Prepared all the lecture material: Tippett; Magnificat; Webern - Cantata, Op. 31; Boulez - Le Marteau sans Maitre; Schoenberg - Pierrot Lunaire; Tavener - The Lamb; Bryars - Incipit Vita Nova. The Tippett and the Bryars are my favourites, although when I listened to the Webern last evening I was pleasantly surprised. It does sound a little dated, though.
Yesterday, began work on 'Being and Becoming'. Managed to write 6 bars! 6 bars only!!! The score is on such a gigantic canvas I reckon that simply aligning pitches in the bars with my T-ruler takes about 10 minutes for each bar. It doesn't worry me. Once I'm into that process and things are underway, then I feel happy. I'm in my own little world, which is somewhere else. A little more can be done today.
Continued with John Storey's book. Found an interesting reference to Pierre Macherey's work, which will be followed up. Currently a lot of work to do.
A surprisingly good day of teaching yesterday, particularly when J.W., an A Level Composition student, came for his lesson. He tells me he's just bought 'In The Court Of The Crimson King'. I asked him for his reactions on the album. He says he was totally stunned by it, and that it sounds 'now'. He also bought Larks', and already has Red. I said that it was dificult for me to convey the power of the album when I first heard it in 1969, but that, essentially, he's right.
E-mails from Robert, Susanna, Ana, Leigh and Robin Walker left a phone message. Andrew phoned, and Christopher phoned the evening before saying he's well into his dissertation.
3 10/30/2001 Bought a Smith, Perkins, Smith album from the record fair on Sunday. Very disappointing. Many of the records/cds where over-priced.
Yesterday managed to continue with further revisions on the RvR material and these can be xeroxed today and sent to David Stoll who is taking the rehearsal in a couple of weeks. I begin on the huge task of writing 'Being and Becoming' into full-score today. It will be a big job and will probably take a month or so.
E-mails from Robert who seems pleased about the reply I received from the journal. After the Soundscape arrangements, if nothing else develops compositionally, I plan to make writing the analyses the project for 2002. However, one never knows: things turn up out of the blue. There is one project pending for 2003, and I await to hear from Gothic Voices and Matthew Wadsworth whether or not funding applications have been successful for the pieces they have asked for.
E-mail from Susanna asking if Jacob can stay with us when Fretwork hit the North West on their leg of the CMN tour. The tour begins on Friday and Sue and I are going to Lancaster University on Saturday evening to hear the concert. Susanna tells me that 'Afterwords' begins the concert. Matt Seattle also wrote with a review of his/McFall's 'Border Seasons' album.
Last evening listened to a little of the David Kitt album, some of the Modern Eon 'B' sides, and wrote something about them on the Modern Eon forum in reply to Ana.
A long day awaits. A strange dream last night.
1 10/28/2001 Clocks went back last evening and we're plunged into winter. However, today's weather looks the best it's been for a long time. I hope, probably along with everyone else, that we don't receive the same battering from the elements as we did last year.
Went to Lancaster yesterday, specifically to the market where there is an excellent second-hand record stall, and found two copies of old singles by the Comsat Angels. I saw the Comsats in the early 1980's, and they were excellent. I sensed, however, that their initial vigour was departing and shortly afterwards they opted to try their luck at commercial success. At the concert their guitarist/vocalist, Stephen Fellows, sounded amazed that we actually liked them. Their early promise had been partly due to the fact that they were careful with the advance they received from their record company, keeping recording costs low and asking the in-house Polydor producer, Peter Wilson, to produce their records. The first two records, especially the second, 'Sleep No More', was a masterpiece. They subsequently signed with a company who wanted them to prove their commercial appeal, and I sensed that this was a mistake. I can't be sure, but I sensed it. One of the singles I bought yesterday reinforced this feeling, as it's a re-working (actually a glossy re-working) of their second single, 'Independence Day'. The original version of ID, along with those first two albums, had this bleakness that encapsulated the early '80's: dissatisfaction with the Thatcher government, fear of possible nuclear warfare, loads of people on the dole etc. For the Comsats to change, for me, was a hard pill to swallow. I didn't know anyone else who liked them, so I don't know how others took it. However, so as to get a true picture of their subsequent history I've ordered two more recent albums. It's only fair to do them justice. One of their early singles, 'It's History', is complelety brilliant. 'Eye Of The Lens' is also interesting. I listened to both of them last evening.
