Dusk at Disney Hall

Apparently Westlake HS is playing Dusk sometime around now at Disney Hall tonight. I had no idea, but ... COOL. Props to John Mackey for the heads-up.

Much more catching up to do : New York was great. MAYWE played their hearts out in Carnegie, and it was great to work with them and their fearless leaders, Robert Ambrose and Laura Moates Stanley. I sincerely hope I can come down to Atlanta and work with all of you again!



The rest of the trip consisted of seeing old friends, including finally meeting the dangerously charming and brilliant Newman/Schlactmeyer offspring, popping in on the Bang on a Can marathon with Jonathan, and checking out all the changes at Juilliard. I took some pictures, but wasn't able to capture it in a satisfying way, so just look at John's pix from his visit a few weeks ago.

I'm flying mostly under the radar while I compose this new piece for the Nebraska consortium. It's not due until August, but I need to finish it by the end of the month. On July 3rd, I head down to Denton to rehearse Ecstatic Waters with the UNT Wind Ensemble before we all pile in the bus and take the show to WASBE in Cincinnati. Concert is Thursday night, July 9th - I have no doubt it will bring the house down!

After that, it's straight from Cincinnati to Austria (well, not really straight - have to go through Atlanta, Munich, and then cab&train to Schladming) for the MidEurope Festival. The word is that Gary Green's doing Radiant Joy with the WYWOP, and Verena finally makes her conducting debut with the group, after running the entire show behind-the-scenes for the past several years!

And then it's to Durham, NC in August! Verena is the new director of bands at Duke University, which kicks total ass. So proud of this girl - came to the US and did both MM and DMA in a total of 4 years, and not even in her native language. That's just one of the many reasons I asked her to marry me. :)

Ecstatic Waters CBDNA mp3

I've posted the entire performance from last week's CBDNA conference. It's one, 25Mb mp3 download. The link will pull the entire file to your computer, and then you can open it in iTunes, or whatever program you use to listen to mp3s. I haven't edited it at all. NOTE: Because of the mic placement to record the ensemble, they didn't pick up the electronics as loudly as they actually were in the hall. This is most noticeable in Mvt. IV, where the quirky, 'mechanized' groove kicks in - it's difficult to hear on this recording, but was more present in the live. Recording a work such as this adds a whole new dimension of complexity...

The link to download the mp3 is on the Ecstatic Waters page, along with the old link to UT's performance from last October. I also have a new perusal score up that reflects all the changes since last October.

BTW, John Mackey has a great recap of our concerts and some remarkable pictures up on his blog - though I suspect if you're reading this, you discovered his site long ago... :)

Ecstatic Aftermath

Last Friday night's performance of Ecstatic Waters by UT at CBDNA was fantastic. I haven't written anything before now because 1) I'm exhausted, and 2) I don't really know what to say, beyond that it was fantastic, and part of an amazing week of music. Verena's transcription of Corigliano's Mr. Tambourine Man was stunning, in no small part because of soprano Hila Plitmann. The Michigan State University concert the next evening was equally impressive - piece after piece of really great and thrilling music. Asphalt Cocktail rocked even harder than I thought it would (and I expected plenty of rockin' to begin with). John made me envious (again) with his ability to lay down a complex yet satisfying groove with concert percussion and band. I *must* get me some of that. Carter Pann showed us in Concerto Logicthat he's ridiculously talented with the piano chops, and oh yeah, he also writes some decent music (!). Ricardo Lorenz, on faculty at Michigan State, burst onto the scene with his masterful first work for band, El Muro. Finally, Bolcom's new Symphony was impressive. I still feel a little ambivalent about some of the structural choices (the seemingly disparate clash of different musical moods and material didn't quite rub me the right way), but it was still a hell of a piece.

There was much more to the week, but I'm exhausted, and am in no mood to attempt real reviews of the music - not my job or my area of expertise. I'm eternally indebted to Jerry Junkin and the UT Wind Ensemble for playing the hell out of Ecstatic Waters. I'm a little sad that the piece's run at UT has come to an end, but I look forward to all the planned performances around the US next year! Mostly, though, I'm itching to get back to composing - haven't written a note since I finished Axis Mundi last Fall. Speaking of which, the recording is coming...today!

Bolcom Caught Fire...

