The Lounge Pianist (2005) was originally for a vocalizing pianist. I arranged the piece for jazz trio (piano, drums and bass) and made a midi version. Here is the middle section:
[audio:https://www.markgustavson.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/loungetriowaltz1.mp3|titles=The Lounge Pianist (Trio Version) Waltz Section]
Plexus is a short piece (six minutes) for flute (doubling piccolo), harp, viola and cello.
An excerpt from Silent Moon for orchestra that explores the mutable elasticity of sound.
The inspiration for this piece was a part of Giacomo Leopardi’s poem Canto notturno di un pastore errante dell’ Asia:
Soft and clear is the night and without wind, and quietly
over the roofs and in the gardens rests the moon, and far
away reveals every peaceful mountain.O gentle, gracious moon, I remember now, it must be a
year ago, on this same hill I came to see you; I was full of
sorrow. And you were leaning then above that wood just as
now, filling it all with brilliance.O cherished moon, beneath whose quiet beams the hares
dance in the woods…Already all the air darkens, deepens to blue, and shadows glide
from roofs and hills at the whitening of the recent moon.What do you do there, moon, in the sky? Tell me what you
do , silent moon. When evening comes you rise and go contemplating wastelands; then you set.
translated by Patrick Creagh
I have been aware of synthesizers since I was in high school around 1976. In fact, I wrote an essay for a writing class about how in the future synthesizers would replace acoustic instruments. This has partly come true, hasn’t it?
When I began my composition studies at Northern Illinois University in 1977 I took an electronic music course that was part history, part hands on. The teacher was Joe Pinzarroni who had worked with Cage in New York on dance music using live electronics and computers. Partially because of Joe, live electronics rather than studio electronics seemed to prevail at NIU. I found that area of electro-acoustic music fascinating over being in a studio splicing tape etc.
I composed three pieces that involved live electronics during my two years at NIU. One piece was for solo cello that had a contact mic going to a reverb unit. The cello was strictly notated and the reverb settings were also given in the score. Another piece, inspired by George Crumb’s “Black Angels,” was for a miked string quartet. Unlike the Crumb, my interest was only to assign an instrument to a speaker in each of the four corners of the concert hall to heighten the separation of the instruments independent lines. Again, strictly notated and composed knowing that the sounds would also be coming from a particular corner in the hall. The third work was a multimedia work thought up by the artist John Goss. A full solar eclipse was to happen on February 26, 1979. John was going to recreate Stonehenge in a field between the art and music buildings. He had numbers that were somehow connected with Stonehenge and he recreated Stonehenge. He assigned me a set of Stonehenge-numbers to do what I wanted in the realm of sound. I took the numbers and used them as frequencies times 100 and spaced them out over the time the eclipse began until it ended. At certain time intervals the Buchla-generated frequencies amped through large speakers on the art building’s steps and facing the mock Stonehenge would change. There were also dancers going around the mock Stonehenge who had their own Stonehenge-generated numbers. Special sunglasses were handed out to the spectators to protect their eyes. If I remember correctly the eclipse occurred around 10:30 am CST. There was a large amount of snow on the ground but it wasn’t a very cold day. I wouldn’t call my contribution music but some type of an aural experience. I enjoyed working in multimedia but that was my first and last.
The next year I studied at the University of Illinois with Ben Johnston. U of I had a great electro-acoustic setup that was classical as well as using many synthesizers and computer labs. It had a long (for electronic music) and storied past. However, other than Sal Martirano’s SalMar Construction live performances, realtime electronics was neither happening there nor was there equipment to use. I do remember around 1981 someone had come back from Japan with a Walkman recorder that was not available in the US yet. He had input the grand piano into the recorder that had some type of prerecorded material that modulated the piano output. It had potential I thought. That was about it. So I stuck with acoustic only music.
Following U of I I moved to NYC to study at Columbia University. I took an electronic music course with Mario Davidovsky. It was classical studio, cut and splice only. He frowned upon tape loops and synthesizers. You had to create everything with a razor blade and whatever dirty old equipment in the studio. I decided to go back to live electronics but in the way Davidovsky does it in his Synchronisms. The sounds are all on tape but the machine plays or pauses and the performers, I composed for flute and contrabass, would closely interact with what was on the tape. It isn’t the way I thought or think about live electronics but it was a way. And that way turned me off to electro-acoustic music until now.
