Tag: composer memorial

Improvising With the Instrument, Not Just On It – A Remembrance of Paul Bley (1932-2016)

Posted on January 15, 2016 by Carol Goss - Headlines, Memorials

[Ed. note: The Canadian-born, U.S.-based composer/pianist Paul Bley, who died at the age of 83 on January 3, 2016, was one of the titans of the free jazz movement and, together with his wife Carol Goss, was a pioneer of the music video. Their prodigious documentation of the work of many of the most important improvisers of the last half-century stands out, along with Bley’s own music making, as a pinnacle of his life’s work. Therefore it seemed fitting to ask Carol Goss to describe how their unique collaboration came to be, and she sent us the following excerpt from Driven to Abstraction, a book in process.—FJO]

Paul Bley and Carol Goss in 1974; photo courtesy Improvising Artists.

Paul Bley and I met January 1973 at his loft on Hudson Street in the West Village. We fell in love and began to travel together. In the winter of 1974, I arranged to bring him and his band, Scorpio, to my hometown of Miami to play at the Space Transit Planetarium for Jack Horkheimer’s show. He shipped the Arp synthesizer down and we recorded it. Right after we returned to New York City, his landlord set a fire in the hall of his building on Hudson Street. Paul managed to pull the Arp out through the back third-story window onto a garage roof. He arrived at my apt at 11 1/2 West 84th St. We put the Arp (which was fine) under the stairwell along with the molten keyboard. Paul then moved in with me.

Two months later, we moved to an apartment Paul had at 26 Jane Street. In the spring of 1974, I produced a concert and reading with Paul Bley and William S. Burroughs at Eisner and Lubin Auditorium at NYU. “Small” video cameras had just become available but were extremely expensive, so I went to Andy Warhol’s Factory on Union Square and tracked down Anton Perrich, who had a camera, and enticed him to record the event for us.

My background was in theater and art, so when I attended a screening of Nam June Paik’s work, I realized I was uniquely prepared for video art. After the screening, Nam June suggested I go to the Experimental Television Center (ETC), then in Binghamton, New York, where there was a Paik-Abe video synthesizer. Around the same time, Paul and I decided to create a company for recording music and video: Improvising Artists.

I began to do residencies at ETC with video synthesizers. I would create a piece in silence and then find a track of Paul’s music of the same length. In the case of “Rings/Lovers,” the music and abstract video were exactly the same length, but created independently of each other. When put together, they synched in an uncanny way, which led me to the realization that editing was counterproductive because everything synchs. “Rings/Lovers” was exhibited, along with “Topography/Please,” at the Everson Museum’s 1976

“New Work in Abstract Video” show. “Topography” was created on the Paik-Abe video synthesizer. The music is as yet an unreleased recording of Paul’s, “Please,” from an electric session with Bill Connors.

I made a number of analog video synthesis projects this way. Then I began renting cameras and recording concerts and studio sessions. I would take the video from these recordings to ETC where I could alter the parameters of the color and contrast, key in images, distort the image with oscillators and feedback. Because everything was analog, it was all done in real time. There was no rendering.

In a few cases, we were able to bring video synthesizers to concerts and improvise with the musicians, who could see the video output on screens—San Francisco’s Great American Music Hall (Bill Hearn, video synthesizer), Axis-in-Soho in New York (David Jones, video colorizer), Gunter Hampel/Marion Brown IAI recording session at Blue Rock Studios (Dan Sandeen, video synthesizer), etc. In 1979 I received a grant to make the first hologram of a raster scanned video image (Rutt Etra, video synthesizer). “Femophagy” was an integral white light hologram which displayed movement horizontally. It was exhibited at the Museum of Holography’s “Through the Looking Glass” show that year.

Paul had pioneered audio synthesis in the 1960s with the Moog and Arp in live performance, so it was a natural progression for me to continue this process of exploration in the visual realm. The fact that it was all analog made it fluid and intuitive. Analog electricity encompasses randomness and accidents. There is an interplay, a tension, between the artist and the instrument. It is truly possible to improvise with the instrument, not just “on” it.

In 1984, Paul sold his Arp synthesizer for $500 to Ralph Hocking, co-founder with Sherry Miller of ETC, so I could buy my first digital video synthesizer, the Amiga 500, thus beginning the next chapter and creation of the Not Still Art Festival, a forum for abstract and non-narrative video artists.

Paul Bley and Carol Goss standing together.

Paul Bley and Carol Goss in 1992. Photo by Jim Kosinski, courtesy Improvising Artists.

Enthusiastic, Shy, Quirky and Brilliant: Remembering John Eaton (1935-2015)

Posted on December 31, 2015 by Melinda Wagner - Headlines, Memorials

[Ed. Note: There have been numerous tributes to composer John Eaton in the weeks since his sudden death following a fall on December 2, 2015. Whether through his seminal explorations of microtonality, his pioneering use of early keyboard synthesizers, or his later development of pocket operas, Eaton touched the lives of many musicians and listeners. Melinda Wagner’s account of him, which goes back to when he was a high school student and an aspiring jazz pianist, offers yet another perspective on this fascinating American maverick.-FJO]

Eaton, Melinda Wagner and her mother sitting at a table in a restaurant.

John Eaton with Melinda Wagner’s mother Bettejo Goodall Wagner, and Eaton’s wife Nelda Nelson-Eaton in Chicago in 1993.

Along with countless others, I was deeply saddened to learn of the death of John Eaton, earlier this month. Widely admired as an innovative, singular and uncompromising artist, Johnʼs contribution to the world of music, in particular to that of the opera repertoire, is beyond compare. While I never got the chance to know John well, I nonetheless knew him to be a much beloved, dear man. Indeed, John was an abiding presence in my familyʼs lore for as long as I can remember, a source of great pride and warm memories.

When my mother was just a few years out of college, she took a position teaching music at East Stroudsburg High School in Pennsylvania. John Eaton, then 16 or so, was one of her first students. My mother was already a gifted musician and teacher. A fine pianist, she had appeared on her own radio show at the age of 11, playing the piano (and tap dancing!) for the Williamsport radio audience. Growing up, she was a bit of an anomaly in her tiny hometown, Liberty, Pennsylvania (pop. 200), a small farming community nestled in the Allegheny Mountains. In spite of her own gifts, and a fine music education (Mansfield Teacherʼs College), nothing–absolutely nothing–prepared her for John Eaton! Prodigiously talented, an accomplished pianist, John was also, in her telling, bursting with ideas. He was fun, enthusiastic, shy, quirky–and brilliant.

John was one of those kids who likes to hang out in the music room. He often brought his projects to show my mother, including original compositions and jazz arrangements. She remembered “lots and lots” of notes. As for Johnʼs original, “serious” works, well, she had never seen such complicated ideas coming from anyone. Even his arrangement of her favorite standard tune, “Embraceable You,” while beautiful, was florid and densely contrapuntal, perhaps a bit intimidating. John was already onto something.

Johnʼs parents welcomed my mother into their home. She was very young, single, and living (I believe) in a boarding house. It goes without saying that she was grateful for company and home-cooked meals. Johnʼs father, Harold Eaton, was an esteemed Methodist pastor in East Stroudsburg at the time. (He retired in 1975.) She was enormously fond of him and his wife, and they all stayed in touch for many years.

