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

Thinking Threesome

 The Eleventh Elephant

Nomad fandom

Gigolo kimono.

Protean turpentine

— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

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 we need to find another date. So let me put this post to bed, with that.

Insomnia Endgame

 “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.

Then and Today

 Trousered Wilderness? Panted Desert

— Postcards From Red Squirrel Trail

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.

Oh, and a Couple of Arrangements

 A headline on YouTube:

“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.