RIP Sitor Situmorang, and my deepest apologies

If I have to regret one thing this year, perhaps it is the death of the great poet Sitor Situmorang, and what I have (not) done. You see, I set to music several poems of his, and in my newest CD "An Essay on Love" I recorded two of them : Malam Kebumen (Kebumen Night) and Surat Kertas Hijau (Green Paper Letters, which is one of his most well known poems). Sitor has been living in Holland for many years now. I told him last month (November), through his wife, that we were going to release the CD in mid December, and of course they were very keen in receiving the CD. Sitor himself had listened to some of my music based on his poems, either live or through the only existing online recording of it, sung by Samuel Tandei : http://wuol.org/tenor-samuel-tandei/ . In the CD they were sung by Widhawan Aryo Pradhita, who has been famous overnight last week for his great, I mean reaaallly great, interpretation as the policeman in CLARA. In fact, now after watching him live and through youtube, and read the raving reviews on the media on him, people buys the CD and ask "in which songs / tracks does Clara's policeman sing?" .............................................................................................................................................. Now, the CDs themselves have been finished in print a week prior to the world premiere of CLARA. But that was the busiest week for us all, me, Chendra and all staff of The Ananda Sukarlan Center. The rehearsals took so much time, especially with the complex music, choreography and stage settings ... and to add them all up into a whole show! So, we just ignored that pile of CDs in our office and did nothing with them, although people had ordered them from all around Indonesia. Anyway, it was supposed to be officially launched during CLARA, where our former President of the Republic, Mr. BJ Habibie was invited but still was sick and gotta cancel all public appearances, even until today. So, as usual, things could wait, and people could wait for it too .... until yesterday, that we received the news of the death of the great poet, and realized that death could NOT wait. Anyway, I wasn't aware that he has been sick. In fact, I wasn't aware about anything else during the preparation of CLARA and even a few days afterwards. The only people I talked to are those who are involved in CLARA. And so, the CDs which were sent to the poets were sent a few days after the premiere of CLARA .... and one of them arrived too late to be listened to by its poet. .............................................................................................................................................. Apparently Sitor Situmorang wasn't just sick. He refused to go out of his appartment for the last few months, and his weight had dropped to a mere 37 kilograms. I remember, when I met him for the first time like 4 years ago, I had the same sensation as when I met Indonesia's great composer Amir Pasaribu. Both have been rejected by our own country, both had to live in exile by the same regime. There is that look in their eyes, the look of ... suspicion? .. , but mixed with a kind of love and pain. Perhaps that's the effect of hypersensitive people being inflicted by violence and suffering. Sitor spent 8 dark years in prison without trial right after the rise of Suharto, and certainly the scars of that period remain open until now. Suharto and the New Order era erased the names of a number of intellectuals and writers, including Sitor, from textbooks because they were considered left-wing. However, Sitor kept the line clear between the regime and the country he loves. Sitor was always faithful and sincere in defending his country and nation. He was 91 when he died. It is now OUR task to put him in his prominent place in Indonesian history, as one of our greatest poets who has inspired many people, me included. Requiescat in Pace, Requiem Aeternam, Sitor Situmorang.

Fun (and not so fun) Facts on CLARA

Thank God the premiere of CLARA went very well. All my artistic worries proved to be unnecessary, since I got great support from Chendra Panatan who had done an impressive concept of choreography, stage decor and even lighting (to those who don't know, he also studied stage lighting with one of the best experts in the world, Jennifer Tipton from New York). His spectacular visual art could dissimulate all the shortcomings in my music! Anyway, as any live performances, there are things that have gone wrong, but hey, that's the beauty of live performances, eh? Since then, many reporters, music students, or just curious friends asked me about things in CLARA, so I guess I just share all those here. Let's consider this "Everything you wanna know about Clara and are afraid to ask", hehehe .... .............................................................................................................................................. G minor is the predominant tonality throughout the whole opera. Not only it is easy to be played on string instruments, but it is also the minor paralel of B-flat, which I usually employ to express love (such as in my song Dalam Doaku). Since hatred is the theme of this opera, I employed this tonality coz as we say, love and hate are just two sides of a coin. .............................................................................................................................................. Clara's original car in Seno Gumira's story is a BMW. But we couldn't find a BMW from the year around 1998, so we got a Mercedes instead. Luckily, the word Mer-Ce-Des has the same amount of syllables as B-M-W , and they even share the pronounciation similarities in Indonesia. So, that's how we changed it into a Mercedes. We borrowed it from a friend of mine at highschool, Prasodjo, who is also the founder of Jakarta Drum School, whose drummers participated (and became one of the highlight of the opera!) in CLARA. .............................................................................................................................................. In all my music the materials, which might be motifs, or "inspiration" if you wanna say it in a cool term, can come from anywhere, anything or anybody. There is one motif, sung by the Policeman in my opera CLARA, which is made from the figure of a penis. It consists of figure A and B: A is 2 adjacent notes (mostly with an interval of a major second) and then B is another 2 notes with a pretty "sizeable" interval. The first two of course reflects the 2 balls, and the real penis is the last two notes. This is employed when the police is feeling horny. The B part can vary their interval, especially if it depicts the growing erection of the penis. The last, largest and most obvious use of this motif is in the policeman's last aria, where he sings "Ayolah sana, tidur" (Come on, sleep). .............................................................................................................................................. I was very much pressed in time in writing CLARA, but during its actual composition I managed to write Two lullabies for piano. The last one was written on the 19th of November, the birthday of my daughter Alicia, since I just got the news (in this internet era is there still a belated news? Yeah, yeah if you are immersed in writing an opera!) about the birth of Daphne Gabriella Irawan, daughter of my good friend Catherine Tanujaya (founder of The Piano Institute in Surabaya) and her husband "Hungry" Jeff (he owns a restaurant hehehe). But in fact, her daughter was born exactly on the same day of Darleen Kristianto, daughter of my highly admired pianist friend Henoch Kristianto, and since I knew about his daughter the same day (even hour!) of her birth, I wrote her lullaby on her birth, 31st of October. In fact, since she was born in the morning, I sent the lullaby in the evening, so it's so valid being a welcoming present to Darleen, eh? And those lullabies gave me a flash of happiness, having finished being written in just 1 or 2 hours, while CLARA was written in months! And it's good to write 2 lullabies at a space of 19 days, if I had written it on the same day they would both sound almost the same! .............................................................................................................................................. You know that popular website www.moviemistakes.com . Well, I am giving away our own bloopers here. There were two HUGE accidents during the second show of Clara. One, you might wonder what the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows" were doing during the 2 minutes before Clara was raped, right? Well, Clara's and her dad's microphone didn't work during that song at the second show. She should have sung a counter-melody on top of Beach Boys' melody. So, "God Only Knows" just passed by for 2 minutes without anything happening.Yeah, it wasn't easy to write those polyphonic stuff on top of their gorgeous song, and thanks to the bloody sound technician, it turne to be an epic fail! Luckily someone videotaped a clip from the first show, you can sort of grab my idea here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQMtuiqMVYc .............................................................................................................................................. - Another accident was the old (wo)man who fell off the steps of the police station. It was an accident! It wasn't in the scenario! But Mislam, the actor who fell, improvised that fall brilliantly that it added a touch of humor in this otherwise dark and gloomy show of 1 hour 10 minutes. By the way, this old woman also symbolizes someone who is "different" in our society, just like the Chinese descendants. It was made unclear whether it was a he or she, but we want to accentuate his/her kind heart. Just like the Chinese, everyone who are born different may be born to be hated, although they have a heart just like the rest of us. Sometimes better, even. .............................................................................................................................................. Originally the production was for 1 night only, which is on the 14th of December. But 1 month before the premiere, tickets were selling very well, and so the organizers decided to open another show. Since the 15th happened to be a Monday, not a good day for shows in Jakarta as the city with the most congested traffic in the world, they decided for the 13th. I was against that idea, since I am very superstitious (read my entry http://andystarblogger.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-truth-about-number-121.html ). But look, apparently the accidents happened on the 14th! .............................................................................................................................................. The role of Clara's Father was originally for Nikodemus Lukas, a 19-year-young (perhaps too young to be a daddy) tenor who has sung many of my music and even recorded them for the CD "An Essay on Love", but for personal problems he resigned just a bit less than 3 weeks before the premiere. In the middle of a panic situation, we got Ivan Subuhwanto, a more mature tenor. Fortunately he is also familiar with some of my music, so he knew what he was facing! The poor guy had to learn all my crazy tunes in that short time. He was of course in a panic attack, but he managed to do his job very well, and I am sure that if we perform CLARA again he would excel brilliantly. .............................................................................................................................................. Last but not least, is that the ending of CLARA was concieved 4 days before its premiere! Chendra realized that visually it wasn't stunning enough to have the duet between Clara and her father to end it. So he devised the "Blood Tears" scene that lasts for 2'30" . And of course he asked me without hesitation "Could you please write 2'30" of music tonight so we can rehearse it tomorrow". So after arriving at my appartment at midnight, I had to write music with motifs taken from the post-raping music as the ending, finished at 3.30 a.m just to wake up a few hours later at 8 a.m to rehearse with the singers. If you think this is extreme, then you don't know that Mozart wrote the Overture for his Don Giovanni THE MORNING of the world premiere!

