Everyone's a critic

Made the "mistake" of posting a simple, straight-forward and mostly sarcastic comment about how a flute solo is not appropriate when writing a piece about The Gates of Hell (after Rodin's sculpture).

Here was the ensuing facebook escapade:

Thanks for listening, Milton. RIP.

It was funny to see all the RIP Milton Babbitt status updates on my composer and music friends' facebook profiles yesterday. Obviously not haha, but after all the negative things we may have said about the man's music, there was a definite sadness in everyone upon learning of his passing early Saturday morning. Nothing but respect and admiration for his contributions to music and, in particular, avant-garde music in the United States.

And that's how it should be.

Thanks for listening, Milton. RIP.

The AP Story here

Composer DOUBLE Fail

In honor of my friend's blog, Jenn Jolley, who's series of Composer Fails (30 fails by the time she hits 30 yrs) is sheer self-deprecating genius, I've decided to post what she might consider a double fail.

One of the places that I applied for a job rejected me outright back in December...but to *make absolute sure* that I knew that I was no longer considered for the position, they sent me this via email about a week ago (to protect the innocent, the name of said school has been blotted out):



The letter seems straightforward and boring enough, so what's the big deal? On second thought, I came to the following conclusion -- The first rejection, especially coming after just under 2 weeks of submitting the application, basically said "you're sooooo not right for the job." This second letter adds to the first by saying also "We hate your face."

Sheesh. Why do I suddenly feel like Billy Madison in this scene?:

Really Have Gotten into this duo

Pomplamoose (playing "Expiration Date")

(Hint: You've seen them in the rash of Hyundai Christmas Commercials that just aired)

First week of my last semester

It's about time. I was starting to become the music grad school equivalent of this guy:

Except for everything that made that movie a raunchy flick. So instead of unlimited boos, sex, and drunken parties, replace with unlimited papers to grade, the need for boos, and late nights writing music and grading papers. Who'd watch that movie? (did I mention grading papers?)

Still need to get into a groove, but have now taught 2 of the orchestration courses for the semester. It's strange lecturing on something other than theory, but at least I know it already.

But...I still don't have my materials! CD, Textbook, and workbook still hasn't arrived, but finally will on Monday. Luckily, I was able to procure a textbook and things for the first week and create the syllabus with little trouble.

Ah, the joys of academia.

Here's to a great last semester in school. EVER.

The Feats of Incovenience Composers Go Through

...for something that ultimately may not be chosen!

The Symphony in C has an annual competition for "young" composers (really meaning anyone under 30...shouldn't they increase this number to at least 35 or 40?). The due date was this past Saturday.

One concession: Naturally, most composers wait until the last minute to submit anything because, let's be honest...it's in our nature. I feel I've improved upon this over the last few years by "tricking" myself into doing something last minute by moving the date a few days earlier. This is more useful for writing music so that I don't lose that edge (I use this word loosely) the music has when forced to write on instincts. But for postmark dates and other mailings, it's just meant to overcome laziness/procrastination.

I meant to send out the package on Thursday (2 days before postmark), but completely forgot until Saturday (day of postmark) around noon.

Printed out 2 scores on legal size paper. No problem. But I didn't have legal size hard covers. Formatted them on 11x17 hardcovers then printed...so far, so good. A sample part needed to be made and I decided to try it out on 10x13 instead of my usual 11x14...still no problem. Just everything needed to be cut. Needed blank CDs...at school. Needed binding supplies...at school. So at about 3:30pm, around 90 minutes before the post office's last pickup, we headed into Austin.

Ran into traffic...duh. Got to school at 4:07. Made the CDs and bound the scores...but the paper cutter won't fit paper larger than 12 inches vertical. Whoops. Off to Kinkos. 4:30pm we get it cut but realized I left my bindings and pliers at school. Purchased some at kinkos for a buck (highway robbery). Cut everything and off to the post office.

5pm...we make it just in time, but I completely forgot to include an SASE. Dumb on my part. We drive out to the last pickup area (turns out to be the central Austin Post Office) before 8pm...finally get everything sorted. It's now 6pm.

It all gets in and postmarked on the correct day, but a lot of it has less to do with procrastination and just being dumb/bad luck on my part. Lesson learned? Not likely.

Haven't seen this in 10 years...

George Lucas' inspiration for Star Wars...

Happy New Year!

If everything pans out, this will be the most epic of semesters.

First up: the premiere and then subsequent second performance of M O V E, by the brilliant Wes Schulz and Alejandro Guittierez, first with the Texas Chamber Group and then the University of Texas University Orchestra (UTUO).

Come see the premiere on February 3 at 7:30pm at Concordia University in Austin, Texas.