Returned from Lancaster and wrote piece #3 for the RvR project. Came downstairs this morning and began revising all three which have been re-visited and re-written this week. Now I'm off to a record fair in Blackpool.
7 10/27/2001 As October ebbs away the temperatures continue to fall. Yesterday, I managed to complete the second piece for the RvR project. This was completed after returning from hospital visiting. My mother has done well and returns home this morning. Continued with the Storey book (!) making further connections between post-structuralism and musicology. In the '50's and '60's academics certainly saw that narrative was dead. Could they have foreseen the return to it in the 21st century? I reckon that underneath they knew it would happen, but in guises they didn't expect; that no-one expected. But that's the nouveau post-modern for you!
Gert-Jan E-mailed and so did Markus. Matt and Jacob also sent messages. Farringdon's have also made contact about my CDs for the upcoming Fretwork concerts in November. This is thanks to Susanna Pell. Contacted Laura and Leigh about this. Received mails from David Fideler, too.
Listened to Yoko Ono last evening. Very revealing! A. wrote about Modern Eon. I continue to listen to 'Fiction Tales'. Wow! I think it might just tell us more about some of the music around today.
6 10/26/2001 Spent most of yesterday writing up one of the RvR pieces. There are three to complete, and today a second one awaits. The completed one is written for three viols and bowed tambura. Today's is for oud, kanun and tombak. The percussionist has asked that notation should consist of where the strong beats fall in the bar: he'll improvise the rest. Cool!
After visiting my mother in hospital last evening, I sat and listened to some of Markus Reuter's new CD 'The Longest In Terms Of Being'. I think this is excellent music. The textural variety of it makes for compelling listening, and the modal character of the first piece, 'The Abolition of Death', appeals to me very much. The second piece, 'A Clue to Reality', has a much reduced texture consisting of simple, but well constructed counterpoint. The 'big' pieces have modal centres which are written on the cover. This is helpful in terms of listening into the musical journey. Very impressive.
Gert-Jan also sent a CD in the post: The Langley Schools Music Project's 'Innocence And Despair'. This is a CD of school children, in the USA, singing cover versions of songs like 'Good Vibrations', 'Space Oddity' and 'Desperado' etc. There 21 songs included, and it was recorded from 1976-77 and devised by their music teacher, Hans Fenger. The sleeve-notes describe the process. HF became a music teacher because he needed to support his family. He went to university, passed his teaching certificate and began teaching. He admits he wasn't experienced in any way, but the results on this CD tell me that his in-experience meant he had to fall back on what he knew at that moment in time: pop music of the period. The arrangements, which consist of massed choir, acoustic guitar(s), bass, chimes, some electric guitar, piano and other assorted percussion, were a revelation to me. There is an enthusiasm there which one often hears when listening to children's choirs. Perhaps more so. I was knocked out! 'Space Oddity' is fantastic. Here are children ENJOYING and EXPERIENCING music. No ties with the business world; no ties with career; no ties with process of any kind. A natural experience. It did me good. Gert-Jan simply wrote on a postcard: 'Please find enclosed a CD that was recently released on the label I work for. I thought maybe you might enjoy this...' . I did, and thank you for sending it. It also struck me that is the polar opposite to the very things I wrote on yesterday's Diary, and that it should arrive when it did was, in a strange way, synchronistic. Gert-Jan's CD is the 'Song of Innocence' to the 'Songs of Experience' I was mentioning. You can't have one without the other, and William Blake knew this very well. Interestingly, Gert-Jan's postcard had the painting by Blake called 'Newton' on the front. Blake hated Newton's ideas because they opposed the world of 'imagination' (symbolised by Jesus for Blake). Newton stood for the rational world.
