Tag: vocal music

Vessel and Ceremony: Convergence Vocal Ensemble

Cultures throughout recorded history have used rituals in countless different ways. At its essence, a ritual or ceremony is a Vessel, and each participant is free to fill that vessel with as much or as little significance as she or he chooses.

The above quote was taken from the program notes for Vessel, a recent concert presented by the Convergence Vocal Ensemble. This evening of commissions was the result of a collaborative effort shared by Convergence and a number of composers, and facilitated by the Austin New Music Coop and a number of sponsors including New Music USA. Composers were commissioned to write pieces for four voices combined with a variety of instrumental combinations, including new instruments created specifically for this event. Prior to the concert, we got the lowdown on the conception and creation of these new instruments by Norma Yancey and Travis Weller. Dubbed “Skiffs,” they were built from (among other things) repurposed organ pipes scavenged from an organ repairman who, upon announcing his retirement, was descended upon by a variety of Austin new music folk, every one eager to lay hands on these dormant parts and give them new life.

“Skiffs”

“Skiffs” built from (among other things) repurposed organ pipes.

Andrew Stolz’s Nomad Unraveling featured members of Convergence (present this evening as a quartet) joined by the composer on harmonium and Travis Weller on the Owl. A sawing, keening sweep recalling the harmonics of an electric guitar cut through the slow rise and fall of the harmonium as the four vocalists shushed and hissed within the texture.  Occasional strums acted as section markers as quarter tones were passed from tenor and bass to soprano and mezzo until all fell silent. Spoken text culled from the book Generations by William Strauss and Neil Howe and a number of articles on “Generation X” provided fodder for the subsequent chant-like section which felt at some points serene and at others like a bizarre church service. The Owl/harmonium combination in this section sounded like a giant, solemn harmonica, fifths and octaves dominating the overtones that echoed through the space. A return to the smaller intervals harkened a final move to consonance, beaters keeping slow time on the Owl as the piece came to its end.

Sarah Dutcher’s Sleep was the only a cappella offering of the evening. Starting with a simple melody performed by Gitanjali Mathur, a polyphony developed, delivered as a closed-mouth hum among the players. Sleep drifted quietly through the hall, vowels morphing from one to the next in a slow six; a soft, short, drifting lullaby. The Water Bowl for vocalists, percussion, horn, and trombone by Brent Fariss circled conceptually around the constant and repeated rituals practiced by those afflicted with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and physically around an actual water bowl which took center stage. Divided into sections loosely demarked by Convergence bass and artistic director Cameron Beauchamp’s heads-up conducting (he was performing as well, and would on occasion make his way into the other performers’ lines of sight to indicate section changes), the piece began peacefully with the singers breathing in and out, sometimes together, sometimes subtly affecting the breathing. Laura Mercado-Wright counted out loud in groups of eight and thirteen, a feature which became central to the piece and occurred in the other players’ parts as well. Hornist Mikal Hart joined trombonist Steve Parker in exploring the low range of their instruments; low guttural moans mixed with Nick Hennies’s bass drums scrapes to complete a compelling sound world.

Laura Mercado Wright, Gitanjali Mathur, Paul D'Arcy, and Cameron Beauchamp

Laura Mercado Wright, Gitanjali Mathur, Paul D’Arcy, and Cameron Beauchamp
Photo by Alan Kahler

In Travis Weller’s Hear Rightly, a trio of skiffs joined Convergence in a setting of 95c, an “erasure” by Dorothy Meiburg. Derived from the 1978 edition of “Lutheran Church Worship,” Meiburgs’s text was created (one might say “sculpted”) by removing all but a few words of the existing page to create a new text. For example, a portion of the text came from the prayer “Thanksgiving For Light II” which, when subjected to Meiburg’s sculpting, became simply “Light II.” Screeching drones produced by bows drawn across the skiff’s strings set the stage for vocal lines which began in the tenor and bass and made their way to the soprano and mezzo. Small dowels drawn across strings created a sound like insane wine goblet music, all jagged overtones and a beautiful ending of each attack that recalled the slightest jaw-harp vibe. Hand-held piano hammers replaced the dowels to create a koto-like impression, and the resulting effect was that of a music box. A slightly creepy dollhouse atmosphere coalesced before forming up with solo voice, then duo, all long melodies, wandering. From this, a single angular vocal line staggered about as the skiffs mimicked sitars.

I should back up here. An intermission preceded Hear Rightly, and I took the opportunity to step outside. On my way back in, I saw Travis beneath a lamp in the parking lot manipulating a large air compressor.

“Whatcha doin’ Travis?”

“…You’ll see.”

Whatcha doin’ Travis?

Whatcha doin’ Travis?

From seemingly out of nowhere, the air compressor began to feed the pipes, but instead of blasting their way through in true church organ fashion, they filled the space and gave body and depth to the prevailing texture. Appropriating these found objects, as removed and repurposed as the text they supported, was as contextually compelling and unifying as it was musically satisfying.

