a visit to mn public radio

The Singers and I made it downtown to the Saint Paul studios of Minnesota Public Radio last Monday to record a 4-song interview/performance for their upcoming concert, Under the North Star: Music of Minnesota. The program is in honor of Minnesota's 150th anniversary and, as you've probably guessed, contains pieces solely by my colleagues (and, in some cases, idols). I'll post the link to the interview when I get it.

The MPR building is amazing. It's nice but, in an emergency, I'm not sure I could stand there for 15 seconds while the door slowly opens. It should read "Glass can be broken in 1 second."













Here's some of the Singers waiting in the green room.













In the Maud Moon Weyerhaeuser Studio. This space is sort of "famous" if you listen to a lot of public radio but it is a BEAST to sing in...one of the drier places I've ever performed in.













Me and my fellow baritone, Tony Mudra. He commissioned The Minstrel Boy way back when and gave it an amazing first performance. Below us is Vicki Peters, conductor of The Summer Singers (not to be confused with the group pictured here) and commissioner of the previous volume of Color Madrigals.













With conductor Matthew Culloton and MPR host Steve Staruch. We've worked with him before but I forgot what it's like to stand face to face with the voice you hear on the radio all the time. He was incredibly gracious and, along with one of the madrigals (Orange Mounts of More Soft Ascent), he had us perform Carol Barnett's arrangement of Oh, Yes and Dominick Argento's Sonnet 64.













This picture was not my idea but turned out semi-funny and warrants inclusion. Thanks to my fellow composer-in-residence, the dreamy Jocelyn Hagen.













Afterwards it was sushi and sake at Fuji-Ya.

good quotes

Death Cab for Cutie is (and probably always will be) one of my favorite bands. Their new album, Narrow Stairs, comes out in May and I can't wait. I recently got their DVD Drive Well, Sleep Carefully and, in it, they throw down a great quote that sort of epitomizes my feelings on being an artist of any sort who is paid for their services.













"I don't know if someone said it to us or someone in the band said it but someone once said that we put the 'punk' in 'punctual.' We have always been the most notoriously on-time band in rock and roll. Even early on we had to be at the club at least a half an hour before they said we needed to be there. Everything had to run according to some strange, phantom clock that seemed to be hanging over our heads all the time."

"Rock and roll just doesn't seem like rocket science. You say you're going to do one thing and you do it. You show up and you have a contractual agreement to perform and there just seem to be so many things that fall into place: If you hold up your end of the bargain, we'll hold up ours."

I like the way they put that thought...especially that last sentence. Being an artist isn't really all that big of a deal. We spin ourselves into a fury sometimes because we study "The Greats" like Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Stravinsky, Britten, etc. so much that we've come to think being a good creator of any sort of art means massive innovation and an eventual grandiose idea of self-importance. It's my contention that good art comes through humility and hard work (a philosophy that I'll admit I'm not always good at adhering to).

I recently watched the documentary on Estonian composer Arvo Pärt (24 Preludes for a Fugue...throw it on your Netflix queue immediately) and gleaned this little beauty from him about writing from a humble place:










"They are not meant to be performed. You must not applaud them. The author must not bow during the applause. There's no need for that. This is natural breathing. More like intimate, but not entirely. It's like communication between two friends."

How about that? There's a reason this guy is famous the world over. I'm fairly certain he's not being literal but, rather, talking about how he feels a new work should be composed: from a place where applause is the furthest thing from your mind.

Speaking of which, I should probably start practicing what I'm preaching here. Time is running out to get that opera on track.

choral award

I got word last night that A Grass-Green Pillow (a movement from the first volume of Color Madrigals) won the 11th Annual Composition Competition sponsored by the Cambridge Chamber Singers. Whoo-hoo!They're set to perform it in May so hopefully I will be able to make it out east to hear them sing it!

Check out the MySpace page if you'd like to hear a recording of the piece (premiered last May by The Singers) and, in honor of its namesake color, here is an appropriately green-filled picture from the archives. I took this one in Scotland a few summers ago during a 6-week backpacking stint in western Europe. It's a garden on the grounds of Stirling Castle.

Since the third (and final) volume of Color Madrigals will premiere later tonight, it seems they've come full circle. One of the first pieces is making it out there just as the final movements are being launched. Hopefully that means they have a good future as a whole set. (Fingers crossed.)

blue and orange

I finished the final "volume" of my Color Madrigals back in November and, last Monday, got the chance to hear both of them. They are the 6th and 7th pieces that The Singers have commissioned since 2004. Since the concert is in honor of Minnesota's 150th birthday, my little pieces (they both barely clock in at 3 minutes) will be hobnobbing with some really great stuff by Dominick Argento, Libby Larsen, Stephen Paulus and F. Melius Christiansen (to name but a few). There are also two other premieres by area composers Tim Takach and Craig Carnahan so you might say that, in terms of Minnesota's choral "footprint," it's an embarrassment of riches. The Land of 10,000 Choral Composers, so to speak.

