Showing posts with label Salvador Dali. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Salvador Dali. Show all posts

Thursday, October 16, 2008

October 16 - Tempus Figgity


Orchestrate the next couple of pages of Moses and Aaron: VI. Let My People, and record it, along with V. What Is in Your Hand in mid afternoon. Together they clock in at a minute; the fragment of VI. at 7 seconds...

Quiz 9 for the Theoreticians is a good hour-and-fifteen minutes, more or less, for most, with musical examples drawn from Charles Ives's Serenity, Scott Joplin's The Entertainer, Claude Debussy's Piano Preludes, and Igor Stravinsky's The Firebird, Petrushka, and The Rite of Spring.


More orchestrational work on Let My People upon return, but still only make it up to page 19, with quite a bit more to do, while dreaming with Harriet of a Big Sur getaway....

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

September 23 - Orchestrating Another Day


Surprise, surprise. Another day, another orchestration; this time including finishing up The Passion According to St. Matthew: I. Then One of the Twelve before heading off to give a dictation of J.S. Bach's Passacaglia in C Minor, which is also used for harmonization, followed by fine compositions by Desiree, Francisco, and Hiraoki.



Lunch at Elephant Bar (N.B. not pictured directly above -- was not any sort of "Last Lunch" -- at least, hope not... although sometimes seem to get crucified on a semi-regular basis...) and a return for the evening class, from Giulio Caccini to J.S. Bach; then home again orchestrating beginning of II. Where Will You Go (to Have Us Prepare the Passover), a funk-minimalist Andrew-Lloyd Webbernlyesque take on Antonio Vivaldi's Four Seasons: Spring I (whereas the previous is more Igor Stravinsky Requiem Canticles: Tuba Mirum inspired, with a little bit of "How Much Is That Doggie in the Window" thrown in for good measure).

Thursday, June 5, 2008

June 5 - Our Crumb Camino Carillon Company


Some have



R. Crumb


but we particularly go for George and company, even though a Google fight would put them respectively at 561,000 to 237,00 -- actually would not have been surprised at an even greater disparity...



Finish up reconstructing an old back issue (January 2005, featuring an article on the Complete [G.] Crumb Project ongoing from Bridge Records) of 21st-Century Music at 21st-centurymusic.blogspot.com, soon at 21st-centurymusic.com and in print. Off to San Francisco again for another back-to-back SF Composers Chamber Orchestra and the Saint Gregory's choir -- and great improvement occurs on both Camino Real: Block 4 and Variations on Americana, with other works proceeding apace as well.



Inspired to begin another piece (there seem to be a few of these this vacation), Op. 164 Alphabetic Homage[inization]s with III. Crumb Carillon, a sound-file superimposition of the two versions of GC's Easter Dawning on Bridge, eventually at markalburgerworks.blogspot.com.

Monday, June 2, 2008

June 2 - Give Us This Day Our Daily Blog


At home, finishing up the July 2008 issue of 21st-Century Music (21st-centurymusic.blogspot.com, and soon at 21st-centurymusic.com and in hard copy).



Also finish Psalm 122 as part of Songs of Degrees, Op. 163 -- turned out to be more George Crumb (Ancient Voices over Makrokosmos I) and less Michael Barger, though he remained the inspiration.

Friday, May 16, 2008

May 16 - Mark Alburger and the Last Theory


More morning rocking in various newspapers around the world and elsewhere,


then it's off to the last theory class (well, at least the last regular class for this semester, as next week is given over to finals), with Sarah looking mighty relaxed on the cellphone, but she's just presented as dictation the traditional English ballad Scarborough Fair, in the rendition of Paul Simon.

D (Dorian):

Do Do Sol Sol Re Me Re Do
Sol Te Do Te Sol La Fa Sol

Harmonized

i i bVII i
i i bIII IV (with a medievalesque snap rhythm) i

with Cristina checking things out on the keyboard, Chris still at work, and Robert having just finished harmonization. Let's see how he did.


