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Creative Vulnerability

Ralph — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:35:00 GMT

A few weeks ago, I learned that one of my composition students had received a “runner up” award in a composing competition. At first, I was a little disappointed and I began wondering how this wonderful string quartet could have only been worthy of second place. Soon however, these initial and - I’ll admit - childish reactions were replaced with a genuine sense of happiness over the success my student had achieved.

It’s funny the second-hand emotions a teacher experiences through the successes and tribulations of their students. In a way, it’s kind of like being a parent. You invest your time and passion in the growth of a young individual, and when that investment pays dividends, you celebrate, when things don’t go as planned, you minimize the damage to the best of your ability.

When you are a creative individual, no matter what the endeavor, your ideas are subject to criticism. Whether you are a politician with a novel solution to an enduring problem, or an artist with a new melody, you’ve laid out a very personal vision that can be lauded, or attacked. Personal ideas take a lot of time, energy, and passion to create and articulate. As creators then, we strongly associate ourselves with our ideas and become intensely vulnerable to their criticism.

Young school-aged students are not, in my opinion, emotionally equipped to absorb such criticism. As teachers, we need to be gatekeepers - opening up gates to positive opportunities while insulating our students from those activities, or people, who will take them to the woodshed. At this fragile age, one negative comment can leave them running for exits, not allowing them to achieve their artistic potential.

It’s a difficult balancing act, however. As teachers, we want our students to be their best, and sometimes that involves some criticism. In my own teaching, I try to be as positive as possible, always pointing out things I like first, then gently suggesting some alternative ideas the student might explore.

But in the end, I think it’s up to the student to decide what changes they’d like to make to their piece, because, after all, it is their piece of music. By respecting their creative freedom as artists, we bolster them at the same time.

Students that continue creating beyond high school will find out soon enough the harsh world of criticism that awaits. Through nurturing in their early creative ventures, and by gaining the emotional maturity that comes with a few more years of seasoning, they’ll be ready for it.

Tough Times, Tough Choices

Ralph — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 23:41:00 GMT

Whether you want to hear the stories, or not, bleak economic news is everywhere. From zero net jobs being created in August to a forecast of an unchanged unemployment rate for 2012, it’s really becoming a struggle to remain positive about America’s economic future.

A few months ago, I had heard that some companies were not even reviewing the resumes of prospective jobseekers, unless they were currently employed. A friend confirmed this through his own experience, noting that an HR Rep from a local employer asked him to confirm on three separate occasions that he was currently employed during a screening interview.

A brief look through open positions seems to indicate that employers want their new employees to juggle multiple responsibilities, effectively doing the work of two positions for the price of one salary. Whereas in the past, you could be a project manager or a business analyst, the new economy seems to want you to do both (all for bargain basement salaries).

In the face of all of this unsettling news, current employees can either:

Cross their fingers, and hope for the best or
Develop new skill sets that make them more valuable (and more marketable) in the tight economy

Unfortunately, there’s no magic pill that can be taken to develop new skills. It requires time and effort, and with a full time job and a family, it most likely means turning off the TV and hitting the books (or the eBook, if you have a kindle).

Tough times call for tough choices, and so for the next two years I’ve decided to put down my compositional pencil and invest that time into developing more business skills in the areas of Web Marketing (Blogging, Search Engine Optimization, Web Analytics, Social Media, Email marketing, etc.). I’ve recently developed an interest in this area, and many companies seem to be looking for employees and consultants that can help them capitalize on these new web technologies.

While I’ve maintained this blog for two years, and have optimized my own website and a company website, I don’t have a long track record of success in web marketing to prominently display on a resume. In order to prove myself, I’ll need to acquire certifications in these areas and volunteer my time for friends, slowly accumulating a variety of experiences and connections that can lead to a new opportunity in this field.

The good news, is that this plan requires me to blog more, allowing me to keep an active presence on the music scene and expand into other subjects I enjoy, like politics, health and nutrition. And, while I’ll be focusing on building business marketing skills, I can apply those skills to better market my music (something that, though it takes time, requires much less energy than writing new music).

Tough times require tough decisions, and it feels better to have some sort of a plan, even one that is sketchy in its current form. More time, and more experience will allow me to do a much better job filling in the details.

Good luck in your own journey toward making a living in the areas you are passionate about. I'm pulling for ya'!

Mixed Feelings on Milt

Ralph — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 20:30:00 GMT

The famed American Composer Milton Babbitt died earlier this year at the age of 94. Babbitt was an important and controversial musical figure who was most notably associated with the American serialist movement of the Post World War II era.

Babbitt was employed by RCA in the fifties and is credited with the invention of the electronic synthesizer. He also was a very gifted composition teacher with prominent students such as Paul Lansky, Mario Davidovsky, and Stephen Sondheim.

Hearing of Babbitt’s death, I began to think of his musical legacy and it left me with mixed feelings.

