NOT AT I ONS FALL 2013
IN THIS ISSUE Letter from the Editors
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Matthew Fava Donald Pounsett Jeremy Strachan Alexa Woloshyn
Letter from Council James Harley
Ontario Project Updates Interfacing Against the Grain Lendl Barcelos
FALL 2013, VOL. 20, NO. 3 The Canadian Music Centre, Ontario Region, produces Notations and distributes it to supporters of Canadian Music The opinions expressed herein are not necessarily the opinions of the Canadian Music Centre. EDITORIAL COLLECTIVE Matthew Fava, Donald Pounsett, Jeremy Strachan, Alexa Woloshyn
In Focus
DESIGN Emma Jenkin
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Reflection
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DIY Ensemble Hanging with ∆TENT New Associates
CONTRIBUTORS Robert Aitken, Lendl Barcelos, Samuel Bayefsky, Matthew Fava, alcides lanza, David Mott, Shannon Peet, Baņuta Rubess, Saman Shahi, Robert Stevenson
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Samuel Bayefsky Matthew Fava Saman Shahi
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alcides lanza Edited by Meg Sheppard Robert Aitken
Noteworthy TES Report Back
Nic Gotham Memorial Article
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Shannon Peet David Mott Banuta Rubess Robert Stevenson
CANADIAN MUSIC CENTRE ONTARIO REGION 20 St. Joseph Street Toronto ON M4Y 1J9 416.961.6601 x 207 ontario@musiccentre.ca www.musiccentre.ca
LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Centenary celebrations have been taking place throughout the contemporary music world, as communities recognize the first generation of composers and artists that catalyzed a radical change in music composition in the twentieth century. Barbara Pentland, John Weinzweig, and Violet Archer are three Canadian composers whose lives and works have been celebrated within the past year – each contributed to the maturation of music in this county. There are, indeed, a great many composers deserving recognition. As 2014 approaches, we here at Notations considered a name that has been absent from the list of centenaries: Hugh Le Caine. In a way, this omission is understandable; Le Caine was a physicist whose devotion to expanding the sonic realm of electronic instruments helped to furnish music studios in the 1960s with advanced equipment. Le Caine often referred to his pieces as ‘demonstrations’, but his groundbreaking efforts (as a scientist, composer, and performer) shaped the vocabulary of electronic music in Canada. In this issue we are treated to an article by Lendl Barcelos who explores Le Caine’s unique conception of sound, and how this was manifested in his instruments. Our In Focus feature builds on this topic with contributions from CMC associates alcides lanza, and Bob Aitken, who worked with Le Caine’s electronic instruments in the McGill and University Of Toronto Electronic Music Studies (EMS) respectively. Apart from reflecting on the earliest examples of electroacoustic music in Canada, volunteers of CMC Ontario also attended the Toronto Electroacoustic Symposium to consider the current dialogue taking place among composers working in this thriving medium. You can read a report-back from the symposium in this issue of Notations that summarizes some of the discussions and concerts that took place over three days in August. This is also the time of year that the CMC welcomes
new Associate Composers into the organization. If ever we needed evidence of the critical mass of activity in Ontario, consider the exciting group of composers that have recently joined this region – you can get to know each one through our New Associate section. We also feature an article on Toronto-based ensemble ∆TENT, a young trio with an impressive sound and a commitment to contemporary music. You can also read about the various activities that the Ontario office of the CMC has participated in recently, and get updates about the achievements of Ontario associate composers. We also devote part of this issue of Notations to the memory of CMC Associate Composer Nic Gotham who passed away in July. Gotham was an important figure here in Canada, and we have invited a few contributions that chronicle his impact in Toronto, but also in Latvia where he lived for the better part of the last 15 years. During the production of this newsletter, we learned about the passing of two other important individuals: CMC Associate Composer Larry Lake, and long-standing CMC staff member Richard Truhlar. We will be devoting a special section in an upcoming Notations newsletter to these two extraordinary members of the community. We hope you are having an excellent start to the 13/14 concert season! We always welcome your feedback, ideas, and involvement here at Notations, so contact the Ontario Regional Office with your thoughts!
Notations Editorial Collective Matthew Fava Donald Pounsett Jeremy Strachan Alexa Woloshyn
Interested in contributing to the Winter 2014 issue? Click here and share your ideas!
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LETTER FROM COUNCIL It was with great sadness that the CMC Ontario Region learned of the passing of Associate Composer Larry Lake. This news came during the production of our newsletter, and we will devote more time to a proper memorial in a subsequent issue, but I think it is worth reflecting here on his long years of service to the CMC. Beyond his contributions as a composer, Larry contributed to the governance of the CMC. Larry first joined the Ontario Regional Council in 1995 and remained a steadfast member until 2011. Moreover, he served as Vice-Chair, Acting Chair, Chair, and Past Chair for most of those years. In these leadership roles, Larry represented Ontario on the CMC National Board as well. Beyond his steadfast commitment, what I especially valued in Larry was his knowledge of the new music community in Canada. He knew everybody! He was already missed at Council since he stepped down; he will be missed even more now. Larry’s work as a composer and performer was very much focused on electronics, particularly through his long involvement with the Canadian Electronic Ensemble. Electronic or electroacoustic music is a focus in this issue of Notations. The CMC is sometimes considered a repository of scores, and it is, but not only! It is worth noting that many of our Associate Composers are active in the world of electronics. This activity runs the range from mixed works for voices or instruments and electronics (live or studio-produced), live electronics (notated or improvised), and electroacoustic works (studio produced for concert playback on two or multiple loudspeakers). Information on such works can be found on the CMC website, and staff will be happy to assist with any queries. The ability to integrate technology into music performance is more accessible today than ever. Not only that, it can be lots of fun! It is not always so widely known that Canada is one of the most important countries in the world for electronic or electroacoustic music. Hugh Le Caine, working in Ottawa, was one of the early pioneers developing new electronic musical instruments and related technology. His support was instrumental in the founding of the first electronic music studio in Canada in 1959, at the University of Toronto. Directed first by Myron Schaeffer and then by Gustav Ciamaga, this studio has welcomed many composers over the years, including Larry Lake. Major activity
in electronic/electroacoustic music has developed in Montreal and Vancouver as well. These days, Toronto is home to New Adventures in Sound Art, an extremely active organization led by composer Darren Copeland and his partner Nadene ThĂŠriaultCopeland. NAISA puts on festivals, concerts, workshops, and more. And just over the summer, Toronto had its annual Electroacoustic Symposium, organized by the Canadian Electroacoustic Community, combining research presentations with concerts and workshops, which attracted participants from far and wide. Exciting developments have also taken place in cities across the province. Composer David Ogborn has a laptop performance group, the Cybernetic Orchestra, based at MacMaster in Hamilton, and composer Brent Lee has established the Noiseborder Ensemble in Windsor, a group that combines music technology with instruments and live video. Guelph has the Advanced Digital Audio Production and Performance Studio (directed by composer James Harley), and Kingston is home to composers/sound artists Matt Rogalsky and Kristi Allik, both using technology as a fundamental aspect of their work. This brief survey does not touch on all the independent electronic music activity going on practically everywhere. There is a lot of electronic music going on in Ontario! The CMC aims to facilitate and promote this activity in any way it can. To that end, I encourage all Associate Composers to make sure the information on your works is updated, with full information about technological requirements where necessary. And, of course, everyone is encouraged to list music events on the CMC Calendar. James Harley Chair CMC Ontario Regional Council
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Members of the University of Toronto percussion ensemble performing at INTERsection in late August. PHOTO: Matthew Fava
ontario project updates
ONTARIO REGION UPDATES NEW MUSIC FOR YOUNG MUSICIANS FALL PREMIERES The Norman Burgess Fund and the New Music For Young Musicians Project are winding down after three years, a dozen showcases, and fifteen commissions. CMC Ontario received a substantial multi-year, province wide grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation to expand our NMFYM activities, and we are excited to present the two final showcases featuring the pieces commissioned during the final year of the project . For more information on the Ping! events contact the Ontario Region of the CMC!
NMFYM String Orchestra Showcase The CMC co-presented a showcase of newly commissioned string orchestra pieces with University of Toronto Schools (UTS) on Tuesday, October 29. Included on the program were pieces written by Alice Ping Yee Ho, John Burke, and Henry Kucharzyk. Each composer worked with a different string orchestra and educator to develop their piece. We were thrilled to have participants from three string programs including UTS, Agincourt Collegiate Institute, and Claude Watson Music/Earl Haig S.S. The concert also featured a guest performance by violinist Erika Raum and pianist Lydia Wong.
NMFYM Chamber Showcase Thursday, November 28 Chalmers House, 20 St. Joseph Street, Toronto Including a special performance by Shauna Rolston and Heather Scmidt, and a celebration of two centrediscs releases (Icicles of Fire and Nebula). There will also be a premiere of a solo piece for harp by Nick Storring, and a piece for double bass with piano accompaniment by Monica Pearce. You will also be treated to the Toronto premieres of solo pieces written by Patrick Horn and Darlene Chepil Reid. Admission is free and includes a reception! NOTATIONS FALL 2013 5
ONTARIO REGIONAL UPDATES
Adam Scime (second from right) leads the Toy Piano Composers Ensemble through passages of Walking
HARRY FREEDMAN AWARD
SCORE READING CLUB
The CMC Harry Freedman Award is being offered once again to CMC Associate Composers! This biennial award offers $1,500 to the winner to support the rehearsal of a chamber piece that will be included on a commercial recording. Former recipients include Constantine Caravassilis who received support for his album Visions which featured pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico. Darren Copeland also won the Harry Freedman award for his piece for hyper-directional loud speakers, Bats and Elephants.
The third volume of the score reading club took place on Wednesday, September 18 at Chalmers House and included three interesting pieces from the CMC collection. CMC Ontario Volunteer Samuel Bayefsky presented a piece by Larry Lake, Filar Il Tuono, which was written for the Hemispheres ensemble. CMC Voting Member Jeremy Strachan presented 5√5 by Udo Kasemets, which Kasemets wrote shortly after being exposed to the writings and works of John Cage – we also heard a rare archival recording featuring Robert Ashley and Gordon Mumma, the two people for whom Kasemets has written the piece. The session concluded with a performance of Walking by Chris Thornborrow featuring the entire Toy Piano Composers Ensemble. Adam Scime, who plays double bass in the ensemble, gave a compelling presentation on the piece and how Thornborrow dabbles with the sonata form, while making it quite his own.
The deadline for applications is January 10, 2013. Results will be announced on April 5, Freedman’s birthday. For more information about applying click here!
Jeremy Strachan discusses Kasemets
Click here to listen to Filar Il Tuono on Centrestrems. Join us for the next installment of the Score Reading Club on Tuesday, December 3. Samuel Bayefsky presenting Filar Il Tuono PHOTOS: Matthew Fava
CMC Ontario continues to organize the Generations/Conversations project, an inter-generational interview series that pairs young artists with more established composers. We continue to invite volunteers to participate as interviewers and interviewees. Upcoming issues of Notations will include conversations with the following composers: Norma Beecroft, Kristi Allik, Alan Torok, and others!
Luan Phungon on guitar performing with Chris Rennie on saxophone
Réa Beaumont performing on the main stage at INTERsection
Andy Yue performs at INTERsection
If you want to get involved let us know!
Members of the Thin Edge New Music Collective take part in the musicircus.