Keith Manlove’s into memory, through ritual featured Convergence’s vocals run through a variety of processing, all accompanied by a video presentation. The video featured two alternating vignettes; the first was of a trio sitting at a coffee table and the second was of a lone dancer whose dance was periodically interrupted by other actors covering her with cloths, blankets, and blindfolds. This sort of thing can get derailed quickly if the video is either too abstract (why are we watching this?) or too narrative (wait, is she supposed to be the french horn or the trumpet?), but here the “story” of the video had enough body to seem linear and enough forward motion to suggest development without being explicitly illustrative or, god forbid, didactic. Visceral vocalizations among the quartet realized by quick breathing and timbre manipulation gave way to Paul D’Arcy’s clear tenor solo. A syllabic “language analog” provided a counterpoint to the video in its suggestion of motion and narrative, and was soon filled out by four voice polyphony. Granularization and reverberation transformed the otherwise smooth voice leading as the performers began to accompany themselves with a variety of hand claps, pops, and head shakes, the last of which had as much visual impact as aural. Descending lines came of like something from the Tower of Babel, each voice struggling to dialog, hands waving and eyes popping as all possible avenues of communication were explored.

 

Giving Life to New Opera: the John Duffy Composers Institute

Ed Note: Late last month I attended a portion of the John Duffy Composers Institute as one of the guest speakers. I was fascinated by the interactions between the seven composers participating in the program, the musicians performing their music, the various visiting speakers, and John Duffy, who is the mastermind of this whole project. So when Jake Runestad, one of the participating composers, offered to write a post about his experience there, as well as to make a short video featuring brief comments by the other participating composers and excerpts from performances of their works, I was delighted.—FJO

Sitting forward in his chair, leaning in to focus on every word being sung, John Duffy turns to me and responds candidly, “Well done Jake, but remember; clarity of text is paramount.” I heed every word John speaks not only because he is one of the kindest and most generous people I have ever met, but because he has a brilliant mind for music and drama.

John Duffy - Photo courtesy of John Polston Photography

John Duffy – Photo courtesy of John Polston Photography

Eight years ago, John Duffy, a respected composer and long-time advocate of new music, founded the John Duffy Composer Institute—an incubator for the next generation of opera composers. The institute brings together leading professionals from the opera world to workshop and produce new works by young composers. This year, there were seven composers selected for this two-week event hosted by the Virginia Arts Festival in Norfolk, Virginia.

I have participated in many different festivals, institutes, and readings, but the Duffy Institute is unlike any other. While it provides an opportunity to hear one’s work performed, it also fosters friendships and collaborations among the composers, performers, librettists, and directors in residence. During our morning and afternoon sessions, we discussed our operas in an open forum where feedback was encouraged and all opinions were respected. Guest composers and librettists presented about their works and initiated meaningful conversation about writing opera, the music business, and life as a creative artist.

When discussing our operas with John and the visiting faculty, a recurring theme was that of time. Time is very different in opera than in traditional concert music because of the staging element—each character’s physical movement influences his or her musical time. Libby Larsen, a member of the composition faculty at the Duffy Institute and one of my previous teachers, shared that when writing opera, she takes the furniture out of her living room and moves around the room as if she is on stage. This allows her to physically connect with a character’s movement and to more accurately represent a character’s sense of time and rhythm. I find this to be a crucial element of composing for drama, in order to create the most effective music possible. This also allows the performer to feel a stronger connection to his or her role that hopefully results in a more convincing performance.

Score samples from the works of several John Duffy Composers Institute participants

Another important and frequently discussed topic was that of setting text. John is a stickler for making sure that the words are clear and that there is no need for supertitles in our works. We studied the amazing textual clarity in the songs of Gershwin, Lesser, and Kern, and worked closely with the vocal coaches and singers at the Institute to learn as much as possible about writing for the voice. In response to these crucial learning experiences, I, and the other composer fellows, shared how vocal music is barely covered in our academic studies in composition. Most, if not all, of our classes and assignments are focused on instrumental techniques and orchestration for instrumental ensembles. Vocal music is one of the most immediate and powerful forms of expression, and I would love to see more schools (and teachers) take the initiative to teach and discuss writing for voices. If theory/composition teachers are afraid of all that the voice entails (yes, it is not an easy beast to tame), partner with the voice department! We can learn a great deal from working with those who practice the craft for which we endeavor to write.

I know I speak for the other composer fellows when I say that my music has greatly improved after my experiences at the Duffy Institute. John continues to be one of my heroes because of his love of people, his respect for artistic collaboration, and appreciation for all sizes, shapes, and forms of music (some of his favorites being Bach, Coltrane, and Eminem). John’s vision of giving life to new opera is an inspiration and is becoming a reality thanks to his tireless dedication to this program.