When John was accepted to Princeton University, my mother was so impressed and proud! No one from Liberty, Pennsylvania, had ever met an Ivy-bound person! She kept a clipping from the local newspaper article announcing his scholarship; I remember seeing it pasted into our family album until, eventually, it yellowed and crumbled into dust.

While still an undergraduate at Princeton, John and his jazz quartet (piano, flute, vibraphone, bass and drums) made an acetate disc that somehow reached the desk of a CBS executive. The disc was later forwarded to Columbia Records, and against all odds, Johnny Eaton and his Princetonians appeared on a major label, although no one had yet heard of any of them. Twenty years later, I took my motherʼs copy with me to college. There, Johnʼs whimsical, impressionistic arrangement of “My Funny Valentine” became one of my favorites. I found his original tunes to be full of personality, technical rigor, and humor. Of his own “Flute Cake,” John wrote, “It has a bit of the rococo spirit–when war was an upper-class sport, when Rousseau enticed countesses to milk cows (with gloves on), and when Figaro and Suzanne poked fun at a decadent (but since much missed) aristocracy. All of which shows that no verbal absolutes are valid in any music–jazz can be flighty as well as earthy.” As a novice student of Music Theory, I was most intrigued by “Babbittry,” Johnʼs tribute to his teacher, Milton Babbitt. Apparently, inspiration for this piece came to him through the strains of Schoenbergʼs Fourth String Quartet.

In spite of his history with my mother, I did not actually meet John Eaton until 1993. I had just seen a performance of his charming chamber opera, Peer Gynt in Manhattan. And there he was, afterwards, accepting handshakes and congratulations–pleased, delighted, eyes twinkling. When I finally reached him through the crowd and mentioned my motherʼs name, I received the most wonderful bear hug. And how pleased he was to learn that I had become a composer!

I regret very deeply that I missed the chance to study with him (John replaced Ralph Shapey at the University of Chicago soon after I left), and I wish we had had the chance to “talk shop.” I am immeasurably grateful, though, not only for John Eatonʼs music, but also for the enduring, cherished friendship this beloved, dear man shared with my mom.

Remembering Composer and MTC Founder John Duffy (1926-2015)

Posted on December 22, 2015 by Ed Harsh - Headlines, Ledes, Memorials

John Duffy
Photo by Glen McClure

American composer and beloved new music advocate John Duffy, who founded Meet The Composer in 1974, died in Virginia this morning after a long illness. He was 89.

In 2011, Meet The Composer and the American Music Center merged to form New Music USA. Ed Harsh, current president and CEO, reflects on Duffy’s profound impact on the field in the post below. Many in our community will feel this loss deeply. We encourage you to share your memories of John in the comments section.

*With John Duffy, everything was possible. He radiated an optimism as forthright and clear as it was free of guile and self-importance. Though the limits of observable reality might be challenged, audacity never distracted from core purpose. His optimism happily went about its business. It lived solidly on terra firma. It got things done.

In the immediate aftermath of a person’s death, we can feel an urge to sum up their impact and role and even character. We want to come to some kind of conclusion about what their life may have “meant,” perhaps as a benchmark against which to take some measure of our own. I certainly don’t propose to do that here. It’s a shaky notion in any case to impose a stable unity onto a life’s complex assemblage of experiences and relationships, joys and sorrows, narrative through-lines and irrational disconnects over time. Summing up any life is foolhardy—especially one as rich as John’s was.

My aim is something more modest and personal, though it’s certainly still daunting. I want to reflect on a few of the characteristics I treasured in John that I feel are his legacy to New Music USA, the second incarnation of his visionary creation Meet The Composer. Mine is just one perspective. I hope others will share in the comment section below their own personal perspectives and stories. John meant so many things to so many people. The more we share, the more we’ll be able to appreciate him.

A gathering of voices would be entirely appropriate to John’s devotion to the American ideals of democracy and pluralism. He was known to list the quality of “tolerance” at the top of his list of values he appreciated most. The example of his own life suggests something broader, more positive and more proactive than mere tolerance. He was omnivorously curious about and respectful of all music. Even if a given artist’s work might not have been to his taste, he would be interested to know more about it, to understand a bit better what drove its creation. What’s more, he wanted others to be interested, too.

This omnivorous openness was paired with a healthy disregard for conventional hierarchies. He didn’t recognize them as valid, so he ignored them. For John, the idea that a “classical” symphonic work was, by nature, automatically worthy of higher status than the work of, say, Ornette Coleman or Burt Bacharach—to use two of his favorite examples—was simply bunk. He was quick to fight the ingrained privilege and prejudice that often hide behind those hierarchies. The energy and self-assuredness he brought to such spirited struggles embodied for me a muscular, practical, American blue-collar view of the value inherent in solidly workmanlike effort, no matter its form.

The exploding variety of creativity we’re blessed with in 2015, which blows through genre categories like so much thin air, may obscure for us now the uncommon character of his views. It’s worth pausing for a moment to make sure that we don’t take John’s openness for granted. Because we shouldn’t. His views were decades ahead of their time and distinctly radical when Meet The Composer was founded in the 1970s.

We should likewise not underestimate the quality of courage he showed in standing up for his own convictions. The name of his organizational creation is its own example. He frequently told the story of thinking deeply about the name for his then-new program. He scribbled one possible name after another on a big yellow legal pad. Under the influence of the direct, human immediacy of Walt Whitman’s poetry, he wrote down “Meet The Composer.” When he finally chose that name—against the advice of many, let it be noted—he was met with a lot of resistance. “The higher ups” at the New York State Council on the Arts hated it, writing letters to him explaining that it wasn’t classy enough. He said he read the letters and just put them away in a drawer, figuring that people would come around to his view sooner or later. Which they did.

John embodied faith, broadly defined; faith in himself and in his fellow artists. This is the fuel that powered his will. And what a will it was, able to conjure abstract vision into very real being. For years in the late 1970s and early 1980s he enthusiastically regaled anyone who would listen with his idea for putting composers in residence with orchestras around the country. We can only imagine how many dozens (hundreds?) of indulgent smiles or blank stares he had to suffer. What an improbable idea it was for a little nonprofit with a tiny budget…. By 1992—ten years, several million dollars, and one transformed orchestral new music world later—it wasn’t improbable anymore. It was obvious.

That was a big victory, but it wasn’t the only one. There was also the MTC commissioning program, the composer-choreographer program, the New Residencies program. So many new realities conjured, to the benefit of so many. Yes, that’s the thing: to the benefit of so many. No one I’ve met more exemplified generosity of spirit than John. He used the term “angelic spark” relating to people who helped others in the spirit of pure common service. The term fits him so well.

I feel sure that in John’s case the spark was inherent and inborn. Life experience just as surely brought it brightly to the fore. John cited a key moment during his naval service in the Pacific during World War II. As he related the story, his ship was attacked and a number of shipmates were killed. He and another sailor stood guard over the bodies through the night. In the morning, with a few Old Testament words from the ship’s captain, the bodies were slid into the sea. That stark demonstration of life’s fragility seems to have inspired in John a permanent commitment to make a difference, to live a life of value and of service.