CMC ON LOCATION AT INTERSECTION The CMC was on hand for INTERsection, the annual marathon of music organized by Contact Contemporary Music which took place in Yonge Dundas Square in Toronto on August 31. The main stage featured an impressive mix of music. Scotty Dawg and the Brass Smash Bash (featuring the music and musical talents of CMC Associate Scott Good) kicked off the event with a rhythmically pulsing, colourful set, followed by an ensemble of laptops and assorted electronics presented by New Adventures in Sound Art. CMC Voting Member Réa Beaumont performed a set of solo piano works that included David Ogborn’s Modulation no. 1 along with an original piece she wrote entitled The ice – cracked. TorQ percussion quartet TorQ percussion Quartet at INTERsection PHOTOS: Matthew Fava
took to the stage as the sun was setting and played a selection of movements and pieces by Peter Hatch, Christos Hatzis, Steve Reich, and quartet member Daniel Morhpy. The event ended with a sixty minute rendition of Drumming by Reich performed by the University of Toronto Percussion Ensemble. Borrowing from John Cage’s philosophy, the event included a musicircus with performers scattered throughout the day, and throughout the square. These micro performances included the Thin Edge New Music Collective, Christina Petrowska Quilico, and Spectrum Music – this portion of the event was curated by Jason Doell, who also joined in the music-making. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 7
ONTARIO REGIONAL UPDATES
GENERATIONS/ CONVERSATIONS IN FUTURE NOTATIONS ISSUES
ONTARIO REGIONAL UPDATES
MORE PERFORMANCES FROM INTERSECTION
EXPERIENCE CONCERTS FROM 11 GROUPS IN TORONTO! A new music passport gets you a specially priced ticket to select concerts in 2013-14 concert season, so hurry up and get your passport today! Experience concerts from 11 groups in Toronto! A www.newmusicpassport.ca new music passport gets you a specially priced ticket to select con
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The members of Skyn Flynt in the middle of Yonge Dundas Square PHOTOS: Matthew Fava
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University of Toronto Percussion Ensemble performs Reich’s Drumming
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Cory Latkovich on cello and Sebastian Shinwell on guitar in the musicircus
MUS I C AL L IA EW AL L I AN C I CE US M
INTERFACING AGAINST THE GRAIN C
. s. ers ation d r l b or g a n i z a c i us 11 o rt.ca m o s i n gw f r o mp a s s p s o Cr sho usic h an e w m atc
BY LENDL BARCELOS
Hugh Le Caine performing on the Sackbut Photo courtesy of the Canadian National Research Council Archive
Hugh Le Caine was a Canadian physicist, composer and inventor born in 1914. He grew up in Port Arthur, a northwestern city in Ontario that is now a part of Thunder Bay. At a young age he studied music via the piano and began to experiment with building his own instruments, while simultaneously dabbling in electronics. He would later go on to earn a PhD in physics. Although he dedicated much of his life to research, he maintained a very active engagement with music and from 1954-74 the National Research Council of Canada supplied him with his own music studio where he could develop new audio technologies.
INTERFACING AGAINST THE GRAIN
Le Caine’s multi track recorder Photos courtesy of the Canadian National Research Council
What a composer of electronic music needs most is not an understanding of the apparatus, but a new understanding of sound. Hugh Le Caine
It is not without nervous hesitation that I admit to having only recently become familiar with Hugh Le Caine. Prior to this year I was not made aware of his inventions, compositions or even less—if there can be less than nothing—to his substantial mutation of auditory perception. The latter may come as a surprise even to those intimately familiar with his accomplished biography, but manifested in his various musical instruments is a novel orientation to sound.
Audio technologies form and re-form relations to what musician and theorist Steve Goodman names the vibratory continuum, the field of micro- through macro-oscillations in which we are embedded. By transducing, amplifying, and/or deadening particular aspects of this continuum, a re-distribution of what is audible occurs. With the advent of sound recording, what once was impossible to hear—an audio clone— ultimately becomes a distinct area of study. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 10
INTERFACING AGAINST THE GRAIN Such was the case with Pierre Schaeffer and Halim El-Dabh, where the generation of a novel and distinct musical practice predicated on recorded sound (la musique concrète), necessitated unique conceptions of listening (l’écoute acousmatique and listening to the ‘inner sound’ within recordings).
sonic experiments and resulting instruments were made with composers and musicians in mind. That is to say, he was not interested in sound that was not organized by human means, a pre-Cagean sound that is not music.
The vibratory continuum is the vast range of possible vibrations both beyond and within our frequency band of hearing. Infrasound or frequencies below the auditory threshold become physically tangible if sufficiently intense. Whenever an earthquake occurs we perceive vibrations within this band. Ultrasound is the corresponding range above the auditory threshold. Unsound—another term developed in the work of Goodman—is the range of vibration both above and below the thresholds of hearing. When the human range of auditory perception is related to the possible range of the vibratory continuum, it quickly becomes apparent just how minuscule a band human hearing operates on. However, this is not to diminish the experiential richness within the auditory band: a smaller infinity within a larger one.
The Sackbut afforded musicians as-yet-unknown sonic results from an alreadylearned repertoire of gestures.
Playability and musicality are constants with regards to Le Caine’s instruments. The keyboard, as a historically habituated way of codifying musical gestures, becomes a familiar interface that allows non-electronic musicians and composers to quickly adapt to his instruments. Even volume sliders on his Special Purpose Tape Recorder have ‘white key spacing’. Rather than opening up the musician or composer onto the vibrational continuum via ‘unsound’ mechanisms (in the infraOne of Le Caine’s earliest and ultrasonic ranges) where the body is contorted to insights in electronic sound took place in 1937 when he Le Caine’s electronic organ machine-oriented postures, Le Caine’s instruments transposed circuits used generator pressure the vibratory field for radio and scientific research into the range of hearing. This into anthropomorphic gestures. His crudetransposition allowed him to explore the looking, monophonic Sackbut from 1948 musical characteristics of waveforms and allows pitch and volume to be controlled with eventually led to his self-proclaimed “first a player’s right-hand via bi-directional keys: successful instrument”, the Free Reed the force used to depress a key modifies the Organ. It should be noted that although the volume and a key’s movements from left capability of transmuting an inaudible signal to right alter the pitch. A pressure-sensitive into an audible one can easily lead one to mechanism to control changes in timbre is speculate about non-musical sound—as is comfortably positioned for the player’s leftthe case with sound artist Christina Kubisch’s hand. This allows for a performer to enact work exploring the inaudible electromagnetic standard musical articulations, such as vibrato, spectrum—Le Caine was adamant that his to modify pitch, volume, and/or timbre. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 11
INTERFACING AGAINST THE GRAIN A major innovation with regard to the Sackbut is the capacity to simultaneously modify the three parameters of pitch, volume, and timbre, thus extending the electronic music performer’s potential to modify sound. Of course, with many acoustic instruments this was already the case, but with electronic instruments at the time it was uncommon or unintuitive. Here we catch a glimpse or perhaps begin to hear whispers of Le Caine’s push to make his electronic instruments viable alternatives to the existing acoustic instruments. Yet far from merely building models of known instruments, Le Caine’s apparatuses create sounds that extend beyond the physical limits of acoustic instruments, expanding the sonic terrain available to performers in the process. When such an expansive “soundscape” is narrowed to a set of manageable gestures, performers and composers are then afforded new audible territories to navigate. It is here that we can begin to locate the mutations Le Caine makes possible within auditory perception. Hugh Le Caine was intimately familiar with various types of waves. Having studied physics and going on to work in radar and microwave transmission, it is clear that he had knowledge of vibrations in the unsound range. Yet, as previously mentioned, Le Caine was not interested in non-composed (un) sound, so whenever an inaudible wave was transposed into the audible range it then became material to be used for composition. In a sense, he wanted to redistribute aspects of the vibrational continuum within the regime of human perception. This may sound as if Le Caine was a typical Romantic calling for humanity to tame and re-organize nature (unsound), but his circumscription to vibration that was musical suggests that he was aware that unsound was beyond him. Le Caine’s insistence on musical sound can then be seen as a humble attempt to remain within
human thresholds of experience. In direct opposition to this is the now-common idea of low-frequency oscillation (LFO). Developed roughly 20 years after Le Caine’s first Sackbut, an LFO allows infrasonic frequencies to be directly manipulated, opening a line of flight for inhuman, machinic expansion. Once Le Caine had contextualized human auditory experience and its thresholds within the vibratory continuum, new understandings of sound became possible. As the epigraph above states, Le Caine’s musical instruments did not require the performer or composer to understand the internal mechanisms of the machinery. The sole prerequisite was a new understanding of sound, new ways of navigating the territories of electrified sound. Here all sound was on a single continuum and one could move from one sound to another. Once habituated to the initial sense of uncanniness, entirely new possibilities emerge. It is not solely the novelty of hearing a sound morph from a quiet violin to muted trumpet then loud cello that is of interest. What Le Caine makes possible with his Sackbut is the ability for a performer or composer to gain auditory traction within a three-axis soundscape of pitch, volume, and timbre. Interfacing through his instrument sonic terrain becomes less ephemeral and, quite literally, more tangible: the instrument itself as an embodied tool for auditory perception. While in England from 1948 to 1952, Le Caine was exposed to the ideas and sounds of musique concrète. Three years later he would complete his Special Purpose Tape Recorder (Multi-track), an instrument that could simultaneously manipulate multiple reels of tape. A composer or performer could control multiple tapes via a keyboard and several sliders, controlling the speed of the tape and the volume of the individual channels
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INTERFACING AGAINST THE GRAIN respectively. Many aspects of the Multi-track were developed to facilitate electro-acoustic performance. For example, the sliders were positioned in such a way so two controls could be moved in opposite positions with adjacent fingers. Le Caine’s most famous composition using this instrument is Dripsody: An Étude for Variable Speed Recorder (1955), a recording of a single drop of water that is first expanded to become an ensemble of pitched-percussion to then be slowly transformed in a manner reminiscent of the Dub music of 10 years later. However, Le Caine’s ‘mix’ is not of an extended duration as with most dubs. It lasts for only one minute and twenty-eight seconds. As with most of his compositions, it mainly serves as a demonstration of the capabilities of his instrument. A longer composition is his A Noisome Pestilence, recorded in 1958. Although still short in length—lasting two minutes and five seconds—Le Caine explores timbre using the Multi-track to mutate a recording of narrow-band noise. Given the
noisy content of the recording, it would require much extrapolation to compare it to Dub music. Nevertheless, since the same basic procedures that are used in Dripsody are used here, perhaps Le Caine can be heard as gesturing in the direction of a noise music variant of Dub—but that would be a speculative hypothesis. When Hugh Le Caine was young, he began creating sounding devices. It may be fortunate for us that he was not particularly satisfied by any of these early experiments, for he began to dream that there could be “beautiful sounds” generated through electronic means. To unlock this imagined soundscape he needed to become versed in physics. This he did, and as time passed Le Caine built a number of instruments that he considered successful. Although none of his instruments were ever commercially released, they still remain as innovations that can be heard as embodying novel orientations to sound.
Penned by Hugh Le Cain himself: “Eimert believes that the point of departure for electronic music is the rationalization of musical elements because of which music is no longer reducible to manual performance. Busoni regarded the world of sound as a continuum, of which the world of our traditional music was a very small part. Eimert sees in electronic music a means of permitting the composer to work in the whole continuum. The limits of playability are abolished, or replaced with the limits of audibility.” From “Electronic Music” (1955)
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Kevin Austin (L) and alcides lanza pictured with Le Caine instruments in the McGill EMS
In Focus
Hugh Le Caine and the McGill EMS by alcides lanza / edited by Meg Sheppard
Hugh Le Caine was an inventor of genius. With interests based in music and technology, he developed units to produce electronic sounds, to process and transform them, and to assemble them without resorting to splicing tapes - the prevalent technical approach of the times (1960s and 1970s). As discussed in the earlier pieces in this newsletter, his vision also brought him to design the MultiTrack Tape Recorder (MTTR), which was a very early sampling machine. Le Caine not only created machines for electronic music production, he also made possible the recording into the MTTR any sounds via microphones – touching the area of musique concrète. The Electronic Music Studio (EMS, which is today known as the Digital Composition Studio or DCS) was established at the Faculty of Music at McGill University in 1964 on the initiative of Professor Istvan Anhalt. At the time, it was practically impossible to buy commercial electronic machinery, so the EMS was very fortunate that from the start it was built utilizing available Le Caine machinery. I have always felt privileged in having had many opportunities to interact with Le Caine. We first met around 1968, in Toronto, during an electronic music conference. I was living in New York then, working at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. My former teacher and mentor, Vladimir Ussachevsky told me, “You must go to Toronto to this conference, and you must meet Hugh Le Caine.” We met and visited the University of Toronto Electronic Music Studio (UTEMS). Later on we met again in Montreal, particularly when he came - as a visiting professor - to enlighten us on the use of his latest creation, the Polyphonic Synthesizer. We teachers and students referred to it as “the Poly”, short for polyphonic, or “the Pauli”, referring to Paul Pedersen, at whose suggestion Le Caine had created the machine in 1970. Le Caine did not talk too much; he was more expressive in moving his hands, cables and connectors. He did two presentations on the use of the Poly: during them we all had our notebooks and pens ready, but Le Caine proceeded to say “Hmmm...