Hm, what about that third measure, visible in both shots as C-E-F? Oh, yes, we meant C-E-G, but then we decide it sounds sorta cool and keep it, re-labeling as C(no5)add4, now justifying the neighbor note in the melody as a chord tone....



Meanwhile, how are Boards 4, 3, and 2 doing? Looks good with Mike and Cristina en medias res (taken before above shots, possibly about to encounter parallel-motion trouble with the tenor note in the F chord, but looking good in their common-tone closed-spacing conclusion), Nick M. and Cecilia (with the latter's also fine closed spacing, with contrary motion between chords a second apart, and the same ending as above), and Deborah with an awful lot of absolutely fine Dm in open spacing (well, that's the way the piece goes).



And here's Joel arriving late (while Nick's work is looking good), having recently performed more top-drawer Frederic Chopin,


and further redeeming himself with interesting questions during performance of lovely and intriguing music by Deborah and Nick M. (who graces us with live guitar performance),



and Block 4 from Camino Real (somewhere else in this time period, produce the brass parts for same), which yields the query, "What does it mean?"



So many things, of course (and certainly Tennessee Williams left much up to discussion, and then there's Samuel Beckett on Godot, to the effect of -- If I knew, I would have said so in the play), but as well, one of Harry Partch's bon mots comes to mind in The Dreamer That Remains:

No messages!
Too many messages!
No messages!



With that, bound for Marin to drop off the hard-copy masters of the May and June 2008 issues of 21st-Century Music (21st-centurymusic.com and 21st-centurymusic.blogspot.com), via the chaotic wonders of Emeryville,


also grading papers at Celia's and making arrangements for standard maintenance (auto, not me...yet...), beyond the flowers of Novato



to the slopes of Mt. Burdell (cue the music).


Home past the newly-desertic landscapes of Cordelia junction,



to a light-framed portrait of Two Sisters,



up Green Valley Road,



with stunning views of Buckhorn Peak (wait, haven't we almost come full circle?),



through a cleft near Rockville (yes!).

Friday, April 18, 2008

April 18 - Play & Sing to the People & Animals


Compositions in Theory today -- fine pieces by Curtis and Mike (the latter on guitar, assisted by Chris), plus Antigone: V. Where Is Your Pain? and


XVIII. The Fire from


The Bald Soprano, both of which (the pieces, rather than above personages) will be on The Red Horse show, 8pm tomorrow, at St. Gregory of Nyssa, 500 De Haro Street, San Francisco, with more info at markalburgerevents.blogspot.com.


Next is dictation from Philip Glass's Akhnaten,


the Duet with Nefertiti: chromatic palindromic bassline

E: Sol Le La Le Sol

with the common-tone-madness harmony of

I64 bVIM7 viho7 bVIM7 I64



In the lab thereafter, adding soundfiles to --

Op. 76 ANIMAL FARM
(March 10, 1999; New Music, 1999)
Grand Zoological Fantasy-Variations for Chamber Orchestra
(1111 1111, 1 perc, pf, strings)

-- as below, in parts A and D

A. Cold-Blooded

I. Wasps









II. Flies









III. Spiders









IV. Crabs









V. Sharks









VI. Frogs









VII. Turtles









VIII. Snakes









B. Birds

IX. Penguins
X. Ducks
XI. Swans
XII. Eagles
XIII. Seagulls
XIV. Chickens
XV. Nightingales
XVI. Cuckoos


C. Mammals I

XVII. Platypusses
XVIII. Kangaroos
XIX. Mice
XX. Squirrels
XXI. Whales
XXII. Bears
XXIII. Cats
XXIV. Lions

D. Mammals II

XXV. Dogs









XXVI. Wolves









XXVII. Skunks









XXVIII. Elephants









XXIX. Horses









XXX. Donkeys









XXXI. Pigs









XXXII. Sheep









also posted today at markalburgerworks.blogspot.com.