An Essay on Love (and the lack of it)

LOVE is the underlying theme for most of the works in my new CD, En Essay On Love. It is always my favorite theme, since it is the most powerful force in the entire universe. Without this preconceived idea of love, we would be acting like a blind person searching for the light with thousand of obstacles in front of us, although love, or to be precise the unrequited or the lack of it, is often the source of the most intense pain and sufferings in this world. But it is also the most mysterious existing word in our vocabulary. What is Love? I believe, all my music involving this theme is my own search of its meaning, since it could only be "explained" in music since it is too deep to be expressed in words. Like music, we don't understand it, and perhaps we don't need to. We just feel it. And like music, it is merely a product of a chemical reaction inside our brains. As simple as that, but the outcome could become the most complex thing that we humans could deal with. .............................................................................................................................................. The "main course" of this CD is my 3-movement Chamber Symphony no.1 "In Memoriam Ainun Habibie" which is a complex mixture between the brainy scientific issues and the intuitive passion of love. But there are other shorter works to complete this CD. .............................................................................................................................................. I wrote a series of works for wind instruments inspired by "Metamorphosis" by Ovid. Echo's Whisper for oboe & piano is the complementary piece for my work for flute & piano, Narcissus Dying. Ovid's masterpiece, together with Shakespeare's complete plays and Plato's Symposium (also a philosophical research about love) are the three books whose excerpts I always read, no matter how little, every night before I go to sleep. Echo and Narcissus is a tale about the nymph Echo and her human lover Narcissus. In short, the god Juno took away Echo's ability to engage in conversation as punishment for her misdeeds. Echo could only respond to questioning. One day Echo was at a pond which she frequented, when a human man came into view. This is Narcissus, and he instantly falls in love with Echo. But, since Echo can only respond to Narcissus, he begins to get aggravated. She cannot explain to her new lover why she must be so cryptic. Echo could only respond with the last words of whomever she was speaking or listening to. Narcissus then looked into the pond, and upon seeing himself, immediately fell in love. He was unable to control himself or his new "lover", for it was simply a reflection of himself. This was caused by the god Rhamnusia, for Narcissus had scorned the nymphs that had mocked him. Narcissus then began to weep into the pool, and his tears began to hide the reflection he so loved. He said "Goodbye!", and Echo responded to him "Goodbye!". Narcissus then lay down on the ground, and wept. When his friends went to retrieve his body, they found only a flower of white and purple. .............................................................................................................................................. Indonesia has great poets in abundance. In this CD there are 14 songs based on my favorite poems of my favorite poets: Hasan Aspahani, Sapardi Djoko Damono, Sitor Situmorang, Ready Susanto and Nanang Suryadi. Not only the poems inspired me, but also some singers each with their particular voices do too. Nikodemus Lukas Hariono "Nicky", Theodora Amabel Beatrice "Bea" and Widhawan Aryo Pradhita "Dito" are winners from various categories of the National Voice Competition "Tembang Puitik Ananda Sukarlan" 2013, and they won not only for their brilliant technique and virtuosity, but also because they have something to offer in their interpretation of the works they sing, from opera arias to "art-songs", from the baroque or classical up to the music of today. And coincidentally, they were all born and live in the same city, Surabaya. In fact, that city is also present visually in this CD, since the marvellous cover and booklet design and its layout are done by the young and highly talented Ryan Tandya, born in that city too. And the competition mentioned above was initiated and organized by Amadeus Performing Arts of that city. .............................................................................................................................................. Some songs were written purely because the poems itself ignite the music coming from the spaces between the words, some were written inspired by the voice of a particular singer (such as Whitman's O You, Whom I Often and Silently Come, by Nicky's voice), and some triggered a memory or a situation, such as Bibirku Bersujud di Bibirmu which was about the great Aceh Tsunami, or Dalam Sakit which triggered my memories of one of my best friends who died of AIDS. Therefore, when the AIDS Foundation asked me for a song, I immediately remembered this poignant poem by Sapardi Djoko Damono. These songs examine all aspects of love, such as the suffering of the unrequited love, either a heterosexual one in Nanang Suryadi's Seorang Yang Menyimpan Kisahnya Sendiri or a homosexual one in Whitman's "O You", a farewell either in distance in Pria yang (Pergi) Jauh or in death like Dalam Sakit both on poems by Sapardi Djoko Damono, or a highly erotic one in Sitor Situmorang's Surat Kertas Hijau. Of course I also touch on the aspect of happiness that love brings, such as in Salju di Musim Semi (Chendra Panatan) or Jemari Menari (Nanang Suryadi). .............................................................................................................................................. The CD "An Essay on Love" will be launched during the premiere of my newest opera, CLARA, on December 14th, 2014 at Graha Bhakti Budaya, TIM, Jakarta