4 10/24/2001 Yesterday we drove to Ambleside but it rained so hard we turned around and went to Lancaster instead. A day of rest. But we need to walk. My body is feeling like doing very little at all at the moment.
Spoke with Peter Dunton on the phone. Acme Records are just about to release a Neon Pearl album from 1968 from tapes that have been sitting on a shelf since then. I've ordered the album but it hasn't arrived.
David Fideler wrote. He has asked me to write a book. I'm thinking about the possibility. I should also be hearing from another publisher about the KC book proposal chapter today.
A day of teaching at Liverpool awaits plus an appointment with David Horn in the Popular Music dept.
3 10/23/2001 How will Musicology evolve? This has been on my mind since yesterday, after reading an article in Fleetwood library whilst my car was being MOT'd. Musicology is a huge subject which covers writing about music, criticism, analysis and so on. It's quite clear that the Postmodern thinking, linguistics in particular, have affected a shift in dealing with the innards of music, so what is said about it isn't just narrative.
Post-war music analysis developed mainly through post-Schenkerian thinking which involved minds like Forte and Nattiez. Analysis was wholly tied-up with distributional, syntagmatic and paradigmatic types. In the UK this was only very gradually included within academia, because there was still a huge emphasis on the writings of Matthew Arnold and F.R Leavis, which emphasised the division of class, and reflected the industrialistion/urbanisation of the nineteenth century. In France and the USA things where slightly different. The French Revolution had, in some way, dealt the class system a death-blow. This had a huge impact on learning, which has always been, to some extent, governed by class and the idealised society.
The most recent type of musicology is interesting because it emphasises the plurality found in much Postmodernity: gender. Susan McClary is, perhaps, the prime exponent of this type of musicology. On Sunday evening I read a brilliant article by Andrew Edgar called 'Adorno and Question of Schubert's Sexuality' which shows McClary's findings in an analysis of Schubert's 8th Symphony. McClary implies, through her findings and in the way Schubert's music allows pleasurable self-surrender, as well the reaction to the strong, less-effeminate formal procedures that Beethoven adopts, to reveal the nature of his (Schubert's) sexuality.
In a sense this is connected to the third type: the Psychological, which is reflected in a recent unpublished manuscript by the composer Geoffrey Poole. Poole says that the way music is written and, indeed, the way in which we relate to it is governed by our prime psychological type: thinking, feeling, sensation or intuition. This is centred around Jungian thought. He also makes the point that certain creative forces tend to stand out, where other recede into the background. Form/style is also influenced by typology. This is, I think, a fruitful way of seeing music.
A possible fourth way, and one certainly on the increase within academia, is the 'Third-Way' kinds of analysis. This centres around popular music, with writers like Philip Tagg, and Richard Middleton. Dick Hebdidge is also notable for his work on subculture and bricolage. This is a non-notation-centric style of analysis, although notation can certainly be adopted. It also includes textual analyses because texts sit in the foreground of popular musics.
A fifth way might be something that David Fideler has called the 'Ecological Postmodern'. This stems from the archetypal and sacred dimensions in that it points a way out of academic establishment thinking, and looks to the likes of Joscelyn Godwin and Fideler himself to provide insights into music through sacred traditions. In a sense this is what Lendvai was doing in his analyses of Bartok. It is cosmological in nature. Gurdjieff's thinking could, for example, be adopted through a kind of distillation musico-alchemical thinking.