Among the units that Le Caine sent to McGill in the 1960s Oscillator Bank (OB) Developed 1957-59 The McGill unit, built in 1961, consisted of 24 wave generators (sine, square, pulse and sawtooth waves), controlled by a touch sensitive keyboard.
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Tone Mixture Generator (TMG) 1965 This very special unit consisted of 13 sine tone generators, each equipped with pitch and amplitude controls, able to produce complex clusters and glissandi over a two octave range. Multi-Track Tape Recorder (MTTR), 1957 Also known as “Special Purpose Tape Recorder for Montreal,” the initial machine had six mono tape recorder heads. Since a tape loop or a complete reel of tape could be read by each head, the user could control a mix of six different recorded sound sources. The unit at McGill, built in 1961, had 10 stereo heads, hence a potential for 20 different channels of recorded information. A keyboard controller was attached to the unit, but solely for speed variation control. Serial Sound Structure Generator (SSSG), 1967: Based on the ‘serial switch’ concept used in early automatic telephone switchboards. Separate modules stored sequences applied to four musical aspects of sound events: duration, pitch, envelope, and timbre. All sequences were stored and coordinated by ‘Timers’, also designed by Le Caine.
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1970
Polyphone (Poly or Pauli), 1970: a polyphonic analogue synthesizer, utilizing voltage controllable sources and procedures, and operated by a keyboard with 36 touch-sensitive keys. There were also a half-dozen pressure-sensitive foot pedals operating photocell switches. Other devices include the Filter Bank (FB), a set of octave filters, arranged in banks of six on a panel, named as A, B, C, and so on. There was also a voltage controlled filter (VCF) with Hi-pass and Low-pass options. Sequences were run by Le Caine’s Timers, with 13 selector push-buttons and looping settings. Using the units in series allowed the composers to have 36 or more notes under control. Another innovative device was the Spectrogram, a unit that could produce sound by ‘reading’ drawings on graph paper. These drawings acted as ‘on’ or ‘off’ switches activating many of the Le Caine units available in the same room.
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IN FOCUS
In my own works I utilized some LeCaine machinery: penetrations VII [1972-III] , for actresssinger and tape. Many of the low frequency, droning tones were created with the Hugh LeCaine Tone Mixture Generator eidesis III [1971-II], for one or two orchestras and tape. Massive glissandi produced with the TMG; use of the 8ve Filter Bank and the Timers. plectros III [1971-I], for piano and tape [to be performed in the dark]. Extensive use of extended tones of very low frequencies, with slow glissandi, derived from the TMG and the OB. The center section with staccato sounds, realized partially with the Timers. ekphonesis IV [1971-III], electronic sounds with slide projections [Guernica] . Similar Le Caine units as above, plus Ring Modulation and extensive filtering acúfenos II [1971-IV], for chamber ensemble and tape [same] All these compositions used the stereo spring reverb from the MTTR and all had quadraphonic masterization on 1/2 inch tape.
A partial list of compositions created with the Le Caine instruments, beyond Le Caine’s own pieces: Kevin Austin: Piece for 4 Track Tape Recorder Canada Unlimited Number One [1969] [McGill EMS] Albert Mayr: So Könte esgeschegen... [1969] [McGill EMS] Pierre Mercure: La Forme des Choses [1964] [McGill EMS] Alex Tilley: Fugal Ecstasy [1971] [McGill EMS] David Bach: Concrete Piece [1970] [McGill EMS] Gustav Ciamaga: Two Part Invention #3 [1968] [UTEMS, Toronto] Laurie Radford: The Invalidity of Monuments [1975] [McGill EMS] R. Murray Schafer: Visual Illusions [1967] [McGill EMS] Paul Pedersen: Fantasie [1967], tape , slides [McGill EMS]
hmmm...hmmm...hmmm,” while he moved around cables, connecting the different operations on the face of the machine: ring modulation, several oscillators, mixing, control of envelopes, and so on. Not much for oral expression but we managed to come out of the proceedings with some notions of what was possible with the Poly. During the 1970s I taught the use of the Le Caine units at the McGill EMS. I also used the reverb units encased within the Multi-Track which were intuitive. Not having any other good echo chamber at the time in the EMS, those stereo reverb units (spring reverb of high quality) in the MTTR were of much interest to me. Another one of my favorites was the Tone-Mixture Generator; what a pleasure to be able to dial up a ‘chord’ of electronic squares or sine waves, using up to thirteen different oscillators, and all controllable via a rotating crank to effect transpositions or continuous glissandi. Nothing similar to that has ever existed in the world of analogue machines. During the last year of Le Caine’s life, he had begun to work in the area of digital synthesis, using a first generation Apple desktop computer. After Le Caine passed away in 1977, it became difficult to continue servicing the machinery he had created. Units had to go to Ottawa for repairs, and the world of vacuum tubes and early telephone connectors was quickly disappearing. The EMS was also evolving, and after we acquired the Moog Synthesizer the studios began extensive use of voltage controlled technology, followed by MIDI and eventually entering the digital world of today. As a result of these changes, the Hugh Le Caine Project came about to gather these machines and information regarding them into one place, and it was agreed that all the Le Caine machines at the McGill EMS would be donated to the Museum of Science and Technology in Ottawa. To this day, that is where the machines are kept, and at times one or two units are part of current exhibits. At my initiative a few student trips were made to the Museum to visit the collection, with the machines shown in a large warehouse. Those trips had students from all our electronic music and composition classes, plus students and professors from Concordia University and from Université de Montreal.
Looking for additional resources on Hugh Le Caine? Visit hughlecaine.com
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In Focus Continued
Hugh Le Caine
An Appreciation
Robert Aitken At age 20 Hugh Le Caine was to me some sort of mythical secretive creature. I was one of only two students allowed into the top secret electronic music studio of the University of Toronto, which opened in 1959. For this I can thank Professor Harvey Olnick, who, along with Dr. Myron Schaeffer and Dr. Arnold Walter, was a protector of the hallowed old house at 2 Division St. and permitted Paul Pedersen and me to get our feet wet in this new medium. As there was no curriculum, we learned as we went along, and one of our first tasks was to catalogue tape loops as fuel for one of Hugh Le Caine’s inventions, “The Multi Track.” Although time consuming and tedious, I give this cataloguing credit, along with my famous flute teacher Marcel Moyse, for teaching me to listen carefully and minutely to sound. The Multi Track, although primitive, was a welcome addition to the process of cutting and scraping emulsion off the tape
to produce various attacks and rhythms. And it provided the possibility of mixing sounds on six tapes at various speeds.
Over a number of years, many new electronic instruments moved to Toronto following their invention by Le Caine at the National Research Council in Ottawa. In many cases we received the prototypes, and then they went on to further perfection at Le Caine’s studio. But we learned to use them nonetheless and were excited with the possibilities of each new machine. Eager anticipation was certainly our mood when the word came that something new was on its way from Ottawa. These included the Oscillator Bank, Serial Sound Structure Generator, Two-Channel Alternator, various ring modulators, an Envelope Shaper, and many that I can’t remember at the moment. The tape part for my piece Kebyar was totally created with the aid
of the Serial Sound Structure Generator and Oscillator Bank, although most listeners assume I manipulated recordings of a gamelan orchestra. Probably I only met Hugh Le Caine a half dozen times, but on each occasion there was a feeling of great mutual respect, and I was delighted when my four track electronic piece Noesis was chosen to accompany his famous Dripsody on the Nonesuch Guide to Electronic Music which included many examples of pioneering Canadian electronic music. A wonderfully generous man, he was always curious about my projects and even showed an interest in my developing performing career. It is amazing to think of the changes in music during the last 100 years and the huge contribution Le Caine made to these developments. Click here to listen to Kebyar on Centrestreams!
LE CAINE INSTRUMENTS IN ACTION An early proponent of Le Caine’s instruments was Istvan Anhalt, who spoke openly and fondly of the degree of control afforded the composer while interacting with Le Caine’s Special Purpose Tape Recorder. You can log into your CMC profile and hear the results! Click here for Cento written in 1967 for Choir and electronics.
In this quote lifted from correspondence between Anhalt and Le Caine dated February 24, 1965, Anhalt comments on Le Caine’s time at the National Research Council. "... it seems to me that Electronic Music made giant progress in this country during the last few years, and this progress is first of all due to the sustained interest of NRC in your most valuable contribution to the field; a contribution the importance of which is internationally recognized and whose progress is watched with continued interest."
GRAPHIC & WEB DESIGN Patience, expertise, and an effortless creativity Matthew Fava, CMC Ontario Regional Director
Her creative energy and resourceful attitude made for fantastic design work on a quick timeline. Toy Piano Composers
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Emma is dedicated to your vision. She is extremely creative and her positive energy is infectious. JUNO Award-winning Centrediscs
in close quarters
HANGING OUT WITH
∆TENT by Matthew Fava
HANGING OUT WITH ∆TENT Soon after their first meeting, Tsurumoto wrote his first piece for the duo, Murmur, which was performed at the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre in 2007. Serious momentum came in 2011 when ∆TENT performed alongside other groups at Gallery 345 in Toronto – the response from the audience, and the feedback they received, helped them decide to have more regular collaborations.
IN RECENT YEARS THE CITY OF TORONTO HAS SEEN AN IMPRESSIVE EMERGENCE OF NEWLY ESTABLISHED ENSEMBLES AND COLLECTIVES THAT QUICKLY BECOME FIXTURES OF A GROWING CONTEMPORARY MUSIC SCENE. It is worth noting that groups like the Toy Piano Composers, and junctQín Keyboard Collective are celebrating their fifth seasons in 2013-14 – other groups are not far behind. A more recent addition to the Toronto milieu is the trio ∆TENT, comprised of pianist Fiona Jane Wood, flautist Emma Elkinson, and composer/clarinetist Hiroki Tsurumoto. Although their name defies online searches, ∆TENT’s sound has captured the attention of audiences, and the group crops up in conversation more and more. The members of ∆TENT met through circumstance. During the University of Toronto New Music Festival in 2007, Professor Dennis Patrick brought musicians together to perform one of Tsurumoto’s pieces: Deux Monts. One of the musicians was Elkinson, who would participate in a performance later that year of Tsurumoto’s Utsuwa – ceramics. At this time, Wood was also at the University of Toronto; she already had a long rich history of collaboration with Elkinson. Both Elkinson and Wood wanted to perform more of Tsurumoto’s “innovative and challenging compositions” as Wood describes them, and they arranged to meet with him. Tsurumoto is originally from Japan, and he studied economics and graphic design while living in Tokyo. In 2002 he moved to New York City where he studied music, relocating in 2006 to Toronto where he studied composition with Chan Ka Nin, and then James Rolfe. As with any artist settling in a new city, finding enthusiastic collaborators was a welcome opportunity for Tsurumoto. From their first meeting onwards, the trio reflects, “it was the alignment of interest, artistic representation, and personal camaraderie that took place that has kept us closely connected.” They discovered a common appreciation for, and interest in, contemporary composition. There was also a clear respect for each person’s artistry. The trio quickly became inseparable, and set upon plans to explore and program music together.