Future years would determine the focal point of that service: composers. You could talk to John for only a few minutes before feeling the energy, the power, the almost talismanic specialness that he conferred on composers. In truth, John felt this way about all artists, but when he spoke of composers the magic was palpably electric. The more society could come to put composers to work, the more society would benefit. Composers were the greatest national resource imaginable.

And composers deserved to be paid like the professionals they are. John’s experience as a composer in a broad range of marketplaces gave him a tactile understanding of creators’ economic value. He was an Emmy-winning composer for TV with deep experience in music for the theater as well as the concert hall. He understood the worthiness of matching appropriate money to appropriate work, and his perspective generated the ethos of MTC, which raised the consciousness of subsequent generations.

Bang on a Can Benefit Concert and Party Honoring John Duffy, September 13, 1998. Left to right, seated: Michael Gordon, Julia Wolfe, John Duffy; standing: Cecil Taylor, Billy Taylor, David Lang, Steve Reich, and Alvin Singleton.
Photo by Peter Serling

To artists given less than their due attention and appreciation by their culture, John’s valuation of composers, both figurative and very literal, was manna for the starving. Like an oasis, John’s championing leadership brought new life and new energy to a community of composers who felt like creative travelers crossing a vast desert. His vision inspired high hopes for what might be built, in fact built together, on the other side. My vaguely Moses-like imagery here is intentional. On a less cosmic scale, John’s positive vision commanded deep reverence and even deeper human attachments. The theologian Forrest Church wrote that although agnostic on the subject of life after death, Church was completely convinced on the subject of love after death. He believed the most profound measure of the wealth of our lives to be the love we leave behind when we die. By this measure, John was a wealthy man indeed.

So IS everything possible? No. Not really. If it were, John would still be with us, having fought back like a champ once again, overcoming the will of the misguided cells in his body. There are certain rules we can’t change. One is that people die. But John’s life leaves a resilient legacy, especially precious at moments when our courage and faith are tested. John reminds us that what’s possible goes way beyond the horizon we see, and maybe even as far as we dare to dream.

John Duffy was featured by NewMusicBox in October 2003. Read the full hour-long conversation John Duffy: The Composer as Statesman.

He Knew Everything and Everyone–Remembering David Stock (1939-2015)

Posted on December 4, 2015 by Randall Woolf and Kathleen Supové - Headlines, Memorials

David Stock wearing suspenders and smiling as he holds a plate with a couple of cupcakes.

David Stock at Carnegie Mellon in 2014. (This and other photos featured herein courtesy either Lindsey Goodman or the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble.)

[Ed. Note: It has been a month since composer/conductor David Stock died at the age of 76 following a brief illness brought on by a rare blood disorder. Born and based for the majority of his life in Pittsburgh, where he established the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble in 1976, Stock was arguably the Steel City’s greatest advocate for contemporary music. But his sphere of influence spanned across the United States and reached internationally as well. In the days following his death, the outpouring of reminiscences on social media about Stock and his personal impact on people was truly overwhelming.

Among those who Stock touched deeply were Randall Woolf and Kathleen Supové. Woolf, a freelance composer, arranger, and composition teacher living in Brooklyn, composed a piano concerto Skin Deep that was premiered by Stock and PNME and he also served as Stock’s copyist for many years. Kathleen Supové, a pianist who performs, premieres, records, and champions new music, had served as a soloist under Stock’s direction both with PNME and the Duquesne Symphony Orchestra. Woolf and Supové also happen to be a married couple, which also seemed an apt way to honor David Stock for whom family was a paramount concern—his own family as well as the entire family that is the new music community.–FJO]

*Randall Woolf: When you look up the word “avuncular” in the dictionary, there is a picture of David Stock. Mustachioed and thin, except for a nearly spherical abdomen, he always reminded me of some of my own uncles—a gang of roofing contractors, usually found in or near a Jewish deli. Always informal, often making a deal of one kind or another, David was distinctly non-academic. You also might say he was quite interested in food. I always remember him starting a rehearsal by raising his baton and stopping his first upbeat to inquire, “Wait….where are we going to eat after the concert?” He was charming, relaxed, and utterly without pretense.

Randall Woolf

But if you were to peer inside the head of this uncle, you would see a vast network, encompassing the entire globe and connected to musicians of all stripes, from China to Venezuela to Iran. David was one of the most knowledgeable musicians I have ever known, truly a mind without borders or prejudice, hungry for every new style, name, and concept in the world of music. The group he founded, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, was his library and laboratory. So many prominent names in American new music got their first attention from David and his group. As long as it was musical and new, David was into it. And not just the music—David was friend to the person who wrote it, as well. The list of people he mentored, including Kathy and me, really does seem endless. Not just composers, but performers as well, and spouses and relatives. As soon as he got to know you, he began to meditate on how his network could be used to help you, to make connections, to further your creativity, to further the cause of new music, and even to help you make a living. For as brilliant and accomplished as he was, he was a staunch anti-snob and always remembered how it felt to be starting out, needing gigs and support—be it emotional, musical, or financial.

For many years, I worked for David as his copyist. The copyist’s view of music is a strange one; you get more involved in the nuts and bolts of the piece than the musical message and develop a serious case of “cannot see the forest for the trees.” David’s music was usually constructed of recurring blocks and textures, which got longer and shorter when repeated, and a handful of accompaniments. It was kind of plain looking on the page. But when I would listen to a piece I had just copied, I was moved and touched so deeply; his music was so alive and human, so emotionally convincing and gripping, that it was at times hard to believe it was the same music I had seen in the score. It reminds me of how his brilliance and erudition were belied by his casual, folksy appearance and manner. He was all of a piece—a caring, giving, brilliant, and musical man.

A more formal photo of David Stock seating at the piano with a manuscript of one of his many musical compositions.

Kathleen Supové: I’m tempted to start and end my tribute to David Stock by saying “what Randy said”! I couldn’t have put it better myself, but maybe I can amplify it in some personal ways.

I first met David by chance in the very early ’80s at a Musica Viva concert in Boston. He was immediately so warm and friendly and was concerned about some professional service I’d used or something—how it was going, were they helpful, that kind of thing. I don’t remember much about the issue at hand, but I did remember David!

A few years later, Randy went off to a festival that David held with the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble. When I heard the details, I knew right away that if aliens coming in from Mars wanted to know about new music in the United States, they should land at this festival. I learned a lot myself.

Kathleen Supove wearing a bright green dress.

Kathleen Supové

When I finally got to know him better (which was not hard to do, even if you were shy), I realized he was a person who not only knew everything, he knew everyone. I would even play a game with him where I would try to think of someone in our field whom he didn’t know! Just when I thought I was getting the best of him, I’d find out he had conducted their first East Coast performance or introduced them to their spouse or some such thing.

He hired me to play concertos with PNME and also the Duquesne Symphony Orchestra (he was no slouch as a conductor either)—most notably Skin Deep, which he commissioned from Randy. Yes, indeed, he was the first to think of a concerto for me, by Randy! We performed it several times, as well as Michael Daugherty’s Le Tombeau de Liberace on a couple of occasions. One year while doing our taxes, we noticed that at least 1/3 of our income came from something related to David Stock. We joked that he could have claimed us as dependents! Seriously, though, David was the closest thing to a mentor that either of us ever had.

