Why Music? Pt2

Theology/Mythology

Being born to liberal parents, I was always encouraged to ask questions. So I did.

One of the biggest questions I wanted to know was why do my Catholic neighbors believe differently from my Dutch Reformed Grandparents when they both of their religion sprouts from the same book. Even though I asked this early in my life, it wasn't until high school when I started looking into different religions.

From dating a Mormon girl and going to service with her, to watching my Wiccan perform prayers to their pantheon. I asked what and why they believed. For the most part the reason was because it was what they have always known, the religion of their parents. Some believed because they would fear the alternative, which they were told was an eternity of torture. Others believed, or didn't believe, because it just "suited them."

As I grew through college I took a few religion classes, and they fascinated me. For a month or two, unbenounced to my parents, I minored in Theology. But I stopped for two reasons; 1- the class work took time away from practicing and rehearsals and concerts. 2- I found the teaching and lessons to be very one-sided. By that I mean my lessons were more of how the teachers religion was correct when Islam or Catholic was wrong or a misinterpretation of "The Book." But when I talked to a Muslim, he was right and the Christian theology was wrong. It was at this point that I adoptied a new outlook, "if one is to understand the great mystery one must study all its aspects." -To quote a geek movie phrase-

So I looked into Taoism, Zoroastrianism, Hinduism, (Buddhism is more of a philosophy than a religion) and even did some reading on the history of the Bible. And though my journey I have learned a great deal of different ideologies and beliefs, I seem to cannot get enough information. What causes people to believe something so patiently that they would disown their own children, or even kill a stranger because they have a difference in belief?

So I study on. I read cases for and against a God so I can form my own opinion. I cannot help it. It is like a drug that I need. A thirst for knowledge that cannot be quenched, like Tantilis. Or a self inflicted council of Nicaea ruffling through pages of what some people believe to be true. As I continue, I do not expect to ever learn some great truth or revelation, but as one of my greatest teachers have taught me, "It isn't the destination that is important. It is your journey."

Why Music? pt1

In my life, I have found three things that completely fascinate me: Astronomy, Theology/Mythology, and Music.

Astronomy-
When I was a young pup, I had a big National Geographic book called, "The Universe." Each chapter was about something in our solar system, starting with the Sun, than to Mercury, Venus, and even Pluto had its own chapter (You see, Pluto was still a planet back then). The last chapter was about what was past the solar system, what other life might live out there, and how long it would even take to get from our planet to the nearest star (about 4.5 years if traveling at the speed of light). There was a page that had all the planets next to the sun to show just how big everything was. That page started me down the path to learn more. Even with how big the Earth was, we were so tiny compared to Jupiter, not to mention our Sun itself. And the idea that our Sun is just one of hundreds of billions of other stars in our galaxy, not to mention the Milky Way is one of hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe, made me feel so incredibly small, so insignificant, and so humble. I wanted to learn as much as I could, but at the time when I was a child, math was not one of my strong cards and the equations I saw the astronomers work with seemed laughably impossible for me to try and conceive. But since then I have read my share of Hawking, Einstein, and Sagan to learn about how super-masive stars have the ability to make smaller stars that can support life. I read news articles about the latest breakthroughs and currant missions that are being planed by NASA. And even now, some 30 years later, I can look up at the stars (of the ones I can see in the Vegas night sky) and still feel so incredibly small, so insignificant, and so humble.

A New Work...

Hello to all who are reading this. Sometime has passed since last I wrote about what I was working on. To tell the truth, a lot has happened in that time. A new spark has kindled an old fire for a project that I had an idea for years ago. I have many ideas of compositions that I want to do. A sonata in G major for Violin and Cello. A Piano Scherzo in E flat minor. A Passacaglia and Fugue in D minor. Just to name a few. But those are now put on the back burner for right now. For right now I have a new composition that will be capitalizing my composing.

It is an Opera. An acoustic rock Opera to be more precise. Two acoustic guitarists, one acoustic basest, and percussionist, and a pianists for the "orchestra." The cast consists of two males, a Tenor and a Baritone, and four females, two Alto and two Soprano. I am keeping it small so it could be performed in a black-box if needed.

The story is a story that I have been playing around with for years, but I could never put the right words together the way that I wanted. But recently I have gotten in contact with a librettist from Vancouver, Canada, and we have been busting out the Opera on a pretty good pace. We are hopeful that it will be done by the end of the year so we can start shopping it early 2014.

As of right now, the working Title is, "Julia."

Nocturne No.1 in C Minor

Nocturne No.1 in C minor

With this composition I have made it more of a priority to hold back. Taking a, "less is more" mentality when composing it, this piece is not focused on technique so much as it focuses on story telling in the music. Mozart is known for his operas. He loved Opera. Even his solo works have a story element in them. I have always had a story playing in my head when I played. When it was a manic depression of a lover in a Beethoven sonata, or exploding balls of mirrored glass against a blood-red sky of a Chopin etude, the images in my head helped me learn a piece and play it. 

The hardest part of composing this, besides having my youngest hanging on my back as I did it, was to hold back. Not for fear of not being able to play it, or trying to sound showy, but to show myself that I can hold back, and in doing so, really being able to let loose a dark part of my music. 

About the technical parts:

This piece of mine, this Nocturne, is set in a very basic rondo form: (ABABCAB) with slight variations with every passing AB. I go from common time to 3/4 every other measure to build an almost uncertainty for strong and weak beats for the listener. The time is not all completely vague, the transition from A to B is noticeable almost mockingly. The trio section, C, brings the play between common and 3/4 together with the treble playing triplets over the bass playing duplets. Melody in a slow waltz as the accompany plays an adagio 2/4 omm-pa. I would be interested to see how a dancer would chose to choreograph to this. After the dancing of the C, we move back into the familiar AB section until the end.