Probably, so as to keep pace with the sciences, musicology will be forced to retain its empirical footing but as Postmodernism can't be totally definitive through its crossing of cultural, and otherwise, boundaries, analysis and criticism will have to remain open-ended. For example, critics can no longer be governed by fashion or taste. David Fideler thinks that the new post-Postmodern is likely to be community based, cosmological in nature and steeped in the experiential linking us to the cosmic patterns. Whether the establishment wish to take that on board remains to be seen, but I think they are likely to do anything as long as the selling of education remains their prime motivation. But as we all live in 'different worlds' it could go anywhere.
2 10/22/2001 A day spent completing the sketch of B&B, collecting information for my study of Postmodernism, and going to see my mother in hospital. David Fideler wrote. After a dry start to the day, it began to rain. We drove somewhere but can't, for the life of me, remember exactly where! I miss the Lake District. We haven't been for ages. There seemed to be a hole in the summer with not going there for holidays. My own compositional activities, apart from the arranging/collaboration I'm involved in, seems to have ground to a halt. It hasn't but that what it feels like at this point in time. However, things turn up out of the blue. One thing's for sure, I can no longer write like those in the middle ground/establishment. I could if I wanted to but I don't want to. But, who'd exactly want to anyway? But it suited me for a time, and I learnt a huge amount from it which has been utilised since in new and different ways. But the establishment utilise tried and tested ways, which centre, roughly, upon the academic. One half of the equation is interesting the other half is so mindFUL that the spirit left a very long time ago. But that's roughly what John Storey's book, Cultural Theory And Popular Culture, implies in its opening chapters. The establishment have to be that to hold onto the ground that is slowly slipping-away from under their feet. G-o-i-n-g...g-o-i-n-g...gone! And then there's some other trendy notion to take its place which has been appropriated from the 'underground'. At least, that's what it appears to be as far as I see. David Fideler has some good points about the changing visions of nature and terms it a 'cosmological unfolding'. This is the post-Postmodern.
1 10/21/2001 Miracles: it raineth not. The swallows have left, it's rather grey and the temperatures are falling.
I awoke to some good news this morning: someone has written saying that a rare Modern Eon single is available. Excellent! Once I'm into something it is throughly researched. I don't like to be ignorant about elusive aspects of music. There is always something to learn. Music has a mysterious quality. I've often found that although I go after things that others might not consider to be important, these things are often very useful at some point in the future. I wondered why I'd become interested in Postmodernism, but it's turned out that recently this has been advantageous.
It was cold in Manchester yesterday. Students at the RNCM JS are beginning to produce some very acceptable work. There is a Young Composers concert scheduled for early on in the summer term, but I'm going to try and get this date moved as it's too close to the outset of term. Once one concert is finished we're preparing for the next! Found books on musicology in the library. Gave Anne-Marie the copy of 'Reclaiming Eros'. She remarked, 'Aha! Reclaiming Eros!', although I'm not sure what she meant by that. I returned home yesterday and got stuck into B&B. Only two pages left on which dynamics have to be added. These final pages stand as the apotheosis, and have to be carefully defined in terms of dynamic shaping.
This year seems to be one of collaborations, compositionally speaking. Another
possible project, of this kind, for 2003 is currently in the making. The ways
we take, and the things we find ourselves doing, are all very different. That
is what I'm learning. Also learning about the Kabbalah.
7 10/20/2001 7-15: grey and pouring down outside. My silver umbrella is in
a bit of a mess too: a spoke here, a spoke...not there. Manchester Oxford Road
does that to umbrellas.
Yesterday, taught and called in at an Internet cafe so as to look at my usual E-mail address which is currently unavailable here. 10 pages of new E-mails awaited. Good thing I looked. Had copy of 'Reclaiming Eros' bound to give to Anne-Marie today. Last evening continued to add/modify the dynamics on B&B. I can't wait to see what this looks like on 28-stave MS. Discovered some Panopus 24-stave MS in cupboard. My 28-stave is Challispress stuff. The next half of term will be spent copying-up the music. I've also decided to revise a section of 'Black Light' and extend the string writing. Nothing too drastic. 'Pie Jesu' can be left, more or less, as it stands., although I've made one or two changes.