God Only Knows What I'd Be Without You

Do you believe in coincidence or destiny? That question aroused when I was writing that section in my opera CLARA, exactly when Clara is driving her BMW before she was attacked by the rapists. It was designed to be 3'30" maximum to create the equilibrium with the sections coming before and after. What I knew was that the music should be calm, but tense. You know, like a thriller or horror movie, when things look all right, but something really bad's gonna happen. Since until then I had no slightest idea of what the music should be like (in terms of notes and harmonies), I left it until the last moment. And so, I have finished all the arias, recitatives, everything, and was left with this 3'30" section. And still it was .... blank. Could something be worse than this situation for a composer ... and time is running out? Apparently it could be. .............................................................................................................................................. It was 3 a.m. (Central European Time) and I had my chat with my new friend Ryan Tandya in Jakarta, an excellent photographer whose works I admire a lot. But we mostly talk about other stuff .... like music, as apparently we have some musical tastes in common. I just finished orchestrating the existing materials of the opera for the day but still stuck on that mentioned scene. And Ryan showed me that BBC Music has released a remake of Beach Boys' "God Only Knows", which I haven't heard for ... oh I dunno ... 30 years maybe or more. It used to be my favorite song, my mom had a vinyl of it, and I remember I loved it since it's so weird, and full of polyphony, which is unusual for a pop song (yeah yeah, I love polyphony since the day I remembered! And not only Bach, but also Brian Wilson - The Beach Boys). Apart from the polyphonic element, the song has a sophisticated harmonic complexity. It modulates in a unique way from A major, D major and E major and extensively uses inverted chords. The tonic chord (E major) usually only appears with the major 3rd or the 5th in the bass. The entire verse progression sounds restless and ambiguous, until the line "God only knows what I'd be without you" when the chord progression finally reaches a clear goal (A—E/G#—F#m7—E). It is as if the idea of 'key' has itself been challenged and subverted. Shortly speaking, a work of genius by Brian Wilson. .............................................................................................................................................. I slept afterwards with that song banging in my head like 50 times repeated during our chat (it was at least a 2-hour one), and naturally I woke up the next morn .. I mean noon with that song in my head. And the song was there to stay, for the rest of the day. If you are a fellow composer, then you know this problem too well : an existing piece of music sounding in your head blocks your own music from coming out. But hey, I gotta do something. If something's hanging in your head, you can't take it away by thinking that it should go away, in fact it would cling stronger if you do it that way. It just gotta go away naturally ... but how long? And .. if life gives you lemons ... make lemonade, right? So, since the song itself is full of polyphony, why not put more voices to the song? And then I also realized the fact that I (and perhaps even the writer of the story, Seno Gumira Ajidarma) have forgotten this: in a critical situation such a mass riot, when you are driving a car, what do you do? You listen to the radio to hear the news, right? And radios don't just put news, but also music. And what texts could be more appropriate after Clara's father anxiously called his daughter to stay away from the city? If you should ever leave me / Though life would still go on believe me / The world could show nothing to me / So what good would living do me .............................................................................................................................................. Isn't that what we call the conspiracy of the universe? So I decided to put the old recording of that song, and make the singers (Clara and her father) sing polyphonically. Which is in fact, composing new melodies with Brian Wilson's tune as the cantus firmus (that's the cool -- or nerdy -- term for a melody used as the basis for a polyphonic composition). And guess the duration of the song .... yup, it's 3 minutes. With some modification using loops and cut & pastings, it's the perfect duration. And it gives time for the orchestral musicians to rest while the singers are singing with the recording. Nothing could fit perfectly. Well, well, Ryan. I wanted to kill you that day for showing me that bloody videoclip. But now, it feels like .... God Only Knows What I'd Be Without You, Ryan. Thanks!

Composers' block, 2nd part (an introspection)