On previous page The members of ∆TENT (L to R): Fiona Jane Wood, Emma Elkinson, and Hiroki Tsurumoto
Those who attend ∆TENT concerts comment on the sophistication, brilliant interpretation, and vision the show encompasses. For that reason it was interesting to hear the trio discuss the shift in their own conception of concert programming. When discussing curatorial habits, Tsurumoto comments: “when I get excited about a concert, it has a lot to do with individual pieces that I discover there, so it is just about my personal preference in music. However, since I started organizing concerts, I have become more and more aware of the context or some sort of coherence of each concert.” ∆TENT devotes a substantial time to the conception and development of thematic elements for their concerts – this can amount to weeks of debate, discussion, sharing, and listening, to arrive at the theme that lends coherence to their concerts. Each member shares a similar passion when discussing their repertoire. “We are committed to presenting music that excites us,” says Tsurumoto, a point echoed by Wood. It is clear to me that the mutualism described in that first meeting has evolved. Each ∆TENT member now serves to validate and reinforce individual musical experiences. Considering the amount that Elkinson, Wood, and Tsurumoto travel, a ∆TENT concert also offers a summation of the composers that they have encountered while performing or attending workshops in other cities and countries. Tsurumoto explains, “there are many exciting young composers here in Canada as well as abroad who we happened to discover through our own individual artistic activities. We are passionate about sharing these experiences first with each other.” It is not surprising to see a ∆TENT program include composers such as Montreal-based Cassandra Miller, José Manuel Serrano from Buenos Aires, Fabian Svensson from Stockholm, Toronto-based Anna Höstman, alongside Tsurumoto.
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HANGING OUT WITH ∆TENT
The sense of discovery that they describe amongst each other is the same experience they want for audiences. They admit, “we are doing what we would like to hear, in a way not necessarily what audiences would like to hear”’ but they view this as an opportunity for audiences to experience something they might not have encountered outside of a ∆TENT concert. As Tsurumoto expresses, “we are not as interested in presenting music just because it is famous, we much more enjoy sharing our own experience when we discovered the music…with the audience members.” Preparation for a ∆TENT concert becomes the common ground for the like-minded artists they work with, and the group is sensitive to the needs of composers, since those needs are highly compatible with their own. They try to work in close quarters with their composers, and in instances where they collaborate at a distance they send recordings from rehearsals in order to get specific feedback. “Their compositions tell a story that is often not apparent on a first reading,” Elkinson explains, “and it is then through the discovery of each
Check out a playlist of samples from the ∆TENT concert in May 2013 which includes Still Life by CMC Associate Composer Brian Harman. Click here!
composition that we learn about each other.” She adds that this process is crucial since composers have so little control after the act of composition, but “here they have chances to change things, to hear what our interpretations of their directions were.” Their willingness to remove as much restraint from the collaboration with a composer is admirable – at another point in our discussion they describe this as seeing through the composer’s eyes. “Every composer we work with has an impact on us, individually and collectively,” says Elkinson. “They are each responsible for shaping our perspective on music and art whether we recognize that immediately or at a later stage in our lives.” Apart from preparing for upcoming concerts in 2013/14, ∆TENT is looking into opportunities to tour some of their programs in Canada and abroad (in particular, the concert they presented as part of the Music Gallery’s Emergent Series in May 2013). In the immediate future, ∆TENT will be participating in the CMC’s On the 13th Piano Series on February 13, which will include the premiere of Cursor 0 for solo piano with electronics; this is the first in a new series of works by Tsurumoto. ∆TENT will also be featured in New York City in May 2014, where the trio will premiere Tsurumoto’s Cursor 3 for flute, clarinet, and piano. As listeners we often seek out music that inspires us, but there is also something inspirational about the lengths artists will go to before a single note is played. Having gone through so much together to reach this point, the members of ∆TENT are expressing something very personal in their concerts and collaborations, and they have added a distinct musical voice to a populous city. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 20
HANGING OUT WITH ∆TENT
END NOTES What’s in a naming convention: What inspires Hiroki’s code thumbnails, and cursor series?
When the early and contemporary mingle: How does Emma view repertoire?
An effervescing scene: What is Fiona’s perspective on contemporary music in TO?
I simply did not want to come up with a new title every time I wrote a new piece, so I decided to number them, but the idea originally came from my busy schedule - working full time as a graphic designer and composing at the same time. I thought about incorporating what I do and what I enjoy, hoping that even at work I could think about my new pieces. Back then, at work, typography was one of the elements I was working on for different projects. Once I started thinking about typographic systems in connection with music, I came up with loads of musical ideas from them.
Very luckily, I was introduced to both contemporary and early music at a very early age and don’t really remember knowing of one and not the other. I believe that knowing and exploring any genre of music adds more colour to your musical palate. Contemporary music and early music have both helped me to develop an inner pulse: early music as I was thrown into a recorder ensemble that was at a much higher level than I was with no choice but to play in time, and contemporary music…well, if you have seen one of Hiroki’s scores, you will understand – they are like the inner workings of a clock!
Toronto, being a wonderfully diverse, metropolitan, and thriving city, is a great location in which to be an artist. Since my relocation to Toronto in 2003, I have found that there is an increasing interest in contemporary artistic idioms and the growing audiences are becoming ever more curious and open minded. There are numerous festivals and concert series throughout the city that are dedicated to the work and presentation of fresh and innovative music. While there will always be a heavy focus on traditional repertoire in the music industry, there is an increasing demand for new music performers and the opportunities for them are broadening despite it being an incredibly competitive market.
Regarding my new series, Cursor, I am planning to use one of my favourite activities, running, as a source of inspiration. I use a GPS watch while running, and you can see the lap pace, distance, and elevation change, and other variables visually with a map and graphs. I am thinking about using that information based on the location or the race I ran in each piece, as again there are connections to everything we do in life and as I run my pieces come to fruition.
I look at every piece I play as if it is a new composition no matter how old it is. Playing so many premieres helps me to remember what it is like to see a piece for the first time, to have no preconceptions.
Several of my classmates while in Toronto are extensively involved in the new music scene and we continue to support one another. While my education here in Toronto was primarily focused on standard repertoire and technique, it was always a very ambitious and vibrant community, which prepared me well for the demanding life of a working musician.
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NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS What got you excited about music at a young age? To pinpoint exactly what got me excited about music at a young age has never occurred to me, since so much great music was always around me, at home, at synagogue, and floating around my head. In that sense I have always taken my excitement for music for granted, in the best way possible. What was the most important music concert/event you attended? One of the most important concerts I have attended was hearing pianist Christina Petrowska-Quilico’s performance of the entire Rivers cycle by Ann Southam. That is music that really puts things in perspective. What is on your personal playlist? I am always excited to discover the next masterpiece at any live performance of new music. For a guilty pleasure, I have been known to indulge in a good bout of silence. How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? It is usually very difficult to see change as it is happening, but I do believe that ‘functional’ music is making a big comeback – that which is composed specifically for events, rituals, or occasions, not just for its own artistic sake or merit. (I exclude film, television, and theatre composition from this category because that exists more to serve an interdisciplinary medium than it does to enhance or lend character to a musically unrelated event.) I believe I fit into this world of functional music in perhaps a strange way, in that as a composer of so-called ‘non-functional’ music, I have always felt that the kind of music I write is actually highly functional in the sense that the event of concert-going, in and of itself, serves the necessary human function of uniting a community under one roof to experience the same thing at the same time. In this way, the music itself is the event, the ritual, and the occasion, and it is wholly self-functioning.
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NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS
What got you excited about music at a young age? Music was a family thing – both my parents were music teachers and performers in local ensembles, and my sister and I each played several instruments – so it wasn’t as exciting as it was unavoidable. But it was enjoyable too, which is why my sister and I have both ended up with careers in music.
What is on your personal playlist? I don’t really have a playlist. My listening is in a way very passive (my attendance at concerts often being based more on a combination of my own availability and the affordability of the ticket prices than on the content of the show) and in another way very active (what I’m composing at the time will dictate what kinds of pieces I track down and experience). Morbid as it may seem, I’ll often seek out the music of a composer whose work is unknown to me after hearing of his/ her death in the news. And music recordings have a frustrating habit of becoming less magical the instant that I’ve purchased them, so I don’t have a large personal collection.
What was the most important music concert/ event you attended? When I was living in Vancouver I had the opportunity to attend a concert of excerpts of recently composed operas by BC composers (I think it may have been the culmination of a workshop presented by the CMC BC Region). I can’t say I How is the field of remember much about composition changing, and that concert except that how do you fit in? it was new and different I find the field of composition and every second of it was to be vast, unmanageable, interesting. The next day I and frightening, so I tend to was walking to work, going put blinders on and just focus over the events of the on the two or three projects concert in my mind, when in my immediate future. In I had an idea for a new other words, I have no idea composition. That idea how I fit in, nor do I have any PHOTO: (c) johnwmacdonald.com became Magnificat for burning desire to know this. mezzo-soprano solo and For reasons unknown even ten treble parts. It’s unlike to me, becoming a better anything else I’ve written, not only because it has been composer has been the most important goal in my life for performed and recorded many more times than any of almost as long as I can remember. I think it’s because for my other efforts, but because it was all composed in me, music composition is a way of connecting – sometimes one sitting without the slightest hesitation. I don’t quite with people, sometimes with my surroundings, sometimes know how that concert led to that composition, but I’m with more enigmatic forces, and sometimes just with myself sure there is a connection there. – and those connections are vital.
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NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS What got you excited about music at a young age? The Beatles. I remember first hearing cassettes of the band around age 4 on family road trips. My parents and grandfather often played the “blue” hits collection (featuring songs from 19671970). Once it clicked for me, I was hooked and never looked back. My mother bought a Fisher Price record player so I could play her old Beatles records – and probably so I didn’t compromise the more fragile record player in the living room. Many of the albums were first US pressings and I wore them out hard on that toy turntable. I started bringing my album covers when I got haircuts, hoping for a Paul hairdo. I pretended the backyard deck was a concert stage. At Christmastime, I sat on Santa’s lap and described album covers in vivid detail; I didn’t figure he was all that hip and didn’t want to risk getting stuck with an elf-built wooden train. At some point, it was the timbres that started to fascinate me as much as the songs and voices. I heard the guitar feedback that opens the Beatles’ “I Feel Fine” and I needed to find a way to imitate that sound. I grabbed the awful nylon string guitar lying around the house and tinkered with it for quite some time. I plucked the low E string and gently touched my thumbnail to the string to create a sound I felt was similar to what I heard on the record. I think about that experience often when decoding extended techniques in contemporary percussion scores such as emulating harmonics on timpani or a vibraphone.
