Steven Bryant

I've been neck-deep in this new piece for Jack Stamp's wind ensemble at IUP, thus the lack of timely blogging. The piece will be a 4-5 minute opener, and so far feels very bright and shiny in character. The premiere is October 17th, so I have a little time, but I'm heading to Austria and surrounding areas for for five weeks, starting this Wednesday, so I'm trying to finish the piece pronto.

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Yesterday, Jim Bonney posted some outtakes from his Mortal Kombat "death screams" session. It sounded hilarious and painful. And irresistable to my audio slice 'n dice compulsion. So I stayed up last night making this (this is the best method of procrastination I've yet found). This is 100% pure Jim, no additives or preservatives (well, a little pitch shifting, perhaps...):

Damnit, Jim

Inspired by Newman's recent post on digging up, airing out, and potentially discarding old works, followed by Mackey's post of an old work of his, I decided to do something similar.

However, both of their works (Mackey's Elegy and Fantasie, and Newman's Lullaby for Munch in Hell), even though they hem and haw and say how juvenile they might be and basically try to make a litany of excuses before...

Belatedly, a few pics from the premiere...

I neglected to get a good daylight shot of the poster outside Alice Tully Hall, but my host, Tina Gonzalez, managed to nab one. Crazy, huh? My name seems so... vanilla... in that context. I should change it to something cool, like Mozartoslawski.



I don't have any pictures from the earlier rehearsals (I kept forgetting to take any), but here's a blurry...

I'm finally back from New York, and have the time and internet access to post. Unfortunately, blogger is misbehaving right now, and keeps losing the connection, so I'm going to post the recording for now and deal with pictures later. It's a single file containing all three movements, so it's a bit large.

Now, before you dive in, some points:

1) The piece is 23 minutes long, thus the 28 Mb file...

The premiere last night was extraordinary. The orchestra was fantastic. I am indebted to Maestro DePreist for asking me to write this, for programming it, and most of all for bringing it to life last night.

Pictures and such coming soon.

Had two rehearsals - yesterday and this morning, and it's really coming together. The second movement still needs a little more passion and intensity, but the first and third are sounding fantastic. We have the dress rehearsal tomorrow morning in Alice Tully Hall, and I think that will give them time to pull the final details together. It's been amazing to sit through these rehearsals - it...

I just arrived in NY for this week's premiere of Alchemy in Silent Spaces by the Juilliard Orchestra, led by James DePreist. Concert program here.

The first rehearsal will be this afternoon at 2:30 (well, they started on it yesterday, but this will be the first time I get to hear any of it)...

I'm actually a little nervous. I just hope I didn't screw up any of the parts...

Last Thursday night (May 11th), the North Little Rock HS Band, under the direction of Bill Spainhour, held their final concert of the year. This is also the occasion in the past when they would award the Ron Bryant Scholarship to two deserving graduating seniors from the band. Since my father's passing last Fall, this has been renamed the Ron Bryant Memorial Scholarship, and was presented...

As promised, I've got a few more pics from the week to share:



Brett Lawson, myself, and Lewis Clark. Lew is the director at Ramay Jr. HS, and this is backstage at their concert last Thursday night, when they performed "Bloom."



I was sitting backstage just before the Ramay band went on, and I suddenly found myself swarmed by what appears to be the flutes and clarinets. Cool.



Earlier in the day, I...

The fourth and final day of Band Week 2006 was a great success. I thought the band was completely 'on,' and they connected with me throughout Bloom. It was a(nother) satisfying and musical performance, and the audience certainly seemed to dig it! Tyler, who laid down the crucial vibraphone solos at the beginning and end, did a great job - thanks man!

In the morning, we did a run-through and...

Today is my one day "off" in relative terms - no concert tonight. Went to Ramay Jr. HS this morning to work with Lewis Clark's group on Bloom. They sound good - in some respects this might be the hardest of the three pieces happening this week (it has fewer exposed moments than "Dusk," but is the longest of the three and requires a maturity of phrasing and sense of long-range musical arc that...