Found Susanna had also written re complimentary tickets for Liverpool and Lancaster
Fretwork gigs. Received E-mails from Dr. Lucy Green and David Horne. Henry wrote
and I replied. Not sure whether it was sent, though. Trying also to find a copy
of Modern Eon's first single, 'Pieces'. So far unsuccessful. Read reviews of
their album 'Fiction Tales' which confirms a strange feeling I have that reviewers
may be, by and large, visitors to our planet.
6 10/19/2001 Final day at schools before half-term. Only RNCM JS to go tomorrow,
though I have my normal teaching at Liverpool Uni next week. The weather is
better than usual for this time of year. Yesterday, it was quite warm. The ivy,
covering the front of the school houses, has turned red and will soon disappear.
Continued to add all the dynamics to the sketch of B&B. There are 25 pages of sketch on 18-stave Landscape MS. Got to page 16. So far, this has taken three days to do. A lot of work. The next stage is to complete this over the weekend, then put it aside for a week. In the meantime, the music for the collaboration with David Stoll has to be written into some kind of readable score to be sent in the next few days to David, so he can take it to the rehearsal at RvR HQ in early Nov. I can't be there for that. After this I can return to B&B, and write it up on 28 stave MS. It is likely to be a gigantic work, but should sound, in the main, delicate except for the middle climax. Also thought more about Postmodernism and musicology. Wrote to David Horn at Liverpool Uni's Popular Music dept. I am thinking seriously of taking on further study into popular music analytical methods. We'll see.
Sat down for 45 mins. Last evening after more preparation for tomorrow's RNCM
teaching, and listened to Modern Eon. Quite brilliant. Why do I often prefer
music which other people don't like at all? It seems that those musicians who
remain in relative obscurity appeal to me more than those who have fame and
riches. With Modern Eon the overall theme of the album is 'imagination'. This
is coded into the musical fabric in a very interesting way. They do sound like
a post-Joy Division band, but that doesn't fool me for one moment. Why are all
the songs joined together? Why are many of them multi-sectional? Why does Danny
Hampson (the bass player) sound, in places, like a cross between Peter Hook
and Chris Squire or John Wetton?
5 10/18/2001 It a dark, rainy, bleak northern morning. I hear people, dressed
in clogs and cloth-caps, trundling their way along the cobbled street t'mill.
They say 'Wet'un this mornin' lad. Gud thing when summer's 'ere!' Oh for a world
of stereotypes! The mills have gone; so have the cloth caps; and the cobbles
have been covered. Clogs do still exist, mainly on the feet of some students
who can't afford to wear anything else, brought on largely by the abolition
of government funding. Here, we have a government dedicated to education, but
one that has a problem: a) they see the need to plough money into research and
funds goes into that; b) the under-graduates are left in dire-straights having
to pay for the what goes on elsewhere. Grants used to be fairly minimal; now
they are no more. Even a minimum amount can help, but to ask students to begin
professional life in debt is a very good way of keeping them under the laws
of credit. And it's a sin, to my mind at least. Usury is a word that does not
belong in my book.
Liverpool was good yesterday. The students are producing very acceptable work. I went to Hairy Records in Bold Street and asked about Modern Eon. No-one knows anything about them, but I did manage to find something about them on the Internet. I think they were brilliant. Why does, sometimes, brilliance fade-away so quickly? E-mails from Robert, Gert-Jan, Peter, Jacob and Nat.
Reading about the Kabbalah at the moment. Also thinking about musicology in
a POMO setting. How does Postmodern thinking affect musicology? Quite a lot!
It seems to centre around the selling of education, and so I will end more or
less where I began.
4 10/17/2001 The computer seems to be working, so a Diary entry can be made.
Yesterday it was returned. It died on Sunday.