In my opinion, Babbitt’s most important contribution to music was the invention of the synthesizer. This has fundamentally transformed music since its creation, leading to parallel tracks of progress in the electronic and popular musical worlds. A partial list of the types of music that sprang up as a result of pr that can be associated with the synthesizer include new age music, eighties hair-band music, digital sampling, computer music, techno-music, hooked on Bach, etc. Not to mention the impact of the synthesizer on things like the act of composing or the areas of film music or theater or ‘pit-orchestras’. Even the apps for the iPhone that allow the lay-user to create music can trace their foundation back to this important invention.

I also appreciate Babbitt’s wide ranging musical interests. Apparently, he was an avid connoisseur of American musicals, not the typical fare associated with that of a serialist composer. From what I understand, he did not push his musical views on his students, but was able to help them refine whatever sorts of music they were interested in pursuing. He also was careful to point out the consequences of a student deciding to write serialist music (including the limitations of performance opportunities and of the dwindling numbers of appreciative listeners such a path entails).

Finally, I value the fact that Babbitt did not change course or sacrifice his musical convictions as a majority of listeners and composers turned away from serial music. It would have been much easier for him to change with the times, and abandon his predilections for complexist-based music. I’ve always felt that an artist should go with their gut, and trust their musical instincts to create the music they truly believe in.

But, as I stated before, I have mixed feelings on the legacy of Milton Babbitt. When I first heard his music, in my early twenties, I thought I wasn’t smart enough to comprehend it, that I needed to hone my ear to better understand its internal orderings. So every few years after that, I would give ol’ Milton another try, and I kept coming away from those listening experiences, feeling just as cold and empty as before.

As my ear grew, I began to love, not appreciate, but love the music of Anton Webern. So for me, it’s not that I have a general disdain for serial music, I enjoy it, if I can find some level of access to it and can connect with it.

And with Milt, I could just never find that access point, that welcomed me inside the music and beckoned me to hear more, to experience more.

There are plenty of composers I don’t connect with over the course of history, but for some reason those composers don’t irritate me, the way the Babbitt does. Part of Babbitt’s legacy is that there are legions of young composers that emulate his style, writing music that is overnotated, utterly difficult to perform, and is responsible for the bad rap that ‘new music’ gets with audiences.

I’ve organized many new music concerts in the past few years, and I’ve seen the consequences of Babbitt’s legacy firsthand. Supportive performers, champions of new music, who have agreed to perform at a given concert become alarmed when presented with a ‘Babbitt-like’ work. If they do perform the work, it comes with a price, either directly, through increased performance costs or indirectly, by the refusal of these performers to participate at future new music concerts.

The frustrating part, to me as a composer, is that often times there are different, and much more efficient notational methods of getting a ‘Babbitt-like’ musical effect that don't cause the performers' headaches. In a solo piece, tempo changes, spatial notation, or simple indications like ‘quasi recitative’ or 'freely' seem to be much better alternatives than the complex rhythmic nesting (subdivided triplets within a quintuplet) Babbitt employed.

To me, there seems to be some kind of an agenda behind this sort of hyper-notation. At its best, it’s ‘Look at how smart I am’, at its worst, it’s a coordinated attempt, an unnecessary one, to try to elevate music into some other sort of rigorous academic discipline, like math or science. Ask Howard Gardner, music is its own type of intelligence, and doesn’t need to be validated intellectually by moving it into one of the other core academic disciplines.

I think people understand this at some level. Try asking anyone to make a list of the top ten geniuses of all time. There’s a high likelihood that Mozart’s or Beethoven’s names will make the list. What more is there to prove?

But the most damaging part of Babbitt’s legacy, is his affect on the audience, and their views toward new music. As long as these schools of thought continue to be perpetuated to young composers, the overall cause of expanding the audience for new music suffers, as more and more people turn away. The comment sheets I’ve collected after performances specifically name the 'Babbitt-like' pieces that irritated the concert goers, many of whom took a chance on a new music concert, and will never come back.

So Babbitt’s legacy is indeed a mixed one – perhaps as his shadow diminishes, the new music scene will progress to a much better place.

But Milt, life is sure a lot easier with my Yamaha synthesizer. Thank you for that!

2011 Call for Singers - Five Seasons Chamber Choir

Ralph — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 10:07:00 GMT

On December 22nd, 1808 a mammoth four-hour concert in Vienna featured the premiere of both the 5th and 6th symphonies of Beethoven performed by local musicians under the composer's direction. Can you imagine what a thrill that must have been to premiere two of the most important works in the history of the symphony?

As a musical culture, we've gotten away from our roots. In the old days concerts with local composers, musicians and audiences were the norm, not the exception.

How would you like to be part of getting back to those roots? If you're a talented singer, we would love to use your abilities in helping form the Five Season Chamber Choir. Details for this exciting project are below.