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Jake Runestad

Jake Runestad

Jake Runestad is a composer and conductor based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He has received commissions and performances from ensembles such as the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, VocalEssence, Seraphic Fire, the Dayton Philharmonic, and the Baltimore Concerto Orchestra. He is currently composer-in-residence with the Baltimore-based Lunar Ensemble.

Being Vocal On the Instrumentality of Cliques

On April 16, St. Peter’s Church was hired to host a memorial for one of the masters of the Great American Songbook, Barbara Ann LeCocq, a.k.a. Barbara Lea. A native of Detroit, Michigan, Lea’s career began in the 1950s upon her graduation from Wellesley College. Her first recording was in 1953 under the alias of Midge Barber. By 1956 she was named Best New Singer in the International Critics’ Poll of DownBeat magazine. During the 1960s, though, she recorded nothing while she pursued a career as an actor, ostensibly to overcome stage fright. She returned to singing in the 1970s and soon became highly revered among aficionados of American cabaret as “The High Priestess of Popular Song.” She, like most cabaret singers, worked primarily with jazz musicians, which was reflected in the list of speakers and performers who attended her memorial, including jazz pianist/vocalists Daryl Sherman (who hosted the event), Ronny Whyte, and Bob Dorough, as well as vocalists Marlene VerPlanck, Melissa Hamilton, Karen Oberlin, Sue Matsuki, Annie Dinerman, and Joyce Breach. Impresario George Wein and cabaret entertainer Steve Ross played piano and sang. Pianist/composer Dick Miller played and remarks were delivered by cabaret clubowner Jan Wallman, impresario Jack Kleinsinger, journalists Roger Schore, David Hadju, Peter Wagenaar (read by Hamilton), and Nat Hentoff (read by Sherman), jazz scholar and musician Loren Schoenberg (also read by Sherman), and talent agent Lewis Chambers (who was also Lea’s acting coach). Pianist Tedd Firth, guitarist James Chirillo, saxophonist Harry Allen, and bassist Boots Maleson were the house accompanists (although Dorough played for Hamilton’s closing “I’m Glad There Is You”).

I only met Lea a few times in the cabaret supper club Judy’s while I was playing bass there, usually with pianist/composer David Lahm and his wife, the late Judy Kreston. She would usually be sitting with Jan Wallman, who previously ran Judy’s when it was called, appropriately, Jan Wallman’s. One of the things that struck me about her was how other cabaret singers gravitated towards her table to socialize and talk about their milieu, their cabaret clique. This was when I realized how insular the world of cabaret performers, especially the singers, is and how necessary this clique of artists has become in identifying and preserving a tradition of American popular song that has informed so much of the music industry of the 20th century. One of the speakers at Lea’s memorial (I probably should have been taking notes, but wasn’t) said, “Music without lyrics isn’t really alive.” Although I don’t agree with the statement, I do agree with his assessment that the way a melody is delivered to our culture is with the words that are ascribed to it. I flashed back to discussions I had had with Anne-Marie Moss, who dedicated an entire evening to explaining why a great tune like “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” is almost never performed as an instrumental and with Betty Carter explaining why she put the song’s introduction in the middle. It was about a point of view, described as universally in the song’s words, being personalized by the performer. This was driven home in Lea’s performance of Cole Porter’s “Begin the Beguine” as a poem-like dirge during the memorial’s video presentation. Jazz singers like Lea, Moss, and Carter define a large portion of our social conscience as a musical clique.

But it is a clique that is larger than any group that might assemble at Judy’s or The Algonquin or Feinstein’s or Zeb’s Place or Kitano or Roulette. It is a clique that is identified by the way it produces music, by what Melissa Hamilton calls “sustained speech,” by singing, and includes artists like Tom Buckner, Judi Silvano, Jon Hendricks, Fay Victor, Theo Bleckmann, Andrea Wolper, Miles Griffin, Vicky Burns, Lezlie Harrison, and so many more. On Saturday afternoons I play at an open-air market on 116th Street between Adam Clayton Powell and Malcom X Boulevards with the Satchmo Manaan Quartet. This is a vocalist intensive group that plays music from the Great American Songbook usually associated with African American culture. While there are, inarguably, rifts in American society associated with concepts of racial inequality, it is also a fact that one of the “places” where these rifts are forged is in music, especially sung music. But most of the jam sessions one goes to in New York, or anywhere else for that matter, feature instrumentalists. This seems to illustrate an attitude among musicians where singers are considered “less than” by those who play upon the technological marvels that were originally designed to accompany voice. This has an effect, I fear, of amplifying the sociological rifts mentioned earlier. Looking at the Great American Songbook, how rarely African American composers (not to mention Native American composers) are represented beyond Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn. Oscar Brown, Jr., Stevie Wonder, and Billy Holiday are given token mention, but too often their messages include commentary about the rifts and are dismissed as “political.” This cliquing from the outside, by the culture machine that benefits the most from these rifts, is what gives the idea of cliques a “bad name.”

To be continued…