UMass Amherst and Rhode Island College (with a little Brown Univ. thrown in)

I'm off this morning to work with Laura Rexroth's wind ensemble at UMass Amherst on the first movement of Alchemy in Silent Spaces, followed by two days at Rhode Island College in Providence speaking to classes and working with Rob Franzblau's group, culminating in a joint concert with Brown University's wind ensemble (led by Matthew McGarrell) on Friday night (Brown is performing Dusk and RIC is doing all of Alchemy), then back to Amherst for their concert on Saturday night (this is a preparatory concert for their CBDNA performance coming up in March at Montclair State University, for which I'll also be in attendance).

Reports from the road, and probably some complaining about the weather. The high today where I'm currently sitting will be 71F. The temperature in Amherst when I woke up this morning was.... ONE DEGREE FAHRENHEIT. 1.

1 single lonely little degree.

Hopefully some more will show up to keep it company before I arrive...

"Wrong About Me"

45 seconds of pure genius from the Salamander Studios hit factory in Memphis, TN. Written, performed, recorded, mixed, and distributed on Sunday afternoon.

"Wrong About Me"
http://www.myspace.com/stevenbryant

James McMurry: lead vox, guitar, backing vox, lyrics
Steven Bryant: bass, lead guitar (all three notes), percussion, ooh-aah vox


people think wrong things about me
but they're wrong about me
no they aren't right

people say wrong things about me
but they're wrong about me

I like:

teddy bears and
rainbows and
the movie Titanic and
sunsets and
bunny slippers and
tulips and
puppies and
truffles and
pink lemonade and
shotguns and
walks in the rain and
caring for my fellow man

and you know I love that Justin Timberlake

----


Mac laying down some vocals



Steve struggling with lead guitar (all three notes)



Mac laying down the real guitar



Steve getting serious about maracas



The all-important lyric sheet

Shout-out to James A. - the music in you wants to be free. Those new Mackie HR624s will help...

Harding Academy represent!

I spent Friday evening with the Harding Academy band and their new director this year, Colby Canterbury, working on Dusk. I have to say when I first walked in and saw that about 40% of the band consisted of saxophones, I was slightly worried. Somehow, though, they actually made a solid, warm, non-saxophone-dominated sound as an ensemble - I was really quite impressed with the group!

Aside from me screwing up the conducting in several spots (I didn't have a score to the piece beforehand - I never have scores to my own pieces for some reason), it went well, and hopefully the band got a sense of what's important in the piece, and how important the overal arc of the music is. I think they were exhausted after we ran through it...I'm relentlessly slow in my tempo, and the poor flute players at the end have to achieve super-human breath control and endurance... :)

We had a good time, and I got them all to pose with me for a pic after rehearsal, even though they were all ravenously hungry for the barbecue that was waiting for them in the next room...



Thank you all for spending a Friday night with me. I had a great time! Special shout-outs (shouts-out?!?) to my new MySpace friends from Harding: Ashley for being the first to find me on MySpace, Brandon on Euphonium (especially since you basically had never played it before), and Jessica for the lovely clarinet solo at the beginning! And of course a big 'thank-you' to Colby for inviting me and for programming my music.

Best of luck on your concert next Saturday - sorry I won't be able to make it - I'll be in Amherst, Massachusetts!

More about that coming soon...

Memphis-bound

Heading to Memphis to work with The Harding Academy Band on "Dusk" this evening. Then it's on to dinner with some old roommates from my undergrad days.

Gotta hit the road...more later!

Arkansas All-State 2006

Because of an imminent ice storm, the Arkansas All-State Convention held its concerts today, instead of tomorrow, as regularly scheduled. I drove down early this morning to work with the Symphonic Band, under Rick Blatti's direction, on my piece, MetaMarch. Two nights ago, Rick asked if I'd be interested in conducting the piece, and I of course jumped at the chance. These concerts were in honor of J. Raymond Brandon, who passed away in December at age 98. Mr. Brandon was an icon of the Arkansas school music establishment (an aside: he was in fact the teacher whom my father student-taught with, and later took over for, at North Little Rock High School back in the early 1970s. The connection continues: Mr. Brandon's daughter, Lisa, was my band director when I was in high school, so our two families go back many years).