I caught conductor Matthew Culloton right as he was about to take off. He flew right through the roof the instant after I snapped this picture. It was impressive.













Good company on the rehearsal schedule. All MN composers.













It's always nice to hear this choir perform. Their artistry is near the top of the field and, despite the fact that I've been working with this ensemble for 4 years now, they never fail to give convincing performances of anything I've ever put in front of them. It's a relationship that I hope every composer experiences in their lifetime.

More to come on these pieces. They're going to record them at Minnesota Public Radio on Monday and I'll be there to do some interviewings.

passages & drano balls

Sometimes it takes someone else's opinion to make you acknowledge the weak spots in your own music and, with my new 3-movement choral suite, Passage: Songs on Octavio Paz, this process is totally evident.

It was originally commissioned by the Hopkins High School Concert Choir and premiered in May 2006 and, at the time, I was totally in love with it (and it's original title, Four Spanish Love Songs). However, when I played it for my good friend Drew Collins (who is not only a crazy-awesome composer himself but the senior choral editor at Kjos Publications) he liked it enough to point out the weak spots for what I see now are good reasons. Being the enterprising kind of guy that he is, Drew suggested a few changes and said he would premiere the revised version with the Festival Choir of Madison.

So nearly 2 years later, I've finally gotten around to it.

However, waiting this long to think about the rewrites he suggested has turned out to be a blessing in disguise as that distance from the initial emotion of writing the piece has dissipated quite a bit and my level of objectivity is much higher. That being said, Four Spanish Love Songs no longer exists and, in its place, will stand a half-man, half-machine, 3-movement version which will tower over its predecessor and from-henceforth-be-called Passage: Songs on Octavio Paz.

It's kind of like that movie, Robocop. 4SLV was a good police officer before but, ever since it had a run-in with the ruthless Drew Collins, it has a cool 80s infrared visor, an automatic weapon implanted in its leg and says stuff like, "Your move, creep." Who could disagree?

Here's a picture of a great meal I had recently at Chino Latino. It's a restaurant in uptown that serves what they call "street food from the hot zones." This meal was no joke: a sushi dish called Wasabi Drano Balls.













The description on their website reads, "ahi tuna wrapped around golf balls of rice and spiked with some sinus clearing fresh grated wasabi." Let's just say that description was pretty close to the truth. It was good, tears-in-your-eyes fun to down these little gourmet bastards.

On a side note: if you're into underground bands you should check out the Minneapolis-based quartet, The Glad Version. I was in composition classes with one of their guitar players and someone just gave me their latest CD to listen to. They are most definitely the real deal.

great blog article

Reading about another composer's process is always interesting to me. John Mackey posted a great article on his blog and it is totally worth a read. He confirms what every composer I've talked to says about starting a new piece.

Here's a totally unnecessary closeup of an NYC subway map I took last year.

happy new year!

I stayed in Iowa a few extra days to celebrate New Year's with some old friends from Luther College. We meet every December 31 to ring in the new year and have a generally great time. It's usually the only time I get to see any of them and, this year, we gathered in Davenport, Iowa for this year's celebration.

Fred and Jana have Laser Cats.













Ryan Newstrom (the poet, incidentally, for 2 of my pieces) always cooks a gourmet meal for us all and this year was no exception. For a guy with a master's in Urban & Regional Planning he is an amazing cook and, frankly, even if he had a degree from a culinary institute it would still be crazy good.

The first course was scallops.













Followed by a potato pancake with caviar.













Pears and greens salad with cashews, bleu cheese and a dressing I don't remember.













The best lobster bisque I've ever had...ever. This was his first time cooking live lobsters. He said they were screaming but that was (hopefully) just a joke.













Lamb chops from Fred's farm in Decorah, Iowa (where most of us went to college or grew up) with mushroom bread pudding and broccoli of some sort.













For dessert it was apricot custard pie (I think) with candied apricots on top. I'm not a sweets person but I dominated this one. It was so good.













Guess where I sat?

And the requisite group picture where one or more of us fumbles with the timers on our cameras and the rest of us hold a smile until they all flash. That being said it's a pretty good picture.

So long, 2007! Now it's back to the business of music-making. I've got revisions to do for the Festival Choir of Madison's performance of Passage: Songs on Octavio Paz by the end of the month and The Singers start work on Color Madrigals, Volume 3 on Monday. Not to mention that opera I'm starting.