Rain Check Redeemed

 “Well, but not having any clue has never interfered with my certainty that I have the answer.”
Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

My sister, the dentist-baffling comedienne....

Conversation with my dentist and oral hygienist

OH: Do you chew gum?

Me: Occasionally I'll chew Trident.

OH: You should try Orbit. It’s the only one I’ll chew.

Me: But they don't have cinnamon.

Dentist: You chew Trident? If you like that I have one you’ll like better.

Me: Orbit?

D: Have you tried it?

Me - No, because they don’t have a flavor I like. So I guess you are the one dentist?

[blank look from all]

Me: You know. The commercial? “9 out of 10 dentists recommend Trident” ...you must be the one hold-out.

[blank look].

I should really quit trying to be funny.

As noted here, my friend Frank Warren’s Quartet will regretfully be deferred to the Fall, and he agreed to write a new piece for April. His Three Notions of Love & Ruin, Op. 50 for Alto Flute & Bassoon was delivered on 28 February.

I need to consider the flow of the program....

Let the Joint Jump

 Life with WCRB: When even the parakeet says, “Oh, God! Not the Grieg Piano Concerto AGAIN?!”

Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

Chief: “Max, take good care of this; the tailor charged us a fortune to rip it up like that.”

Agent 86: “Chief, I’ve got a dry cleaner that’ll do this for nothing.”

Probably my sole pre-compositional thought for the final of the Op. 178 duets was: a short, jaunty wrap-up. The first sound file (from January 2025) is simply the hopped-up “Three Blind Mice” alluded to here. It was only a start, but so pleased was I with those opening 15 bars that my thought then was to make the entire piece a patchwork of found musical objects. By April of 2025, the piece ran to 70-ish bars, at around which point, I’ll allow that work pretty much stalled. Ian Anderson/Jethro Tull came to my aid: I decided that his Bach adaptation, “Bourrée” would provide the next episode. I made note of three tunes yet to employ (I wound up not using “Frère Jacques.”) Most notably, I wanted to close the piece with Thelonious Monk’s “Straight, No Chaser.” I finally girt up my musical loins this past weekend, and essentially finished composition yesterday. As at times happens, I got all the notes set down as I wished, and today I saw to setting the dynamics landscape, so I can now pronounce Janky Juke Joint, Op. 178 № 3 finished.

At Last

 WCRB Programming sez, “Take a walk on the mild side!”

— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.

— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Mine auld friend Chris Forbes, I have found it highly gratifying to see, has hit a composition Sweet Spot and is completing new pieces right and left. On our phone call, he remarked that it has been a simple matter of doing some work each day. An attentive reader of this blog will know that I have made a similar observation more than once. I post today to report that I returned to work at last on Janky Juke Joint. For now, that is all.

For When We Are Again Six

 Pärt’s spare parrot

— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

When I was your age, I’d have jumped at the chance. But then again, I wasn’t second rate.

— Jonathan Winters twitting Jack Klugman in a pool room in The Twilight Zone

Pam Marshall just finished her new piece for us, Dreaming in Spirals. Alan Westby & Chris Forbes are at work on new pieces.  I intend adding clarinet and double-bass to Cape of Good Nope for color. I have already composed Simple Music specifically for the event (whenever we may pin a date down.) And we should reprise the Fantasia on a Theme of Rahsaan Roland Kirk. I feel just a shade sheepish looking so far ahead when I still need to finish Janky Juke Joint, but I should look ahead, you know.

Photo: on a balcony in Puerto Rico 14 years ago today, composing one of the Tiny Wild Avocados.

Eleven Years Ago Yesterday

 More people are misspelling the falls “Niagra;” wonder where that comes from?

Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

The spirit of freedom is not buried in the grave of the valiant.

— Dr Martin Luther King, Jr

From the archive ... 23 Feb 2015:

A growth story: added 28 measures (40") to Discreet Erasures, Op. 99
More tomorrow!

After the passing of Charles Wuorinen, I retroactively designated him the piece’s dedicatee. For his spirit presided over my work on the piece. Not necessarily in its musical material or operations, but as I fondly remembered how he encouraged me to push beyond whatever insufficiently-perceived musical barriers might have hemmed me in. Fun fact: I submitted the Op. 99 to a call for scores. It was not selected, of course, but the episode stands out for being the rare instance when I got some specific feedback. One of the judges pronounced the piece ‘unplayable,’ (which at the least justifies my belated dedication.) I am not convinced that this is at all true, and the incident may just illustrate the limitations of the judges empaneled for such calls.

The photo was taken by Maria Bablyak.

Rain Check Issued

 Occasionally someone asks me, “Do you dream music?”

Last nightI dreamt that The Addams Family and Mission: Impossible had swapped theme songs. Your mission, Gomez, should you decide to accept it ... the Secretary will deny any knowledge of Uncle Fester. And the IMF team? — they’re creepy and they're kooky.

Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

... my, and probably your, son.

— Madeleine Kahn, straightening Graham Chapman out on a detail in Yellowbeard

As reported here, one of the pieces written by colleagues for the April concert at King’s Chapel was Frank Warren’s Opus 119 Quartet. Frank and I have been in touch regarding the fact that we shall be a trio for this concert, and he is setting to write a duet for Alto Flute and Bassoon by way of a substitution.

nearly a poem

 Lawd, I done cracked my iPhone’s screen,

Dang, but it’s the wust trouble I ever seen,

If’n I kin git it fixed, mebbe I won’t feel so mean....

— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

Maurice Chevalier: Your maman was a married woman.

Audrey Hepburn: I’m SO glad ....

he wrote it and he called it a poem

he wrote a poem about the things he sees

the hair of the person sitting before

the toes of the shoes of the person sitting behind

both black and with its own particular shine

the black cat crouched beneath the rose-bush the cat running from the sound of his voice

the green of the leaf the red of the single blossom

the green of the tag at the black cat's neck the sound of the tag in the collar as the cat runs

the black of the laptop of the person sitting beside

the gentle black of his suit the cut of the suit

the black of his hair the black of his turban

the smell of the green leaf the scent of the red blossom

the feeling in his ears as he walks into the silence of the small backyard

for there is a feeling that is a special feeling

apart from the silence itself

and if he could get at that feeling why

he would write a poem

and the sky would weep

and the tears would be joy

and that black cat would wish it had stayed indoors

(...nearly a poem)

9.vi.99