access to the audience
kyle gann’s recent post that quoted cornelius cardew got me thinking about this whole alt-classical thing.
“access to [the] audience (the artist’s real means of production) is controlled by the state.”
for the past 5 years playing and composing outside the mainstream has had a lot of advantages:
1. i write what i want and for who i want
2. the time from composition to rehearsal is usually a matter of days
3. i get everything played that i write (the good and the bad)
4. i perform with who i want and where i want
cardew’s statement implies that gaining access to the concert halls (the means of production which is controlled by the state) is the primary path to gaining access to the audience. while i prefer to play in non-traditional venues it has some limitations:
1. concert halls are definitely not a priority, but it is any art music composers main access to press and reviews. its kinda ironic that we don’t really matter until we play a concert hall though our best shows and crowds are occur in the alt-venues.
2. playing in clubs works the best, but in los angeles the problem isn’t about finding a place to play, but to find other groups who share a similar aesthetic sensibility to put on a decent show. booking a show can easily devolve into a vaudeville act.
3. galleries can be great place to play, but if they don’t already host musical events getting an audience to come out to a new venue takes time.
4. of course there is no money playing these alt-venues, and the freedom that i have to write our own shows and work out my material on a consistent basis (like any rock band or standup comedian)
5. if i wanted to have a paying “career” as a composer then my options of “making a living” are all clearly controlled by the state. if i took this path i would have to embrace the “work for hire” attitude and become a plumbers of art music taking whatever commissions and projects that came my way.
there are some pretty obvious limitations to the whole alt-classical thing. this is not a path you choose to pay the bills. i was lucky to learn early when i was playing at disney that making money doing your art can be highly problematic and have embraced the model as composer as musician and educator (much like bach and vivaldi).
these days we might have the we have the power to self publish, record and perform our own music.
the freight train theory of history
the results of the my latest compositions are starting to take shape. one of these new pieces (fearless leader) represents a new direction for my music. ligeti’s death got me thinking about his famous quote:
“Now there is no taboo; everything is allowed. But one cannot simply go back to tonality, it’s not the way. We must find a way of neither going back nor continuing the avant-garde. I am in a prison: one wall is the avant-garde, the other wall is the past, and I want to escape.”
i think his point isn’t really about the rejection of tonality or the acceptance of the avant guard, but the idea that once you choose to follow freight train theory of history, to progress you must reject something else to move forward (ernest krenek in the ockeghem bio).
i think there is a third way. innovation for the sake of something new can lead empty art. my new works are influenced by performance considerations than by artistic innovation. not anything i’m doing is new or cutting edge, but the combinations of these ideas are a practical matter and a response to the limitations of performance and rehearsal i have faced for the past three years.
the pieces are written in c score, to be played by an indeterminate size ensemble so that we are able to adjust the orchestration for each group that gets together to play.
these pieces also have an indeterminacy of parts, form and orchestration. they can be realized in a performance in a precomposed fashion in which all the parts are assigned and the piece unfolds in a specific manner.
yet we also can create a version so that in some sections the musicians can choose which lines to play and even change the form and internal repetition structure from show to show.
somehow the idea of opening up the score for future “customization” makes more sense to me these days. i can think of many examples of similar ideas (duke ellington, charles mingus, terry riley, cornelius cardew…) but this is more an solution to a specific problem.
in rehearsal the early realizations of this have been powerful. it changes the power structure of an ensemble; for us to make music you have to go beyond just playing what is on the page. decisions are made and agreed upon with the ensemble that really matter in performance. how do we want this to unfold? what is the best way to get to the center of this music? where is this piece going? so far many of the “happy accidents” have made the music much stronger. there is such a difference when everybody is when they are given freedom to choose and interact than when they are assigned a specific role.