Project Details: On May 21st at 8 pm, the newly formed Five Seasons Chamber choir will premiere Palm o' His Hand by composer Ralph Kendrick, and Four Latin Motets by Luther College professor Brooke Joyce. The performance will take place at Coe College's Daehler Kitchin auditorium in Cedar Rapids as part of the Iowa Composers Forum's A Cedar Rapids Festival of New Music and will be conducted by composer Ralph Kendrick. Singers are needed on all vocal parts. Ideally the group will be between 16-24 singers (4 to 6 on a part).

If you're a talented singer, help us get back to our roots by forming the Five Seasons Chamber Choir for this special performance!
Rehearsals: Rehearsals will take place at St. Mark's Lutheran Church at the following dates and times.

Saturday, May 7th from 9 -11 am
Saturday, May 14th from 9 - 11 am
Saturday, May 21st from 9 - noon (Dress Rehearsal at Coe)

Review the Works: Want to check out the scores? Feel free to download them below.

Download the score to Palm O' His Hand

Download the score to Four Latin Motets

Learn More: Ralph Kendrick's Palm O' His Hand is a spiritual written in 2003 for 8 part chorus, soloist, and string bass on a text by the composer. Regarding the work the composer notes, "This is an absolutely contagious work where the basses get to sing walking bass lines while the other parts create a texture of heavily syncopated jazz harmonies. Add to all of this a string bass and an inspiring solo, and you've got the recipe for fun! Bring your funk to the rehearsal or don't show up!"

Brooke Joyce's Four Latin Motets uses medieval compositional techniques to create sparse, chant-like lines based on sacred Latin texts. Director Ralph Kendrick offers, "The Latin Motets are very spiritual works, where lines are repeated to create a sort of hypnotic effect."

To Participate or to Learn More Details: Send an email to Ralph Kendrick at ralph@ralphkendrick.com

Singers, please find rehearsal aids below. You can click on the link of your part to hear a piano version.

Palm o' His Hand Full Choir Version
Palm o' His Hand Soprano Part
Palm o' His Hand Alto1 Part
Palm o' His Hand Alto2 Part
Palm o' His Hand Tenor Part
Palm o' His Hand Bass Part

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If I Could Do It Over...

Ralph — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 19:01:00 GMT

It’s not too often that a movie comes out that really makes you think. For the most part, movies are a distraction from reality, a pleasant side-trip to the grind of daily living.

The Butterfly Effect was one of those movies that really made me think – and we’re talking about the kind of thinking that goes on for several days. If you haven’t seen it, the main actor has the power to redo a series of events from his childhood. I can’t remember the plot entirely, but his best friend in the movie struggles with drugs, and he keeps trying to redo portions of their shared childhood together to make her life turn out better.

Interestingly enough, when he changes particular scenes from his childhood, she turns out better, but there are negative ripple effects, whereby several other people end up having worse lives because his friend’s life was improved. He keeps trying to go back and redo things, but the end product always turns out worse.

Deep, theological stuff, for sure.

Have you ever wished you could have a do over?

I think that’s pretty common. If I would have answered the interview question this way, perhaps I would have gotten the job. If I had only said ‘x’ instead of ‘y’, maybe I’d still be in a relationship… I shouldn’t have lost my cool with my kid.

Hey, we’re all human. We make mistakes and I’m sure we could all make good use of a few do-overs.

I wish I could redo several things about my graduate studies in composition. I went to grad school at 22 and looking back on it, I don't think I'd done enough living at that age to know what I really should be getting out of it and what activities I should be focusing on.

So what would I change?

For starters, I would have been much more social and much less bookish. I was always trying to read high-minded stuff about musical aesthetics, theory, and philosophy.   I suppose that makes sense if you want to be a college professor (which I did at the time). But what I missed out on, is all of the connections I could have made with excellent performers.   I made some, to be sure, enough to keep me busy, but I think I would have been much better off getting to know more performers that I could collaborate with after grad school. Not to mention all of the great things you can learn from performers!

Several years after grad school, I realized the importance of score study – looking at a piece of music while listening to it. This is great training for a composer on notation, orchestration, and form. I did a fair amount of score study in school, but not enough of it. I wish I would have realized the importance of this endeavor, and made better use of the library and all of those exotic scores, while it was close by and easy to access.

But my biggest regret is that during grad school, I had no concept of the value of time. Once you have kids, are working a full time job and maintaining a house, you understand how precious it is to have an hour of composition time. In my early twenties, I took for granted all of the free time available to me to compose and I didn't use it like I should have.   I’m sure if I was in grad school now, I could have written 8 or more pieces a year, versus the 3 per year I averaged in grad school.

In looking back however, a stark reality has hit me. If I hadn’t gone to grad school in my early twenties, I probably would never have taken the opportunity to go.   There are a lot of sacrifices that have to be made to go to grad school after you've started a family. I certainly wouldn’t put my family through the financial stress such a venture would require now.