If you have so much pain in your heart and soul and you want to heal it, you normally go to a psychologist, psychiatrist or even hypnotherapist. Well now I can tell you another way to vomit it out. Write an opera about the traumatic effect of being raped, AND do it very near the deadline. In that case, you don't have a reason to postpone it until tomorrow or the next day. You just gotta deal with it and vomit it on paper (or in our case nowadays, on those bloody Sibelius staves on the computer). This is what I have done for the last 3 weeks. 22 days, writing my ca. 40-minute CLARA, complete with its orchestration. If you do your maths, that means 2 minutes of music every day, and they are not 2 minutes of simple flute solo music of just 1 line. It's a whole orchestration, PLUS the vocal line, PLUS thinking to match the words to the music PLUS doing the polyphony for the dialogues. Until September I only did 2 arias for Clara's father, and they were not even complete, and neither were they orchestrated. They were even written "under pressure", since there was a concert for a "teaser" for CLARA organized by the Four Seasons Hotel and the National Commission for Violence to Women at the end of September. The whole opera is about 2 things: 1. extreme sufferings and pain, both physical and mental ones, and 2. about evil on earth, the decadence of humanity, how extreme we can inflict pain and sufferings to our own brothers and sisters. .............................................................................................................................................. How could I manage to compose so much in so little time? I dunno. I worked like I've never did before, that's for sure. I slept a maximum of 5 hours a day for the last 3 weeks. And of course I don't write this just to finish it in time, otherwise it makes no point of writing this. "To achieve great things, two things are needed; a plan, and not quite enough time.", said Leonard Bernstein, the great composer, pianist, conductor and my idol. This is the strangest period of my life, I think. Just before this opera, I wrote my Chamber Symphony, "In memoriam Ainun Habibie" and I was in such a happy and loving mood. Love is always my favorite theme, and the look on Mr. Habibie's (Indonesia's 3rd president and the commissioner of the piece) eyes every time he talked about his late wife was enough to inspire anyone. It was also rapidly composed (Í spent the whole June doing it), but it was much easier. Then, a period of about 2 months of almost nothing put down on paper. I was conscious that CLARA should be finished during that uninspired period of crisis, but somehow I couldn't put any note on paper. I knew and always know HOW to compose, but I just couldn't do it. You might think I am a loser, a whiner, a wimp, well perhaps I am. But there is something in composing which is inexplicable. If I CAN do it, why don't I? I dunno the answer, except that what I gotta write is too painful and too true. A composer's block is not about that we cannot compose, but about something else. Feeling stuck sucks, especially for us creative types. Which logically explains why when we are stuck we resist it. We often start to get "tight". Closed off. Frustrated. We suffer. .............................................................................................................................................. Why is that? .............................................................................................................................................. We suffer because we cannot accept this period of non-performance. Our idea of what our lives should look like takes over what our life does look like. We are not looking at reality clearly and not aligned with the whole truth. It makes the entire "not doing" situation even worse because not only are you now uninspired but you are resentful at life for being uninspired. That's a heck of a lot of suckiness! And yes, I did go to a friend who now specializes in hypnosis, and those sessions really helped. It's like finding a key to a locked door. But perhaps, the thing that helped the most is to be brave enough to touch the pain inside me, and let it go out. Hypnotherapy doesn't do that, but what it does is to make you strong and bold enough to do it. So, perhaps being stuck is not that bad. I now even believe that being stuck is a blessing. It forces us to slow down. To try new things. To question our direction. Being uninspired requires us to stop pushing life and start receiving, if we allow it. Just because life is not unfolding the way you want it to unfold does not mean it's not unfolding the way it's supposed to. .............................................................................................................................................. And what lesson can we learn from CLARA ? That the world, that means WE, don't need money and more money for security. What we need is LOVE. Clara (a fictional character, but based on many real individuals) is depicted as a rich girl whose daddy is a successful businessman. In fact, BECAUSE she is rich (and of Chinese descendant), those wild men who are systematically organized by the stronger power suppose that she deserves to be raped and tortured. Those men, the rapists, are even deeply religious people, and that's where the problem is. They are religious, but they forgot that there is God, and God only means love. .............................................................................................................................................. I can't thank enough my dearest friends for all the late night hang outs, the internet chats. No, they are not the sponsors, but I just wanna say that even with billions of funding from sponsors, without these good friends who helped me in times of darkness, CLARA wouldn't have existed. In this case, friendship means much more than money. So thanks to Erza S.T. the ultimate Grand Duchess of the opera (and drama!), to Risti Brophy and T. Marlene Danusutedjo for all the late night talks accompanying the alcohol, to my close friends with golden voices but also shared their time and support Evelyn Merrelita, Nikodemus Lukas, Mariska Setiawan, to my friend and hypnotherapist Willy Haryadi, and my best friend doubling manager doubling choreographer doubling director of the opera Chendra Panatan. One thing I should warn the public here is that CLARA is not a nice and beautiful opera, but it is a brutally honest one. It's even darker and more painful than all those Puccini death-ending operas, coz this is not about death, but about the exact opposite: the highly questionable purpose of life. I never raped anyone, and I have never been raped either. But I have pain in me, and I put it all in this work. I just hope that there is no more pain inside me left after this, so my next musical works would be all sweet, nice and exquisite (wouldn't it be nice?). .............................................................................................................................................. This blog entry was written late at night (in fact it's almost sunrise) after a visit of my friend, the prominent Global & Greatness Coach Michael Thallium (www.michaelthallium.com ), to my house earlier. Through the years he's made lots of documentaries about me, and in one section of the documentary he shot yesterday I talked about composers' block spontaneously (in all documentaries I didn't use any scripts). After he went home, I started to re-think about it, and so I put here all the thoughts I didn't talk about in the video he made. The link to the video is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYXX6Oo_P-U

Pain is Inevitable, Suffering is Optional

There have been quite a few pros and contras about the "teaser" or "preview" on my next opera, CLARA when we performed parts of it last month at the Four Seasons Hotel, Jakarta. Whatever the reaction, it didn't leave people indifferent. The role of Clara's father was sung by the same tenor who will sing it in the premiere next December, Nikodemus Lukas, but the role of CLARA was sung not by Isyana Sarasvati, but by Evelyn Merrelita, who is a bit older than Isyana. Her role at this "teaser" concert wasn't big anyway, and it was done without much acting, and no real costumes and decors, so it was allright. Allright? No, she sang brilliantly, as usual, and so did Niko. We performed 2 arias of Clara's Father : Jangan Pulang (Don't Come Home) and Pesan Papa Terakhir (Dad's last message). The text (by Seno Gumira Ajidarma) is direct, stabbing, and clear. Poetic, but honest and true. In fact, CLARA will be premiered as the closing of the International 16 days against Gender violence, also coinciding with the International Human Rights Day which will also include the Indonesian premiere of that controversial documentary by the Oscar-nominated (for his previous documentary on exactly the theme of violence during the Suharto era) director, Joshua Oppenheimer : The Look of Silence. This film has already been premiered during the Venice Film Festival a few weeks ago. Anyway, about the "contra"s for my opera : some people (especially who went through what happened during the period of the fall of Suharto in May 1998) expressed that my opera will be too painful to them. Not only politically, but also psychologically. Those scars are about to heal, why should we open them up again? .............................................................................................................................................. Do we move on in this life by forgetting the pain of the past? My best friend, the one I always turn to in times of sorrow, always tells me this phrase : Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional. That simple? If it's that simple, why is it so hard? .............................................................................................................................................. I am working hard, very hard in finishing this opera. It's been a difficult period, last August and September. I practically composed next to zero during that period. Now time is running out, apart from the fact that my biggest inspirer is always that thing called "deadline", I suddenly have all the things that could inspire and motivate me to compose : the performance of Evelyn Merrelita and Nikodemus Lukas really boosted something inside me (although Evelyn will not sing in my opera in December. I will, certainly, write another opera involving her, after my comic opera "Laki-laki Sejati" where she took the main role 2 years ago), and also the book "Disangkal" ("Denied") which the National Commission On Violence Against Women gave me as a gift. It is a manifestation of "Homo Homini Lupus", a proof of how low humans could act and inflict sufferings to each other. It is a powerful book, and I now know that I am indeed destined to write these operas to understand more about what happened in the past in my beloved country. You see, in May 98 I was still in my appartment in Den Haag. I didn't have internet back then and since it's never a habit for me to watch the news on TV, I realized what happened only a few days later. I then called my mom in Jakarta, who said that I shouldn't worry since that huge mass riot was systematically and massively organized against people of Chinese descendant. Not only we are Javanese, but also my dad was in the military so my family was just very, very safe. And only a year later when I went to Indonesia I found out that things indeed were much worse than I thought. Hundreds of Chinese weren't just killed; they were tortured, and the women were raped in ways unimaginable. There is a history of anti-Chinese sentiment in Indonesia, but even taking that into consideration, the violence of May 98 was unusually extreme and virulent, attributed to the encouragement of the army and the Suharto regime. .............................................................................................................................................. Friends, we are afraid of ourselves, of our own reality; our feelings most of all. Pain is a feeling. Your feelings are a part of you. Your own reality. If you feel ashamed of them, and hide them, you’re letting society destroy your reality. You should stand up for your right to feel your pain. This is not opening old scars, friends. This is about resisting to forget. To heal, we must forgive, but we cannot forget. This entry I wrote is not about being strong, it's about overcoming our weakness. Whether you were held or beaten, cared for or neglected, happy or sad, or TORTURED AND RAPED, take a moment to remind yourself that we are not defined by what has been done or done to us, but by what we choose to do with the time we have left. Fear should be faced head-on and if we're going to fight it, we should do it in a forum that allows the opportunity to help anyone who can relate to it find the courage to move past the past or reach out to get help to escape a painful present. It is painful, yes it is, but we should turn pain into wisdom, and make sure we do not inflict that pain to others in the future. I believe painful emotions have a self-healing and self-correcting component. When we take advantage of it, we flourish. When we don't, we suffer. So, we choose. That simple? If it's that simple, why is it so hard?

