place in the USA with the renowned Millennium Symphony from the end of April through the end of May. You will get as many conversations and discussions with the conductor as you need. (Of course, you may attend as well!)

Some deadlines to be aware of:

*** March 23, 2009: Contracts sent out from the ERMMedia offices.

*** April 3, 2009: All paperwork due back to ERM by April 3, 2009.

*** April 6, 2009: Press Announcement (Sent worldwide) of Pieces & Composers in Project!

*** April 24 - May 23, 2009: Recording Sessions to take place in Virginia!

*** July 1, 2009: Rough edits / rough mixes of your recording sent to you on CD-R (You will have input as to balances, etc.)

*** August 1, 2009: Liner Notes and Bios finalized. CD booklet sent out to composers for approval.

*** September 15, 2009: Release of MILLENNIUM PROJECT: MADE IN THE AMERICAS! Worldwide.

Once again, Congratulations! If you do not get your contracts and paperwork within one week from today, please call us immediately at xxx-xxx-xxxx or via email at xxxxx@ermmedia.org.

You can hear fantastic ERMMedia recordings through the ERMMedia RADIO at our website at www.numusicdirect.com

Congratulations!

M.J. Ainsely

ERMMedia

www.numusicdirect.com

www.ermmedia.org

Dr. Atomic

I saw John Adams' Dr. Atomic at the English National Opera tonight. Solid music, very boring libretto and very trite, injected meaning. Interesting staging, great lighting, slightly racist costuming (probably out of ignorance, you don't get many native Americans in England- wait why were the native Americans in it again?), and taught me a major lesson:

Do NOT have a entire stage work hinge on an explosion unless you plan on having an actual explosion onstage. No matter what else you do (almost), your climax will be disappointing.

15 Albums

I was recently tagged by a friend in a facebook note to list 15 albums that changed my life. I usually don't do chain emails of the sort, but that sounded like a cool one. So I'm reposting it here. 15 albums that have changed my life, in no particular order:

1. Refused - The Shape of Punk to Come

2. Radiohead - Kid A

3. Dillinger Escape Plan - Calculating Infinity

4. NOFX - Punk in Drublic

5. Miles Davis - Bitches Brew

6. Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning

7. Steve Reich - Music for 18 Musicians

8. Cadence Weapon - Breaking Kayfabe

9. Aphex Twin - Richard D. James Album

10. Strung Out - Twisted by Design

11. AFI - Black Sails in the Sunset

12. Olivier Messiaen - Quartet for the End of Time

13. John Zorn - Electric Masada

14. Lagwagon - Trashed

15. Mars Volta - De-loused in the Comatorium

There should be a few more honorable mentions, but a lot of times it's a group of albums by a band, or a set of bands with no particular albums as number one, that changes the way I look at things, at least about music. In Rainbows (and Hail to the Thief, and OK Computer) should be next to Kid A, but Kid A was my first exposure to Radiohead. There should be something about post rock in there, which has had a huge effect on me, but tends to do so with songs. So hell yeah to Godspeed's "Storm" on Lift Your Skinny Fists, and a bunch of stuff by Mogwai, Tortoise, Sigur Ros, and more. And to David Bowie. Hunky Dory would be next on the list.

Dream Lights (Riverbank)

Listen to this. 

Click here if you want the score.

Adorno Gone PostFreakEverything-MathFolkCore

I've been reading Philosophy of New Music, and various interpretations of it, and have a very rough, short response I've been tossing around.

In it, Adorno argues that to be successful, aside from a bunch of arbitrary criteria derived from the German tradition he means to disavow, music must be radical, and radical enough to anger audiences and make them realize that their own situation in society is pretty much awful.

Philosophy of New Music followed an essay he published entitled "On the Fetish Character in Music and the Regression of Listening." In that one he "presented the change in the function of music," as one that repetitively sells the commodities of mass culture to an audience which has become, for lack of a better word, lazy in their listening.

Here's the thing: how can he expect his high-brow position on music that develops according to its own rules, within each piece, to liberate the individual consumers if they completely ignore it and it is drowned out in the noise of the chaotic mass culture he so despises? Literally, his definition of music as true art with a moral responsibility won't get anything done. It gets studied and performed in classrooms and lectured about, but doesn't move anyone to action to improve their own situation. What sort of music can do this? Music that destroys boundaries and preconceptions of itself, but does so in a way that it can compete with mass culture. So write a record that is a piece of true art, that is radical, behaves by its own internal logic, and riles up the enslaved spirit, and then blast it at everyone louder than anything ever before. Invite people to a concert of what they're used to, sell them what they know and are conditioned to want, then once you have them start breaking down walls and make an example that they'll be there to experience.

Adorno, you're right, you just don't know how to sell it. Berg was a genius. So was Messiaen (who you probably would have hated, I haven't come across his name in your writing yet). So are Radiohead and Merzbow and Raccoo-oo-oon and Dillinger Escape Plan (a few records ago). Schoenberg caused such a stir because the educated concert-going Viennese public had, at the time, a sense of consonance and harmony and order that he disrupted. The public doesn't have this anymore. To most people, a violin sounds like a violin, nearly regardless of what it is doing. Lure them in with its sweet sound then melt their skulls with a wall of feedback, and be sure to throw in a triad just to point out how badly many of your followers, Adorno, missed the point.

There's one other big point that needs to be said: I enjoy music. A lot of aesthetic philosophers seem to have forgotten about this. It's OKAY if a piece doesn't point to truth or operate according to an internal dialectic or free the soul from the bonds of consumerist, production based society. Is it art? Who the hell cares? Let's dance.

Why I Haven't Posted Anything In a While

I've been working like crazy on a fancy looking website, which is finally up and running. Here. Or here:

http://www.nickwritesmusic.com

Tell everyone.

The other reason is that I've been spending the time writing music. Dream Lights (Riverbank) is finished, for flute, two clarinets, piano, and percussion. So is another piano piece, and another is about half way there.

I've also been teaching myself puredata, which has been fun. I made a metronome that resets itself, times how long it takes to do so, then uses that amount of time to generate a sine wave. That's not music, but I've never programmed a line of code in my life before this, so that's pretty exciting.

The next big project is also under way. It's for piccolo, flute, alto flute, horn, trumpet, trombone, harp, marimba, vibraphone, tubular bells, drumset, string quartet, and six singers, and is going to be relatively epic. Meaning not Rite of Spring, but definitely more face crushing than a lot of what calls itself metal these days. Actually I have no idea. I usually start in one direction, but get lead to all sorts of other places and end up with something totally different than I expected. Nonetheless, this is going to be a fun one. And is tentatively titled "And The Star Angel Descends, Creating a Painted Sea." We'll see about that though.

Back to reading Adorno. Who is wrong!