So in the end, I’m thankful for the opportunities that I had. I’ve made enough performer connections to keep me busy, and additional connections can be made for the rest of my life (though with a bit more effort than when you’re in school). I still have access to scores and music through local college libraries, and I’ve become quite an efficient composer, giving the scarce amount of time I can carve in my schedule for composing.

Maybe real life is an awful lot like The Butterfly Effect. The path you are on right now, is the right one, even if it's not always apparent at any given point in the journey.

Why I Coach

Ralph — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 11:15:00 GMT

If you’re a frequent reader of these pages, you’ve noticed that I’m a big advocate of the idea that changing the world starts in our own communities. First and foremost, I believe we can help the world by doing our best in raising our own children the right way. Secondly, we can volunteer in our communities in areas that we’re passionate about to positively affect the lives of others.

A few years ago, my daughter expressed an interest in playing basketball on a team. The parks and recreation league was looking for coaches and I tentatively volunteered as an assistant coach. After a few weeks, it turned out that I was the only coach showing up for practice consistently. By default - and whether I wanted to or not - I became the ‘head coach’.

The irony of me being a head basketball coach is quite rich. I’m not a good basketball player by any stretch of the imagination. I was a mediocre player in middle school, and abandoned basketball for wrestling in eighth grade.

But my weaknesses in basketball are compensated by my ability to have fun with kids, and my creativity to come up with drills that keep their interest, while teaching them the fundamentals. I’m now in my third year of coaching my daughter’s basketball teams and I’ve enjoyed every second of it.

By and large, our teams have won more games than they’ve lost, but that’s not what matters. What’s important is that every player on the team gets better. There’s a wide range of skill levels on second, third and fourth grade teams. At the beginning of the season, some kids are not strong enough to make a layup, while others can shoot the ball from the free throw line (probably the girls with older brothers!).

It’s a thrill to cheer on the kids that couldn’t make a layup at the beginning of the year, and watch them make a shot in one of the last games. You can see the glint in their eye as they run back on defense, it’s the kind of glow that will last them the better part of a week.

What a joy it is to see a kid begin to dribble equally well with both hands as the year progresses, or to watch a kid who formerly was afraid of the ball begin to rip rebounds out of the moshpit in the lane.

What greater reward is there, than seeing a kid discover a passion for a game that’ll give ‘em a positive outlet in a high school that might be filled with bad crowds and tough choices. What greater reward is there, when a former player sees you at a school function, and gives you a hug or you hear a mom say their daughter continued to play basketball but really misses Coach Ralph.

Most times, when you volunteer, you end up making the world a little better. In the end, the person you benefitting the most is yourself.

Shaq Attack!

Ralph — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 18:17:00 GMT

The guest conductor confidently strode to the podium, respectfully acknowledged the audience, and prepared his baton for the first downbeat. The holiday audience sat at rapt attention waiting for orchestra to break into the program’s next selection “Sleigh Ride”.

Sounds like just another one of hundreds of predictable holiday pops concerts across the world, right?

Hardly.

This conductor had a considerable edge on most other conductors – namely a height edge (of about a foot-and-a-half). He also outweighs most conductors by at least 150 pounds.

In case you missed it, Shaquille O’Neal, the legendary basketball center, took the stage last week to conduct the Boston Pops Orchestra and the Tanglewood Chorus in three selections. Shaq hammed it up, boogied a bit to ‘Can You Feel It’ and left the stage to a rousing ovation, high-fiving players on his way out.

I first learned of this event watching ESPN during my morning workout at the YMCA. I must have seen the same video clips four days in a row on ESPN and on other networks as well. In fact, ESPN is still airing clips this week.

Is this just the latest in a series of gimmicks designed to prop up shrinking orchestra budgets, or is the work of marketing genius?

The answer, as with most things, lies somewhere in-between the extremes.

Upon viewing the highlights initially, I thought to myself, “What a joke!” Shaq has no sense of tempo, and the orchestra, made up of professionals is essentially keeping itself together. And the by-product will be, of course, “See, anyone can conduct!”

Conducting, in it, of itself, takes a whole lot of skill, not to mention the ability to interpret a score and rehearsal techniques.

But overall, I think the plusses of this event far outweigh the minuses. Consider, in my four half hour workout sessions in front of the TV, I saw this replayed on four separate occasions. How many other times was it played throughout the week? ESPN has a wide audience for sure, but how many of those viewers had even thought about an orchestra in the past five years. Maybe a few them thought, I wonder if there’s an orchestra in my town I could see? Still others thought, you know, I’ve been meaning to get to a holiday orchestra or choral concert anyway, let me see if there’s something going on this week.

The orchestra itself wasn’t demeaned in anyway by this appearance, in fact, they sounded great. If their season ticket sales increase and they are able to stay in the black for one more year in this tight economy, more power to them. Let’s face it, orchestras have to do some of these things to make lots of money on a few concerts, so they can support the remainder of their season.