Composers' block ?

I usually write music like an idiot. I just don't think, I just write. As if one is in love: the brain stops working, and one just follow one's instinct or whatever you call it (although I must admit, with this bloody thing called love my instinct has been wrong some times). That's what I do in some inspired days, but those were just days. And then "the well turns dry" as we say, for a short period of time. But the last few weeks have been different. I'm having such a hard time writing this new opera of mine, CLARA (see my previous entries about this opera), and I've been spending time thinking of its reason why instead of the real musical notes. .............................................................................................................................................. For many of us, the hardest part of all is getting started. Sitting down in front of a computer screen or a blank sheet of music paper, rolling up our sleeves, and ...- -and -- .... nothing. But in my case, I have started. I have finished 2 arias, out of 7. But things have come soooooo slowly. In fact, I am not even sure of its formal structure, which I changed from the original story by Seno Gumira Ajidarma. I am doing the flashback technique, which makes it easier to stage, concerning the decoration and make up for the artist. But I still feel something is not right .... I want to compose. We may be facing a deadline that should compel us to write. But instead of feeling motivated or inspired, we grow anxious and frustrated. And those negative feelings can make it even harder to work. That's what we call "writers' block." In my case, it is because the character and expression is too strange, too deep for me. Imagine the feelings of two people that are really alien to me : a corrupt and insensitive policeman, and the feeling of a girl just being raped with nobody to help her. With the Stanislavsky method, it would be very easy : I would just rape a girl, and then I would ask a very strong, bulky and ugly badboy hunk to rape me. I would then know exactly how it feels to be both. But things are not that easy, as you see, eh? So how can I write music that expresses those things which I can't even express, coz I can't, and am afraid to dig deep and feel it? .............................................................................................................................................. If it's any consolation, I know I'm not alone. Many professional writers--of fiction and nonfiction, poetry and prose-- and composers have also had frustrating encounters with the empty page. .............................................................................................................................................. When asked about the most frightening thing he had ever encountered, novelist Ernest Hemingway said, "A blank sheet of paper." And none other than the Master of Terror himself, Stephen King, said that the "scariest moment is always just before you start [writing]. After that, things can only get better." So, that's no consolation for me, coz I have started, in a difficult way but hey, I have started, but things don't get better. And yeah, I started from the "easy" part : writing the arias of Clara's Father. As a father of a young girl myself, I know, feel and have preoccupations of the safety of my daughter. And so, the arias which are featured at the concert of my opera highlights at the Four Seasons Jakarta Hotel next week (25th of September) are all Clara's Father's Arias, sung by Nikodemus Lukas, who will also sing in the opera's premiere. Apart from it, he will sing an aria (the funky one!) from my previous opera, Mendadak Kaya, and soprano Evelyn Merrelita will sing some arias from The Mother, whose Son Was Kidnapped. And perhaps, this entry in my blog wouldn't have existed if I weren't stuck. This is in fact an excuse for me, instead of just gazing at the white music paper, I thought I should share this feeling of being stuck. So, I am pasting some of the quotes about this problem. Hope you enjoy them, and for fellow writers and composers, hope they can console, and even inspire you! At least I'm sort of useful (at least that's my feeling) now. .............................................................................................................................................. "I carry a notebook with me everywhere. But that's only the first step. Ideas are easy. It's the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats." (Sue Grafton) .............................................................................................................................................. "You don't start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it's good stuff, and then gradually you get better at it. That's why I say one of the most valuable traits is persistence." (Octavia Butler) .............................................................................................................................................. "We can't be as good as we'd want to, so the question then becomes, how do we cope with our own badness?" (Nick Hornby) .............................................................................................................................................. "If I waited for perfection, I would never write a word." (Margaret Atwood)

A mathematical mistake in Romeo & Juliet?

Well well, only after the 100th time reading Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet I start to do my mathematics. Here we go : .............................................................................................................................................. The tragic story of Romeo and Juliet took place from Sunday to Thursday. Romeo and Juliet met each other at the party on Sunday night. They married Monday morning. Around noon time Romeo kills Tybalt. Tuesday, Juliet goes to the friar to ask for help. Tuesday evening, Juliet drinks the potion. Wednesday is the day of the discovery of Juliet's fake death, and in the evening, Romeo commits suicide when he believes his wife to be gone. Thursday, Romeo and Juliet dies. .............................................................................................................................................. But think about this: if Juliet takes the potion on Tuesday night, and the potion lasts 42 hours, she will not wake up until Thursday afternoon (in the play that's when Romeo and Juliet's funeral takes place). Therefore, in Act 5, when Friar Laurence says that Juliet will wake up in 3 hours, it is still Wednesday night. You see? It doesn't add up!! .............................................................................................................................................. Can someone, a fellow nerd or a fellow love-sick patient clear this up for me?

