Mar
20

Miscellanae

Some things:
- Recently, the Da Camera Young Artists put on several concerts at the Menil Collection as part of an ongoing series surrounding Debussy (who turns 150 this year).  I arranged his piano prelude “des pas sur la niege” for string quintet and percussion and in addition wrote my own response to this piece, which I titled “fantasy on footsteps”, for string trio and vibraphone.  Both performances went great, and the rest of the program (which featured Ravel, Messiaen, Saint-Saens, as well as other Da Camera composer Mark Buller) was, I thought, just right for a Debussy tribute.

- On Wednesday, March 14th pianist Linda Angkasa premiered my “Trio Lima” along with violinist Eric Siu and percussionist Robert Garza in Rice University’s Duncan Hall.  I couldn’t have been happier with their performance, and Linda’s recital on the whole (“Gamelan-Influenced Western Classical Music”) was interesting, engaging, and a complete success (it also featured a premiere of an awesome solo piano work by Rice composer Charles Halka ).   The whole program is being repeated again this coming Friday, March 23rd at 7:30 pm at the HCC Performing Arts Center.  Here’s a link with further details:

http://www.artshound.com/event/detail/441573337/Gamelan_Inspired_Western_Classical_Music

- In the works: a set of a variations for violin and piano for my friend and violinist Abby Young (University of Oregon), a piece based on L’Homme Arme for cello in honor of composer Robert Kyr’s 60th birthday, and a piece for clarinet and percussion written for Musiqa and The Contemporary Arts Museum of Houston.

-This summer I’ll be spending a month at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, France, doing what they’ve been doing since the 1940s or so (lots of intense musicianship training and master classes in composition).  I’m also looking into other travel plans for the summer, so hopefully it’ll be a busy and exciting one.

 

Mar
19

Travelling Salesman Trailer

Hey all,
I’m way overdue on posting this, but I thought I’d share that the trailer for Travelling Salesman has been released.

It features a few selections of the music I wrote for the film.  Stay tuned for more details about its release.

-Ben

Nov
09

The crazy part of the year…

Hello, friends!

It’s been a long while since my last post.  I think I’ll try to update more often, even when the post seems mundane, even if it’s just a random thought, or quote, or random tidbit from my day.  Why else do I have this site?

We’re entering one of the craziest times of year, music-wise.  Here are some highlights of the next month (and news from the past few months)

- I was delighted to have been selected to be apart of the Young Artist program of Da Camera of Houston (http://www.dacamera.com/young_artists).  This involves numerous projects, events, performances, workshops, etc.  This Saturday, at Houston’s Menil Collection,  I’ll be performing an arrangement of Thelonious Monk’s “Brilliant Corners” with fellow Y.A. and friend David Connor on bass (for more info go to http://www.menil.org/programs/Programs.php).  The program is called “Bach in the 21st Century” and will pair performances of Johann Sebastian’s work with contemporary and contrasting works.  Over the next year I’ll also get numerous opportunities to compose works for special occasions and more chances to play jazz and other contemporary music.  I even used some theory-skills to make a harp arrangement of a Bach aria from figured bass (and seriously, who ever thought that would be a practical skill?).

- Three of my “LEGO” pieces will be performed Nov. 16 at the Shepherd School of Music on our Composers’ Forum Concert.  They are: The Hawkocopter, Buggy Motor Car, and Obi-Wan’s Spaceship.  These are based on toys that my nephew, Joey, has made with his LEGOs.  I did the exact same thing when I was his age (in fact, it was a constant obsession).  So trying to bring his imagination into my music seemed like the perfect way to bridge the creativity of a 4-year-old with what I do now.  See my last post for a description of what these are all about.

- This week I’ve been rehearsing with Opera Vista for their production of Thomas Ádes’ opera, “Powder Her Face,” which shows on Thursday and Friday night at Zilkha Hall in downtown Houston.  Honestly, that music is some of the most difficult I’ve come across.  Should be quite a treat (or a trip?!).