Being And Becoming is getting there. The sketch was completed yesterday at around 14-00. The next thing is to write it into fair-score, and then it can be sent, together with Pie Jesu and Black Light, to be written-up onto computer. B&B is a big piece. The coda is a huge system of overlaps: a grand summary of the whole piece, if you like. This Diary entry is accompanied by Modern Eon's 1981 album, 'Fiction Tales'. It is a fine album. I saw Modern Eon in Manchester in the same year. They were marvellous, but one album later plus three singles and they were gone. Where to? They come from Liverpool, and I plan to find out more about them as Hairy Records, in Bold Street (mentioned in this month's Mojo Collections) might be able to help in my quest to find out something about this very unusual group. Who said '80's music was un-interesting?
A ticket has also arrived for Fretwork's London concert.
3 10/16/2001 Computer problems. Just managed to lose a more comprehensive Diary
entry. More tomorrow.
1 10/14/2001 What a grey and nasty day! Drizzle, falling temperatures and generally
looking bleak. We read from the Times this morning that Bin Laden is now threatening
the UK with airplane suicide attacks, which probably means longer waiting-time
at airports, falling numbers of those who do travel, more airlines struggling
to survive, fear and so on and so forth. Whatever the case, this man and his
followers have to be found and brought to justice. I fear the coalition forces
will have a job on their hands. I hope I'm wrong. It took great periods of time
to hunt down IRA bombers, a situation we all lived through here for many, many
years. However, many of them did eventually end up in prison.
Last evening I continued with the orchestration reaching the coda by around 21-45. This remains to be completed over the course of the next few days. I'm going to repeat this three times: first for woodwind/brass and tuned percussion; second for strings/harp; third for the complete ensemble. The coda on the original repeats about 20 times, but without changes in timbre. I'd be daft not to take into account the available orchestral colours at my disposal. Listened to the Gurdjieff harmonium performance which is simply called '# 88, 1st for Orchestra'. Clearly, G. heard this as being orchestrated possibly by Thomas de Hartmann. But I'm unclear which period the piece comes from: first or second (the second followed G.'s motor accident)?
The article covering Ted Hughes awaits. One never quite knows what to make
of some biographies. Are things exaggerated simply to sell more books or cover
things up that really happened? One never really knows. From this extract, from
this new biography, a reader gets the impression that H. was a real womaniser.
He was also an 'artist'. Does this imply that artists have a kind of license
to misbehave in ways that some others might not? If people want to womanise
then that's their concern: it has nowt to do with me. Things happen that start
chain reactions in peoples' lives that cause these things to happen. In other
words, things 'happen' to people which aren't their own choosing. If archetypes
are present then people, themselves, are powerless. Hughes understood this force
quite clearly. Some things that happen are above traditional moral laws and
quite definitely 'determined'. Fate has us in its grip. Nor do I mean to imply
that all biographies follow this course but simply wonder if facts are sometimes
distorted? Also, I worry about the families who often enter the picture through
no fault of their own. I often get the impression that pots and pots and piles
(and piles) of money are at the bottom of all this intrigue: anything that might
sell and feed the coffers of publishers and those who wish to make money. But
that's being cynical, isn't it? No: I think it's being perfectly realistic.
Of course, we learn a lot about the people we read about.
7 10/13/2001 A day in Manchester. Weather wasn't too bad and student pieces
begin to develop. Continued with research into the Tarot as well as a lot of
other thinking. Met Anne-Marie Hastings who is interested in having a look at
'Reclaiming Eros'. She is currently playing as part of a piano trio and says
that the group sometimes include viola hence the interest in RE.
Called in to see my mother yesterday. She is beginning to improve generally following the death of my father. It all seems a long time ago now. This evening we should have been going to Linda and Kevin's to compare holiday photos, but I've decided to postpone the invitation mainly because I want to get on with Being And Becoming. Next week I have to return to the Stoll/Keeling/Voss/Tucker piece to tie-up loose ends/re-write the bits and pieces which need revision following the meeting last month. The players begin to rehearse the piece in November, so there's no time to lose. Angela sent me a sketch of her piece last week which is rather beautiful. Gert-Jan sent me a CD he's produced: Thomas de Hartmann's 'Music for Gurdjieff's "39 Series" '. I listened to some of this last evening. It's beautifully performed by Wim Van Dulleman. G-J also included a tape of Gurdjieff improvising on the harmonium. This is more than interesting.