Is classical music dead .... for the n-th time?

I dunno how many times I wrote here, for my younger pianists colleagues, that as a performer/artist we gotta be more daring, adventurous and (if it's still possible, hell yeah, why not) original. Of course I looooove all those Beethoven Sonatas etc. etc, but who are coming to listen to those Sonatas performed again and again? Me, yeah, and very few other freaks, but think of the hassle of going out of the house to go to the concert hall. The motivation should be strong enough. Especially in Jakarta, the most jammed city in the world! If not, I just take some CDs of mine and listen to it at home. And c'mon, let's admit it: between the performer and the repertoire, you are coming to a concert for the performer, right? So, when (s)he is a young and beautiful person, do you really care what (s)he is performing? Of course there are other values apart from having a pretty face (if this were the only criteria, I would have given up my career loooong ago), which includes charisma or stage presence, personal friendship or relationship with the artist... and an adventurous programming. There was a recent statement from Martin Engstroem, that highly powerful guy of the record company Deutsche Grammophone (well, no classical record company is that powerful anymore nowadays). I quote his words : "The image is central to the cultural life. When I came to Deutsche Grammophon, my office was A & R, or manager of Artists and Repertoire. But the repertory did not matter to anyone. The artist was what counted; and my job ended up being a big A and a small r because no one buys the symphonies of Beethoven. A CD lasts long, making it unnecessary to replace it. Today people follows the artist. The public wants the last CD of Cecilia Bartoli or Lang Lang, and it matters little what is recorded. The repertoire is secondary." .............................................................................................................................................. And this is not just happening with piano recitals. What, do you think, is the reason of the closing of many symphony orchestras, the continuing problems of the most expensive opera house today which is the Queen Sofia Palau de les Arts in Valencia, and the latest the Metropolitan Opera of New York? Coz they don't get enough public. No, no, I rectify it. They couldn't get enough NEW public. And members of the old audience are leaving. It's not that the public is funding them. It's the sponsors: nobody wants to sponsor events which do not attract public. So, for us who don't have exactly the pretty faces needed, there are other elements which matter when we are performing. But the most important thing is that performers should have interaction with the public with his music. Shortly speaking, he should have sex with the public, not just masturbate alone on stage, performing the works that he likes and imagining that the public would like it too. Programming is not an accumulation of good music on stage. It is a process. Even sex has a process, you can't start with an orgasm. .............................................................................................................................................. But I think we are going in the right track in Indonesia. At least, the classical audience is GROWING, not DIMINISHING, and most importantly, young people go to our concerts. I personally try to think of fresh --which often means not mainstream-- programming, and I do need fresh ideas constantly. And that, my friend, I can only get from the public. So please tweet me, give me ideas of what you wanna hear in concerts! .............................................................................................................................................. That's why I was so delighted when The Juan March Foundation (this is a prominent patron of the arts in Spain, with whom I've been working since my move to Spain in 1998) is programming a series of concerts with the theme of music based on the motif B.A.C.H . Juan March Foundation is also famous for their fresh approach to programming, and inviting prominent artists who care about this aspect ; their latest guests were the American composer John Adams and the conductor-pianist Daniel Barenboim. For the next season they asked me to perform with this program of BACH motif (they have a series of the same theme, there is a concert with string quartet, and other instruments) and also asked me and several other Spanish composers to write new works on this motif. For my concert, I chose my favorite composer, Santiago Lanchares to do a new work which I will premiere together with mine. Of course, the most celebrated piece of music with this motif is Liszt's Fantasy and Fugue on B.A.C.H. But then, browsing on the internet and guided by Miguel Angel Marin, the artistic director of the Foundation, I found tons of other pieces, so I checked some of them . One particular piece which took my breath away was by Rimsky Korsakov: Six Variations on the theme BACH, op. 10 (this opus number doesn't mean it's an early work. Well, he was 34 years when he wrote it, but remember that he was not a "child prodigy" as we normally say it. And he combined his compositional career and teaching with a career in the Russian military). It's just so clever how he uses the BACH theme as the bass line only most of the time. In fact, one don't hear that theme too often. And his harmonies are, well, inventive, striking, you name it. And apparently, after it was premiered and performed several times after it was written in 1878, it was sort of forgotten. There is no record whatsoever that it's been performed outside Europe, so most probably when I perform this in Indonesia it will be the first Asian performance ... after 136 years! I also looove the piano writing : it's clear, transparent and not one note too many. .............................................................................................................................................. I admit, I learned a lot from Rimsky's work in writing my own music music, Fantasy & Fugue on B.A.C.H. My piece turns out to be so different from Rimsky's, but I understood the harmonic wealth and possibilities from that motif. And also I realized how it could be so diatonic, chromatic and atonal at the same time. My piece lasts for about 6 minutes or a bit more, it is quite virtuosic and perhaps it's the most "atonal" sounding of my works till now (apart from some short pieces in Alicia's Piano Books), but I hope its virtuosity would compensate its atonal dissonance, especially the fugue which lasts for just a bit more than 2 minutes. .............................................................................................................................................. The thing is, a piece of music becomes "legendary" because of some mysterious luck (apart from its high quality, of course, but as I said, there are so, so many forgotten masterpieces). Some composers like Taneyev, Paderewski (who used to be the Prime Minister of Poland! And perhaps he was the only example in history of both a good politician AND artist), Respighi and I can name hundreds more of "unplayed" composers which include Rimsky Korsakov just had, and still is having bad luck. So, pianists, start searching! The internet is now your best friend! .............................................................................................................................................. Since the new Titan Center concert hall in Bintaro (South Jakarta) invited me to perform there and taste their nice acoustics, I decided to perform both Rimsky Korsakov's Variations and my own Fantasy and Fugue there. My work will be a first performance, since it hasn't been performed before, although the official World Premiere will be at the Juan March Foundation in Madrid later this year. The concert at Titan Center will take place on September 20th at 7 p.m. There will be some Rapsodia Nusantara pieces too, of course, and my now popular Variations on I. Marzuki's "Rayuan Pulau Kelapa" which is a present "with love" from Rina Zoet to her husband, Daan :)

