Written any blogs lately?

I notice that some have not written any blogs for a while (in one case, the last blog was written in September), and some have not left many comments on the class blog (which is what you are reading now). As we head into the final week of classes, it might be good to put these activities on your "to do" list if you have been an inconsistent blogger/commentator. You have until December 11 to get caught up; that's the day I will tally up everyone's totals in these two categories (your own blog entries, plus comments on class blogs).

Don't forget that you can post a review of a MusicWorks article in your blog, and it will count as two blogs. Likewise, a concert review of a contemporary music concert (or a contemporary composition on a concert of otherwise dead composers) will count as two blogs, assuming it is reasonably substantial (just 100-200 words would do the trick!).

If you have not been very good at class participation, I will even consider extra blogs (thoughtful ones, please!) as partial participation credit.

Final Concert! (Do I have your info?)

Well friends, hard to believe it, but we are only days away from our final concert (Sunday, 7PM, Petro-Canada Hall). Have you submitted all necessary programme information? If not, please provide it in the comments section below, by 5PM Friday. I was still receiving programme information for our first concert up to about an hour before the show, and I would prefer to have the information much sooner than that this time.

Also, if you have a requirement to be early or late in the programme, now would be the time to let me know (and the reason, please).

In no particular order, below is the programme information I currently have; please check spellings for accuracy:

Mary Beth Waldram - 3:43 - Susan Watkins (sop.), Mary Beth Waldram (cl.), Lindsey Wareham (pno.)

Aiden Hartery - Constantly Risking Absurdity - Stephen Ivany (bar.), Jill Dawe (tpt.), Phillip Holloway (tbn.), Andrew Coffin (pno.)

Andrew Rideout - Fire and Ice - Erin Milley (sop.), Brooke Stewart (vn.), Andrew Rideout (perc.), Simon Mackie (pno.)

Adam Batstone - [NO TITLE] - Bethany Saunders (sop.), Adam Batstone (gtr.), Andrew Rideout (perc.)

Joshua White - Fog - Patrick Edison (ten.), Joshua White (Mel.), Laura Jacyna (vc.), Simon Mackie (pno.)

Dave Goudie - A Musical Journey Through a Moment - Sarah Caines (sop.), Laura Jacyna (vc.), Lindsey Wareham (pno.)

Alexander Pryor - Une Pesce, Due Pesci - Megan Barnes (sop.), Sarah Clement (fl.), Mary Beth Waldram (cl.), Alexander Pryor (pno.)

Lindsey Wareham - I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud - Emily Cairns (sop.), Mary Beth Waldram (cl.), Lindsey Wareham (pno.)

Chris Rodgers - [NO TITLE] - Chris Rodgers (gtr.), Andrew McCarthy (perc.), Dylan Varner-Hartley (pno.), Josh White (DB)

Steve Cowan - [NO TITLE] - Brooke Stewart (vn.), Laura Jacyna (vc.), Andrew Rideout (perc.), Dylan Varner-Hartley (pno)

Stephen Quinlan - Hippo's Hope - Stephen Quinlan (ten.), Jill Dawe (tpt.), Celina Barry (tba.), Jennifer Benson (pno.)

Brooke Stewart - Would You Look at That - Emily Stockley (sop.), Brooke Stewart (vn.), TBA (vc.)

Project 2 - Choice of (a) Musical Cliché or Genre Recontextualization, or (b) Text Setting

I handed out project #2 descriptions on October 26 in class, but never posted them to our class blog, so here they are:

→ You have a choice in your second project between (a) "recontextualizing" a musical cliché or genre for 3-4 performers (possibly including voice and/or electronics), or (b) composing a work for voice and 2-3 other instruments,.

(a) Below are links explaining the cliché-based project:

• Using Musical Clichés in Creating Art
• Using a musical style or gesture as a point of departure
• Recontextualizing and Atonality

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(b) WRITE A SETTING OF WORDS AND MUSIC FOR VOICE AND 2-3 OTHER INSTRUMENTS
Duration: 3-5 minutes

1. Aim to set the words as expressively as possible. ALL musical decisions should be based on textual considerations.


2. The harmonic language should be original (i.e. not based on traditional harmonic sonorities), as was required for the first project. However, you need not begin by creating an original harmonic progression, as you did for the first project. The kinds of sonorities you choose should grow out of what is expressed by the text.


3. Selecting the text takes time; you need to live with it for a while before knowing whether it will work in a song setting. Look for a text that can be enhanced by adding music to it, respecting the fact that poems work just fine without music. Setting a poem to music does not necessarily create better art than the original poem without music, and it may produce worse art! Setting a poem to music results in a different kind of art than that of the poem alone; it may touch the listener in a different way. Find a text that draws a meaningful response from you. When you feel you understand it thoroughly, you are ready to begin the process of setting it to music. You may need more than one text if choosing short poems.


4. Recite the words many times, in many ways, in the same way that a trained actor practices reading the same line many different ways until they discover a delivery that most suits the line. Consider how and where emphasis, space (pauses), rhythm, and tempo can be manipulated most effectively for communicating meaning. Take notes!


5. Emphasis, when reciting poetry, occurs on at least three different levels:
   a) Emphasis on the correct syllable within each word;
   b) Emphasis on a particular word within each line;
   c) Emphasis on a particular line within a verse; what is (are) the most important point(s) within a verse? How can you communicate this importance to the listener?


6. Write the text on blank paper, leaving considerable space between lines. Then, using notes made during the previous two steps, begin the process of applying rhythm, meter, tempo, and space (rests) to the text, using standard rhythmic notation below each line of text.
Hints:
• The more space (i.e. time) you leave between lines (or within them, if appropriate), the easier it will be to add instrumental parts to the voice part. Well-written instrumental parts complement the text and can create a dialogue with the singer.