I'm looking forward to tomorrow's Sunday Times as there is a continuation of
the Hughes/Plath story (saga) which began last week anticipating the publication
of the new biog. of Ted Hughes. All good advertising to sell books!
6 10/12/2001 These early mornings are beginning to get to me. It seems to get
harder to drag myself out of bed. Used to have more energy than I have now.
I find one-to-one teaching totally exhausting. Not sure why. The group teaching,
at the RNCM, and the day at Liverpool Uni is certainly less fatiguing. Days
spent at school are taken up with: flute, clarinet, guitar, A Level/AS Level/IB
teaching composition teaching plus my own composing/arranging. Maybe it's the
shift of gear from the different instruments to academic subjects? Or maybe
it's the intensity of it all? There is also some amount of preparation of materials.
I've never been able to quite work out why it is so tiring.
Managed to plough on with a huge section of Being And Becoming. This arrangement for full orchestra, compared to the one I did for small orchestra, is more imaginative. Risks have been taken, such as increasing the size of the percussion dept. It's a huge series of overlapping from one instrument/group of instruments into another. Robert's Newlyn Soundscape, an unreleased one, is a particularly static improvisation which becomes more active as it progresses. The original is around 45 minutes long. Bert has managed to get it down to around 15 minutes, but I've chosen to repeat the first section, for timbral reasons, as well as another section. This will probably increase the length to about 20 mins.
Sid Smith replied to my E-mail asking if I could gate-crash his book launch.
He says that I can. Thanks Sid! Continued listening to The Big Romance by David
Kitt. Excellent! David Stoll wrote saying that he will take the next gathering
at RvR which means I can have a break. That week looks like being fairly busy
attending three of the Fretwork gigs.
5 10/11/2001 Listening to David Kitt's new CD 'The Big Romance'. Very moving,
but non-rhetorical. As I was listening to 'Step Outside in the Morning Light'
discovered Robert Fripp had sent an E-mail with encouraging words.
Yesterday a good day in Liverpool. Arrived to find it was sunny and warmer than it was at home. Read Barthes' 'Image, Music, Text' on the journey there: especially 'The Grain of the Voice' and 'Musica Practica'. Left at 17-00 and managed to catch the 17-15 train meaning arrival at home was sooner than later. I was able to continue with a little more of Being And Becoming reaching the place I hoped for. Ideas about how the percussion, including the celesta (together with the vibraphone) might bring a section to a close in a contrary-motion flourish. It will be a massive task, yet enjoyable, to write it into full score.
Dan has put the Fretwork gigs on the PM pages. Bill wrote, too.
4 10/10/2001 10: the number of completion. I've had several experiences when
dates influence events. Is this because numbers are archetypal? Inner events
correspond to outer events at that time? The older I get the stranger, and more
wonderful, the world becomes. It's a shame that fanatics are still determined
to smash the balance of things in the name of 'religion'. It's also a very strange
thing that those who purport to be religious in outlook are often anything but.
This is isn't cynicism, just reality.
Yesterday, Being And Becoming continued to develop. I managed to get into my old E-mail address to find less mails there than I was expecting. I had to do this in the I.T Dept. at school. They gave me a code to get into the computers: my fingerprint! E-mails from Jacob, Gert-Jan, Robert and Bert. Bill also sent one. Got home to find a copy of Ken Nicol's new CD, 'The Bridge', waiting. The track I play on is at the very end and called 'Summer At The Wailing Wall'. I enjoyed listening to it. I think it's a very good album.