...at ABA last Thursday night. I rode over to the ABA convention with Verena and AEJ on the band bus (hooray for band bus trips!), to hear the UT Wind Ensemble give their concert at Texas A&M. It was a hell of a concert - for me, the biggest highlights were Sunil Gadgil's absolutely astounding performance of Bolcom's Concert Suite for Alto Saxophone and Band, and John Mackey's Kingfishers Catch Fire, which I'd never heard performed live. I must say, as exciting and feel-good as it is on a recording, it's 10 times that live. The surround trumpets are extra satisfying (though I could use even more - I think Mackey should call for at least Circus Maximus numbers). Jerry Junkin does a very cool alteration of the final trumpet entrance that involves them entering in a slow pan that circles around the audience from left to right. I dig it...and will likely steal it for the final movement of my Concerto for Wind Ensemble, whenever I get around to doing those other movements.

The UT Wind Ensemble gets no time to rest - they have another concert this Tuesday at the Meyerson Symphony Center. My own Ecstatic Waters will make an appearance on the program as well this time (the website above is out of date and doesn't list it). The concert is at 7:30pm at the Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas. I know I always say this, but seriously, if you're in the DFW area, you should come to this concert... :)

TMEA: Baylor performs Alchemy

V, JM, and I will head down to TMEA in San Antonio tomorrow morning for the Texas Tech and Baylor University concerts. Texas Tech is doing two movements of Mackey's Sax Concerto at noon, and Baylor will follow at 2pm, with Mvt. I the logic of all my dreams, from Alchemy in Silent Spaces. I heard Baylor last week at rehearsal, and again this morning in a pre-TMEA performance at Westwood HS here in Austin, and they are doing a fantastic job with my piece (and the others, too, notably Corigliano's Gazebo Dances and Daugherty's Bells for Stokowski). So, all you TMEA people out there - we expect to see each every one of you at the Texas Tech and Baylor concerts on Thursday! :)

...and then hopefully it's off to a bar so Mackey can introduce us to the newly-created Asphalt Cocktail!

Mackey Sax, TMEA catch-up

As promised, a few pics from Mackey's visit and TMEA:

John Mackey, Harvey Pittel, and AEJ, immediately after the fantastic UT concert with Mackey's Sax Concerto. Read more about it here. This man's circular breathing is indeed spectacular - I never could master that back in my saxamaphone-playin' days. And of course the ensemble was excellent as usual - they also played a well-done new "West Side Story" arrangement with particular 'verve.'




V and I headed to TMEA for a couple of days - now that it's just down the road, how could we not go? We spent some quality time with EW for the first time in far too long. He gave a clinic on his choral music with the Texas Tech Choir that was rather well-attended:



The choir was great, and ready for anything - Eric threw some new music at them just before the clinic, and they gobbled it up easily. I'm so inspired by hearing them that I've gone and dug up my one and only choral work from circa 1994. As I feared, it needs some serious work before it sees the light of day (even then, still not sure it's worthy of being heard in public). Hearing them did remind me how much I love choral sound.

As usual, E was besieged by fans asking him to sign anything and everything. Including the fans themselves:



At one point the crowd was bordering on the dangerous - almost crushing E and his manager, KC, against the wall. I'm sure that's a normal amount of attention for choral composers, though...

Unfortunately, we had to head home on Friday, and missed Mackey's numerous concerts, but we did make it to a rehearsal of the 5A Symphonic Band with Tom Lee. Holy hell - I'm jealous of all those high C's in the horns. They did indeed sound awesome. This piece was for the JWECC consortium in Japan, which Newman's doing this year, and I'll be composing a work for them next year. They ate up the high C's with no problem, so I figure I'll write some high D's. Why not, right? It's just a whole step... (For the sarcasm impaired, I'm not serious - rabid horn teachers need not write in indignation).


Since I woke up at 3am this morning and couldn't sleep anymore, I figure I'll go and transcribe Dusk for orchestra. Enjoy your day, wherever you are!

TMEA

V and I are at TMEA for a couple of days this week. Mackey (who was in Austin last weekend for a performance of the Sax Concerto with the UT Austin Wind Ensemble) has a couple of big performances with the All-State bands, and Eric will be giving a clinic on some of his choral music with the Texas Tech choir at 6:30 this evening.

Fun times! More later, perhaps with pictures!