Some people like pops, some people like something a little more serious, but with these sort of approaches the orchestra can provide some of both and most importantly….

They can keep the doors open.

The Crossover Phenomenon

Ralph — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 18:30:00 GMT

In 1995-96 I was in my second year of graduate school. I was writing a very serious marimba piece because, after all, I was on my toward becoming a very serious composer. I was using some fairly complicated pitch structures, a la Anton Webern. Suddenly, after the first half of the composition was written, I began hearing a groove pattern that was anything but serious.

I'm not sure there's an official definition of groove music, but the idea is that you lay down a really nasty line and repeat it often, because it's so catchy. A lot of popular music is based on grooves.

But 'serious' composers need to avoid grooves at all costs, right? We need to strive for abstract structures, that take repeated hearings to unwind (or so I thought). Because of the trappings of this sort of thinking, I scuttled the groove idea and went on with the 'ultra-serious' business of flipping melodies upside down and backwards, etc.

The piece received its first premiere, and I remember thinking that I really didn't like how the second section unfolded. It seemed as though the ideas got lost in my own complicated musical map.

In general, I think it's good idea for a composer to move on to the next piece after one is completed, rather then continually rewriting pieces to get them just right. But in this case, something kept gnawing at me about this marimba piece, as though there was a better version inside me somewhere.

Earlier, I had sketched out the groove section, and began taking a look at it again. It really seemed to fit, and provided a much needed sense of repetitive structure in the work. At that point, I just sort of let go of any misconceptions I had about groove music, and began trusting my instincts. I kept bringing the groove music back, with improvised material in between, that kept getting a little further and further out. For good measure, I also added a hi-hat, that the marimbist could strike on beats two and four, to really get the piece rockin'.

So in a few short days, the work was drastically rewritten, and performed yet again. Interestingly enough, I've actually seen people in the audience bob their heads during this section, grooving right along with the performance on beats two and four.

This was an extremely important musical discovery for me. A sort of coming out of the closet moment in the sense that I grew up with funk, jazz and rock music and I used to play a really mean electric bass. There wasn't a bass line around that I couldn't play and I played 'em all with jazz groups, speed metal bands - you name it! So I feel these types of music deep down in my bones. They're a big part of who I am as a musician. To not write in these styles, or to at least incorporate aspects of them in my writing, would essentially be ignoring a core part of who I am.

You may have heard of The Crossover Phenomenon in music. It's often used to describe a recording where a classical artist, like Yo Yo Ma, plays folk music, or a popular artist like Billy Joel creates something in the classical realm. This is all well and good, and anything Yo Yo Ma plays sounds terrific. But I prefer to think of the crossover phenomenon differently. I am a crossover artist through and through. I don't wear one hat most of the time and crossover to wear another hat on a whim. I have grown up with one leg firmly planted in the classical camp and the other firmly in the rock camp.

So what the hell does all of this mean, when it comes down to the important business of making music. Well, it means a whole bunch of variety within a piece, sometimes within the same movement. It also means that the groove-based music I create develops or morphs into something completely different over time. You can hear the core melody coming through, but you might feel as though you've been transported into a completely different world.

Take, for example, my trio Furtive Glances for sax, piano and electric bass. Initially in the work, the sax is improvising over the top of groovy jazz feel. As the work unfolds, the sax melody morphs into something that sounds as though Brahms wrote it himself. These sections are separated by several minutes in the actual work, but I've merged them together in the excerpt below to illustrate the point. Take a listen, and let me know what you think. Can you hear the same melodic shape, slowed down a bit?

Listen to Excerpts of Furtive Glances

On Blogging

Ralph — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 02:38:00 GMT

A year ago, I decided to begin blogging on this site. I was curious to explore the new rage and see if blogging could help me connect to other folks interested in music on the net. During the year, there were over 9,000 visits to my blog, showing a steady increase on a monthly basis. In December of 2009, my first month of blogging, I attracted 84 visits to the blog. In October of this year there were 1,678 visits.

One of the reasons I began blogging, was to promote traffic to my website more consistently. I planned to provide fresh content on a weekly basis to give interested parties a reason to keep coming back to the website (since it is linked in with this blog).

About eight months into this experiment, I noticed that more people were visiting the blog portion of my website, than the static portions. I began adapting the blog, providing more listening excerpts of my work, discussing more of the background behind my pieces, and offering updates about my career. This blog is really just a different vehicle to get that information to the reader. To me, it really doesn’t matter where you get your information about me and my thoughts about music, it merely matters that you're interested in those things.

I've always been fascinated with the intersection of music and life. This blog provides a format for me to talk about how life inspires music and how music can inspire us to live better lives.

The blog also allows me to relate to people through common experiences that we all share. Unfortunately, many people view classical musicians and composers as being a bit elitist. While some in our ranks are a bit stuffy, at the end of the day, we’re just regular folks with the same struggles and triumphs as anyone else. Hopefully the blog has helped break down some of preconceptions that people have about classical musicians.