Teaching at Liverpool University today from 12-30 - 5-30. I haven't timetabled
myself for a break but will have to have one.
3 10/09/2001 One thing that being without technology has done is to re-introduce
a sense of calm. Not having to rush around and check E-mails (and I still can't
get into my address so I've taken on on a temporary one) has been rather nice.
Not having to get up at the crack of dawn to write/reply/write the Diary has
also been like a holiday. Holiday is ended. Back to it. Do I need a pointed
stick? More like a pointed billiard cue. Until the re-orchestration of Being
And Becoming began last week I had become very lazy. B&B put a stop to that.
Although I've arranged this previosuly for small orchestra, using the forces
of a huge orchestra is a completely different kettle of fish. B&B (a Soundscape
Robert recorded at Newlyn) is very static. The problem has been to visualise
it for a symphony orchestra. I overcame this problem last Friday by using 'klangfarben'
techniques. After consulting with Bert Lams the piece is now well on the road;
not complete but getting there.
Christopher has returned to university, Nicholas is away with his new job, and Elizabeth continues to do well at college. She's applied for university places next year. Interesting conversation with Jacob heringman last evening on the phone. Fretwork are soon to tour the country on a Contemporary Network Tour, and are performing 'Afterwords' in a programme which includes Tavener, Woolrich, Gough and Nyman. They visit the Union Chapel, in London, on November 6th, as well as Lancaster University, Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, Sheffield Cathedral and other cathedral/church venues later in the week.
The collaboration with David Stoll is soon to continue. We are supposed to
complete our part in the project by mid-November.
2 10/08/2001 Last Tuesday the computer went wrong. People came round and took
it away. They said it would be fixed soon. It wasn't. I have just got it back.
It wouldn't switch on. I took the cover off and used screwdriver to manipulate
the parts. By then smoke was coming out of my ears. I pressed a button. It works!
But where are the programs? All the coloured little things on the screen look
weird and there are less of them. I hate electronics. Much has happened since
last week: a) anthem given the go-ahead; b) very promising project for the Metropole
Orchestra of Amsterdam; c) new arrangement of Being And Becoming in the process
of...; d) lectures done at Liverpool University; e) head feeling clearer than
it was.
2 10/01/2001 Yesterday was a day of significant progress and encouragement.
David Stoll's and my own contributions to the next RvR composition project were
given the go-ahead during the meeting at RvR HQ. Altogether, I felt encouraged
to hear about the progress which Mark has also made towards this next recording
project, as well as hearing the choral piece he has written. The problem, as
ever, is likely to be time. We heard an oud, tambura, Arabian/Persian kanuns,
tombaks and other such fabulous instruments played together. I never thought
for one moment that I might be writing for instruments such as this. Such is
the element of surprise. It was good to see Angela and her family, and also
John and his family.
Returned home to receive an E-mail from Susanna Pell, of Fretwork, saying that 'Afterwords' had been recorded for German radio and that everyone liked the piece. Also Gert-Jan E-mailed from Holland with good news on another front. The state of the rail network is causing concern again, and yet miracles do happen! I got to B'ham New Street last evening to find the 19-55 to Preston had been cancelled. Got on another train to Crewe and then hopped platforms to find a special train had been laid on from Crewe to Preston. Free cups of tea had also been laid on. This eventually got me home an hour before I was due to arrive. On Saturday I arrived in Milton Keynes 5 minutes before schedule. Saturday's teaching was reasonably hassle-free. Leigh collected me from the station and drove like a whirlwind to RvR. Read about Tarot on the trains to M'chester and to MK. This Diary entry is accompanied by The Durutti Column's 'LC'. Have discovered that DC's drummer, Bruce Mitchell, was originally the drummer of one of the most fantastic bands to emerge from Manchester, Greasy Bear. To see this band was an experience. I once played in a group called Sunburnt, and we supported GB at a gig close to hear. They were fabulous! They were know as 'Manchester's answer to the Grateful Dead'.