I did Jennet Ingle‘s Crushing Classical Podcast promoting San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra and my composers interview YouTube channel Music from Humans. I hope you enjoy our talk as much as I did.
Archive for June, 2024
Crushing Classical: Opportunities for All
Thursday, June 27th, 2024Reviving An Old Score: Breathing New Life into Past Compositions
Monday, June 24th, 2024After returning from my travels, I decided to take a different direction before diving back into my “tape”and orchestra piece. This summer, I aim to revive and update some of my older scores, inspired by lessons learned while recovering Dr. Mark Alburger’s music. My string quartet, The Shadows of Japanese Children, hadn’t been opened in Finale since 2002. This week, I updated those files to the current version of Finale and created MusicXML and PDF versions, plus new audio realizations.
This composition draws inspiration from a deeply moving source—a book titled Unforgettable Fire. The book comprises drawings and narratives by survivors of the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, depicting harrowing scenes of children whose shadows were etched into the ground by the devastating blasts. This musical tribute is dedicated to the memory of those children. This string quartet is based on Japanese children’s folk songs and traditional Japanese forms. Each member of the quartet is featured in a movement, ensuring everyone gets a chance to shine. This work hasn’t been performed much, and the fourth movement, awaits its premiere by any quartet willing to take it on.
This project is part of my plan to add automated score sales to my website. The first step is ensuring all scores are in proper PDF form, ready to go. This effort will culminate in a store featuring perusal scores, audio samples, and purchasing options. Below is a rough draft; let me know what you think!
The Shadows of Japanese Children
Overcoming Technical Hurdles and Creative Breakthroughs
Monday, June 3rd, 2024I had an incredibly productive week working on my “tape” and orchestra composition. I’ve been wrestling with a syncing issue in Finale where the “tape” part (audio track) would only stay in sync if I started playback from the beginning. Given that I’m 6-7 minutes into the piece, this was wasting a lot of time. After days with Finale support, we discovered that although both my file and Finale were set to 48 Hz, a bug required switching them to 44.1 Hz. This change saved me an enormous amount of time, allowing me to write over two minutes of music since then.
Building the Musical Narrative
The B-section of the second part focuses on the positive contributions of our leaders, even those not entirely successful. Here, I’ve woven in additional references to requiems, including Gregorian chants from Agnus Dei, with lines that translate to “have mercy on us” and “give us peace.”
Agnus Dei Lines
After completing the first draft of the second part, I started the intro to the third section, which highlights Presidents who have let us down and are more self-serving than serving the country. This segment begins with a powerful series of hits, setting a darker tone.
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A Week of Productivity and Future Plans
With the software issues resolved, I felt an incredible surge in productivity. I made significant progress just before needing to take a brief break. To ensure continuity, I’ve created detailed notes so I can seamlessly resume work later. I’ve also submitted the “tape” portion to The San Francisco Tape Music Festival, 2025—fingers crossed for a positive response. I probably won’t have updates until the end of June, but stay tuned for more on this and other compositions!