The last time I saw him was September 11, 2011. We both performed on a Peace Concert/10th Anniversary 9-11 remembrance sponsored by Stephen Burns and Fulcrum Point. He conducted the world premiere of an ensemble arrangement of his Three Yiddish Songs. It had been a long concert, many long, soulful, heavy pieces in a row. When David’s piece started, I remember feeling so uplifted and even joyful in response to this buoyant music, in part because of his wizardly orchestration, and also just because he had such a multi-layered emotional response to this tragedy. After the concert, we all went to a wonderful Greek restaurant in downtown Chicago. Someone in our entourage knew the owners, so they brought us platter after platter of rich, tantalizing dishes. David was in heaven.

A group of eight musicians wearing yellow hard hats and playing various instruments (doublebass, harp, clarinet, trumpet, French horn, violin) conducted by a young David Stock wearing a white hard hat in what looks like a cable car.

An early promotional photo of the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble. David Stock is wearing a white hard hat in the back.

Both of Us: The best way to celebrate who David Stock was is to perform some of his music! He has a lot of it: six symphonies, ten string quartets, twelve concertos, and more—humorous pieces, sad pieces, austere pieces, energy-filled danceable pieces, Jewish pieces, jazzy pieces. May he remain a part of American music forever.

One of Our Brothers as Well as a Bright Light—Remembering James Horner (1953-2015)

Posted on June 26, 2015 by Roger Bourland - Headlines, Memorials

The news of composer James Horner’s death hit me surprisingly hard. I choked up trying to convey the news to a friend. Why the strong response, Roger? You barely knew him.

“Jamie”—the nickname everyone at UCLA knew him by and which later he came to loathe—finished his master’s degree in composition at UCLA. He started his Ph.D. work, but abandoned it when he started scoring his first Roger Corman film while simultaneously trying to be a teaching assistant.

Over the years, I continually heard stories about Jamie/James Horner from some mutual friends, from his fellow students, his former teachers, and from friends who played his film scores in Hollywood. But I only met him for the first time in 2010 while serving as chair for the UCLA music department. We had several one-on-one meetings, and he generously agreed to give a master class for our composers. Over that time I developed a great affection and respect for him.

James Horner lecturing a group of students in a classroom.

In our meetings we talked for hours about concert music, film music, role models, his UCLA teachers and classmates, about Hollywood, and our favorite composers. As we were putting together a curriculum to train young composers for a career in Hollywood, I picked his mind about how we might go about that. He acknowledged that young composers go to school fantasizing about a career such as his, but lamented that the market for composers of his kind (i.e. writing film scores that call for large orchestral forces) is evaporating. “I am a dying breed. Few composers will ever have the opportunity of doing what I have had the privilege of doing as my career.”

He talked about the challenges of working on James Cameron’s Avatar: “Cameron held onto tight control of every aspect of the entire sonic palette. He was clear that he did NOT want any themes or melodies. ‘A tuneless score.’” As challenging as it was, Horner realized his role in the process, and that it was Cameron’s vision, money, and film. It was his job to rewrite until he got it right—and this was the award-winning composer of Titanic, also a Cameron-Horner collaboration.

For the score of Avatar, Horner collaborated with ethnomusicologist Dr. Wanda Bryant to assemble a musico-sonic palette of unique world music instruments. After auditioning hundreds of timbres, he culled them down to a palette of twenty-five and presented it to James Cameron, who then rejected all but five, all of which are heard in the soundtrack today.

As his two-hour masterclass went on, this composer who had been described as quiet, shy, and private, became more forceful. He clearly enjoyed talking and teaching these young and eager students. Many of them stayed afterwards to have their picture taken with him. He graciously stayed late to pose and speak with them.

Jeff Kryka, Yuchun Hu, and James Horner

I asked him who his favorite film composer was: “I have tremendous respect for John Williams. He is in a class by himself.” We then gushed over Williams’s output and evolution as a composer, citing case after case of terrific compositional cleverness and invention.

Professor and soprano Juliana Gondek, a classmate of his at USC, asked him whether he would ever write an opera. “No, but I would love to write a ballet.”

I asked him: “Talk to us about crying and music. We don’t teach it at the university.” (The class laughed.)

“I could never make people cry in my concert music. In my music for film, I can,” he said. “I loved having the opportunity [in Titanic] to help the audience fall in love with two characters; and knowing that they will both die offered me a unique musical challenge.”

I found James to be a true gentleman, a smart businessman, an excellent teacher, a sensitive artist with a big heart, and a composer who loved the art of collaboration—despite not always getting his way.

In our final private meeting, I told him something I knew would be important for him to hear. When the composition area at UCLA interviews prospective undergraduate students in composition, one of the questions we often ask them is, “Who are your favorite composers?” Expecting to hear Stravinsky, Schoenberg, or John Adams, to our amazement year after year the majority of applicants put James Horner at the top of that list.

I saw a gracious, generous, sensitive but outgoing and humble man.

As a composer, he was “one of us” and we have lost one of our brothers as well as a bright light. James, we will miss you. You have touched the world and left it a better place.

The Freedom Of A Bird In Flight – Ornette Coleman (1930-2015)

Posted on June 23, 2015 by Jamaaladeen Tacuma - Headlines, Ledes

Jamaaladeen Tacuma playing an electric bass and Ornette Coleman playing alto saxophone in an apartment.

Jamaaladeen Tacuma and Ornette Coleman rehearsing in 2010. Photo by Sound Evidence

Without question, the total Ornette Coleman experience for me has been nothing short of mystical, mesmerizing, educational, and sensitive. Everyone that has crossed his path has their own story, and here’s mine.

I grew up in Philadelphia in an area called North Philly. There you had the birth of some of the most famous musical artist to contribute to the world’s music scene. John Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, Archie Shepp, and so many more that it would take this entire space to mention. My first professional music experience was with an organist named Charles Earland who, in the late ‘70s, switched from playing bass on his organ to hiring me as an electric bass guitarist. I had just graduated from high school and received a music scholarship to attend Berklee College of Music. Going to Berklee and sitting in those classes did not sit well with me, as I wished to become an on-the-road, touring jazz musician, performing at global jazz festivals, playing club dates, and performing with all of the creative musicians who were making musical statements. (Boy, I was a dreamer.) Be careful what you wish for, as I soon witnessed a chain of events that would change musical history and the small role I played in it. After a one-year stint with Charles Earland, I was called into the backstage room at a small club in Newark, New Jersey, called The Key Club and told by Charles that I was fired from the gig. I asked him the reason, and he said that my timing was off. That seemed strange to me. I always kept the groove and when I would solo, the audience would go wild. But I guess some band leaders just will not stand for that kind of sideman attention from the audience.