And of course, I’ve been blogging to increase my name exposure throughout the country. The marked increase in the number of visitors helps me to conclude that I’ve been successful in achieving that goal. I also recently met an individual in Ames, IA who had come to a concert where I was having a work performed. He mentioned that he was a reader of my blog. When I asked how he found out about the blog, he wasn’t sure. I thought that was neat!

The world is changing. In this age of social media with the internet looming larger than ever, artists need to think differently about their careers. Blogging is one approach, of many, that can help art reach new audiences all throughout the world. So, if you have an interest in writing, and want to increase the exposure to your art, I’d encourage you to start a blog – you can create one for free on Wordpress.com or Blogger.com. If you have any questions on the process, don’t hesitate to contact me.

So, as I look forward to a new year of blogging, I may begin expanding the range of topics I take on. I have an avid interest in politics, but have been afraid to alienate people by talking about a subject that is socially taboo. We’ll see what the new year brings and how the choice of subjects affects the traffic flow.

Thanks to all of you for continuing to check out the blog. I’m honored that you have chosen to spend a few moments of your busy lives, checking out what I have to say.

Though the new year may find me tackling some new areas, the primary focus of this blog will always be on music.

After all, it's music that makes me tick!

Express Yourself

Ralph — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 22:44:00 GMT

A few years ago I was reading a review of several works by an up-and-coming 15 year old composer. The reviewer praised the young composer’s craft, his inventiveness, and the maturity with which he handled musical form. At the review’s end, however, the reviewer made a curious comment. He mentioned that he couldn’t wait to hear the composer’s work in a few years, after he had experienced his share of hardships with a few girlfriends.

What the reviewer was getting at, of course, was the idea that the young composer’s music would have more depth after he had experienced more of life’s triumphs and tragedies.

Igor Stravinsky, one of the greatest composers of all time, once said that music, by itself, has no meaning. On the other end of the spectrum, the Greek theoretician Boethius felt that certain musical modes (or scales) elicited certain emotions. Some composers and theoreticians have even gone so far as to say that certain melodic intervals cause a particular emotional reaction in the listener.

I believe Stravinsky was right, in the sense that a composer can’t put together a series of notes and expect that every listener will derive the same meaning from the way those notes are organized.

On the other hand, I certainly feel things when I listen to music. I feel, quite deeply, a sense of hope and triumph when listening to the finale of Beethoven’s 9th symphony.

Not everyone will feel this same sense of hope when listening to Beethoven’s 9th, however. A composer and a performer cannot control how the listener will interpret their musical offering, as each listener brings a unique set of life experiences and listening abilities to the table. So, since music’s communication is inexact, it’s communication of any sort of one-dimensional meaning is inexact as well.

But let’s go back to what that reviewer was saying for a moment. Does a composer write differently based on their particular set of life experiences?

Of course they do.

If I look back at my own work, I believe there’s more heart and soul in the works I’ve created since becoming a father. If you ask me to explain what particular aspects of the music are deeper, I’ll be at a loss. What I can say, for a fact, is that the whole process of creating music has been much more moving to me, since having kids.

For artists then, a silver lining may be found even in life’s worst experiences, as they will provide another shade of emotional content to be communicated. Artists may be incapable of doing anything else than grieving at the height of these travesties, but somewhere, down the road, we can deal with these painful life experiences through our art.

A few years back, I was going through a bit of a rough patch at work in one of my previous positions. I felt as though I had a lot more to offer, but most of my ideas for improvements were shot down out of the gate. After awhile, I gave up offering suggestions and began going to work and simply going with the flow. Over my lunch breaks during that period, I wrote a lament for violin and piano. You can listen to an excerpt of the piece by clicking on the link below.

Listen to an Excerpt of Forlorn

In this time of Thanksgiving, I am thankful for many things. I am thankful for the ability to express myself in art – in good times and in bad.

The Stuff They Didn't Teach You in School -- Part Two

Ralph — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 01:35:00 GMT

Insanity is the act of doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results.

There’s a lot of truth in that saying. If you’ve submitted the same resume to 100 job openings, and haven’t received any calls for an interview, it is probably time to redesign the resume. Similarly, if you’ve been in a job for 10 years and, in each of those years, been passed over for a promotion, it may be time to try something different – either working on relationship skills, or getting some advanced training outside of work.

But, of course, there’s that seemingly contradictory saying that goes, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!” Perhaps the one-hundred and first-job application is the one that pans out, or the eleventh try at the promotion is the one that lands you the job of your dreams.

Each year, the Iowa Choral Director’s Association awards a commission to a composer to create a new choral work that will be premiered at the organization’s summer symposium, in front of hundreds of choral directors. It’s a composer’s dream as it could take a lifetime to get a new piece of music in front of that many potential interested parties.

I’ve entered this competition at least six times, perhaps as many as eight. Which means, I’ve lost it more times than I’d care to admit. But this year, finally, I was declared the winner of the competition.