Mind you I have followed much of what has been happening since the late 1980’s. While I was in Amsterdam on a Fulbright I heard concerts that demonstrated what many composers were doing in computer research that was funded by Phillips. George Lewis was someone in Amsterdam at that time. I heard many concerts in New York throughout the 80’s and 90’s. I knew composers who had been using Max in the mid-1990’s and I had a look at it. I certainly was fascinated with some of what I heard but the learning curve was daunting.
The Max/MSP learning curve is still steep but less so than it was 15 years ago. And laptop computers make having a home studio feasible. As a result I am getting involved with electro-acoustic music again after a 29 year layoff.
For now I am using patches that alter the sound of my realtime clarinet and would like to find a way Max can be a part of the composition process in real time.
I have no goal. I am learning the software.
This sound is the final dissolving image from Dissolving Images for solo piano, Lisa Moore is the pianist. Soon to be released on Albany Records.
This is about 30 seconds from Two of Cups for clarinet and viola. The Two of Cups refers to the tarot card of the same name and represents partnerships and unions. Much like the Lovers card, energies come together to create a mutual bond. Beauty, power, and electric vibrations occur, bringing romance and sexual energy to the scene. Platonic relationships also benefit from the Two of Cups. This is the card that signifies reconciliation. Struggles come to an end, and harmony is restored to even the most hostile of relationships. Inner conflicts also come into play when this card appears. An inner peace is created. Expect to feel strongly connected to others, but also to other entities that bring two together like ideas or talents.
The form of the piece is an alternation between an A and B section. The A sections are in unison and the B sections are contrapuntal. The melodic lines in both sections are asymmetrical but in the B sections the melodic lines simultaneously explore differing meters to create the illusion that the two instruments are independent. Then the lines come together in the unison A sections. The excerpt is a complete B section.
I composed this piece in honor of my marriage to Pamela Gurman.
As I mentioned in my July 19th post I decided to use W. B. Yeats’ poem “The Fisherman” as part of my song cycle The Fisherman Songs. The song is complete. The fly fisherman in the poem is both symbolic and real. In this complex and passionate poem there is a tranquil moment when the fly fisherman alights his fly on to the stream. Here is a phrase in the piano that suggests casting the fly:
This excerpt is from the opening of a work in progress entitled Lament a monodrama for lyric bass, bass clarinet, percussion, contrabass, female chorus and piano. The piece takes place in a Manhattan jazz club in the middle 1950’s. The text is “Lament” by Dylan Thomas. The piece begins with a piano solo accompanied by glass bottle windchimes to create a nightclub ambience.
Hymn to the Vanished performed by S.O.N.Y.C. (String Orchestra of New York City) at Wiell Recital Hall (at Carnegie Hall) in May 2002. The work is dedicated to those who perished in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
BACKGROUND
On September 11, 2001, Pam and I were recently beginning to split our time between living in our east village apartment and our home on Poospatuck Creek, a part of the Moriches Bay estuary on Long Island.
Poospatuck Creek
Pam was at the apartment and I decided to stay at the house for a week. I woke up early and sat on the dock taking in the bluebird sky and crisp air. I had no idea what was going on in the city until I was in my car listening to the radio and the confusion of reports. At the time I didn’t have a cell phone to contact Pam and the phone lines were over loaded. Later in the day I was finally able to get in touch with her to find she was safe. Separately, we made our way back that evening to our Long Island home.
After a few days of listening to nonstop reports I found myself emotionally overwhelmed. A profound sadness moved me to compose a piece. I contacted the conductor Nick Armstrong who is the director of the Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra and asked him if I could compose a memorial piece to be presented on a program in October. We agreed on a string orchestra. Even though I finished the work rather quickly there wasn’t enough time to rehearse the work for October, so it was pushed to a December concert at Brooklyn College’s Gershwin Hall.
The question I ask myself about works in memorium is how to listen to them. Do I listen to the work with consideration for whom the work is dedicated or do I experience the work independently of the memorialized? I choose the later. The work is the expression. I would like to experience the work without the history and memories that would cause a conflict with my perception of the work’s intention. The work’s attitude will have been influenced by the history and meaning that inspired it without me adding another layer of thinking on top of it. Even though what inspired the piece is significant, the work of art is independent of it. The compassion that brought about the work can be a model to absorb the experience of the event, to feel the event and then, when ready, to let it go. If we are open minded, works of art can remind us that compassion and creativity can help free our psyche of these constantly occurring miseries and atrocities in the world.
Dust Dance is a 4 minute plus dance movement for orchestra.