Anyway, in honor of him, the program included Francis McBeth's "Grace Praeludium" which was commissioned by and dedicated to Raymond Brandon several years ago. Because of the shortened schedule, the concert was whittled down to only two pieces. Mr. Blatti called the section leaders together after we got the news this morning at 10am, and had them vote on the pieces they wanted to perform - and they chose McBeth's and mine! I was honored, and I had a great time pulling MetaMarch together with less than an hour's worth of rehearsal. I'm indebted to Rick and his generosity in letting me conduct my piece (which turned out to be half the program!), and I look forward to working with him again. After the concert, we grabbed some lunch and I gave him a ride to the airport, and we batted around ideas for my next piece (which will be the final one in my Parody Suite series), including the all-important title...

To the band, Julia Reynolds, John Webb, Rick Blatti, and everyone who improvised and rescheduled the whole convention at the drop of a hat, my heartfelt thanks for letting me be a small part!

PS To everyone in the band - I wasn't kidding about MySpace - come by and visit me!

Here's a couple of pics from rehearsal this morning...look at all those tubas! And the trombones, man oh man - some seriously meaty sound coming from over there...

St. Charles East HS @ Carnegie Hall

Last Monday, I had the privilege and honor of conducting my work Rise with the St. Charles East HS Wind Ensemble at Carnegie Hall. I had a great time working with the group and conducting this piece (my first time!). A special "thank you" to director Jim Kull for inviting me to be a part of this event. Jim has been a big supporter of BCM for a few years now, and this evening was no exception as he programmed both my piece and Jonathan's Avenue X (with Jonathan conducting as well).

Since Carnegie refuses to allow any photography inside the hall, I don't have any pictures (as far as they know) from the actual gig. Here's Jonathan, Jim Kull, and myself after the concert:



I should also say "thank you" to Tara and Natalie, the 2nd and 1st Horns, respectively - they worked very hard on this piece, and were absolutely crucial to its success:



To the whole band: it was a pleasure working with you in Chicago and in New York - I hope you all had a great trip, and are getting some rest now! I look forward to next time. Maybe a full BCM concert with all of us conducting? ;)

UPDATE: Newm posted some more pics and such on the BCM front page about the event - check it out!.

Juilliard Farewell Party

Tuesday, Feb. 7th marked my last day of nearly 10 years of affiliation with Juilliard, first as student, then as a staff member. Many different events in my life over the past 10 months or so have converged to bring about this new direction. It was difficult - I've worked with a great number of wonderful people over the years there, and it has been the best 'day job' I could've possibly found. But it was still a day job, and the demands of my professional music life have increased to the point where I couldn't do both, at least not well.

Alright, I promised a few pictures from the farewell party, so here's just a small selection:

First up, here's Margo and some of the champagne she provided. Margo is the mother of Juilliard, and the voice, as well - if you ever call the school, the silky voice you hear saying "You have reached The Juilliard School" belongs to this lovely lady right here. She's an institution within the institution, and loves and is beloved by all.




Here we have President Polisi and I talking for a few minutes. He was gracious enough to drop in - he's always been extremely friendly and amiable with me, and I was honored that he took a few minutes to come by.




Finally, here's most of the IT department - my partners in computational crime and destruction. From L-R we have Daniel, Tim, Alex, me, Dave (blue shirt), Bill, Dave (in back), Jeremy (Mr. Thumbs-up), and the bossman himself, Tunde. Missing are Diane, Gail, and Luis. Working with all of you has been great - going to miss you!!




Onward and upward. Next up: conducting in Carnegie Hall...

Catching up...soon

Been traveling and haven't had much internet access...at least, that's my excuse for not keeping things up to date. A LOT has been going on. I'm about to hop on another plane, so this will be quick until I can flesh each one out:

Last week I officially resigned from Juilliard to pursue composing and conducting full time - I do have pictures of the party, and I hope to post some tomorrow.

On Wednesday, I worked with the St. Charles East HS Band. They did "Rise" and performed it beautifully last night at Carnegie Hall. I had the honor and pleasure of conducting the performance - many, many thanks to Jim Kull and the band for inviting me to be a part of this event!

Saturday and Sunday, I attended Eric's "Paradise Lost" at Northwestern - it's changed radically since the LA performance a year and a half ago, and I believe it's MUCH tighter now. More on that soon.

I'm off...but I will catch up on things here very soon. I hope....

Imminent Change

I've been back in New York the past few weeks sorting things out. The big news: after almost a decade, first as a student, then as an employee, I'm leaving Juilliard! I'm leaving to spend more time composing, conducting, etc. Tuesday, Feb. 7th will be my final full day...pictures from the party that day will be forthcoming, if they're appropriate for public viewing... ;)