Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
recorded and engineered by honey owens
Archive for the 'Present' Category
Page 2 of 2
A few weeks ago in my composition class at PSU, my professor introduced us to a piece called OK FEEL GOOD by a composer named Jonathan Newman. I was instantly taken back by it. The piece was written, as Newman states in the notes of the score, during “a year of somewhat intense personal distress, and I was extremely tired of feeling bad, so I decided to write a very happy piece.”
To me it’s an amazing work, full of lush melodic color and pulsating with rhythmic motion. I specifically state this because the motivic material is written in a somewhat odd meter. It starts with a bar of 7/16, goes into a bar of 3/8, back into another bar of 7/16, and then finishes with two bars of a more common 3/4. But it manages to flow very well. It has many moods, no doubt due to the fact of his intentional transition from dark to light, and it’s easy to her his love of jazz rhythms, percussion, and Gershwin. It’s warm and very tender at times, extremely sexy at others, and it reminds me a lot of a Don Ellis composition. It’s rad.
The seven and a half minute long composition was written for the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble and debuted on July 12, 1996 at the Harris Hall as part of the world renowned Aspen Music Festival. The orchestration is for a small six person chamber group: Flute (doubling Piccolo), B-flat Clarinet (doubling Bass Clarinet), Violin, Cello, Piano, and Percussion (Crotales, Xylophone, Vibraphone, Marimba, Triangle, Suspended Cymbal, Conga).
Finally I would also like to mention that Mr. Newman is part-founder and member of the BCM International, a consortium of four composers: Newman, Jim Bonney, Steven Bryant, and Eric Whitacre, who was the artist in residence at the APU School of Music two years ago. He adapted ideas and themes from Milton’s epic poem to a multimedia opera/dance/stage performance with live and prerecorded music and entitled it Paradise Lost. Interesting idea, sort of trendy output. Anyway I thought it was cool that they all work together and promote each other. Something of a no brainer but refreshing to see for two composers that I had no idea were connected.
Each year, a couple of friends and I from Sioux City always make, and trade, our (sometimes not) uniquely own “Best Of” mixes from our favorites of that year. But this year I decided to make a mixtape of snippets from some of the songs I really enjoyed. I must admit that I strayed from my usual stern path of checking out the new releases and struggled, or maybe better put: was tempted, to push a lot of the “popular records” into my final decision. In the end, I opted to not include some of the popular “top 10″ records (i.e. panda bear, beriut, the national, etc.),but I did have fun with it, in fact I had a blast! Here’s my compressed, comparitvely short, last hooray for the Best Music of 2007. Check it out:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
I am consciously not including the tracks played in this mix with hopes that you will help me, by commenting the artist/song, and revel in some of the similarity, or at least knowledge, of this years’ fruits. I open up the comment board to you to post anything you recognize.
I have also compiled an image of scenes/posters from some of my favorite movies I saw in 2007. By far, this doesn’t include them all, nor are they in any specific order. I also have quite a list I of flicks I still am anticipating. Some of those being: Once, King of Kong, Into the Wild, Juno, I’m Not There, The Band’s Visit, The Life Of Reilly, and many others. Here’s a pop-up of that image:
Whaddaya think? Let me know if you dig ‘em and please recommend your favorite screengems to me as well. As previously indicated, I once again invite you to tag the movies you recognize via flickr (link to the image, use the “add note” function) and help me better understand your thrills from the great, heavy, and joyous year of our lord, two thousand seven. Here’s to you and, more than well deserving, TO US.
Dated news for some, new for others, I moved:
425 se 3rd ave #208
portland, or 97214, usa
and I’m finally making my first Dash! record:
Titled Gets Unrecovered, it’s a collection of some of the new, some of the old. Eleven tracks, also showcasing a kind, bonus element including a Crystal Seth -> Righteous jam and a few selections from a film score that I am excited about/equally proud of. It should be ready for release, via Marriage and The Prescott Family next Wednesday, coincidentally when I fly back to my parent’s house, and my hometown, of Sioux City.
Lots to come in the near future including a The Righteous and Harmonious Fists Tour tour blog as well as some fat videos when I treat myself to a Christmas present of a digital camera, or maybe a cat, I haven’t decided yet1. Also, I’ve been thinking deeply about going into a classical composers bend of in-depth research/background/history alphabetically and vibeing on some shit of their’s when it hits me hardest…we’ll see, maybe a new years resolution, amongst others. Hope you dig it. Also, a top 10 albums/movies of the year vid/pod-cast…on it!
