Preparation

I know it would have been a distraction from plot development, so I’m not proposing any change to the movie, but am I the only one to wonder, on seeing the self-driving cars in Minority Report, if they still run on gasoline?
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

The readiness is all.

— Hamlet

Sixteen years ago this past Friday: 18 Sep 2010 Just booked my flight to Rochester for the première of the Viola Sonata opus 102.

There have been non-musical activities enough that there has been no brooding, as such, but there is no denying that the months following the April King’s Chapel concert have shown me my limitations as a forecaster of what I might expect. That said, while the process of getting from A to B was mostly an experience of bewilderment, in terms of Henningmusick, at least, the program we are putting together for 28 October is just what I wished. I am not pleased that circumstances forced me to disappoint fellow composers who have furnished pieces whose performance I feel we have to delay, and I wish we might have found a second date on which to repeat the program, mais c'est la vie.

The most important facts, for which I have ample occasion to be grateful are firstly, that I enjoy the privilege of working with excellent colleagues who are unfailingly enormously supportive. And secondly, that the Woburn Public Library is so welcoming to our making music in their beautiful space.

First rehearsal tomorrow. I mean, not absolutely the first rehearsal, as we've read a couple og the pieces a vew months ago, but it’s the first of our freshly linked tranche of rehearsals now that we have a firm concert date.

Program for 28 October

One of the most poignant things about watching Independence Day is: the Towers yet stood.
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

I’m sorry, I did not create the Cosmos, I merely explain it.
— Mel Ferrer, in A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy

For one reason or another, uncertainty has hung over this projected concert for so long, that I devised no fewer than three possible programs. No matter: now that we are officially a quintet for the Library, the program will fulfill my two key wishes: a reprise of the Op. 197 Fantasia on a Theme by Rahsaan Roland Kirk, and the première of Simple Music, the piece I specifically composed for this season. Given our Dan’s sabbatical, it was necessary (but not at all difficult) to modify the scoring.

Music, Simple and Otherwise

Karl Henning (1960) Magnificat a 4 (2006) Full Ensemble (3:30)
Frank Warren (1950) Three Notions of Love & Ruin, Op. 50 (2025) Alto Flute & Bassoon (4:00)
Henning, Simple Music, Op. 205a Full Ensemble (première) (10:00)
Dennis Báthory-Kitsz (1949) Just Another Love Song (2025) C Flute, Alto Flute & Bassoon (4:00)
Warren, Passacalyawhatever, Op. 116 (première) C Flute, Alto Flute & Bassoon (6:00)
Henning, One for Ahmad, Op. 208b C Flute, Full Ensemble (première) (4:00)
Henning Cape of Good Nope, Op. 206 Full Ensemble (première) (6:00)
Henning Fantasia on a Theme by Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Op. 197a (2025) Full Ensemble (8:30)
Total Duration: 46:00

Peter H Bloom, C Flute, Alto Flute
Todd Brunel, Soprano Clarinet, Bass Clarinet
Carol Epple, C Flute
Greta Rosen, Bassoon
Dave Zox, Double-Bass

 

Somewhat More for Ahmad

 From my Google search history:
Is there a trick to grating ginger?
— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

We’re developing a new citizenry. One that will be very selective about cereals and automobiles, but won’t be able to think.
— Rod Serling

I composed One for Ahmad back in the Thinking Threesome days, but that was actually my second go at the piece. I originally thought about a piece for the full ensemble. Now that we are a quintet for the 28 Oct concert at the Library, I have added two voices to the piece; in a way, a return to the original conception.

On Two Simples

 The Schnook, the Creep, His Spite and Her Mother
— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

“In the meantime, sir,” said Mr Chillip, “they are much disliked; and as they are very free in consigning everybody who dislikes them to Perdition, we really have a good deal of Perdition going on in our neighborhood!”
— Dickens, David Copperfield

A day or so ago I pretty much chopped out (the music having in large part taken shape in my head) the fourth Opus 211 Simple Prelude.

To my delight, it looks like Dave will be available for our 28 October concert. So now, I wonders, how easily will Simple Music “reduce” to quintet?...

@karl-henning-1

Bringing On the Unease

 “Microwave for three minutes?”
I can’t wave that small for such a long time.
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

Tonality and modality are no more than words in a dictionary. They are of practical use but by no means indispensable. If you look at history, you’ll see that after birdsong, which imitated rain, the oceans and the noise of storms, people began to sing in octaves and fifths, according to the natural distribution of voices; then came modes — pentatonic modes from China, diatonic ones from Greece and chromatic ones from India. This modal language was used for centuries, because tonality as such didn’t emerge until Bach’s day, when it was merged with a highly modal and chromatic language. Before him, Monteverdi and Gesualdo were highly chromatic, just as Mozart was after him. If you like, tonality proper has existed for only two centuries, and Beethoven strikes me as the only composer who is frankly tonal. With Chopin and even more with Debussy, this famous tonality becomes veiled once again. Beyond these concepts, the only phenomenon inherent to the world of sound and which composers have to take into account is resonance.
— Olivier Messiaen, from an interview with Jean-Christophe Marti, January 1992

A collaboration which was years in the waiting: my colleague and friend, the most excellent guitarist Aaron Larget-Caplan, has created the première of Uneasy Sleep, Op. 203, and the composer could not possibly be better pleased.

A young couple and their energetic little girl were seated on the bench in front of me, and as I intended recording video on my phone, I thought with mildly amused pleasure what fun it would be if the child vocalised during my piece, which would be in accord with Aaron’s earlier remarks on John Cage. However, the mother had the most considerate thought of taking her daughter to the front of the club to forestall any disturbance (though as I say, I should not have considered myself or my piece disturbed.

Lesser or Even Least Works

 Seen on the Internet: You do not need a parachute to skydive. You need a parachute to skydive twice.
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
— Stephen Jay Gould

Today I finished the third of the Op. 211 Simple Preludes. I had to start over twice, until I reminded myself that my rubric for these pieces is: If I don’t know where the material wants to go, it’s probably not simple enough. I cast bot hands on treble clef, as my intention at the outset was to borrow material for the C Flute/Alto Flute duet, Illusions I Can Live With. How many Simple Preludes will I wind up writing? Not sure. Maybe I stop at three? We shall see.

A Date

 From almost nothing, vast somethings arise.
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

Whenever you write, whatever you write, never make the mistake of assuming the audience is any less intelligent than you are.
— Rod Serling

If I accomplished nothing else musical this week (and I don’t believe I did) we have a date for a concert at the Woburn Public Library: Wednesday, 28 October.

Don’t ask me yet whether we’ll be a quartet or quintet ... Watch This Space