To be considered for the commission, a composer needs to submit some choral works for the committee to review. Interestingly enough, this year, I submitted the same choral works that I had entered on previous occasions and yet, this year, I won the competition.

What changed?

In the past year, I was fortunate enough to receive two wonderful performances of the choral works I submitted. For this year’s submission then, I was able to submit those high quality recordings along with the scores, for the committee to review. And that, I believe, was the difference.

In school, we spend an awful lot of time on the art of composing, on honing our craft, but we often don’t receive mentorship on the nuts and bolts items that we need to be professional composers. So if you haven’t received this advice yet composers, let me be the first to tell you, spare no cost and no effort towards getting high quality recordings of your music.

A few years back, I served as a judge in a composition contest. It seems to me there were about 14 entries. I played through the pieces, and, after weeding out a few of the entries, made a rough ordering of what I felt were the top 8 pieces. A few of the pieces included a recording, so I listened to them to help verify my initial thoughts on the pieces’ rankings. I was blown away by one of the performances, and suddenly, the piece I had ranked eighth was now in the running for winning the competition. Ultimately, I selected another piece, because I felt it was a bit more creative, but isn’t it interesting that the eighth ranked piece jumped to number two, based on a high quality recording?

Getting high quality recordings means that you’re either going to need to build some quality relationships with performers or spend some money, or both. Trust me though -- these investments are well worth it in the long run. Not only will your pieces be commemorated for history’s sake, you’ll stand a fighting chance pursuing opportunities against all of the other composers out there that have spent the time and money procuring high quality recordings.

When you were a kid, after you’d done something stupid, your mom probably asked you, “If everyone else was jumping off of a bridge, would you do it too?”

This is one of those rare cases, where you’ll need to ignore your mom’s sage advice….

You need to do this precisely because everyone else is doing it!

Can Music Change the World?

Ralph — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 16:44:00 GMT

Does music have the power to change the world?

In May of 1992 a grenade was thrown into a bread line in a pedestrian precinct in Sarajevo during the Bosnian war. Tragically, twenty-two people were killed in the explosion.

How would we react if this calamity happened in our neighborhood? Personally, I’d probably hunker down in my house, only going out in public when I had no other choice.

Vedran Smailovic reacted quite differently. Rather than hunkering down, the professional Sarajevo cellist decided to honor the victims by giving public concerts outdoors for each of the next 22 days. Dressed in full concert attire, the cellist performed Albinoni’s Adagio in G Minor and other pieces day after day among the debris in the war-torn city.

I’d give anything to have an ounce of his courage.

He could have easily been shot down as he played and been yet another victim of the war's senseless ethnic cleansing. But he survived, and his story provides a powerful testimony to the power of music to provide hope and to give comfort in the darkest of times, in the grimmest of places.

What a stark contrast, the grief stricken cellist playing beautiful music with all of his soul amongst the rubble of buildings blasted apart by the savagery of war. The cellist's love of humanity and his concern for his fellow man pitted against symbols of a war that knows no humanity, that has an utter disregard for the value of human life.

There are very few people that, through their actions, can directly change the world as Vedran did. There are many of us, however, that can help make our communities a better place. And in doing so, collectively, we too can help make the world a better place, one compassionate act at a time.

Music is certainly part of the equation toward making the world a better place…ever seen a kid lose him or herself performing a piece of music or have you experienced a time when you've forgotten about your physical or emotional ailments while listening to a piece of music? If so, you know its power.

Music has the emotional power to change our moods, to conjure up forgotten memories of friends and times long ago. At its best, a musical creation can even provide us with a glimpse of the Ultimate Creator, as though these notes were drawn directly from the hand of God and performed with the help of His spirit.

But not everyone was created with the gift to make and share music. I’m quite confident however, that each of us was given a gift or two to make the world a better place. Opportunities are all around us to:

Coach a basketball team
Mentor students over a lunch hour
Volunteer at community shelter
Visit people in a nursing home
Participate in a fundraiser for a local non-profit

I think the key is, to identify your gifts and then use them. When we’re doing what we were created to do, when we're participating in activities we're passionate about, we don't feel as though we are working. We enjoy using our gifts in this way, in fact, the entire experience of using them is refreshing spiritually.

Hillary Clinton was once maligned for her book, It Takes a Village (to raise a child). Her detractors said that instead, it takes a parent to raise a child.

They’re both right.

Opening Up a Can of Whupass

Ralph — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 15:52:00 GMT

This past weekend I decided to check out the offerings of a used CD store in town. I was surprised to find a really good selection of Classical music CDs and ended up purchasing about 10 discs.