What was the most important music concert/event you attended? Michel Van Der Aa’s multimedia chamber opera, One, featuring Canadian Soprano Barbara Hannigan at the 2006 Holland Festival. The elusive plot line and symbolism had the same level of tension and intrigue of a David Lynch story or a great episode of the Twilight Zone. Hannigan’s performance was unbelievable, performing virtuoso lines in counterpoint with her mediated self in the film screens. Van Der Aa’s sounds were simple and primal using themes such as broken branches and the sound of a lighter in the electronic soundtrack. His “Greek chorus” of vocals, when they occurred, were striking in their large scale vertical harmonies that echoed the composer’s mentor, Louis Andriessen. What is on your personal playlist? In terms of concert music, I am devoted to music with craft and complexity, but only if I can feel the impact of the work in terms of emotion and more importantly, visceral impact points. I remain moved by Jacob Druckman’s orchestral works which, while not programmatic, are sonically dramatic with a tangible sense of timbre. As a percussionist, I’m always trying to stay up on what recordings come from my colleagues and contemporaries. We are blessed in Canada to have a high quotient of world class recording percussionists such as NEXUS, Aiyun Huang, TorQ, and many
more. As a relatively recent resident of Canada, these artists as well as our Windsor Canadian Music Festival, brought many wonderful composers, including associates of the CMC, to my attention. I intend to feature some of these composers on my own recordings. In the jazz world, I love the work of Jim Black’s Alasnoaxis. I find Dave Douglas’ projects to all be top notch. I am also an admirer of hardcore punk and post-punk music from the 1980s. The music was visceral, different, and often a site of positive politics and individualist life choices. Moreover, the music, concerts, and recordings were made in a DIY (do it yourself) fashion, without the mechanics and hierarchy of the recording industry. My favorite performers of the genre are 7Seconds, Hüsker Dü, All, Black Flag, Shellac and Minor Threat. I am still a believer in the music and the message of the singer songwriter, I am a great fan of artists like Richard Thompson, Bob Mould, Elvis Costello, Kevin Seconds, Ryan Adams, and the like. How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? I believe the streams of compositional style are evolving, but continuing, in some ways, as they have over the last century. There are the “scientific” advances in complex music; there are continuing
evolutions in the streams of modernism and minimalism; there are experimental and avant-garde performance media; and there are streams of advanced tonal idioms. The influx of post-modernism and the freer mixture of compositional techniques, as well as the “downtown” influence of popular/rock music on a younger generation of composers, have blurred the lines of these streams. Finally, the availability and accessibility of multi-media resources have been a game changer for the types of output in the field of art music. My music is often intended to create bridges for both audiences and performers from one contemporary aesthetic stream to another. For example, I seek to employ techniques, timbres, and rhythmic structures from influential contemporary works towards my own compositions –professional or pedagogical. I believe audiences hear and enjoy musical components in my work that they may have missed when hearing music where all the components of pitch, rhythm, dynamics, and meter are complex with limited amounts of predictability. From there, it is my hope that the listener will recognize these traits from works they previously heard but had a limited connection to.
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Photo: Zack Berjawi
NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS
What got you excited about music at a young age? To the ever-clichéd harp arpeggios, picture this: we flash back to a 5-month old version of me enjoying the theme to the “Adventures of Noddy” (March of the Wooden Soldier), a British childrens’ show, shaking my head from side to side to the beat. No wonder I loved that tune in kindergarten! My mother excitedly tells the story of a one-and-a-half-year-old me dancing outside a record store in London, England. A song was blasting from the store: I Never Felt More Like Singing the Blues. I was enjoying it and started dancing on the sidewalk while a circle of smiling old ladies was forming around me. At some point, my mother realized that I was no longer by her side and when she went looking for me, that was where she found me! Moving forwards to a nine-year old me, I loved going to my girlfriend’s house and plunking out by ear every budding pianist’s favourite Top 10 tunes. I then begged my parents for piano lessons, which I was finally given at age ten. Flash forward to the present day and I can say my repertoire of favorites has thankfully grown. What was the most important music concert/event you attended? That’s a hard one. Like asking a mathematician about their most important numeral! I can’t settle on any one concert because my musical tastes are so varied that every one is important, each for their own special reasons. A friend reminds me that I cried at a Keith Jarrett concert. I saw Ravi Shankar live in concert and was moved to study the sitar, taking lessons from his nephews, former students, and even George Harrison’s teacher. I stayed with the study diligently, and even wrote a song cycle that used the sitar which a soprano and I debuted on CBC radio. I kept at it until I found the sounds on midi. What is on your personal playlist? My playlist runs the gamut from the guilty pleasures of the Piano Guys, and Regina Spektor’s music – particularly the song “Samson” – to Sting, Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, Pat Metheny’s album “Still Life Talking”, Peter Gabriel, Arvo Pärt, Ligeti, Ravel, Schubert, Beethoven, Vaughn Williams’ “Serenade to Music”, John Williams, Mychael Danna, many film soundtracks, jazz, world beat, musical theatre, opera and more!
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How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? While the world of digital media goes through rapid changes, our oncereserved creative space is being invaded by all kinds of people who identify as composers. I’m finding that with easy access, our intellectual property continues to be challenged, while we as concert composers struggle to find our own special audiences. It seems that we are being called to rethink our creative output so as to find ‘practical’ applications that service our audiences in new and innovative ways. This has challenged me to create for many types of media in my creative output.
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NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS
What got you excited about music at a young age? It was through my father, an opera singer, that I discovered music. I loved to go and hear my father sing. At a very young age, I started to accompany him at piano while working on opera repertoire.
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What was the most important music concert/event you attended? I went to hear Claudio Arrau performing Beethoven’s 3rd piano concerto with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. From master pieces to guilty pleasures, what is on your personal playlist? All the works from Bach, Debussy, Takemitsu, Mozart, Ravi Shankar, and Beethoven. I also enjoy Bartok’s string quartets, Luciano Berio’s sequenzas, Sibelius symphonies, and Scriabin’s studies, preludes, and nocturnes. Other favourites includes Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps, Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe, Pietro Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana, José Pablo Moncayo’s Muros Verdes, Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot, Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto and Aida, and Ennio Morricone’s theme for Cinema Paradiso. I also listen to a variety of world music. How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? Technology has changed the way of composing and producing music. But even if composing, producing, and distributing music is faster, the effects do not apply uniformly to all music, especially contemporary composition. Contemporary music is usually performed and analyzed within universities, while occupying a small place within concert repertoire broadly. This has not changed very much from decades ago. Contemporary music and composers must fight a way through, and challenge misconceptions about our music. Even though as a composer I face this challenge, music makes it possible for me to express myself without constraint. This is very rewarding as an artist. This is the very reason I love composition. The freedom of creation – l’art pour l’art. Art is an adventure where nothing is guaranteed, but we continue trying, and searching for our ideal sound. That is, in my opinion, where the interest lies...
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NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS
What got you excited about music at a young age? I am not entirely sure that I can provide a satisfactory explanation as to why music captured my interest from an early age. All I can remember is that a deep fascination with music has always been with me. I adore all kinds of music. For some reason classical music has always possessed a peculiar power or ability to move me in a very deep way whereas other musics, albeit wonderfully moving in their own right, don’t seem to pierce my emotions quite as deeply. Some of my earliest memories involve an old battery powered tape deck. I can remember lying in the front hallway of my house playing tapes of the classics my mother had purchased. I can remember listening to these tapes over and over, enamored by the sounds, staring at the roof, with a new set of batteries close by.
What was the most important music concert/ event you attended? The most important concert event for me would be the live performance by Jeff Buckley I never saw. He died in 1997, before I had a chance to discover his music. His compositions, his creativity, and his philosophy of living changed my life. He was also known for stunning live performances, and I am certain that if I had the chance to see one of these performances, it would be one of, if not the most important live musical event in my life. Maybe there’s something beautiful in never knowing.
What is on your personal playlist? I am a student of music, and therefore all music interests me. I feel strongly that all music has something to offer. There are far too many genres that excite me to even begin to make a list. There is even the music I haven’t discovered yet, that I know I will love. Perhaps this is one of the most exciting things about music. You can spend five lifetimes searching and learning, and still feel like you haven’t left home. All I can offer is that, even though I’ve heard all kinds of music, and fallen in love with music so many different times, my search for that next piece, or song, or sound, or moment, will continue until I drop.
How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? I don’t think I have enough foresight to determine how composition is changing. These things can only be examined in retrospect of course. I also think it might be dangerous to ask myself where I fit in. All I know is that there is a wonderful and vibrant community surrounding what I do, and I want to be a part of it, and to help it grow. I have always thought that composing is just another part of my musicality the same way playing piano, or performing on double bass, or strumming a guitar alone in my room is part of my musicality, and I want to be the best musician I possibly can. I guess I just want to give back to music what it has given to me.
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NEW ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS
What got you excited about music at a young age? I think it was getting an electronic Fisher Price keyboard when I was three. I would listen to and play along with a variety of pre-set demo songs, and soon was able to compose tunes of my own. The excitement I felt composing back then is the same rush I feel some 23 years later. Nothing compares! What was the most important music concert/event you attended? The most important concert I have attended is not the one featuring the most prestigious artist. I think back to the musical production of The Lion King as moving and even life changing. I was quite young, but I remember the elaborate costumes and set design in the opening number while hearing the sounds of a large chorus with the orchestra. I was so overwhelmed that I cried with joy! What is on your personal playlist? For me, there is no such thing as a “guilty pleasure” when it comes to listening to music. My personal playlist contains a wide variety of music, ranging from Gregorian chant melodies and Bach chorales to Radiohead and the latest electronica. How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? There is new music in every generation. Today, classically trained young composers such as Nico Muhly, Mason Bates, and Gabriel Prokofiev are exploring “cutting-edge” trends and techniques in concert music. These composers are attempting to synthesize many types of contemporary musical expression to create a unique language representative of the musical here and now. Their goal is to bring diverse audiences together, especially the young. My goals are very similar. One example is my piece, Up and Down Dubstep (featured on a Centrediscs recording by Beverly Johnston, Woman Runs with Wolves). This work is for live performers (piano and percussion) and audio playback, with an electronic track consisting of samples ranging from a Puccini aria to the sounds of the current electronic music, “Dubstep”. As well as exploring the synthesis of different types of music, I am also interested in increasing the utilization of powerful audio-visual documentary content and contemporary music composition to lead to an even deeper experience in the concert hall.
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What got you excited about music at a young age? As a chorister in England from age 7 to age 21, I was exposed to first-rate choral music from Gregorian chant, through the Renaissance and Baroque periods, to 20th century composers like Britten, Holst, and Vaughn Williams. And all of this exposure was in first-class acoustics, which added resonance to the intrinsic beauty of the music. What was the most important music concert/event you attended? The most important musical concert I ever attended, because it was the most formative, was a performance, in my youth, of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. In relatively old age, I have composed a St. Matthew Passion myself, in an atonal idiom. What is on your personal playlist? If I am asked what music I most like to listen to, the straightforward answer is simply to name three favorite composers: William Byrd, J.S. Bach, and Bela Bartok. Beyond that, I should add that my least favorite listening is music forced upon me in elevators, restaurants, gymnasiums - all too often bad music into the bargain. Whatever happened to silence? How is the field of composition changing, and how do you fit in? In a long life as a composer of mainly vocal music, especially choral, the most significant and rewarding change, for me, has not been in compositional style: rather, it has been in the much improved ability of singers, especially choral singers, to tackle music of idiomatic difficulty. This has enabled me to write with confidence for performers who, in an earlier time,
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BRITISH COLUMBIA John Baker Peter Huse Miklos Massey Michael Park Christopher Reiche Xiao-ou Hu
PRAIRIES Scott Whetham Tommy Banks
QUEBEC Mathieu Marcoux Auguste DĂŠcarries (posthumous)
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NOTEWORTHY
SOME RECENT ACHIEVEMENTS FROM CMC ASSOCIATE COMPOSERS AND VOTING MEMBERS
LYDIA ADAMS AMONG CELEBRATED ONTARIO ARTISTS
HO AND SHARMAN RECOGNIZED WITH DORA AWARD
CMC Voting Member Lydia Adams has won the 2013 Premier’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. Dr. Adams was one of six finalists for this prestigious award, which recognizes Ontario artists who have made outstanding contributions to arts and culture. Adams’ exceptional contribution to choral music, and Canadian composition in particular, have been recognized by many institutions. Having conducted the Amadeus Choir for 30 years, and the Elmer Iseler Singers for 15, she has taken many opportunities to program contemporary music and support young Canadian artists.
