Developed the ‘Push and Pull’ ting some more. Quite like where it’s going, getting darker, a real challenge today considering I was in such a good mood.

sketch2.2.12
Headphones, don’t bother playing through tinny speakers. As requested have put more of a beat behind it. A lot of tidying and quantising to do, sonically too, everything is competing. Got a session with a mix down pro. Can’t wait!

What do you get if you cross a dodgy keys player, midi sounds, Logic Pro, an hour, excessive listening of Ravel and afrosounds?

A musical sketch which sounds like this: sketchy  (my bounces always end abruptly for this blog).

I know weird ennit. Gonna use it for Uchenna methinks, just so much tidying to do. Couldn’t resist the use of whole-tone scales. The oboe loop sounds wrong, will fixup. The beat underneath is gonna be a sampled kitchen appliance, or a heart beat; simply a guide for the moment. The hunt for live strings is on!

A new year, new year’s resolutions,  brand new second hand you, new diaries, new socks. Instead of resolutions I have made some determinations (kind of similar) but the process is habitual (twice daily in fact), and I am winning, I’ll share a few.

They are:

• Respect for all life (including my own)
• Respect for money
• Create lots of beautiful sounds
• Travel lots (UK and Int.)
• Be able to do a bananeira and macaco in capoeira (All about fear, because I have executed them at least once, just not on demand)

As burn out fast approaches, I’ll quickly tell you about new projects I am involved in.

1. Kismet – Through running an event as part of BASS Festival last year I bumped into two fabulous curators and creatives: Rose and Ian. Since then we decided to work on our liccle project Kismet, the team has increased now, to ‘music journalist in the training’ – Ross, Zara and Saad. We are not quite sure what Kismet is or will become; but we  know that we all share a passion for arts, culture, supporting emerging talent and being inclusive – these values will impact on Kismet. We have a fundraiser next week where I shall be DJing (amongst others) and serving fondue.
2. Working loads at Washwood Heath Technology College, piano teaching and composition workshops. The kids are truly amazing! I’m always jamming with staff, kids, sharing tunes and laughing loads. I feel very lucky.
3. Working on the marketing/social media side for a visual arts project called Kalaboration.
4. Composing for Uchenna – keep going on about it, but loving the process.
5. Devising my own composition ideas and working out how I can up-skill in this area. The dream is to do a Masters…. I picked the worst time to decide on doing this – d’oh!
6. Delivering creative workshops with primary schools in Brum – composition and ensemble.
7. Another exciting project involving film and sound which I can’t announce yet.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Reading a cool book by Twyla Tharp and this quote inspired me, she tells us Mr. Beethoven:

“was constantly switching from one skill set to another. For example, he wrote thirty-two piano sonatas at every stage of his career, early middle, and late. Years would pass when he didn’t write any piano sonatas; during those gaps, he turned to symphonies and string quartets and piano trios and concertos. He knew there was a difference between what you could accomplish on a solo piano and the music you could achieve with a full orchestra, and he reveled in the difference and used both. Switching genres was his way of maintaining his inexperience and, as a result, enlarging his art. Whenever he came back to the piano, he would bring to the keyboard everything he had learned from the trios, quartets, concertos and symphonies. That is why his thirty-second sonata, Op.111, composed 5 years before his death, breaks your heart: Everything Beethoven had learned about musical form, ensemble, and masses of sound can be heard in this last sonata.” (excerpt taken from “The Creative Habit“)

Wow! So, I’ll be writing piano sonatas from now on….

The dance commission theme is ‘Push and Pull’ – musically I am thinking about the following things:

- machines: conveyor belts, items that can be pushed/pulled; washing machines, fridges have been sampled, thanks to Leon Trimble for the iPhone mic!
- relationships: feeling of being coerced into doing or being in things/actions you hadn’t had time to really consider
- nature: elements that best depict the sensation of being forced

Here are the developments, I’ve made the score slimmer, taken out some of the embellishments. Can’t wait to see how the dancers react to this! Still have 12 more minutes to write. I think I need to go deeper and darker: being violently pulled into a situation before a dazed release. We shall see….

Have a listen: pushandpull5.1.12
I think dynamics would be a start, greater contrasts would really help this, I’d love to record some proper string players for this too. Maybe the last section of Push and Pull could experiment with form? I could end with a string quartet? Could work.

Today’s 30 min sketch, loops, playing with midi, ah, if only I could access live musicians more easily. This academic year’s challenge.

Listen with headphones or you miss the bass line – needs a tidy up. orchestralsketch

A dance piece I composed music for is being performed next month at Dance Xchange, 4th November. I’ll be sat at the back biting my nails, critiquing. Be there!

“Just write. It’s not about sitting around waiting for the muse.The people who are really good labour over what they write.”

Amy Ray

Started southside in Hastings with my beautiful friends Debs and Ben. I taught EFL in a beautiful school, swimming twice a week early each morning in the outdoor pool. I went from coughing, spluttering and wheezing (after just two lengths) to a much improved front crawl (and a minimum of 10). We visited Brighton, ate at a Thai restaurant set in a bookshop, made loads of nice veggie food and went on nice country walks. I am trying to be vegetarian. This is not easy.