One of the recordings I picked up was the Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus performing Mozart’s Requiem. I was trying to get some work done yesterday while listening to the piece, but I found the music so compelling, that I simply had to stop what I was doing on multiple occasions and focus on the composition. I could devote an entire blog to the artful handling of fugal writing in this piece; another blog on Mozart’s dramatic usage of register; and yet a third blog on the timing and brilliance of the formal and textural changes in the piece. Suffice it to say, that with the Requiem, Mr. Mozart has delivered yet another ass whuppin’ to this lowly composer struggling in vain to string together a few notes here in Eastern Iowa.

On a related note (pun intended), I remember one time in college, listening to Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring with the score, and marveling over the complexity of the composer’s orchestration. I dejectedly walked into my composition lesson the next day and asked my teacher “why should I even bother continuing writing music, I’ll never be able to put something together like the Rite of Spring?” I can’t remember his response, but it must have been good enough for me to not give up entirely.

There’s usually one piece on most concerts I attend, that humbles me a great deal. I’ve been on the receiving end of whuppins by a whole host of composers – Beethoven (repeatedly), Brahms, and Bartok to name but a few.

But I think it’s a healthy thing for a composer to get cut down to size now and again. It’s important to be aware of one’s shortcomings by recognizing how others have done it better in specific areas - orchestration, dramatic portrayal, formal architecture, creativity, you name it. Composers can use these experiences as learning opportunities, sizing up areas we need to improve upon. Then, we can take some time to study the scores of those whuppin’ our butts, to see how they’ve created these magical moments and later, apply these concepts to our own works.

In fact, recognizing greatness and working toward that standard to become better is true in just about any human endeavor. Take for example, the case of Kobe Bryant. Do you think he is as good of a basketball player as Michael Jordon? In my opinion, he’s probably not, but he’s close, close enough for the question to be asked and given some serious consideration.

How did Kobe get to where he is today? What if he had championed lesser players, like Clyde Drexler or John Stockton, and used them as his measuring stick rather than MJ? Would he be as good of a player today? Probably not.

And so, as composers, it’s good to compare ourselves to the best, and keep striving to be included among their company. I don’t have any delusions that the name Kendrick will ever be held in as high of regard musically as the name Mozart or Beethoven, but if I keep trying, perhaps by the time I’m 70, these great geniuses will be merely be stepping on my little toe, rather than consistently bruising my entire backside.

That would hurt a whole lot less!

Anger, Fury, Rage

Ralph — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 09:35:00 GMT

Have you ever been really pissed off? I mean, white-hot venom, spittin' nails pissed off?

Sure you have - we all have been, right?

A while back, I witnessed an absolute debacle of a performance of a piece of mine that left me feeling white-hot mad. It's one thing if some young performers give their best, and give your piece an average-go, but this was an ensemble that had an excellent reputation, and should have done better.

What angered me even more about this situation, was that the piece was performed on a well-attended concert with works by my peers, and the performances of those works seemed really well done.

Why all the angst, you ask? It's really hard to explain, but when you create something, there's a whole bunch of you in that creation. You wake up at 4 or 5 in the morning, day after day, and you work and you craft and you spill blood on the paper, trying to get all of these details to work out just so, and then you entrust this new creation, your new baby, to a group of performers to render to an audience. It's a very vulnerable spot for any composer to be in. When that group doesn't respect the piece enough, to give it a decent rendering, it hurts. The audience hears the piece as it was performed, and assumes that's what the composer meant, when in cases like these, the composer envisioned something far better, it just wasn't rehearsed enough to sound right. Imagine someone leaving the concert and saying, "most of the pieces were good, but I'm not sure why they programmed that work by Kendrick, it wasn't all that great." As a composer, your name and reputation are on the line with each performance, and they're in the hands of others.

So anyway, I leave this performance with smoke comin' outta my ears, and on the drive back home I started thinking about how angry a 'cello can sound and how I had just heard my friend, the cellist Carey Bostian, play with Orchestra Iowa earlier that week. Carey had been letting his hair grow out, and as I watched him play that night, I had thought about how cool it would be to write a piece for him that was suitable for a moshpit.

Carey Bostian, Violoncello

Bingo.

Worlds collided, and now, suddenly, a plan to write a piece sometime down the road for solo 'cello, became a necessity. It was a Sunday night, and I had to work in the morning, but I didn't care... I was hellbound on staying up all night, and capturing this anger while it was fresh.

Immediately upon coming home, I brewed a fresh pot of coffee and began sketching out the piece. I decided not to worry about getting everything perfect, I was more concerned with capturing the intensity of the emotion. It's kind of like Jimi Hendrix going off on a guitar solo, the notes aren't always rendered perfectly, but there's a raw emotion to the playing that you can feel, that's what I was after.

Here's an excerpt of the piece I created that night - venom and all. But before you listen to it, I must tell you that while I was in college, I used to play bass guitar in a heavy metal band. I think you'll hear some of that coming through as you listen to a portion Syrian Nightmare, performed by Carey Bostian.

Click Here to Listen to an Excerpt of Syrian Nightmare

Can you feel my angst? I hope so. I hope it feels like a hammer just hit you over the head.

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