In June, CMC Associate Composer Alice Ping Yee Ho received the 2013 Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding New Opera for The Lesson of Da Ji. The opera was commissioned by the Toronto Masque Theatre, and was written with librettist Marjorie Chan. The Lesson of Da Ji centres around the true story of the Shang Dynasty concubine Da Ji, and the King who enacted revenge on her secret lover. The music incorporates eastern and western instruments, and the production included a performance by traditional Peking Opera dancer William Lau. The Lesson of Da Ji
was performed during the spring as part of the Masque Theatre’s season finale. CMC Associate Composer Rodney Sharman was also recognized, receiving the Dora award for outstanding sound design and composition for his original score for the dance-opera From the House of Mirth, written in collaboration with choreographer James Kudelka and librettist Alex Poch-Goldin. Sharman’s piece was produced by Coleman Lemieux & Compagnie, and was performed many times in Toronto between 2012 and 2013.
THE LESSON OF DA JI
LYDIA ADAMS
ALICE PING YEE HO
RODNEY SHARMAN
NOTEWORTHY
NORBERT PALEJ IN THAILAND
THORNBORROW MAKES A MARK IN THE A/V INDUSTRY The third annual SOCAN Foundation Awards for Young Audio-Visual Composers were announced in July, and CMC Associate Composer Chris Thornborrow was one of two composers who received the top prize. The jury members lauded Toronto composer Chris Thornborrow’s “understated but tension-laden score” for the film We Ate the Children Last (directed by Andrew Cividino), which won the $3,000 first prize in the Fiction category. Thornborrow also won the second prize in the Animation category for his score for Lucian (directed by Randolph Lizarda).
CHRIS THORNBORROW
This unique award recognizes the talented composers working in Canada’s film and television industries.
CMC Associate Composer Norbert Palej attended the 2013 International Composition Festival which took place in Thailand between July 8 and 13. Palej was one of several guest composers alongside Bright Sheng, Chinary Ung, Chen Yi, Zhou Long, Zygmunt Krauze, Amy Williams, Paul Patterson and Antonio Celso Ribeiro. Among the activities that took place during the festival, Palej’s Piano Concerto was performed on July 8th by pianist Christopher McKiggan and the Majidol Wind Symphony, conducted by Erin Bodnar. Two days later, Yale-based cellist Alvin
Wong gave the world premiere of Palej’s Chaconne for solo cello. As part of his residency, Palej also gave a public lecture and taught composition lessons.
Participants from the International Composition Festival: L to R artistic director Narong Prangcharon, Bright Sheng and his wife, Chen Yi, Norbert Palej, and Zhou Long. And yes, Palej is rocking a Penderecki String Quartet Shirt
CD RELEASES NEBULA CMC Associate Composer Heather Schmidt has put together an album of solo piano works. Nebula encapsulates her incredible strengths as both a composer and performer. Fans of her rich and colourful music will enjoy this album! You can click here and log into your CMC account to listen to an archival performance of the title track from the album, Nebula. Click here for more information on the album.
L’ERRANCE The Silver Birch String Quartet is one of Canada’s most innovative young quartets. They are currently the String Quartet-in-Residence at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario. L’Errance captures the musical output from the first years of collaboration between the quartet and fellow Sudburian (and renowned CMC Associate Composer) Robert Lemay. Click here to get a preview of two tracks from the album. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 33
CD RELEASES
ONTARIO REFLECTIONS For the past thirty years, Toronto’s Hannaford Street Silver Band (HSSB) has commissioned and premiered over sixty new compositions. This award-winning band has also released a number of commercial recordings and received two Lieutenant Governor’s Awards for the Arts (awards that each time emphasized the group’s strong youth program)—a truly impressive achievement in its own right. Counted amongst its personnel are some of the best brass and percussion performers in the greater Toronto area and this level of excellence has certainly inspired many composers to write original works and transcriptions for the band. Many of these commissioned composers call Ontario home and this factor was the impetus for their most recent compact disc entitled, Ontario Reflections (Hannaford Live - Volume 1). All of the compositions on the CD are HSSB commissions and five Ontario composers are represented: John Burge, Kevin Lau, Gabriel Major-Marothy, Godfrey Ridout and Rob Teehan. The largest portion of the CD is devoted to Burge’s work, Cathedral Architecture, recently premiered by the HSSB last November (2012) at Metropolitan United Church with organist William O’Meara, lead by UK composer and conductor Edward Gregson. A substantial fivemovement piece, the combination of brass band and organ generates numerous sonically varied passages and the recording has done a fine job capturing the reverberant resonance particularly in the loud passages (and the work certainly tries to blow the roof off at the end). This 2012 concert also included the first performance of a very clever and sympathetic arrangement by Steven Bulla of Godfrey Ridout’s Fall Fair. This Ridout classic will be very familiar to lovers of Canadian music in its original orchestral version and it is great
to have a recording of this piece available commercially, as it should have an equally long life in the annals of brass band music. The Ridout and remaining compositions on the disc are all conducted by Raymond Tizzard. The CD begins with Lau’s Great North Overture, a work structured in a traditional slowfast-slow design that incorporates many fanfare-like gestures ending with an up-tempo coda. Teehan’s Wildfire follows, and is a single movement tour-deforce of virtuosic brass writing driven by energetic percussion colorings—a testament to Teehan’s experience as an accomplished tuba player (Teehan is also sousaphonist in the wildly popular Heavyweights Brass Band). The opening bass line drives the music forward throughout the work and Richard Moore on drum set certainly deserves the special acknowledgement given to him for his contribution to this performance. The final piece on the disc is MajorMarothy’s Mischievous Spirit, the winning entry of the HSSB’s inaugural composition competition for brass band works written in the form of a March. In the band’s fingers, embouchures and articulations, the music’s gaiety and frolicking character are captured with precision.
a truly impressive acheivement
Click here for more information and to purchase the CD!
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REPORT BACK FROM TORONTO ELECTROACOUSTIC SYMPOSIUM
This past summer, volunteers and staff of the CMC participated in the Toronto Electroacoustic Symposium. The symposium is an annual event that brings together artists and scholars from electroacoustic communities in Canada and abroad, while showcasing their works and accomplishments to the public. Participants are treated to concerts, lectures, paper presentations, installations and more. All activities took
place at Wychwood Barns near St. Clair more support from a broader community so Ave. and Christie St. between August 14 that the social impact and relevance of the pratice can feed back into its creation. and 17. The events were well received, and well attended. Even more striking was the number of audience members who were outside of the electroacoustic community (namely, those who do not compose or perform electroacoustic music). This was heartwarming since contemporary music needs
Special recognition should go to CMC Associate Composer Emilie Lebel, The Canadian Electroacoustic Community, and the folks at New Adventures In Sound Art (CMC Associate Composer Darren Copeland, and Nadene ThĂŠriault-Copeland) for coordinating this multi-day event.
REPORT BACK FROM TES
From Matthew Fava With so much musical activity in the city of Toronto centred downtown, it was nice to take my bike north to St. Clair for the second day of the symposium. After a short welcome, we were treated to a presentation by the electroacoustic trailblazer from BC, Barry Truax.
Barry Truax PHOTO: Matthew Fava
Pendlerdrøm (1997), or Commuterdream, is one of Truax’s compositions that he demonstrated during his presentation. It begins with the soundscape of the Central Train Station in Copenhagen. Eventually, a rhythm from a moving train is seamlessly looped, and then slowly transformed into a dream-like ambience exploring the hidden qualities of what might otherwise be ignored as background noise. Using familiar sounds as the basis of this sonic narrative changes the listener’s relationship to the piece and the physical space. Listen here.
Truax embodies some of the finest qualities in a composer: he is willing to discuss his methods (just visit his website to see) and he cares deeply about the various ways that his music intersects with other fields and with society. Truax centred his discussion on the idea of inner and outer complexity, which seeks to contrast our understanding of the inner structure and patterns of sound with the outer environment that embodies real world concerns. The implications for an artist and their audiences are very important since, as Truax points out, we are trained to instantaneously resolve contradictions when hearing a sound removed from its context. This is best illustrated by our relationship to the sound of an acoustic instrument in a concert; that abstracted sound lacks an inherent meaning that connects with the inspiration, experience, and intention of the composer who wrote the music. During his talk, Truax offered examples of his use of processing methods such as granular time stretching, and he illustrated how he abstracts source material in a way that bridges the outer world and the inner world of a sound or soundscape. Navigating the continuum between found and abstracted sound is an excellent way to develop an “aural competence” and stoke fascination with electroacoustic and soundscape compositions. This was an excellent way to begin the day! So much of what Truax discussed paralleled the keynote address delivered by Francis Dhomont in the late morning. Dhomont is a seminal voice in electroacoustic
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Left: Darren Copeland (L) and Francis Dhomont Centre: Soprano Liz Pearse performs Jon Fielder’s Vous l’inaccessible Right: Michael Palumbo hosting the Thursday afternoon concert PHOTOS: Kevin Austin and Matthew Fava
composition, having devoted his work to the genre since the 1960s. It was inspiring to hear his reflections since he was witness and contributor to the earliest era of acousmatic music in France. Dhomont reminded the audience of the radical shift in method and conception that came with acousmatic music and electroacoustic music; to illustrate his point he recalled the number of music students who used to enter an electronic music studio with notated music in hand. Dhomont felt this habit was problematic, since the studio enables a composer to start with a concrete idea and move towards abstraction, rather than beginning with an already abstracted idea. In a statement to younger composers he cautioned them against a utilitarian relationship with electronic music, appealing to them to make poetry of the sound and to explore topics that matter to them and a wider public. Although I was interpreting his message through a translator, his statements and presence had a profound impact on me.
Another interesting session from the second day of the symposium was a presentation on interactive systems and biofeedback by Valery Vermeulen. There is a tradition, now at an expansive stage, of incorporating the sonification or interpretation of biological information into performances and installations. The presentation centred on a particular interface called EMO-Synth. The EMO-Synth is an interactive multi-media system that can measure an individual’s emotional response to sounds and images such that a particular emotional state can be invoked through a highly customized and immersive experience created solely for that individual. The session broke down the advances in various fields, including artificial intelligence, affective computing, and algorithmic music composition, that have allowed the EMO-synth to be developed alongside other technology for highly immersive experiences. A lively discussion resulted as symposium attendees grappled with the problem solving that has resulted from the refinement of interactive systems such as the EMO-Synth.