At any rate, I was devastated. I left New York and headed back to Philadelphia without a gig and without my scholarship to Berklee. But, as destiny would have it, exactly one week later I received a telephone call from guitarist Reggie Lucas and percussionist James Mtume, two gentlemen who knew me as a youngster in Philadelphia and who had kept their eyes on me from early on. These guys were Philadelphians themselves and had already been out there on the road playing with Miles Davis and his electric band. When I arrived in Philly they told me that the saxophonist/composer Ornette Coleman was planning a European tour and was looking for an electric bass player to join in. I didn’t know much about Ornette but, as destiny would have it, I had just been looking at a Downbeat article about Ornette featuring a photo of him playing saxophone and violin. It clicked; this was the same guy. I immediately said that I was interested in going back to New York for an audition for Ornette.

The day I arrived in New York, I went over to his famous Prince Street Loft in Soho where he resided and rehearsed his band. There was an elevator from the first floor that opened up directly into his loft space. I walked in and was greeted by works of visual art situated all over the room that would rival the collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As a matter of fact, the first art piece that I laid my eyes on was the famous mirrored colored mask painting that was used on the cover of Dancing In Your Head. There was so much more, I couldn’t take it all in.

Immediately Ornette came out of one of the rooms and greeted me. I noticed that he was not a huge man, he was shorter than me and he spoke in a very quiet voice, almost a whisper. Bern Nix was there, and I remember seeing the legendary drummer/composer Ronald Shannon Jackson there. Denardo Coleman was there, walking around, and we introduced ourselves to each other. We took our seats and my audition began. There was a music stand in front of me, and Ornette handed me sheet music. My music reading at that time was not as good as it turned out to be by the time I left Prime Time. I noticed that it was just notes written in the bass with no chord progressions. Ornette proceeded to count this tune off in a very strange way that I was not used to. In retrospect he did that only for me because, as I found out, he never counts any tunes off. He relied only on the melody to dictate the beginning and ending of any composition.

So we started. I struggled to play this finger buster melody, and we stopped. In my mind I knew that I did not nail this melody as it should have been played, but something clicked with Ornette and, with that sly look that he sometimes had, he said to me, “I want you to come to Europe with me.” Right there on the spot I, Jamaaladeen Tacuma (then Rudy McDaniel), had become part of a musical adventure that for me would change the way that the bass guitar was performed and how it was listened to. I stayed at the loft and we worked for a few more weeks on the material until we were ready. It was really prime time. Ornette needed another guitar player, and I suggested a guitar player from Philly named Charlie Ellerbe. That completed the initial Prime Time band lineup with Bern Nix and Ellerbe on guitars, Ronald Shannon Jackson on drums, myself on bass guitar, and Ornette Coleman on alto sax, trumpet, and violin.

We rehearsed a series of compositions that Ornette had been writing to ultimately fit inside of the Paris premier of Skies of America. I was told beforehand that we were only going to Europe for a two-week tour, but again—as destiny would have it—we stayed in Europe for six months. We stayed at Ornette’s favorite Paris hotel, Hotel Le Prince on Rue Monsieur Le Prince, where he had known the owner for years, an older lady he simply called Madame. Isn’t it such a coincidence that the word Prince showed up in so many facets of Ornette’s life, his New York address, his Paris address, as well as the name of the Paris hotel? There in Paris, the beginnings of Prime Time and the education we all received under Ornette’s direction was absolutely priceless.

Ornette Coleman playing saxophone and Jamaaladeen Tacuma playing bass on stage in performance.

Ornette Coleman and Jamaaladeen Tacuma in performance. Date unknown.

We rehearsed, rehearsed, and toured throughout Europe using our Paris hotel as our base of operation. In those long rehearsals, we were introduced to the concept and theory of harmolodics and its function, application, and overall approach to the music that we played. Ornette’s early musical statements were met with such question and controversy. He never coined the phrase or said that what he was aiming for and what we were doing was “Free Jazz.” The term that was most endearing to him was “compositional improvising.” In harmolodics—unlike Western music where the melody, harmony, rhythm, and arrangement are neatly tucked in their place—all components are moving in the same direction simultaneously. The melody, or the composition, is the most important factor because from the melody one could extract their own musical ideas that could and should bring about the emotion that the listener reacts to. In compositional improvising, the musical idea is more important than the notes.

Sometimes the instrument and the notes could get in the way. As he stated in the beginning of my recording, For The Love of Ornette, “Fellas, fellas, forget the note and get to the idea.” What Ornette stressed was that each individual set up their own musical ideas with their own bridges attached. If you found the place that would enhance the other band member’s ideas, that could be a good thing. Also, on the flip side, one could also find that musical idea that could erase the others. The idea of being tied down to a riff was not acceptable. When this was applied and working, it was clear that the result was “pure music” and, to take it a step further, “pure sound.” Jazz, rock, classical, and other man-made genres are steps away from pure musical and sound expression. The music business as we know it today dictates the limitations, and this is what Ornette drove home to me and my fellow band mates.

Ornette Coleman wearing sunglasses and playing tenor saxophone and Jamaaladeen Tacuma smiling.

A promotional photo of Ornette Coleman and Jamaaladeen Tacuma from around the time of the release of Tacuma’s 1983 Gramavision album Show Stopper.

This freed us, this freed me of looking at my instrument as just that. An instrument. The instrument didn’t rule me, I ruled it. It was just a vehicle and a means to express our musical ideas. Being able to concentrate on musical ideas allowed me to capture any music style and also leave it whenever I wanted to. This was a blessing and we owe that to Ornette Coleman. As the band Prime Time, we recorded several records with Ornette and for my first solo album recording, Show Stopper on Gramavision records, Ornette was gracious enough to write an original composition entitled “Tacuma Song,” a solo piece that allowed me to exemplify the bass guitar in a completely harmolodic way, with the melody or composition being the basis for the improvisation. Since my first solo recording and leaving Prime Time, I have traveled the world, made many recordings, and in 2010, after long discussions and planning, I was able to reciprocate the wonderful gift that Ornette gave me in “Tacuma Song.” I organized a recording session where I wanted Ornette to do absolutely what he does best and that is to improvise in a beautiful compositional way. I was blessed with his appearance and returned the gift with an homage recording entitled For The Love of Ornette on my Jam All Productions artist-run label.

Ornette has meant more to me as a human being and musically than words can really express, and there is one more small gem of a story that would allow you once again to peek into the spirit of Ornette. There was one moment in my life as a young man when I was venturing on a spiritual path and decided that I did not want to play music anymore. Ornette heard of this and came to Philadelphia from New York, met with my mother, and pleaded with her to convince me to return to music again. I did and I thank God and I thank Ornette Coleman.

It’s clear that Ornette’s impact was not only rooted in preparing individuals to think outside of the box, but also to take very natural ways of doing something and bring them to the forefront. We often talked about certain places in the world where people did not know anything about Western concepts of playing. The idea of playing notes E to A or C to B. They don’t know anything about that in remote villages and they still create incredible music that brings about healing. Ornette’s idea and concept was to also bring certain emotions to the music and to have those emotions be felt by others. He wanted to make you cry. He wanted to make you dance. He wanted to make you think or just sit down in silence. So I think his legacy will exemplify that not only was he a good human being and a kind and soft-spoken gentleman, but musically he will continue to bring about a change in how folks think about music, how they will approach it, and how they will perform it. With the blessing of God, my thanks to Ornette Coleman for taking me in, allowing me to think as a human being, and to play music with the freedom of a bird in flight.