Had a lovely break down in Rome with my long time travel buddy Stephanie. I forgot why hanging is so easy: our shared book worme-ry, penchant for stationary, good food, analytical minds, love for travel and occasionally being silly billies. We’ve gone from being these lil munckins (2003), to this (2008), to experienced travellers and jaded site seers, in my opinion there’s no point seeing every iconic building as you wear yourself out and everything becomes an amalgam of one another – that’s my excuse:

Rome was hooootttt!! 34 – 37 degrees each day: scorchio! Food was good, but didn’t bowl me over, its subtle flavours and fresh produce give your palate a warm hug for sure and the cuisine is of a high standard…. However, it just doesn’t compare to the variety of dishes and flavours found in Japanese cuisine. I loved the fiore di zucca: courgette flowers stuffed with anchovies (sometimes mozzarella), the pasta was great too.

Finally, I saw another made-in-Japan chum Corin in Paris for my birthday. Fun times! I walked round Paris and found 2 cool record stores. I met some super humble and friendly DJs (not many French people I met were like that), promoters & collectors.

I’d been veggie for a month so wasn’t surprised to be taken to a traditional French restaurant for a birthday meal meat joint which was rammed called Le Clos Bourguignon (tut tut!). The French aren’t fond of us veggies, not one dish catered for me – okay one salad excluded, so I ate steak and escargot. The snails tasted boom, the steak I wasn’t bothered about – so silly breaking the veggie-ness for red meat. All in all a good day!! A much needed break!

Bring on Monday!

Old, but funky.

An eventful/Creative Partnerships project saw me back at Bishop Vesey’s Grammar School, (they let girls in for A’ level),  I didn’t enjoy my time there to be honest, but working on this project gave me a new perspective on the place (some of the teachers are still there!! That’s 14 years!! WTF!!) I ran social media sessions documenting a survival skills project, think Ray Mears meets web 2.0. Highlights were toasting marshmallows, firemen coming to Sutton Park – even though we informed them in advance about making fires (they were quite cute however) and working with some bright, lovely young people. I really miss my group.(Sniffle).

Also ran social media (and music sessions) for Paganel School – to help document their Scalextric project which was fun. I also created music for the final competition hosted at the Hippodrome.

Blogging hiccups throughout though, posterous doesn’t have user hierarchies like wordpress and blogger, and wordpress is utter shite rubbish at embedding content it doesn’t approve of, so no to easy embedding of audioboo.fm, dipity.com etc. There were ways around it but still…. We also did some live streaming in Sutton Park – which you can watch here.

Now, after being outdoors and working mainly in schools, I am chained to my mac typing up evaluation forms for the soon to be no more Creative Partnerships. This is my procrastination, a happy one.

Here’s some blurb about the piece: “Using dance theatre, music and spoken word, the mixed bill premieres brand new work ‘Word!’, a choreographic response to headlines around youth culture….”

I’ve included a sketch for today, I’ve written so many the last couple of days. This one’s my favourite. Green light, red light, will it make it to performance or sit in my sketches folder for eternity? Regardless of the decision, I’ve had loads of fun, I bought some orchestral samples and messed with them a little.
meanders

It was great to travel down to Ipad dance centre and meet with dancers and artists, all the way to E14 in the heart of Trinity Buoy Wharf. It was great to be able to tweak pieces with dancers present, see their responses to sketches.

The opening section is fierce, if you get a chance to watch the performance I definitely recommend you go, I was blown away by the impact of dance and word. It’s touring the UK with a Brum show.

You may have seen this back in November – apparently facebook can predict when couples are going to call it a day. Stats can be altered to say anything in my opinion, but the article is quite thought-provoking. If the geezer is right then that’s quite scary, pretty much affirming how simple us humans are

“The graph spikes most notably just after Valentine’s Day and right before Spring Break.”

Hmmmm, so if you have itchy feet around Valentine’s day you’ve got 6 weeks until showdown. I’ve seen quite a few single statuses on facecrack, maybe it’s so peeps can be free to frolic at festivals, lol!

Anyways, when I first heard this tune some months back it blew me away. Proper deep, contrasting sections dealing with the different stages of recovering from a relationship: neurotic tendencies, reflection, finally ending positively/spiritually.

I relate, sure most can. You learn from them. You move on. Growth. Life.

Muldrow as beat maestro (and on keys I hope) – killer combo!

And I’d lie for you
I’d cry for you
and pop for you
and break for you
and hate for you
And I’ll hate you too
If you want me too
Ah, Uuu…
I’d pray for you
crochet for you
Make it from scratch for you
Leave out the last for you
Go to the store for you
Do it some more for you
Do what you want me to
Yes I’m a fool for you.

(Miss Badu with some hilarious and heart-felt lyric writing)

What would you do for love? We all know Meatloaf has his limits.

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