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REPORT BACK FROM TES
Left:David Ogborn presenting at the TES Centre: Composer Danny Saul performing Frictions_Storms Right: Freida Abtan presents a paper at the TES PHOTOS: Kevin Austin and Matthew Fava FROM SAMAN SHAHI I had the chance to attend the 2013 Toronto Electroacoustic Symposium both as a participating composer and a general audience member. The symposium interested me because it has become part of the process of developing contemporary music, which is achieved through the multi-dimensional artistic dialogue between composers across regions and generations. I was keenly aware of the dialogue and artistic exchange between the younger generation—I count myself among it—and our more experienced peers. This was apparent during the social aspects of the symposium such as post-lecture Q&A sessions, or time spent hanging out at the bars and restaurants near St. Clair and Christie. Musical creation, installation, and space usage were among the topics at the symposium, and the vast array of perspectives and approaches that were discussed truly optimized the experience—I imagine other participants revelled in this experience as much as I did. Satoshi Morita and Hill Hiroki Kobayashi’s installation took my breath away, with its exploration of the sonic relationship between body and space. The first part of the installation was called Sonic Suit, which had a three-minute tape part featuring sounds that were manipulated through subtle vibrations triggered by a person wearing the suit. The second part entitled Tele Echo Tube used/involved a microphone in a large lamp-shade type tube that
transmitted whatever sound it picked up in the room of the symposium to a rig on Mount Fiji. The rig would play the sound, recapture it within the reverberant acoustic of that mountain setting, and then transmit that sound back for the audience to experience in the concert space – this creates a unique relationship between the audience and a natural soundscape. A lecture-recital by Michael Rhoades on his most recent project, Hadronized Spectra attracted my attention. This piece for electronics is based on the data acquired from the Large Hadron Collider. The composer explained the sonic choices and their placements in the work as a whole and played some parts of the composition for the audience. Rhoades compellingly argued that as technology and science advance in their respective fields, human beings are able to perceive sound and visuals in much more complex and multilayered ways. Rhoades added that it is only a matter of exposure to this sort of experimental sound art that can provoke the brain to try to decode and understand it. The chaotic blocks of interactive sonic phenomena as well as the dense mathematics behind those sounds made the project and its sonic representation very captivating. The four concerts at the symposium that I attended were all very different. A majority of pieces were playbacks, with some involving live manipulation by the composer. Some concerts
involved live instruments with fixed media or live electronics (Timothy Roy’s Wunderkind, and Adam Vidiksis’ Synapse_Circuit for example), and some others with video projections (Teresa Conors’s Aspect of Trees). Vidiksis’ piece from the Thursday night concert for percussion and live electronics really grabbed my attention! He was not only playing the different drums, but was also simultaneously creating sonic effects using the live electronics hooked up to his laptop. The interaction between the acoustic and the electroacoustic elements was spontaneous and interesting. When I talked to him afterwards, he mentioned how the piece sounds almost entirely different in every performance, giving it an organic feeling. A stand-out piece from Friday’s afternoon concert was Jerod Sommerfelt’s Kernel_panic. Sommerfelt’s work featured very minimal percussive sounds, which developed smoothly into much larger and impressive thuds. He was also controlling the main mixer to create panning and other spatial effects while the tape was running. My experience as a participating composer was also exceptional, and I had the pleasure of meeting so many new friends. It was very satisfying to hear my work, A Dialogue in Afshari for fixed media and solo clarinet, performed by Peter Stoll on the first night. The symposium was, indeed, a stimulating and gratifying experience. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 39
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A Heated Debate from Samuel Bayefsky On Friday, Steven Naylor delivered a lecture titled “Mastering the Mutable: Music,technology, and change.” This lecture not only grabbed our attention here at Notations, it also inspired a very animated discussion among participants at the Symposium.
In his talk, Naylor considered both the difficulties and opportunities in the world of music technology today. He noted that attempting to “master” technology, the way one can master playing the cello, is a difficult and futile endeavour. Yet there is pressure on those in the field to become expert adaptors to technological developments in music. Such advancements may come with broader compositional capabilities, but they also demand more from the artist (generally, time and money). So should one even bother with it all? Yes and no, Naylor argues. At one end, he encourages a heightened awareness of the impact that technology has on the artist and their work. Employing the metaphor of a traveler visiting new countries and trying new customs, he asks artists to be adventurous, yet selective, in what they choose to bring home with them. Composers should be explorers of new technologies, but must only use the things that will benefit their art, not the things that will hinder or frustrate their creative process. At another point Naylor posited that the music technologies at our disposal today can accomplish everything that we need them to, and further development should focus more on efficiency of existing technology and the resulting ease of the work process.
The lectures that followed seemed to reflect the struggle that Naylor so acutely pinpointed. Benjamin O’Brien talked about the challenges composers face as translators (he further described this work as a “specialized, ontological branch of transformation”). As a “translator” himself, O’Brien experiments with taking sounds out of their contexts and reforming them in new ones. In doing so he creates many problems for his compositions: abstracting the sonic source from its natural environment, projecting it in a new light and mutating it in such a way that it can still be recognized by a listener. These problems both arise from, and are solved by technology. As O’Brien detailed his complex technical translation processes (a very specialized discussion and somewhat less accessible as a result), I couldn’t help but ponder how his work reflected the previous talk given by Naylor. O’Brien’s experiments led him into new technological territories, from which some challenges expectedly arose, and without which he wouldn’t have been able to continue. His process is the artistic and technological balance that Naylor so eloquently prescribed for the composers and experimenters of the audience.
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NIC GOTHAM 1959-2013 The CMC was very sad to learn of the passing of Associate Composer Nic Gotham on July 25, 2013, after a long struggle with cancer. During his musical life he was a profound figure on the music scene in Toronto, and also in Riga, Latvia where he lived and worked between 1998 and 2012. In the weeks following his passing we felt it was important to draw attention to Nic’s musical affinity, which placed him at the centre of so many important developments in Canada and in Latvia. In the next few pages we are treated to reflections from several individuals in Nic’s life including his partner and collaborator Baņuta Rubess.
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DOING WHAT WE HAVE ALWAYS DONE NIC GOTHAM IN TORONTO BY ROBERT STEVENSON
I first became aware of Nic Gotham through his involvement in the burgeoning music scene in Toronto’s Queen St. West in the mid eighties. His group Gotham City, along with other ensembles such as Vector, Graeme Kirkland and the Wolves, and Thin Men, really set the improvised music scene in Toronto on its ear. Prior to the growth of this vibrant community, improvised music in Toronto centered around clubs like Bourbon Street and George’s Spaghetti House, where the music was mostly quite conservative, drawing on the long tradition of bop. Of course there were venues like the Music Gallery, located at that time on St. Patrick north of Queen, or A Space located above Warburton’s Music on St. Nicholas, a tiny laneway running parallel to Yonge Street north of Wellesley, where you could hear local artists, like CCMC, Artists’ Jazz Band and the Nihilist Spasm Band, or international artists such as Misha Mengelberg, Joseph Bowie or Oliver Lake. However, this experimental music scene was quite small and marginalized, attracting a tiny audience of cognoscenti who were passionately in the know. The Queen West music scene was something quite different. It changed everything. Suddenly the hegemony of bop in the local jazz scene was called into question. Venues such as The Squeeze Club, the Cameron, and The Bamboo were drawing large, young, and devoted audiences who were excited by the vibrant new music that Nic and his colleagues were making. Without abandoning any of the sophistication of earlier forms, Nic’s music in this period embraced the developments that were taking place in improvised music. It appealed to the head and
the hips. It’s extraordinary now to remember the vehement hostility that some older members of the jazz community expressed about the work of these young Turks. At one point, in response to this hostility, Victor Bateman, leader of Vector, released a cassette entitled Jazz Is a Four Letter Word, thereby reminding everyone that this music could never be entirely pinned down or codified. Upon listening to Nic’s music at this time, a few things were immediately apparent. There was a concern with creating music
that was at once sophisticated, erudite, and technically skilled, while at the same time accessible to anyone willing to set aside preconceived notions of what music should sound like. There was nothing arcane about it. If you were familiar with the influences that were present, this made your listening experience richer, but certainly this knowledge was not required for enjoyment. It was thoughtful and groovy. I also sensed that Nic had greater ambitions for his work. Although he certainly didn’t consider NOTATIONS FALL 2013 46
Gotham City inadequate for his creative needs, the music possessed an expansive quality that ultimately would require larger forces across a number of different contexts. As he gravitated towards working in the theatre, first with productions such as Boom, Bay, Boom and later with the opera Nigredo Hotel, a subtle, but significant change took place in his stance as a musician. From being a saxophonist/composer, he became a composer and saxophonist. No longer was his work as a composer tied to his being a performer of that work. His compositions began to stand apart from his performing activities. Along with this came the desire to compose music that integrated his interest in jazz and other improvisational approaches with his study of through-composed music (with principal teachers David Mott and James Tenney) in what could be loosely referred to as contemporary classical music. The problem was that there was no readily available ensemble dedicated to this task. The
solution was to create one. This was the beginning of Hemispheres Music Projects, formed in the late 80s. As Shannon Peet discusses later in this piece, the ensemble, which consisted of performers from both the classical and jazz traditions, went on to commission and perform works not only by Nic, but by a diverse group of composers that included Jean Derome, Rene Lussier, Wende Bartley, Peter Hannan, Maarten Altena, Victor Bateman, and many others. One of Nic’s great strengths was his ability to work with other artists in a common cause, which is vibrantly illustrated in the creation and development of this ensemble. Alongside Hemispheres, he continued his immersion in the theatre, which culminated in the creation of his opera Nigredo Hotel (1992). This work was definitely new territory for Nic, but then again, the exploration of new vistas is a constant throughout his career. The measure of his success in this arena is exemplified by
the immense popularity of this opera, which has received many productions throughout Canada, Great Britain and Australia. While continuing to work on commissions from a diverse group of artists throughout the 90s, Nic embarked on his next major collaborative project, the forming of the saxophone quartet 40 Fingers in 1993. This was no ordinary saxophone quartet: Nic played alongside Peter Lutek, David Mott and Chiyoko Szlavnics, and each member was not only a skilled player, but an accomplished improviser and composer as well. Through the many concerts, broadcasts and recordings this group made throughout most of the 90s, Nic and his colleagues redefined the possibilities of what a saxophone quartet could be. Once again, as he had done throughout his career, Nic imagined new possibilities for an existing medium while at the same time creating a music that was both contemporary and accessible.
Nic, centre, pictured with members of Gotham City NOTATIONS FALL 2013 47
One of the many collaborations initiated by the Hemispheres ensemble included work with Dutch composer and bassist Maarten Altena, pictured here while in Toronto.
WHEN THE UPTOWN CAME DOWNTOWN SHANNON PEET
Somewhere, in a recent biographical note I read that Nic listed David Mott and James Tenney as two of his most important teaching influences. Both of these men loomed large in my time on the Toronto new music scene as well. In 1986 and 1987, the iconoclastic electro-acoustic group Sound Pressure had a strong hand in bringing the ‘uptown’ musical influences (York University) downtown —something both Arraymusic and Jon Siddall’s Evergreen Club Gamelan had signaled previously. However, Sound Pressure entrenched this movement and, in my recollection, those influences beckoned a lot of new crossover composition. Nic was ver y engaged on the scene as this new ethos emerged, and, to a degree, he was poised for exactly this intrepid era, keenly anticipating what was to come.
When Jim Montgomery at the Music Gallery suggested the two worlds of new music and jazz/ improvisation come together for a concert, of course I insisted on being a part of it! I already knew Nic and Gotham City, and this sounded like one risky, albeit challenging, venture. Hence, the fantastic 14-piece ensemble Hemispheres was born, with Nic acting as Co-Artistic Director. Nic was at the forefront of this cross - fertilization and experimentation as the fusion of these and other influences began to propagate. His natural instincts, mischievous curiosity, and zeal for the unconventional gave his leadership at the helm a distinct personality. As the spill-over of musique actuelle from Victoriaville (FIMAV) and Montreal crept upon the Toronto scene, Nic was actively commissioning and encouraging new programming and new
collaborations, thus ensuring the health and legacy of this rather unique little ecology. As the 40 Fingers Saxophone Quartet then emerged, it was obvious to all that Nic was in his natural environment; his contributions were huge and of course we all benefited. It was a heady time. It was friendly and fun and stimulating and noisy—and, quite frequently, misbehaved. We had fraught rehearsals but great concerts, endless meetings, a couple of operas, and fundraisers. Mostly, we all supported each other. We were brash. We toured together, partied together, argued together, and recorded together, season after season. It was an exhilarating period of my artistic life and I have wonderful memories of sharing much of this with Nic. He taught me a great deal. His appetite and curiosity were enduring. More than anything he loved a good laugh. I will miss him.