1 Well, actually I kinda have…realistically, a external hd. ya know? shit! that’s the market to be in these dayz, damn.
Speaking of visual and conceptual relationships, I’ve been enjoying some strange trips from using a unique software called RGB MusicLab. It was cleverly designed by Kenji Kojima who explains it quite well by saying,
RGB MusicLab converts RGB (Red, Green and Blue) value of an image to chromatic scale sounds. The program reads RGB value of pixels from the top left to the bottom right of an image. One pixel makes a harmony of three note of RGB value, and the length of note is determined by brightness of the pixel. RGB value 120 or 121 is the center C, and RGB value 122 or 123 is added a half steps of the scale that is C#. Pure black that is R=0, G=0, B=0 is no sounds.
It is not an impression of paintings or photographs of a composer. It reads a score from an image data directly.
So, as l recall one of the most influential exhibits I’ve ever experienced, here a few pieces I’ve come up with.
Duration: 0:30
Tempo: 183
Instrumentation: 2 electronic kits (right and left channels), 1 saw wave (center)
hmm…an interesting start
Duration: 2:09
Tempo: 440
Instrumentation: Choir (left), atmosphere (center), orchestral harp (right)
notice how dark the image is in relation to the pitch
Duration: 1:05
Tempo: 470
Instrumentation: celesta (left), pizzicato strings (center), slap bass (right)
this one moves quite quick but is full of color
Duration: 1:15
Tempo: 190
Instrumentation: music box (left), guitar harmonics (center), woodblock (right)
similar color throughout, crazy ending(?)
Duration: 2:02
Tempo: 600
Instrumentation: harpsichord
Keep in mind, this is Bach’s seal in which he signed his music
Duration: 3:51
Tempo: 137
Instrumentation: Electric Piano (left), Car Engine (center), Electric Piano (right)
Spastic, yet rich and full
Duration: 0:29
Tempo: 80
Instrumentation: Tubular Bells (left), Rain (center), Tubular Bells (right)
The fluidity of this picture seems to bring out an actual “song”
Duration: 0:31
Tempo: 600
Instrumentation: Celesta (left), Dulcimer (center), Celesta (right)
I absolutely love this interpretation, it is mad and fits the mood completely
Duration: 1:27
Tempo: 309
Instrumentation: Timpani (left), Reverse Cymbal (center), Electric Piano (right)
Totally rad and conveniently weird — a true stare.
Duration: 1:20
Tempo: 151
Instrumentation: Percussive Organ (left), Contrabass (center), Bottle Blow (right)
Reminds me of the moth and it’s journey
Although completed in the spring of 2007, I have yet to show my first large-scale symphonic work, The Sioux City Symphony, to a wide audience. I worked on it for about a year, originally as a self-commissioned goal of submitting it to the 2007 APU Composition Competition and lately, still without feedback, I have been revisiting the piece to hear how my ear has changed, for better or worse. A lot of time has passed since I finished it and I had to take a big step back and let the work ferment. I still remember going mad in my room with excitement and frustration, often working on it for hours late into the early morning and leaving my eyes strained and the mark of headphones embedded into my hair.
I realize there is a lot I could tell you about each movement, let alone the work as a whole. A statement of sorts. This is something that I’ve been wrestling with ever since I started. Addressing that now, all I can say is that for the time being I’m not going to can’t say anything more than I already have. I will say that I’d like to share my feelings, as tedious and boring as they might be, about different sections and movements, melodic lines, ideas, influences, etc. in the future. I hope you understand.
I don’t expect a lot of feedback and, to me, that is completely justified. It is hardly accessible1 in many aspects, but I must show it to you! I must give it away! Keeping it hidden2 would be much much worse, and selfish. So I now present to you…
1st Movement: Adagio (3:44)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
2nd Movement: Allegretto (2:31)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
3rd Movement: Andante con moto (3:59)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
1 I apologize for the MIDI rendition and hope it is not too much of a distraction. What you’ll hear has very little to do with the sound. It’s all about the notes.
2Feel free to download a copy of the full score as well. (1st Movement — 2nd Movement — 3rd Movement) For me, reading scores has become very enjoyable as well as a way to observe many more details and articulations.
Part 1
So on my first day of school I wake up, begrudgingly, on time and reach over to grab my glasses and they’re gone.
What the hell?
But then remember that I watched an episode of Peep Show on my computer, lying down on my bed right before I went to sleep.
Well damn-it, they gotta be around here somewhere!
I start searching my floor. Unfortunately my floor, which is wood and covered with a dark brown rug, is the same color as my specs and I have to shuffle my socks so I don’t step on them. Nothing. I get down on my stomach and try to look horizontally at the ground and see them peeking up. Nothing. I tear my bed apart.