Black and white photo of Ornette Coleman and Jamaaladeen Tacuma rehearsing.

Another rehearsal photo from 2010: Ornette Coleman (left) and Jamaaladeen Tacuma (right). Photo by Sound Evidence.

Missing the Gig: Remembering Clark Terry (1920-2015)

Posted on April 3, 2015 by Marcus McLaurine - Headlines, Memorials

Clark Terry. Photo courtesy Marcus McLaurine.

[Ed. Note: Composer, trumpeter, flugelhornist, band leader, and jazz educator Clark Terry died on February 21, 2015 just two months after his 94th birthday. An NEA Jazz Masters inductee who recorded over 100 albums in his own name and appeared as a sideman on over 750 others, Terry had a profound impact on countless musicians, among them composer, bassist, and band leader Marcus McLaurine who performed with Terry for more than 30 years. We asked McLaurine to share his memories of this iconic American artist.–FJO]

To be a real leader, one must possess certain traits such as dignity, integrity, and a sense of fairness, all of which Clark Terry embodied. I personally learned about who the man Clark Terry was many years ago, after being in his band just a short time. I was driving a 1965 Rambler at the time, and it so happened that I was having car trouble this one particular week. So the evening of a gig with Clark’s group, I needed a ride into Manhattan to perform at a club called the “Village West.” I figured since my car was not running I would just call a cab and I should be able to make it on time. The only problem was that every cab company that I called said that they had no available drivers. Now I really started to panic, because I wanted to make a good impression with Clark, as far as being on time was concerned. I realized that I did not have much time and if I didn’t get a cab soon I would be in hot water.

Lo and behold, I did finally reach a taxi service that was able to come and get me and my bass, but the trip would not be an easy endeavor. I lived in Jamaica, Queens and to get to Manhattan from my house when the traffic was good would be about thirty minutes, but now the cabdriver would have to deal with the tail end of rush hour. I knew that there was no way that I was going to make the performance on time. (This was before cell phones were available.) . After much bobbing and weaving through the traffic, the cabby finally made it to the lower west side of Manhattan where the club was located. I paid the driver and hurried inside, but to my surprise the band had started without me and another bassist was on stage performing.

My heart sank into my stomach, because my worst fear was now being realized and I would surely be fired. So I patiently waited until they finished the first set. Clark caught my glance as he was leaving the bandstand and with a gleam in his eye he said, “You really blew it, didn’t you!” Thinking to myself, “Yes, I know that I did,” he then stated emphatically, “Where were you this afternoon for the gig that we had in Midtown Manhattan?” The reality of the situation hit me like a ton of bricks. I had totally forgotten about a job that we had that afternoon. Words cannot fully express the sense of depression that swept over my whole body. Clark casually walked away with some of his friends and the rest of the band, as they made their way back to the band’s dressing room. The whole time back there Clark completely ignored me and I can remember the drummer at the time, Charles Braugham, trying to console me, but to no avail. Well, the time was fast approaching for the band to return for the next set and because I had not spoken to Clark during the entire break, my fate was left in limbo. (Would he fire me or would he let me stay?)

Clark was very clever in how he dealt with the situation, because I think he wanted to see how I would react to what had just transpired. The moment of truth finally arrived and Clark came over to me and said, “This is what we’ll do: You pay the bassist who did the first set and you come and finish up the gig.” The sense of relief that I experienced was overwhelming and I truly could not believe what I was hearing. That day I realized that I was dealing with someone who was of extraordinary character, because the average person would have given me my walking papers. From that day on I became a huge fan of Mr. Clark Terry and he could do no wrong in my eyes. Clark, thank you for giving me the opportunity to be associated with your extraordinary legacy.

Clark Terry and Marcus McLaurine sitting together.

Clark Terry and Marcus McLaurine. Photo courtesy Marcus McLaurine.

Performing with Clark Terry was a pure joy and very challenging at the same time, because his mere presence on the bandstand raised the bar exponentially. His knowledge of the American songbook and of more contemporary composers was extremely vast. I can remember performing at the Village Vanguard with Clark and he began playing a piece impromptu. Clark would do this every now and then, which really forced everyone in the band to learn as many songs as possible. I had no idea what the piece was and was having a great deal of difficulty with the song. Needless to say, this was a very uncomfortable situation to be in. I later found out that the song was “Sweet Lorraine” and I am sure Clark played the song in honor of Lorraine Gordon, who was the wife of Max Gordon, the owner of the Village Vanguard.

Clark Terry was also noted for his highly identifiable sound, which was very rich, warm, and full. All you needed to hear were just a couple of bars of him playing and you knew immediately that it was Clark Terry! His sense of time, rhythm, and melodies were impeccable, and it seemed that Clark was always trying to push himself beyond the envelope, to do things on the horn that no one else had done, such as playing two horns at once or playing the trumpet or flugelhorn upside down. It was a true marvel to watch how he would gradually flip the flugelhorn upside down while never letting the horn leave his lips—all of this while still playing. Pure magic!

Another identifying quality of Clark’s was this language that he had created called Mumbles. I first heard this routine at the University of Nebraska’s student center in 1972, where Clark was performing with the university’s jazz ensemble. I remember laughing so hard that my face was aching. The language sounded like gibberish, but he would do it with inflections from other countries, such as Germany, France, and Italy. You could not understand a word of what he was saying, but you felt as though you understood every word. Clark made a recording with Oscar Peterson called Oscar Peterson Trio + One and, as legend has it, Clark performed this mumbles language over the blues. After listening to the playback Oscar Peterson thought this new language that Clark had created was hilarious and hence “Mumbles” made it on the recording and the rest is history!

Clark was the consummate entertainer on the bandstand with a style that harkened back to the days of Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, and countless others. He always engaged the audience and had this uncanny ability to know just what material to perform next. Clark was also noted for being one of the first jazz educators and was always more than ready to help young musicians who were eager for knowledge. A couple of Clark’s earliest students were Miles Davis and Quincy Jones, who later became jazz icons in their own right.

I was very fortunate in that Clark asked me to be a part of his jazz camps and this was where I was able to learn his method of teaching, where he stressed a system of phrasing that he called the Doodle System, which was phrased “daddle, deedle, dawdle, dowdle, doodle.” The idea would be to sing this phrase very slowly and then, once you had mastered it, gradually increase the tempo, so that you could develop good phrasing for your solos. When you hear Clark performing you can hear him utilizing this system of phrasing in his solos.

Clark also had a great sense of humor and always maintained that feeling of being positive on and off the bandstand. Anyone who was fortunate enough to come in contact with him quickly recognized this and would always cherish the moments spent with him. I personally feel blessed to have had the opportunity to be associated with Clark for more than 30 years. Clark was more than an employer to the members in his bands, he was a true friend for life and we all will miss him dearly. We have truly lost one of the giants. Godspeed, CT!!!

Remembering Ezra Laderman (1924-2015)

Posted on March 13, 2015 by David Stock - Headlines, Memorials

Ezra Laderman, smiling, wearing a jacket and tie

Ezra Laderman, photo courtesy Theodore Presser Co.