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Nic (left) alongside the members of 40 Fingers, PHOTO: Lawrence Acland
AN EVOLVING RELATIONSHIP DAVID MOTT
I first met Nic Gotham in my orchestration class in 1978 at York University, followed by my jazz composition class in 1979. Having known Nic as long as I have, first in the capacity as one of his teachers, but fortunately and most importantly as a fellow composer, saxophonist, and improviser throughout the better part of his professional career, it seems startling to remember our early relationship. As a student, he was distinguished by having an innate creativity and curiosity which, indeed, continued to drive and inform his career. It was in his career, post-student life, where he particularly flourished. Whether it was his new jazz approach through Gotham City, his remarkable Hemispheres Ensemble, his chamber opera Nigredo Hotel, his founding of the 40 Fingers Saxophone Quartet, or his later works for choir and various large ensembles, Nic was voraciously creative. The music he made was always vital, authentic, beautiful, and never derivative in any way. And Nic made things happen. He had artistic agency of a capacity seldom seen. He, along with several other notable musicians, founded a Queen St. new jazz scene in the 1980s that Toronto has not enjoyed before or since. Hemispheres was a ground breaking ensemble that further contributed to the scene around the Music Gallery’s days at Queen and Dovercourt. And then there was 40 Fingers. We (Nic on alto, Chiyoko Szlavnics on soprano –followed by
Dan Friedman and Rob Carli on that instrument, Peter Lutek on tenor, and myself on baritone) all composed for the quartet, we all improvised, and we were happy performing interesting music by other composers. This is where I got to know Nic best. Two stories about Nic from those days illustrate his tenacity and his humor. ņ On a cross-Canada tour (“Fingers and Film” – performing music of our own to silent German films from the 1920s and 30s) we arrived in Montreal only to find out that the artistic director for the venue, at which we were to perform, had been fired two weeks earlier and we were on our own for equipment, audience, and artistic fees. I immediately said, “Great, forget about playing. I know a terrific restaurant. . . .” But Nic said, “No. Let’s play anyway since we’re here.” So we called everyone we knew in Montreal and had music stands and stand lights cabbed over to the venue where, remarkably, we played for a sold out house and the best audience of our tour. When we played at the Annex Theatre in Toronto for two nights and recorded (Live Fingers) in a blistering summer heat, there was a play going on simultaneously in the adjacent space. So Nic was given the task of announcing some important logistics so that members of our audience didn’t end up on the stage of the other performance. Nic said, “Let me tell you how to go the bathroom.” He paused, considering what he had just said and went on, “You may
have thought that you already knew that,” and proceeded to impart those important logistics. I was fortunate to be able to spend time with Nic on occasion after his return to Toronto following his period in Latvia. He hardly ever mentioned his illness to me even though he had been given a terminal prognosis (which he never communicated to me). We always talked about and shared music with each other. Even the last time I saw him, only a few days before he passed, he played a rough mix of his final commission, which was very beautiful, and he insisted on listening to some of my Heart Meditations which had recently gone up on CBC’s Concerts on Demand. We joked as usual and it haunts me that, flummoxed in saying goodbye, I said something inane by way of farewell. But I doubt that he minded. There was an interesting symmetry in that he asked me to invigilate his doctoral defense, which he did successfully by Skype only a few months before he passed. It was a privilege, listening to his ideas on the relationship between composing and improvising as it was knowing his music, his skills as an improviser, his effortless musicianship, and his indomitable spirit and deep commitment to and love for music. And I wish him godspeed as the tears run down my face. NOTATIONS FALL 2013 43
RIGA LIBRE
Choir School (a music high school), then at a conservatory level, at the Latvian Music Academy—he leaped at the opportunity. Now Nic is sorely missed at both institutions. Nic was instrumental in the very creation of a jazz curriculum, and he received a special Citation from the Minister of Culture in recognition of his services. As one student said, “Nic was a jazzman by definition, since jazz music means to enter new territories. Nic’s motto was to take a step into the void and see where you go.”
Nic and I moved to Latvia in 1998, intending to stay for one year. We stayed for fourteen. Nic is now considered one of Latvia’s own. His death was headline news, and recently the Latvian national radio aired a two-hour special about his music. “Everything that happened around Nic was surprising and unforgettable,” said the program director.
Nic’s love for the unexpected caught the attention of several leaders in the Latvian music scene. One was Kaspars Putniņš, one of the conductors of the Latvian Radio Choir, and now a good friend of Canadian-based concert presenter Soundstreams. Putniņš invited Nic and I to create something together (I’m a playwright and a director), and we came up with a piece about cooking and childbirth in five different languages, the diptych Fruits of the Earth. Composed for the Riga Saxophone Quartet (RSQ) and the Radio Choir, the musicians donned chef ’s hats and surgical scrubs for a memorable staging at the Latvian National Opera.
BANUTA RUBESS
When we left Canada, Nic was writing his second chamber opera and he was deeply involved with 40 Fingers. But in Riga, there were no Music Galleries; the opera house was in the grip of Verdi and Puccini, and the attitude towards improvisation was hesitant at best. As far as jazz goes, no one had the academic knowledge Nic had picked up at York University. Given this conservative environment, Nic’s initial strategy was “When in Rome.” He gathered local jazzers into the ensemble Abi gali (“Both Ends”), where Nic explored a more traditional sound, allowing a new playfulness to come into his work. Abi gali recorded a CD, and played all across Latvia, as well as Tbilisi, Georgia, and the Pori Jazz Festival in Finland. In order to be more adventurous in jazz while residing in Latvia, Nic would have to train a new generation of musicians. So when he was invited to help create a jazz department— first at the renowned Riga Dom
Fruits of the Earth remained one of our personal favorites, rivalling only our chamber opera Oh Pilot. In 1999, the latter was workshopped in Riga with Wayne Strongman and Tapestry New Opera Works, featuring Alexander Antonenko in the title role. Afterwards, we struggled for years to get Oh Pilot to the stage, and were thrilled to mount a production at the Latvian National Opera in 2007, and later tour it to Lithuania. My libretto was a meditation on the nature of grace and its presence just before death. Oh Pilot was on our minds many times as Nic and I battled for grace ourselves over the last year.
Šnē, who runs the chamber orchestra Sinfonietta. Nic wrote a piece for chamber orchestra called First Light, playing saxophone with the orchestra. Šnē paired this piece with the work of Steve Reich, who attended the concert in person. Later, Šnē commissioned Nic’s first symphony, Nightscapes, which Nic completed after he’d suffered his first bout with cancer. Nic was already in Toronto when Nightscapes premiered, yet Šnē felt their collaboration was intimate even across 6000 kilometers, thanks to modern technology. Nic was always ready for new challenges, and so a few years ago he began to study for his doctorate at Brunel University, UK. But that wasn’t enough. He’d been gigging at big parties together with a disc jockey called Uldis Cīrulis who performs with the stage name DJ Monsta. Together they were Nic + Monsta = NiMo. This project wasn’t meant to be cut short, but they were able to produce an album (The World is Your Oyster) that represents one aspect of their collaboration. You can purchase NiMo’s CD, The World is Your Oyster, on iTunes. NiMo also created a special program for the Latvian National Symphonic Orchestra – click here to view a video clip online.
Another musical friend in Latvia was the visionary conductor Normunds NOTATIONS FALL 2013 44
ESPRIT ORCHESTRA 2013-2014 SEASON Alex Pauk, Founding Music Director & Conductor
The World is Your Oyster—Nic took the motto seriously. His optimism was profound, though sorely tested. After many misdiagnoses, Nic discovered he had tonsillar cancer in the spring of 2011. He suffered through a brutal operation, and then had to re-learn how to walk, swallow, and accept that he could no longer play the saxophone professionally. Three months after the operation, he was teaching again. Just before he left for Toronto in 2012, he conducted his students in a new project called Riga Libre, an improvising orchestra. They tore the roof off, even though their conductor was white as chalk. Dr. Nicholas Ivor Gotham’s dissertation was about improvisation. Improvisation involves freedom and risk and ensemble, skills which are especially valuable in a country struggling to shed its Soviet past. Nic wished to create an award in his name at the Latvian Music Academy, to be granted to an improvising instrumentalist, or a composer interested in improvisation. He stipulated that the jury should have at least one Canadian. Artis Sīmanis, the current Rector of the Academy, is eager to establish this prize. Artis met Nic in the early 1990s and was still phoning him to chat in the last days. Artis leads the Riga Saxophone Quartet (RSQ) and featured Nic’s music at the festival Artis founded, Saxophonia. Clearly Nic’s work in Latvia was not over: his composition for RSQ plus wind orchestra, Step Pivot Stride, was premiered at the Great Guild Hall in Riga on November 17.
JOIN US TODAY! SUBSCRIBE! 416.408.0208 or performance.rcmusic.ca New Era Launch Thursday, October 24, 2013 Works by R. Murray Schafer, Claude Vivier, Alfred Schnittke, Samy Moussa. Presented by popular demand following Teng Li’s previous appearance with Esprit, the concert features a repeat performance of Schnittke’s Viola Concerto. O Gamalan Sunday, November 17, 2013 Works by José Evangelista, Chan Ka Nin, Alex Pauk, André Ristic, Lou Harrison and Claude Vivier. The programme includes music influenced by gamelan or combining gamelan and orchestra. Featuring Evergreen Club Contemporary Gamelan as guest ensemble. Strange Matter Sunday, January 26, 2014 Works by Samy Moussa, Zosha Di Castri, Gabriel Prokofiev and Unsuk Chin. In collaboration with the UofT Faculty of Music New Music Festival. The concert introduces Samy Moussa as a conductor with his star rising fast in Europe. Firebrands Sunday, May 25, 2014 Featuring newly commissioned works by Zosha Di Castri and Christopher Mayo – young Canadian composers living and making a major impact abroad. Also music by Louis Andriessen, one of Europe’s most eminent and influential composers of today. Part of Koerner Hall’s inaugural 21C Music Festival. All concerts start at 8:00 PM; Pre-concert talks at 7:15 PM Koerner Hall in the TELUS Centre at The Royal Conservatory Subscriptions: $200, $180; $75 Single Tickets: $55; $50; $20
A final story: one night in Riga, the two of us had planned to go out. This was a rare opportunity, since our kids were still small. We had tickets for the opera and we were late. We had to grab a cab, and as soon as we stepped into the car, we realized that neither of us had any money. When we broke the bad news to the driver, he turned and looked at Nic, then he said, “Aren’t you that guy who plays the saxophone? I’ll drive you to the opera for free.” WWW.ESPRITORCHESTRA.COM
POSTSCRIPT BOB STEVENSON For me, no explanation of Nic’s Toronto activities would be complete without a description of the last project we worked on together; namely, the concert of his compositions presented at Gallery 345 in Toronto on July 24, 2013, the day before his death. When, at the beginning of June, I received news from his wife Baņuta of the rapid, inexorable progress of the cancer that would lead to his untimely death, I felt a deep need to do something for a colleague and friend that would directly involve him and celebrate his work while he was still with us. After discussing this with Baņuta and our long-time confidant Shannon Peet, we asked Nic if this was something we should do. He enthusiastically agreed. At this point I thought that Nic would simply send me pdfs of the relevant scores and parts and I would set about securing the players, booking rehearsals and selecting a venue. I was wrong. Nic was still working, still composing, still refining his compositions. Ultimately the concert included three North American premieres and a world premiere of a concert suite drawn from his opera Oh Pilot, with a libretto by Baņuta Rubess. I also participated in a recording of another new work on July 12 at The Array Space in Toronto with Rick Sacks, Stephen Clarke, and Paul Widner. This is especially astonishing when you consider that by this point Nic could work for no more than an hour at a time without taking a prolonged rest. At the time of that recording session I had still not received a score or parts for the suite drawn from Oh Pilot. “Nic,” I said “ I’ve got to have Oh Pilot. We’re two weeks away from the show. I’ve got to conduct it and no singer will commit to it without seeing the music.” “I know, Bob, I know,” Nic began, “it’s the next thing on my desk.” Then he looked at me with that mischievous glint in his eye that I was so familiar with and said “You know, I’m having a lot of fun. I wasn’t expecting that.” For me, what it comes down to is this. If you ask a musician anywhere in the world when a musician is at their best, they will say “when the music comes first.” It is such a simple idea, but when you give your life to music, as Nic did, sometimes it is as easy as falling off a log, but sometimes it is the most difficult thing imaginable. So many things can stand in the way of this credo. I’m too tired. I’m too sick. I’m dying, I have other concerns. It is as if Nic said to me “Bob, we’re going to do what we’ve always done. We’re going to put the music first.” What a courageous thing to do. What an inspiring gift to me. I’ll not soon forget it.
NOTATIONS FALL 2013 48
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