• Explore alternatives to the natural tendency to place accented syllables on strong beats, or even strong parts of beats. Challenge yourself to discover other means of communicating emphasis (see #7 below)! Avoiding the obvious makes things less predictable.


• Free your rhythm; mix simple and compound rhythmic values; use ties; consider other tuplet values.


• Don’t forget to include rests; singers need places to breathe, and the text will have stronger impact if you give the listener sufficient time to absorb the meaning of each line; too many lines too quickly can result in information overload.


7. Textual emphasis can be achieved in a variety of ways, such as:
   a) Metric (rhythmic) placement — expected or unexpected;
   b) Delaying the expected arrival of a word (i.e. “and … …cried!”);
   c) Lengthening the note value(s) for a word. Sometimes, shortening note values can have a similar effect;
   d) Using significantly higher (or lower) pitches for a word than were used for the rest of the line;
   e) Textural contrast; a word sung on its own, without accompaniment, can be quite effective;
   f) Text repetition; repeating a word, or even a line, is possible, and gives added emphasis;
   g) Orchestration; similar to (e), but this time the instruments can be used for reinforcement of particular words;
   h) Dynamics (e.g., suddenly louder or suddenly softer); perhaps the most obvious method, so avoid over-reliance on it, although when used in combination with any of the above techniques it is fine.


8. Challenge yourself to find appropriate places to use extended vocal techniques.


9. Challenge yourself to find appropriate places to use extended instrumental techniques.


10. Score carefully; don’t make the singer fight to be heard! Become familiar with the voice you are writing for (where is it louder, where is it most comfortable, etc.), and become similarly familiar with each of the instruments you are using. The most common technical challenge we face when writing for voice is making the text intelligible to the listener; all your careful planning will not matter if the audience cannot understand the words (although even here there are exceptions; if setting Latin Mass movements (e.g., Agnus Dei) for an audience familiar with these texts, the lack of clarity in your text setting may not impede the audience's ability to understand it. Also, some composers, beginning around the mid-20th century, would deliberately set vowels or consonants in isolation from the words from which they originated. This, as you might imagine, can make it extremely difficult to understand the words, although the composer's goal was often expressive nevertheless.


11. Another consideration in intelligibility is that it tends to be physiologically more difficult for singers have good diction in higher registers.

•Week 1: set text rhythmically, according to 4, 5, 6, & 7 above.
•Week 2: set it melodically. You will have to sing it in class!
•Weeks 3 and 4: finish the project, adding instrumental parts, and modifying the melody as needed. In-progress versions of your work must be workshopped (performed) in class every week.

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Since some questions have arisen on the ever-popular topic of tonality/atonality, below are some blog links on the topic and a definition that may be helpful:

• Why Atonal?
• Atonality — Even the Word Sounds Unpleasant!
• Atonality = Noise?
• Fun With Scales and Modes

→ Tonality (Wikipedia): "The system of musical organization of the common practice period, and of Western-influenced popular music throughout much of the world today"

"Fair Copy" Due Friday, 1 P.M.!

Just a reminder, in case you missed today's class or last week's blogs, that the final, bound, "fair copy" (i.e., best quality copy) of the score for your first project is due this Friday at 1 P.M.

You can get your scores bound at most photocopy shops, including the one in the student centre, as far as I know. It costs about $2 for this service.

The score should have a front and back cover (cover stock, or clear acetate front cover).

The front cover (or cover page, if you are using clear acetate) should have your composition title, the titles of each movement if they have titles (but don't list "I, II, & III" if they don't have titles; use those numbers at the top of the first page of each of the pieces instead) and your name.

Inside the front cover (on the left-facing page) you should have the total duration of the composition, as well as your programme note (and optional brief bio).

The score should be printed double-sided.

I recommend slightly heavier-weight paper for the double-sided pages, so that the notes on the back of pages don't "bleed" through.

There are three blog entries on the topic of musical detail; please read them before handing in your scores:

On musical detail (1)
On musical detail (2)
On musical detail (3)

Successful Concert!

Congratulations to all composers involved in today's concert! I thought it went very well indeed, although, at 2.5 hours in length, it was a bit of a marathon, was it not? :-)

Although we had all heard in-progress versions of your compositions over the course of the past six weeks, these really only gave us a glimpse of the finished products. In most cases, a tremendous amount of revision occurred subsequent to in-class readings, and in all cases the recital provided our first opportunity to hear everyone's finished compositions. Plus, what we hear in class is almost always a read-through, whereas what we heard in today's recital were polished performances, and this makes a huge difference in how an audience hears the music, as we all know.

These class recitals are always a real treat for me, and I hope you feel the same way. There is something very special about witnessing the process that leads from the amorphous, murky beginnings of a work to it's completed state. The creative process is often difficult, perhaps even painful at times, but it sure is rewarding to see it come to fruition.

And many thanks as well to all of today's performers! If I counted correctly, there were 20 performers involved, so an impressive number of people put a lot of work into making this recital a success.

Thanks to Mary Beth Waldram for recording the show, and to Jessie Blennis for her help backstage!

And finally, thanks to all who remained to hear the end of the concert! Only one class member was unable to do this due to having to go to work, but everyone else hung in there 'till the very end, which is a great way to show your support and respect for each other's music.

→ All went well, but, given that we will be doing this again at the end of the semester, it would be useful to think about what could be improved for our next concert.

• Did you wish there had been a larger audience, and if so, what do might be done to achieve this? Any ideas as to how we could have better publicized the concert?


• Would you have liked to have had a post-concert reception of some kind in the lobby?


• Is there anything we could have done to speed up the concert a bit?


• Any other ideas, or comments?