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.
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
Throughout everything you write there’s a shadow of your own life. — Richard Matheson
The next Henning Ensemble event today remains something of a question-mark. Indeed, my original intent wuth this post was to list a potential program for 18 September. But the late-breaking news is that wew need to find another date. So let me put this post to bed, with that.
“Some guys do nothing but complain,” he sang, complaining....
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)
There are grounds for believing that the human brain is somewhat smaller than it was 25,000 years ago and I, personally, fear that the Gorilla brain is increasing in size and weight. But let’s not cross that bridge till we come to it. For the present we are certainly brainier than the Gorilla, and the Gorilla seems to know it. You never hear of a Gorilla attempting mental feats for which he is totally unfitted by physiological limitations, the way some other animals do. Thus the Gorilla seldom makes a complete and utter idiot of himself, as Marmosets do so frequently. — Will Cuppy, How to Become Extinct
I made a start on the duet for bass clarinet and bassoon, Harmonious Insomnia on Monday the 17th. I planned on a five-minute piece, and on incorporating one of the Simple Preludes. The “adoption” of the first Simple Prelude into Insomnia was (could be) no mere copy-and-paste operation. For one thing, there are harmonic intervals in the piano original which defied simple copying onto two single-line instruments. Finding the musical solution was of course an artistic asset. The important thing is that the overall simplicity was incorporated most gratifyingly. And the alternation of the Common Time and quintuple meter provides (with corresponding simplicity) sufficient rhythmic variety. We also have the contrast between the “white-key” simplicity of the adapted Prelude and the mildly sinuous chromaticism of the new Insomnia material. All that was needed, then was the usual dynamics and rehearsal letters, and the piece was complete on Wednesday the 19th. And I arranged the piece for violin and viola with a friend in mind.
The nonmusical inheritance from my father had been, with wise counsel of trusted friends, invested in War Bonds, a move more patriotic than prudent. In 1918 with the war lost, we had nothing except the modest salary of my aunt, a clerk in an insurance company, who shared what she made with us. Later on the impoverished Austrian Republic granted a small monthly payment to my mother, which terminated when she left for the United States. Soon after the Armistice in November 1918 we got the first shipment of food parcels from the United States. We queued on a very cold afternoon for some hours in front of a beautiful baroque palais, eventually receiving a splendid basket of food, with A large tin of corned beef the outstanding item. Meat had been more than scarce and that same evening the four of us did away with the contents of the tin can. It was such an overdose after a long dearth that none of us ever could face corned beef again.
— Erich Leinsdorf, Cadenza: A Musical Life
Eight years ago today (and for those keeping track: yes, prior to my stroke) I had the great pleasure of attending the second performance, down Florida way, of my Opus 116, Plotting (y is the new x) for violin and harpsichord. A most thoroughly gratifying occasion. Today, eight years since, I am delighted to have completed my Opus 212: Harmonious Insomnia for bass clarinet and bassoon, composed for my friends Todd Brunel and Greta Rosen.
“You’ve been rolling your yoga mat the wrong way.”
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)
One of the interesting things about Bond is, that he’s just as bad as they are ... the real sense of distaste for who he is, what he is, because he’s old enough to recognize himself.
— Timothy Dalton
Something I meant to add yesterday ... enlarging, as it were, on the Trifles theme is that one artistic response to Greta & Todd reading duets of mine was to arrange Three Things That Begin With ‘C,’ Op.65 for clarinet and bassoon, and All the Birds in Mondrian’s Cage, Op. 97 № 2 for bass clarinet and bassoon.
And two years ago today, in “I didn’t even see the irony, Officer, honest!”
Watch 1,000 Musicians Play Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall (Part Two)”
— Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)
Now, in November 1967, numb with chronic fatigue, I discovered that the spirit of competition may be the needed philosophical foundation for a free-market economy, but for the individual human being the urge to be overly active is, at best, a delusion and at worst a psychological illness. Since I knew myself to be afflicted by it, this was now the time to overhaul my life. As I struggled with the decisions how to do this and that, As I sat up late at night rummaging in the recesses of my mind, I recalled scenes that were filed away but never forgotten.
There was the illness and the death of [Dimitri] Mitropoulos. After finishing one grueling eight-week stint with the New York Philharmonic, he had a heart attack and landed in hospital within two days of the final concert. Having little else to live for he returned too soon to the orchestra and to the Met, for the inevitable second attack and further hospitalization. As if on a suicidal mission he undertook in 1960 to prepare the Third Mahler Symphony with the orchestra of Milan’s La Scala and died during a rehearsal, Perhaps through shock from the proverbial chaotic conditions of Italy’s musical world.
There are always romantic tail spinners who will proclaim this to be an heroic end. To me it is a sorry finale for a distinguished and good man. Even the obituary in the New York Times mentioned, with more accuracy than delicacy, that all the unparalleled kindnesses to players did not obtain for Mitropoulos their best efforts. There is, alas, no relation between human empathy and musical good behavior.
— Erich Leinsdorf, Cadenza: A Musical Career
Well, am I composing again yet? Yes and no. Finding myself, on one hand, with the shades of a question mark hovering over the Ensemble, or at least over its calendar, and on the other a wish to write something, only not for the shelf, please, I took an inspirational cue from my friend Luke Ottevanger and decided to write brief easy piano pieces. Two, thus far.
When Greta & Mike presented the clarinet/bassoon version of Janky Juke Joint, our Todd immediately expressed interest in playing it. So this is not an absolute surprise. Still, I wasn’t expecting Friday’s message from Greta that she & Todd had got together Thursday and that they also read the bass clarinet/bassoon version of the Lamentatio. So, it is for Greta & Todd that I shall compose the Op. 212.