Robin Williams did NOT die of suicide, and art is sh*t

This entry is one that I wish I wouldn't have needed to write, but I feel that I have the obligation to write it, for many reasons. It's been 1 week since the death of my idol, hero and life-changer, the actor-comedian Robin Williams. He committed suicide, and many have tweeted (especially the religious ones) that he had a choice to end his life, unlike those who died of accidents or illness. The word “suicide” gives many people the impression that “it was his own decision,” or “he chose to die, whereas most people with cancer fight to live.” And, because Depression is still such a misunderstood condition, you can hardly blame people for not really understanding. Just a quick search on Twitter will show how many people have little sympathy for those who commit suicide. .............................................................................................................................................. You know I suffer from Asperger Syndrome. It comes with many "side effects" : feeling lonely in the crowds, strange reactions & feelings to the situation around us, need of isolation, inability to communicate or socialize ... and depression. So, I identify very well what Mr. Williams went through, although his was 10 or even 100 times worse than mine (at the moment anyway). Depression is not a choice of lifestyle. You can’t just “cheer up” with depression, just as you can’t choose not to have cancer. When someone commits suicide as a result of Depression, they die from Depression – an illness that kills millions each year. It is hard to know exactly how many people actually die from Depression each year because the figures and statistics only seem to show how many people die from “suicide” each year (and you don’t necessarily have to suffer Depression to commit suicide, it’s usually just implied). I feel the need to clarify the stigmas that continue to surround it. Perhaps Depression might lose some its “it was his own fault” stigma, if we start focusing on the illness, rather than the symptom. Robin Williams didn’t die from suicide. He died from Depression. It wasn’t his choice to suffer that. And it has to do with "art". Eh? Well, let me tell you about it. .............................................................................................................................................. I consider "art" as our vomit, or our sh*t. Yes, it can be THAT disgusting. We create art because it's something inside us that needs to go out of our body, or our system, otherwise it becomes poison for us. That's why sometimes we can't stand listening to our own music, or see our own paintings. The most beautiful works of art so often were born out of pain and sufferings. And that's why, if you wonder why artists sometimes can be such complex people, we have the necessity to "create art", unlike some "healthy people" who can be happy in life without doing it. It's a way to create balance in us. And I wish more people would understand this: creating art doesn't necessarily means that the artist has so much time and "feel like" doing something, Producing art is not a pastime like filling up crossword puzzles. And sometimes, getting that "art" out of our system is still not enough. I do believe that when we who are gifted with creativity, something is also taken away from us. It is the nature's (or God's, if I may guess) way to create balance. And that's why I think you should be happy if you don't have the necessity to create. Coz you're balanced already. .............................................................................................................................................. Anyway, back to Robin Williams, I am deeply grateful for his role as Professor John Keating in the film "Dead Poets' Society". So sad that RW died the way Neil died in this film. Prof. Keating reminded me the meaning of life: coz we're creatures of human race and we have love. Dead Poets Society has changed my life. I identify so closely with Todd Anderson (played by Ethan Hawke) in that film. He transformed me from that kind of boy I was: afraid, confused and insecure to face the world, but Keating has reminded us, through Walt Whitman's poem, that "we can contribute a verse". And oh my, what a verse that Mr. Williams has contributed to us! Requiescat in Pace, Robin Williams. You have changed the life of at least a boy who was afraid to face his own choice for his life.

In memoriam Peter Sculthorpe, the greatest Australian composer, a friend, an idol

Before anything else, I'd like to say one thing about Peter Sculthorpe: composer, friend, idol, who died last week (August 8). Since he corresponded by email (although he arrived late with this technology), I missed his handwriting. I think he can also be remembered as the composer who had the most beautiful handwriting in the world. I started corresponding with him in the 1990s (still on "written paper"), and his manuscript of Little Passacaglia, the piano piece he wrote and dedicated to me, was still in his handwriting. I have it at home in Spain, if I were there now I would have scanned it and paste it here. I have wanted to write this obituary as an admirer and a friend, but the premiere of my own Chamber Symphony "In memoriam Ainun Habibie" took much of my time (his date of death coincided with the date of my arrival in Indonesia; I received an email from his manager on that date but then I went directly to the rehearsals of mine from the airport), so sorry for this late post. .............................................................................................................................................. Peter Sculthorpe is not "just another composer" for me. He, together with Toru Takemitsu who I also got to know and worked together, was an artist who defined "the classical music of his country", in his case, Australia. Both him and Takemitsu opened up my eyes (I should say ears) that we MUST establish the identity of our nation's classical music by digging deep into our native music ; that's also part of the job of a composer. And for an Australian, it's not an easy job. What is Australian native music? It took him a while to get it into his system. His music has been influenced by all the neighbouring countries' music. He wove Balinese elements into Sun Music III (1967) and Tabuh Tabuhan (1968) and leant towards Japan in Night Pieces (1971) and Koto Music (1973). Such pieces reflected the composer’s prescience that, despite two centuries of British sway, Australia was, geographically if not yet culturally, part of Asia. I then recorded all his piano music up to the year 2006 (he had written a bit more since then) and my CD has been released around that year, as well as Takemitsu's which will be released later this year (2014). In Takemitsu's case, it was really his complete piano music, since I recorded it a few years ago, and he died in 1996. .............................................................................................................................................. Peter Sculthorpe, perhaps Australia's greatest, or at least the most important composer in history, was born in the Invermay, a suburb of Launceston, Tasmania, on April 29, 1929. His mother was from Yorkshire and schooled her young son in a love of English poetry. Guided by the music of Delius, the aspiring composer began to write pastorales and to take long walks through the bush. Simultaneously, however, he grew fascinated by the music performed each week at a nearby Chinese market garden. Anyway, I am not going to write his biography here since you can just google it. But I wanna quote what's perhaps his most powerful sayings. .............................................................................................................................................. “I set out to present my own view, my own vision, of Australia. We don’t think of, say, an Australian painting of Australia by Sidney Nolan as an Australian painting. It’s his view of it and it’s the same with me", he said once in an interview. I met him only twice, and those meetings were in London and in Amsterdam, never in Australia, which is quite weird. Everytime I went to Sydney, he was always abroad. It was during those meetings that I became more and more convinced, that my own Rapsodia Nusantara series for piano are pieces that I was born to write. Some of them are commissioned or sponsored, some I wrote purely out of the blue, some enjoyed tremendous recognition, some were only played by a handful of pianists, but those pieces just gotta be written, I know it. .............................................................................................................................................. Thank you Peter. Not only your music lives forever, but your spirit remains within me. O Captain, my Captain ! Your fearful trip is done, The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize you sought is won (apologies for modifying Walt Whitman's poem). Now you can Rest in Peace.