- On Nov. 20 I get to perform George Crumb’s Vox Balaenae (Voice of the Whale) with two other Shepherd students on cellist Clara Yang’s DMA recital.  What an incredible piece!  There’s a cool, interactive website about it here.  We’re doing it just as Crumb recommends – with the special blue lighting, black masks, and amplification, which of course all cumulatively create a mysterious, epic, dramatic, and theatrical aura.

It may seem like I’m performing more than composing, but I have plenty of composition projects in the works as well, including wrapping up the LEGO pieces, beginning a trio for violin, piano, and percussion for a DMA pianist’s March concert of Gamelan-inspired music (more info to come!), and planning a violin/cello duo as well as a set of variations for violin/piano for other Spring performances.  As I was recently discussing with some of my colleagues, it seems like most of the day-to-day grind involves putting out dozens of small fires that come up, hoping that eventually there will be time for the “big” things.  But papers, reading, tests, teaching obligations, work, etc. never really stop, and in the end, I’m content to accept the perpetuity of life’s obstacles and just be grateful that this is my life.   I’ll certainly be even more grateful when Thanksgiving comes around.

Hope this finds everyone well.

Cheers,
-Ben

Jun
03

Summer, Speed Cars, and the Seinfeld Theme Song

Summer.  Time for wrapping up old projects, planning new ones, and tons of leisure time in between.  In the former category, I’m happy to report that I recently finished scoring Timothy Lanzone’s Travelling Salesman – a project which I began almost a year ago!  The film should be ready for screening at some point in the very near future.  Stay tuned.

"It shoots laser fire out of the back."

Meanwhile, I’m moving forward on my current project, a set of pieces for mixed ensemble (cl hn perc vln cb) based on the LEGO creations of my 4-year-old nephew.  On the right is the one I’m currently working on capturing.  In my nephew’s words: “This is Thai-Sen’s Speed Motor Car. It shoots laser fire out of the back. That means it goes so fast.”

Below is another movement for the piece: Obi-Wan’s spaceship (no, not all of them are from the Star Wars universe).  Let me paraphrase his commentary on this one: it goes really fast.  Also, it “spins in the air and it can jump over things…it’s really a good guy spaceship…it has two yellow bombs in the front. It’s yellow for when it’s so bright out and that’s their camouflage.”
There will likely be about 5-7 of these short pieces – a set of LEGO miniatures of some sort.   And even though it may seem silly in some way, I’m taking it as a serious collaboration: he builds the sets, invents the background stories, gives them names.  All I’m doing is trying to weave these elements into a musical fabric that somehow, abstractly, resembles its subject.  This has, after all, been done many times in the

"It's really a good guy spaceship."

past…think of Petroushka, Debussy’s Children’s Corner and many of his Preludes; some of Bartok’s Mikrokosmos and other pieces for children; Ravel’s L’enfantMa mere l’oye, Noel des jouets.  In fact, much of Ravel’s output reveals a deep connection and delight with childlike imagination.  Recently, we have Thomas Ades’ Living Toys and David Lang’s Pulitzer-winning The Little Match Girl Passion as examples of using children’s fantasies as the impetus for a work.

In other summer-related news, I’ve been watching a lot of Seinfeld lately and have had that theme song continually running in my head.  Just goes to show the power of using rhythm, groove, and instrumentation to create something memorable out of otherwise simple and straightforward material.  It also goes to show I’ve been watching way too much Seinfeld (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

 

 

Mar
24

New recordings posted

More music!

I recently had the pleasure of performing fellow Rice DMA composer Karl Blench’s piece for clarinet, viola, and piano called Book of Mental Imagery.  Four of the nine movements are posted on the “Piano” page.  A couple weeks ago, my own piece for flute and piano, Night Tides, was premiered: recording posted on “Music.”  As soon as I get a hold of the recording of my performance of Dutilleux’s Sur un meme accord, I’ll get that up as well.

Hope you enjoy!  In the meantime – lots of exciting things on the horizon! Better get to work.