Tonically specking,this isn't very in-depth. It stays fairly diatonic through out the C minor A and B as well as the dominate minor tonic in the trio. 

The story, or the emotion that invoked it, is my own,  and telling you what it was would rob you of what it would mean to you, the listener. When you do hear it, I would love to hear what you thought of it. What you felt, if there was a story for you, or colors it reminded you of. Thanks for your feed back.

The Importance of Red

the Red of lips, the Red rose
the Red of days gone to those
the Red of truth, the Red to me
the Red of passion inside thee
the Red of you, the Red of song
the Red of places I belong
the Red of socks, the Red of sound
the Red of love to which I'm bound
the Red of hope, the Red of light
the Red of faces in delight
the Red of lust, the Red of death
the Red of life in your breath
the Red of sex, the Red inside
the Red of everything that I hide
the Red of black, the Red of gold
the Red of Red new and old
the Red of wind, the Red of water
the Red of earths lonely daughter
the Red of war, the Red of tears
the Red of chocolate woven fears
the Red of music, the Red of mud
the Red of everything in my blood
all of this Red and more
all of this that I adore
all of this that I've said
all that is the importance of Red

For me, and for those who want to know.

There is not a moment in my life that I can recall when I wasn't surrounded by music. Before me, my parents worked at a record store. I remember one of the first things I ever learned was how to put a record on a turn table without scratching it. There was a wall in the house I grew up in that had shelves full of vinyl. Hundreds, if not thousands, of records always playing. Beatles, Talking Heads, Bob Dylan, Beethoven, Ministry, you name it. So, to put it mildly, I grew up engulfed by music.

I grew, and developed an interest on learning a musical instrument, specifically the Drums. My Mom agreed, but insisted that first I must take a year or so of Piano studio. At my age then, and due to the already constant ridicule from other kids my age at school, I thought the Piano was for girls and didn't want to give more fodder for my so called "peers." You see, I struggled in school. Being diagnosed with dyslexia and ADHA, I had a label to help describe why that was. It was a "learning disability." So, in my young mind, it was an excuse that I could tell myself. But my Mom was dissatisfied with that. She taught me to use music to help me in my studies. Using my talent of hearing a song once and being able to repeat it back, she taught me how to memorize my spelling words with melodies. It helped, but barley. 

It wasn't until I saw the movie, "Great Balls of Fire" that I decided I wanted to play the Piano. Let me rephrase that. I wanted to play like Jerry Lee Lewis. I wanted people losing their minds as I played. I wanted girls throwing themselves at me because I could play like that. And it was then that I developed a crush on Winona Ryder. So I told my parents I wanted to learn how to play the Piano. 

I started late, in comparison to other kids I would later compete against. Eleven. After two years of lessons I started taking Drums, but still kept the Piano as my main instrument. After three years, I auditioned for the Piano department at LVA, the performing arts magnet school here in Las Vegas, and was accepted. It was there I feel I truly came into the beginning of who I am today. (how many times can you refer to yourself in one sentence?) I started as a freshman with three years of piano study playing with and against kids who have been playing since they were two, and I was holding my own too. 

Now, the transition from originally wanting to play rock-n-roll to wanting to play classical goes thusly: 

The year before LVA, when I was still in Jr high, I was learning the Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor "Quasi una fantasia", Op. 27, No 2 Mvt 1 by Beethoven, more popularly known as "The Moonlight Sonata,"  and I couldn't wrap my head around it. I didn't understand why it was going the way it was, why it moved the way it did. And it wasn't until my Mother sat me down and told me that Beethoven was deff, and this was the sound of his pain not being able to hear. I know now know that he could still hear when he wrote that music, but the idea of bringing an emotion to sound fascinated me. It still does. And then the wanting to learn how to play became a need.

So, at 11 years old: I was reading and doing math about two grades lower than the rest of kids my age, the other subjects were not that much better. I start taking Piano lessons and excel at it. Fast forward to my senior year of High School, I am taking college level English classes, and an honors level Math (I would have been in an AP math class but I had too many tours, music competitions, concerts and rehearsals that took up much of my time), and I was double majoring in Piano Performance and Percussion Performance. I got into college, a feet I never thought possible before I started Piano lessons. Not only did I think I could get into college, I never thought I would be good enough at anything to study it in depth. But at the dear ol' U of R, I took the opportunity to study Piano at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. Pretty bad ass, right? You tell my younger self that was going to happen and he would have laughed at you.

As I grew in my music skills, I fell in love with theory and composing. I was still fascinated with the idea of translating emotion into sound. So I graduated from college with a BM in Music Studies, emphasizing in Piano Performance, Percussion Performance, and Music Theory/Composition. 

Let us move up to today, and the reason I am starting this blog. 

Since graduating from college I have had surgery on both of my arms due to cubital tunnel syndrome. I cannot play the big Rachmaninov and Chopin works like I use.  My arms don't have it in them like they use to, not yet anyhow. Instead of falling and feeling sorry for myself, I turn to my composing. I feel like now, with a little bit of real life under my belt, I can translate my emotion into music. 

My wife, my inspiration, suggested that I start this blog to talk in depth about the compositions I am currently working on. The places that they originate. To tell you, the listener, what it is exactly that the composition means to me. 

I started this with a history of how I got here (a little in sight, if you will), to let you know what music has done for me. I will continue to compose, with or with out bad arms, and I hope this gives a little more understanding on how I do it.

Now if you will excuse me, I am going to my Piano (Winona) and translate some more.