I first met Ezra Laderman at the old Bennington Composers Conference in the summer of 1966. Several of my colleagues and I were very impressed with the fact that he was a working composer, not one securely ensconced in academia. This was indeed a revelation, as very few composers we had met did not have a teaching post.

Ezra’s work habits were also an object of our admiration; he composed starting early in the morning and, no matter the project, he addressed it with consummate professionalism. Over the subsequent nearly half a century, he found a home in the academic world, then in government service at the NEA, then back to teach and administer at Yale. Through all those changes, he continued to work hard, on a regular schedule; what a role-model! Even as head of music at the National Endowment for the Arts, he had it built into his contract that he would protect his composing time, in D.C. and also at his beloved Woods Hole.

At the NEA, he did his best to carve out a niche for composers and for new music, especially during the difficult times of the right-wing assault on the NEA. What great service he gave all of us in keeping a focus on the living creator and those who played his or her music!

I had the privilege of serving on many panels during his tenure. His wisdom was always welcome. One year, we tried judging composers for fellowships (when are we going to get them back?) anonymously, so we wouldn’t be distracted by the composer’s academic reputation or honors amassed, but by only the music itself. Adrian Gnam, the assistant director of music, decided to play a trick on us judges: he played a piece that he said had not been submitted, but that he wanted us to score as if it had been. We caucused, and decided it was exactly on the cusp of grant or no-grant. The surprise, of course, was that it was a work by our leader, Ezra Laderman!

(By the way, after more than thirty years, it still rankles that the composer fellowships were scrapped because of the “pornography/blasphemy” crisis with Mapplethorpe, et al.—and they themselves were not the recipients of the grants. Ah, the bad old days….)

Ezra continued to turn out a stream of superbly crafted works, no matter his other duties’ demands. And he continued to serve his fellow composers in so many ways, such as his three years as president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Fortunately, we continued to see each other now and again, often in connection with his music’s performances here in Pittsburgh. Especially memorable were two pieces commissioned by our mutual friend, Richard Page: the Bass Clarinet Concerto with the Pittsburgh Symphony and a dark-hued chamber work featuring Page’s noble instrument.

Since no one is perfect, one of these occasions was a not-happy premiere: Laderman’s Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra. The quartet (not to be named… better forgotten) was not really up to Pittsburgh Symphony standards, and the medium itself—quartet and orchestra—is virtually impossible to pull off, even with Ezra’s superb technique.

Of all the pieces in his huge catalog (eleven string quartets, eight symphonies, etc.), the one I most regret missing was his opera about Marilyn Monroe; there is a truly tragic operatic subject for you! I hope that some enterprising company will revive it.

Ezra was always interested in what other composers were doing , whether his peers or young up-and-comers. He was an unusually down-to-earth guy, never putting on airs with “lesser” colleagues. I remember vividly a conversation about Shabbat dinners at our respective family’s homes, especially the chicken, prepared exactly the same way, every Friday night, at his. (Mine were more eclectic.)

Aaron Copland often spoke of being a “good citizen” of the world of music, and with Ezra’s passing we have lost a very good citizen and a fine composer.

Remembering Tom McKinley (1938-2015): A Personal Reflection

Posted on February 24, 2015 by Marc Rossi - Headlines, Memorials

Photo of McKinley wearing a tie and holding a score

William Thomas McKinley in 1988. Photographer unknown. Photo courtesy Elliott Miles McKinley.

It’s hard to believe Tom is gone. He was such a force in my life, and in the lives of so many others. To me, Tom is what a life in music is all about—a love of the medium, passionate drive, and the relentless pursuit of creative excellence. He set a standard to which I continually aspire.

Tom was born in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, on December 9, 1938. He took an interest in music at a very young age and began playing piano at six. By eleven he became a member of the musician’s union and was already playing jazz in nightclubs around Pittsburgh. After high school, he enrolled at Carnegie Mellon University (then Carnegie Tech) to study classical piano performance. However, during his audition, he stunned the piano faculty with his ability to improvise in almost any style and drew the attention of composer Nikolai Lopatnikoff. It was Lopatnikoff who persuaded Tom to switch from piano performance to composition.

In 1963, while a Tanglewood fellow, Tom met Gunther Schuller. Gunther would become an important mentor, friend, and advocate, and steer Tom to pursue graduate study in composition at Yale where he would meet another important mentor, Mel Powell. After graduating Yale with two master’s degrees he accepted a teaching position in composition at the University of Chicago. In 1973, Gunther would again prove influential in Tom’s early career by extending an invitation to teach composition and jazz piano at the New England Conservatory of Music. Gunther would later say of Tom’s music that he had “more original ideas on one page than most composers do in a lifetime.”

When I first began studying with Tom in 1975, I was blown away by his playing. Then I heard performances of his chamber pieces, and was further impressed with the richness of his music. When I showed Tom my compositions he helped me see the depth of my own potential, to value my own ideas, and to ignite them. Being a composer and jazz pianist, Tom was a role model for my own work. He was a composition teacher and a mentor to me, much the way Mel Powell was for him. Up to that point I was frustrated, feeling that being a serious composer would mean giving up all the love I had for jazz and spontaneous improvisation. Tom helped to confirm what I sensed—I could do both, abolish this duality, and see creative music from a perspective of higher unity. He demonstrated how, musically and spiritually, one could embrace both—through notes, gestures, and at every imaginable level.

In that sense, he was a true American original and, to my knowledge, the first American classical composer who was also a major post-bop jazz pianist. Tom played and recorded actively with jazz greats such as Dexter Gordon, Hank Mobley, Roy Haynes, Miroslav Vitous, Billy Hart, Gary Peacock, and Eddie Gomez, to name a few. Put together with his enormous output of chamber music and orchestral compositions (more than 400 works by the time he passed away), he occupies a unique place in music history.

William Thomas McKinley at the piano in his office at New England Conservatory circa 1990. Photographer unknown. Photo courtesy Elliott Miles McKinley.

As lifelong friend and Pittsburgh-area composer David Stock said, “Very few composers have been so completely versed in jazz and concert music.”
Tom once remarked, “None of my best students sound like me.” I think that is a testament to their talent, and to his teaching abilities. His gifts were so huge; he didn’t need to create musical or ideological clones. Intensely prolific, he wanted his students to truly become themselves. Everyone who studied with him had his/her life transformed. This is evidenced well by the outpouring from former students on the news of Tom’s death, all speaking of his impact on their lives.

Some of my happiest moments with Tom were when I had the chance to make music with him as a fellow composer during recording sessions or as a colleague on a jazz concert. In 1992, Tom started a recording company (known then as MMC) to help American composers get orchestral music recorded. In the recording booth, Tom offered tremendous insight to all the composers during the recording process. His ears were lightning fast, and he knew just what to suggest and how to do it tactfully so as not to step on the conductor’s toes. He understood the orchestra as few do, and anyone who studied with him knows what a great orchestration teacher he was. I am honored that some of my own orchestral music appears alongside Tom’s on several releases from that time. I also had the privilege to play jazz alongside him on some recent concerts, which gave me a rush like I had back in 1975 when I first met him.