three years ago i created this ensemble with an idea of an specific instrumentation that i was interested in working with. now i have turned around 180 degrees. its all about having a group a people that want to get together and make music on a consistent basis because we have to express ourselves through the communal nature of rehearsal and performance. the size of the ensemble can expand and contract based on our busy schedules, a only moderately balanced quorum is needed to put on a show. in a very early review, i hope these “adjustments” to my process have freed my ensemble to create music in a more creative and collaborative way and perform in far more often in the future. fto!
d.i.e. (diverse intstrument ensemble), 051706
may 17 2006
california state university, fullerton
recital hall
folias echa para mi senora dona tarobilla de carallanos-1650
andrea falconiero
de plus en plus
gilles binchois
douglas law, countertenor
from 125 “contrapunti” on a cantus firmus-1540
constano festa
counterpoint 23
counterpoint 27
counterpoint 88
conterto I re minore per 2 oboe, archi e cembalo-1715
antonio vivaldi
la deploration de johan okeghem-1500
josquin despres
douglas law-countertenor, veronica paez-oboe, brian madigan-ebass, pam gadaire-eguitar, ryan nunes-vibraphone and marimba, michael lassarre-alto sax, carl stronach-vibraphone and marimba, esther li-keyboard, scott mcintosh-clarinet and bass clarinet, xico castano, clarinet, paul bailey-trombone, lloyd rodgers, conductor
Ensemble's Mix Is A Classic Alternative: Josef Woodard/LAtimes (2005)
Los Angeles Times, January 21st, 2005
(Copyright (c) 2005 Los Angeles Times)
“After his concert at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts on Wednesday, Paul Bailey spoke to the audience about his ongoing adventure, the Paul Bailey Ensemble — an “alternative classical garage band.”
Fair enough: The cheeky description points to the group’s self- reliant, can-do spirit and its intention to mix high and low culture, art and pop. Fittingly, the setting was the casual Sierra Room, where the audience sat at tables as if in a new-music cabaret.
A balanced grouping of strings, woodwinds, guitar, bass, keyboard, vibraphone and sometimes vocalists, the ensemble consists of classically trained and impressively focused players who create an appealing, collective sound. Bailey, a trombonist, educator and composer, formed the group in 2002 as a do-it-yourself forum outside the usual and limited channels of classical music presentation.
Stylistically, the ensemble is very much locked into the Minimalist groove. The Cerritos concert was well-stocked with repetitive lines, easygoing tonalities, and undulating cascades of eighth notes, reminding us of the comforting, even old-fashioned, charm of the Minimalist style.
In the concert’s first half, instrumental pieces from Bailey’s suite “Summerland” and guitarist Sean R. Ferguson’s “Chopping Tool” offered their rhythmically chugging energies, more about ensemble machinery than melodic or thematic development. These fed directly from the inspirational trough of such classic Minimalist recordings as Steve Reich’s “Music for 18 Musicians” and Philip Glass’ “Glassworks.” The inclusion of electric guitar ( Ferguson ) and bass (Matt Menaged) nudge the sound more toward a rock aesthetic, thanks to our associative connection with those tools.
This program’s main attraction came after intermission, with the world premiere of Bailey’s ambitious “Retrace Our Steps,” ostensibly written for mezzo-soprano Nicole Baker. She sang key parts in the four-movement work, with text that included cryptic poetics by Gertrude Stein and socio-philosophical tracts by Guy Debord and Jenny Bitner. But Baker ultimately became a team player and folded into the democratic mesh of the ensemble’s conjuring of nine instrumentalists and four additional vocalists.
One unsettling aspect of an otherwise engaging concert was the canned texture of sound processed through microphones, allowing acoustic instruments to compete with electronic ones. Then again, that is a hallmark of Minimalism, which borrows from pop’s sound palette and equipment list on the path to a new classical paradigm. In short, the Paul Bailey Ensemble is out of the garage and on the way up.”
holiday break-busy!
an extended holiday break is one the great advantages for being a teacher, but this holiday is been very busy. since the friday afternoon that school ended (dec 20th) i have been editing music, emailing musicians, calling and mailing news outlets and radio stations, rehearsing, and recording for our upcoming performance at the cerritos center. [...]
