This Saturday my Sunset + Music event will be included in the ONN/OF festival here in Seattle. People should meet
outside the festival venue (The Sweater Factory in Ballard) at 4:45 to participate in this time-specific music event based around sunset. Participants should download the piece onto their portable listening device, and at the event they’ll be given the cue to press play 10 minutes before sunset. We’ll then sit back and listen and observe the changing of light with the music at this pivotal moment. Click here to download the music for the event.

To review...
1. Participants download the music and put it on their iPod.
2. Show up to The Sweater Factory in Ballard at 4:45pm on Saturday, January 28th
3. Press play when instructed to 10 minutes before sunset!

This event was presented around the country in the summer of 2011. You can read more about the Seattle events from last summer in The Seattle Times or on KUOW's website.

On December 21st Tom Peyton and DoTank presented Tom's Bell by Bell event at Make Music Winter in New York. The video above contains music from both yours truly as well as Tom. I was very excited to write a piece of music for this ensemble, and as you can see from the video, it seems as though the event was successful from the standpoint of turnout as well as the anticipated and welcome outside sounds. This last weekend seems to have been filled with moments of happy accidents with sounds mingling...potatoes frying in a skillet creating fifths slowly inverting upwards with John Luther Adams playing on the stereo, a band saw outside creating a happy drone beneath some Friedman string quartets, and Doug Laustsen played a field recording of my piece, Lament, being performed at MMW on his radio show and noted the sounds intermingling as well. Perhaps my ears are unusually attuned to noticing such things since my Sunset + Music events over the summer encouraged such things, but whatever the case, it's been a pleasant series of sonic events as of late. To hear Lament in its entirety being played at Bell by Bell as well as a few other composers works for this event, click here.

Listening List
Lou Reed - Set the Twilight Reeling
John Luther Adams - The Light that Fills the World
Woody Allen - Wild Man Blues
David Lang - Child
Stravinsky - Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra

     A few days ago I meandered around downtown Tacoma parking garages with a friend of mine (whom I was visiting), a Conch shell and my trusty digital recorder. Though I've often been fond of reverberant spaces and sounds, I hadn't spent too much time experimenting with playing instruments in these types of places, but I was taken aback by the effect. After I finished with a series of notes the sound would come rush back on top of me, and the first time I had an involuntary physical reaction, not unlike the one where you brace yourself for wind upon hearing it coming in your direction. The sounds echoing around urged further experimentation. Though I've long enjoyed a few recordings by Stuart Dempster that were made up at Ft. Worden in a giant empty cistern that has a 45-second reverb time, I previously didn't understand the full scope of how those pieces must be put together thanks to the reverb, or just how interesting it is to experience that sound coming back on you and making your bones vibrate, but now I get the appeal and have a new appreciation for those sounds...and for numerous other people who've since gone up there to record inspired by the possibilities.
     This experimenting has been in preparation for recording the electronics part of a piece I'm doing for winds and fixed media, as well as for the 3rd installment of my iPod/time-site specific pieces, Blue Hour, which will start at sunset and go until it's black. For the winds and fixed media piece I had been using some small pieces of Conch recordings I made in a reverberant stairwell, and I wanted more Conch sound, but then it occurred to me, well, why not have the 5-7 wind players just all play Conch shells during that section? So, I've set about the task of finding a few different sounding conch shells for the different performances of this as of yet untitled work. What could be more exciting than listening to tea kettle sounds followed by 5-7 people playing conch shells? Nothing.
     Conch shells popped up additionally recently when I was listening to a recording that came out this year of some of Cage's number pieces, which were composed towards the end of his life. This particular recording has one track that has two of his works combined, which is something Cage encouraged during his life, but has taken on greater popularity posthumously as people unpack the great treasure trove of works and ideas left behind. Notably, using this technique percussionist Bonnie Whiting Smith has created 51'15.657" for a speaking percussionist. This combination of works on the aforementioned recording, Two3 and 108, has rich undulating textures, surprising harmonies, and some curious and fanciful sounds coaxed out of Conch shell with water. Also perhaps it's fitting to talk about all this today as it's the birthday of Edgar Varese, and where would any of us composers (Cage included) be without him?

John Henry implores you to have a listen to under served and neglected Canadian composer Claude Vivier's Wo bist du Licht! "I really wasn't expecting the turns it took in the 2nd half...and the juxtaposition of the orchestra, soloist and tape are haunting and beautiful - nearly brought me to tears! Also that Gamelan gong starting around 1:20 is so striking, as is all the orchestration," said John. In fact, the harmonic auras surrounding that sound are a result of a trip through Bali, and were a common theme in Vivier's work following that trip. "A pity he died so young! How tragic."

_There’s been a rash of east coast-west coast tension over the last couple of weeks on the tiny island that New Music exists on, with an unusual amount of humor tempering all the banter. This latest round of Montagues and Capulets-esque feuding started with a lively LA Times review of the wild Up performance at Beyond Baroque in L.A. that started with a bit of a jab at a certain handful of composers who reside in Brooklyn. Some of the composers in question seemed rather taken aback that someone would call into question their music - in fact the very foundation that they’ve tried build their ideals upon - and publicly decried the article as being in poor taste and wondering why there was so much hatred being directed at them. Following that there were the west-leaning Grammy nominations. Most recently, a new article in The New York Times seems intent on leaving out reams of music history, the vast majority of contemporary composers and New Music scenes in other cities in favor of promoting a small group of composers who live in New York. Though, perhaps it all boils down to press for some of us. New York’s press is international, whereas here in Seattle, which has an extraordinary music scene of all sorts, the press is mainly only read locally - and even the veracity of that statement is increasingly questionable as the reporting on music (all music, not just New Music) is minimal at best…and often only reports other reporting. Surely a broader picture would’ve been painted if only there were more people writing about the goings on outside of New York.

But I digress – luckily, humorous diversions abound these days to lighten the mood such as this wonderful new mechanism for generating program notes or grant proposals. There’s this cute video, and then there’s this remarkable collection of photographs documenting curious ideas new and old. Perhaps this humor will get us through to age 103, as Elliot Carter will do on Sunday. Happy Birthday Mr. Carter – your music was the first contemporary music I ever played when I was in high school – thanks for the continuing inspiration.

I couldn't be more pleased that on Saturday, December 10th Jeremiah Cawley of The Box Is Empty will be conducting my piece Kugami, which is for men's choir and soprano with piano, cello and bass clarinet. The event will be at 3:00pm in Brechemin Recital Hall on the campus of the University of Washington. This piece was originally debuted at Seattle Pacific University under the direction of Ken Pendergrass. Jeremiah's ensemble, The Box Is Empty is a project-based New Music ensemble that is interested not only in playing the hits from contemporary repertoire, but also in expanding undeveloped areas of New Music such as the choral realm. If the amazing performances at the all-Andriessen concert earlier this year is any indication, this new ensemble will be an exceptional addition to New Music...don't miss their next concert on January 21 at The Chapel here in Seattle.

_ Henry Cowell - Piano Music of Henry Cowell - Sorrell Davis Hays
Outkast - Big Boi & Dre Present...
Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation
Benny Goodman - Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert
James Tenney - Spectral Canon for Conlon Nancarrow
Fats Waller - Jitterbug Waltz
J.S. Bach - Goldberg Variations (Simone Dinnerstein)
Panda Bear - Person Pitch
Atlas Sound - Parallax