Tom once said, when asked if he ever took a vacation, “Holidays? My life is a holiday! Composing is being alive.” I will dearly miss Tom. I will miss his quick wit and humor, his kindness and generosity, and his love of life, coffee, and his deep uncompromising passion for music. His death should inspire us all to work harder, find the very best within ourselves, and honor his legacy.

McKinley and Stoltzman, both wearing ties but no jackets, standing together.

William Thomas McKinley with clarinetist Richard Stoltzman in 1985 Photographer unknown. Photo courtesy Elliott Miles McKinley.

[Note from the composer’s son Elliott Miles McKinley: William Thomas McKinley passed away very early in the morning on Tuesday, February 3, 2015. It was in his sleep and unexpected. (He was not suffering from any long-term illness that we knew of at the time.) We are not sure of the cause.]

An extremely cluttered desk filled with various manuscripts and folders.

William Thomas McKinley’s desk on the day of his death, February 3, 2015. Among the materials there are a new composition for the SOLI Chamber Ensemble plus various articles and drafts for books he was working on. Photo by Elliott Miles McKinley.

*Marc Rossi is a composer, jazz pianist, and Professor at The Berklee College of Music in Boston.

Come Away – Ezra Sims (1928-2015)

Posted on February 9, 2015 by Theodore Mook - Headlines, Ledes

At around 9:30 at night on January 30, Ezra Sims passed away in his sleep, lovely and soothing (as the Whitman goes), after a heroic struggle against the infirmities that had plagued him for the past few years. His frustration was palpable, his suffering devastating, but still, I couldn’t help but snicker when he would complain to his doctors about his failing mind—which, even at what he felt was diminished capacity, could pull the first sentence verbatim from a book he’d read 15 years earlier. Or remember a theme from a Schumann Symphony or the graceful nuance of a particular turn of line or phrase from, well, just about anything. I always felt like I should have an encyclopedia and a dictionary handy when I talked to Ezra, but it would have taken a staff of ten to keep up with him.

The Sextet (1981) was the first Sims piece I played: a Dinosaur Annex performance in the Spring of 1982, with Janet Packer, Anne Black, Ian Greitzer, Ken Radnofsky, and Tom Haunton. During one of the rehearsals, once I lifted my head up enough to hear what was going on around me, I discovered this was no mere new music piece, as Ezra would say, but a turmoil: churning, vital, sensual, bouyant, joyful, painful—life itself, in sound. This new music seemed to fill its lungs with the same air I did, and changed my circuitry forever.

Only where love and need are one,
and the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For Heaven and the future’s sakes.
—Robert Frost, “Two Tramps in Mud Time”

His home at 1168 Mass Ave was a nexus for all of us, a place so saturated with airborne yeast (empty beer bottles) that Ezra left his dough on the kitchen counter to rise on its own. Those of us touched by the force of his personality and culture rose as well, lovingly—not always very gently—mentored by this fussy, brilliant man. He touched us all and he kept in touch with everyone: piles of letters written in his heavy hand signed with his graceful initials (the same which adorned his gorgeous handwritten scores), admonishing notes, phone calls, dinner parties, excursions to museums, more admonishing notes, long walks, mushroom hunting, New Year’s cards, lunch invitations —none of his communications ever trivial and always, in later recounting to friends, a glue which held us all together. There were some dubious soups, with mushrooms discovered on some rotting log in Cambridge which would spark conversations about John Cage, Tanglewood, Merce Cunningham, the Judson, John Herbert MacDowell, a tsunami of cultural connections—all the while wondering quietly whether or not you would live to see the next sunrise. Are you sure these mushrooms are OK?

After his move to Hurley Street, things were much the same. Ezra was amused by a neighborhood fool dog, the crazy landscape innovations next door, the abundant spring flowers, the fish place, and cockles, and we were satisfied by the musty comfort of the same old books, the art, and Ezra himself at the table In the days to come, perhaps we lost a little in the indirectness of email, the brittle replication of computer scores instead of the nuanced calligraphy of his older ones, but we were older, too, with families and jobs. The world changed: a harsher, glancing light that grates against the Turner-esque glow of Ezra’s harmonies. Not so much dissonant as nostalgic, mourning the loss of a civility that now seems archaic rather than heroic.

Ezra leaves us each with set of quotes. On the occasion of peeling off his sarong at a dinner gathering: “I hope no one minds a naked host.” On the occasion of being served brown rice at a Japanese restaurant: “Had I known it was that sort of place, I shan’t have come.” At a rehearsal of Lee Hyla’s String Trio at his house, popping his head in the door: “That intonation will not leave this house!” While he was reviewing recording takes, the successive phone calls: “How could you?”, “What on earth happened? How could you?”, “What happened?” He worried about us, gossiped about us, complained, criticized, corrected, and over time for me, became a refuge.

All of the characters from one of Ezra’s favorite books, Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons—Feckless the cow, the spooky aunt, the oversexed farm boy Seth, the crazy preacher father who takes off to spread the word (“you miserable, crawling worms….”)— have counterparts in Ezra’s Birmingham childhood. No, not an exact match to the Sims family, but outrageous overtones which made the description of his Birmingham life more vivid, like the music he would come to write years later. His boyhood cow, an “improving” aunt (in that she was bent on raising the cultural standards of those around her), preacher-grandfather AJ Sims, Sister (always Sister, I don’t think I ever knew her name), and the youthful Ezra—bass player, guzzling milk out of the pail, the passionate discoverer of Stravinsky in the local record shop—all fashioned the deep Southern gentility, culinary habits (salt in the coffee?), food preferences (How much milk does he drink? Salt in the coffee? Really?), embedded into the Ezra we grew to love. Together with his friend Arthur, lapping up the pot liquor, feeding the iron pig, savoring the overcooked greens, and exuding an erudite southern poise which, however scandalous the conversation, was expressed with an eloquence that made our young Yankee sensibilities seem cold, lumpy, and crude. And though they knew the difference between Dutch and Polish rudders, the unexpressed secret was all the funnier.

Ezra’s early musical experiences—playing the bass in the school orchestra (because he was big for his age), singing in the chorus—may have taught him his harmonic subtlety, but I’m inclined to be more mystical. He went from Birmingham, through steel mills, Chinese language school, Yale, Mills, and New York encountering a cast of characters and circumstances powerful enough to derail even the most individual soul. But he ultimately came to a place so uniquely his own that it has no siblings, no cousins, no counterparts. His ear made the demands, and once he found the sound his ears sought, he drew the map for us to retrace his steps back to the music traditions he loved. He was not an iconoclast, but a logical evolutionist, who ironically arrived at his destination by a leap of faith.

He did not compromise, and went for years without a performance. It was not easy to find performers willing to undertake the work, but by some miraculous alchemy, Rodney Lister, Scott Wheeler, Toby Armour, Richard Pittman, Boston Music Viva, Ian Greitzer, Janet Packer, Kathy Matasy, Ann Black Diane Heffner—and the loyal cohorts they spawned—brought Ezra’s music to life. And not just the notes, but the music underneath, with its radiance and warmth. Despite his crankiness, and the harshly direct statements he could make, we celebrated his steadfast individuality and his courage. And if we couldn’t quite create our own universe like he did, he inspired us to try. He is a center, a focus, a force of gravity, and will always be so.

But we will miss him.

Theodore Mook

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