Feb
24

Ravel in Texas

I was just starting some preliminary research on a paper I’ll be writing on Ravel’s opera L’enfant et les sortilège and discovered an article that cited a lecture that the composer gave, in April 1928, at the then-named Rice Institute in Houston.  Picturing the Parisian master in southeastern Texas giving lecture-recitals like a DMA student in this muggy, semi-tropical atmosphere conjures a very different image than the one I’ve always had of him (you know…immersed in everything fine, exquisite, French).  So I searched our library’s website and found that the pamphlets had been scanned and archived as PDFs.  Ravel gave two recitals in collaboration with a soprano and a violinist, playing all the piano parts himself.  The second recital was preceded by the aforementioned lecture.  I hope you find these as interesting as I do.

April 6th program
April 7th program
(April 7th) lecture on “Contemporary Music”

Jan
30

Upcoming performances and other news

The composer Yehudi Wyner was in residence here at Rice this past week.  The other composers and I had a great time with him – lunches, a master class, a presentation, private lessons, and a concert featuring a couple of his works.  I highly recommend listening to his oboe quartet (oboe + string trio) as well as the Pulitzer-winning piano concerto “Chiavi in Mano.”  I also found this interesting interview with him.  At 82 years old, he is sharp, eloquent, bubbling with enthusiasm, and hilariously witty.  During my own lesson with him he shared stories about hanging out with his friend Henri Dutilleux, one of my musical heroes (of course we also discussed some of my music).

In other news: my piece “The Lily Flower” for chorus and piano will be performed several times at Palomar College (CA) in April – once as part of Peter Gach’s own piano series on April 3rd (which will also include Schumann’s Kreisleriana), then on the Palomar Chamber Singers’ concerts on April 8th and 9th.  I hope to make this piece part of a larger set of settings of short Japanese poems in the near future.

This semester at Rice I’ll be performing Steve Reich’s “Four Organs” with the 20/21 contemporary music ensemble, selections from George Crumb’s Music for a Summer Evening for two pianos and percussion, as well as on two of my colleague’s own composition recitals.  My recent piece “Very Sharp Things” for clarinet, violin, cello and piano will be read by Speculum Musicae later this semester, and I’ll be premiering a new work for flute and piano on our composers’ forum concert.

Dec
14

Travelling Salesman

On the set of TS

I’m home in Carlsbad, CA and have been devoting the past few days to finishing the music for Travelling Salesman, a feature film written and directed by Timothy Lanzone, produced by Fretboard Pictures. Producing and editing the music can be a tedious process filled with minuscule, mundane moments and details, but its incredibly rewarding and fun at the same time. Having begun the process without much experience with electronic music, it’s also been quite the learning experience. I’ve been using a variety of sound sources:  samples of strange piano sounds that I recorded while in school in Houston, additive synths that I made with Max/MSP, and an assortment of MIDI-based VST instruments. I’ve been manipulating, tweaking, editing, etc. with a combination of Audacity, Cubase, and Logic.

It’s been a joy and a challenge (intimidating at times) scoring the film since it’s paced so carefully and deliberately. Sequences of escalating tension abound, particularly as the implications of the film’s premise are gradually revealed. And it’s beautifully shot as well.  I just keep hoping the music somehow lives up to the rest of it!

The film depicts the heated backroom discussions of four mathematicians who have solved the P vs. NP problem and a government agent (a severe, creepy, Big-Brotherish sort of guy) who has come to collect their findings and coerce them into silence. I should be finishing this all up (hopefully) over the next few days so that the team can send out the final version for festivals, screenings, etc. Better get back to work!

Dec
10

Piano page

I’ve added a page focused on my experience as a performer, which has really been the main thread throughout my musical life. If you are a composer whose music I have performed, or a performer whom I’ve accompanied, and have a recording you would like to share, I will gladly post it and any pertinent info, with your permission. Collaborating with other musicians of all types has always been my favorite way to make music, and I’d love to share some of these experiences.

Nov
27

Welcome

I’ve created a website to share my music with others.  The “Bio” page has information about my musical background and career; “Music” features recordings and scores of selected pieces as well as a complete list of works.  Questions, criticisms, suggestions, thoughts, etc. can be directed to me via the “Contact” page.  Thank you for your visit!