Are they folded in the sheets? Stuck in a pillowcase?
Nothing. So now I’m kinda feeling defeated, still really tired, and the brilliant idea came into my head…
What if I reenact the scene, maybe then I’ll get a better idea of where to look deeper.
So I doze pretty quickly, almost sure that they’ll just show up in my hand whenever I decide to wake.
(2 hours later)
Nothing. Things start to get very frustrating for me. I’ve now missed my first class at my new school but I can deal with that, whatever. It’s more that I’m literally quite attached to my glasses, they have been a part of my life — my face — since I was in the 4th grade so naturally I am put in a weird position. I feel totally helpless, lazy, and a huge eye-strain headache coming on.
WTF?!? Why today?
So I decide to take the bus to work, I can’t drive. I adjust the computer monitor to the lowest resolution it’ll go and still scooch my nose up to the screen. But then I start to realize something.…
Without eyesight, I have total freedom. Well at least a sort of freedom…from stares, uncomfortable directness, details.
I know I have to take advantage of the day, this feeling, and I start to enjoy being eyeless in Portland. When evening comes I play a show with Davis and Adrian at Valentines. Quietly content with not trying to make contact with much more than the sounds my heightened ears are awakening my conscious mind to, I listen to Privacy perform one of the most beautiful shows I’ve ever heard her play. Our show is a mixture of me fumbling a bit on an old Casio keyboard and closing my eyes and feeling my way around the electronic drumpads. There’s a unseen energy that comes out when you forget about looking. We were feeling it.
Even if I find those damn frames I think I’m gonna ride this day out sans sight
We go back to NoPo and Davis and I look around my room for a few minutes. I’m checking the bathroom again, just in case, and Davis calls out “Hey, I found them.” I hear his voice as I walk down the hall. “These it?”, he says as he picks up my glasses from a milk crate next to my desk.
Yep, that’s them. But I’m just starting to let go.…I think I’m gonna finish this day on my own.
Part 2
There was a pretty rad event last night on the 4th floor of the Oak Street Building, 16mm film loops by experimental short filmmaker Devon Damonte and music from Michael and Curtis Knapp, Adam Forkner, and Adrian Orange. Co-presented by Marriage Records and our neighbor 40 Frames, it turned out to be, well, a lot like Damonte described it:
“Multiple projectors manipulate handmade cameraless 16mm motion graphics. Imagery is textures and text forms rubbed from beach glass fragments onto variegated grids of engineering plotting papers. Magical contact plastics, photocopies and lots of adhesive tape are also involved.”
Read more about one of the films that was shown, “Radioactive Spider”, in an interview from 2002.
Here is a short video montage of the event:
**********************************************************************************************************************************************
1) Making an awesome portfolio for the Composition Department faculty in the School of Music at PSU.
It’s nice to realize that you’ve created some cool projects throughout the years, worked hard, and now get to showcase them in a nice package. Also a big challenge.
2) PSU?!? Yep, PSU!
This has been a huge decision to make and has only recently come into my mind. I had no intention of staying in Portland after this summer when I originally came, but the opportunity has presented itself in a very welcoming way and I have really felt the urge to continue living here and finishing up school at Portland State University. They have small but loving composition program and I’ve already gotten a chance to meet some of the other students.
3) Making delicious salads.
This is pretty obvious, but there’s nothing like a nice fresh bowl of greens in the afternoon. Find a good smoked cheese and thin hand grater for extra tastiness. Yum..
4) Seeing old friends in the near future (Taku, Gina, Jerry, Chris, the Spense & the Gib…).
Might be a while before I see ya’ll again, so this one’s very important and exciting for me.
5) The Prescott Family’s new webspace!
’Bout ready to drop & it’s gonna be hot!
6) Reading stuff that people write.
1: Awesome article by Alisha for SHADES : 2:Shout-out to Michigan crew : 3: Killer thread about some new b-ball recruit for the Iowa State Cyclones
7) The Japanese version of this.
Imagine Thanksgiving playing reggae music in Japan, with extra tracks featuring yours truly.
WTF? This show for sure!
Hilarious write-up for our show with Adrian and Ghosting. I have no idea how we’re going to deliver this drug for the price people are paying ($6…at 9PM…tomorrow.….), but it should be a trip…
9) The Rock ‘n’ Roll Camp for Girls turning some cute kids into serious rockers.
Check this out for some serious laughs, click for lyrics.
10) Speak — Sometimes People Make A War
I found this video underneath the weight of the Marriage site replacing a missing link on one of the posts and think about it just about every day. It’s for real.