A new volume of Rapsodia Nusantara, but ....

I haven't had even a 15-minute break since I arrived in Indonesia! Immediately after I landed, we rehearsed my Chamber Symphony no.1 "In memoriam Ainun Habibie", commissioned by the Habibie-Ainun Foundation (see my entries of last month and before). It's been premiered with myself conducting my 10 wonderful musician friends at the residence of Mr. Habibie, Indonesia's third president and we also have recorded it using Mr. President's impressively exquisite library as the studio. Yeah, we were interrupted for about 40 minutes by the sound of the torrential rain, but apart from that, the recording went so well. So, we'll see what we'll do with that recording! Now that the dedicatee of my Rapsodia Nusantara no. 11, the marvellous (and stunningly beautiful too) Argentinian pianist, Natalia Gonzalez Figueroa is going to give its world premiere in Buenos Aires on the 23rd this month, the score of that work has to be published for that date. The issue is, that my manager usually publish my Rapsies in a volume of 5 numbers, therefore there exist already 2 volumes now: no. 1-5 and 6-10. For the moment I've finished composing up till Rapsy 12+1, but I haven't written Rapsy 14 and 15, mostly due to the fact that nobody / institutions have commissioned them. And no time to do it either ... I gotta finish this opera soon! Well, two-thirds of Rapsy 14 is taken from my Chamber Symphony (some parts are adapted into piano plus the original cadenzas for the piano in the 3rd movement), and I could have done it in a few days and without any sponsors (just like my early Rapsodias!), but that still leaves me with Rapsy 15. .............................................................................................................................................. So, Chendra my manager proposed me a solution (he almost always has a solution for everything practical ... not musical ones, but mostly for administrative and executive purposes). He proposed to publish my Variations on Ismail Marzuki's "Rayuan Pulau Kelapa" and on "Silent Night" together with Rapsy 11 in one book. In this case, they are similar : both written based on existing songs / materials, just like Rapsodia Nusantara. I thought it's a fantastic idea, so I add similar pieces, yet to be premiered : Fantasy & Fugue on B.A.C.H (I will blog about this soon, near the premiere) and Fantasy & Passacaglia on "Adeste Fideles". And voila, the book will consist of 5 pieces, just like the volumes I and II of Rapsodia Nusantara! .............................................................................................................................................. The "Adeste Fideles" Fantasy was written during the days when I was "dry" during my first few weeks of writing my opera, CLARA. Clara had a difficult start, since I tried to change the structure of the story into a flashback. Even with the structure carefully planned, I was still feeling insecure even until I already wrote down the first few (even many!) notes. The theme doesn't help either. It's so painful, not the usual "mental" pain as in unrequited love, but a physical one, since it's about rape and death. Everything is so violent, and I have so much fear for violence. I tried to make this opera as a therapeutic method for me to deal with things that I fear so much in me. So, I wrote a variation of the passacaglia every time I dried up or was incapable of writing .... which proved that those days were a lot! "Adeste Fideles" turned into one of the longest pieces for piano that I've written (it lasts around 12-13 minutes). .............................................................................................................................................. The original "Silent Night" is perhaps the only musical work that is remembered from the German composer Franz Xaver Gruber (1787-1863). On the Christmas Eve of 1818, Joseph Mohr, an assistant pastor at St Nicholas, showed Gruber a six-stanza poem he had written in 1816. They were both working in that church at Obendorf, near Salzburg. He asked Gruber to set the poem to music. The church organ had broken down so Gruber produced a melody with guitar arrangement for the poem. The two men sang "Stille Nacht" for the first time at Christmas Mass in St Nicholas Church while Mohr played guitar and the choir repeated the last two lines of each verse. In later years, Gruber composed additional arrangements of the carol for organ and for organ with orchestra, as well as scores of other carols and masses, many of which are still in print and sung today in Austrian churches. .............................................................................................................................................. There are no royalties involved in these two songs, and I have liked the tunes since I remembered, so writing paraphrases on those tunes proved to be really fun. I just hope that they are fun to play as well!

Let's keep the drama ONstage, not OFFstage

Not really much time to rest after finishing my Chamber Symphony. I gotta go back to my opera CLARA that was abandoned due to the writing of Chamber Symphony. Oh, I haven't blogged about that? Well, now I do. It is based on a short but powerful story by Seno Gumira Ajidarma (better known as SGA), the same writer who inspired me to write my previous operas Satria and The Mother, whose son was kidnapped. This opera is commissioned by Pundi Perempuan, an institution to raise and manage funds to support the Women's Crisis Center (WCC) that deals with the issue of violence against women in various regions in Indonesia. So, if you buy a ticket to see this opera, the money goes to the commissioner's foundation, and it will be used for helping the female victims of rape. They commissioned me an opera that deals with that issue and gave me freedom to choose the libretto and soloists, and since Clara is a celebrated Indonesian masterpiece of Indonesian literature that addresses the sexual violence of that period which I have long wished to set to music I immediately accepted their invitation. Apart from that, SGA has always been one of my favorite writer. .............................................................................................................................................. “Clara, or the lady who was raped" was written by SGA during the economic, political and social crisis of May 1998, and published in the wake of Suharto’s resignation. “Clara” is a multi-layered narrative that recounts the perspective of an ethnic Chinese woman who was raped during the anti-Chinese riots and mass rapes that occurred in Jakarta at that period. These riots and sexual violence were orchestrated and facilitated by networks in the security forces that were seeking to destabilise Indonesian society. Throughout the New Order (that's how the Suharto regime is called), Indonesians of Chinese background were frequently scapegoated and marginalised in the grand but fake narrative of what and who made up the Indonesian nation. “Clara” makes a significant contribution to recent Indonesian short fiction, because of the way it shows how the narratives of the victims were both denied and silenced by state law apparatus. The ambivalent attitude of the policeman who listens to Clara’s account of her rape, captures both the hatred and jealousy for the Chinese as well as attraction towards them. I put the long aria of the policeman's feelings in the beginning, with music changing constantly from romantically lyrical to rhythmical (again, Michael Jackson proves to be still very much alive in me). .............................................................................................................................................. Apart from the reason above, the strong reason why I wanted to set CLARA to music is the rape issue which I am pasting here from a recent survey. ................................................................................................................................................. A third of the responders in a survey last year in Great Britain believe that a woman acting "flirty" can be blamed for being raped. And this study are based on a survey into two sexes with equal numbers of each. More than a quarter also believe a woman is responsible to be raped if she was wearing sexy clothes or drunk. Even more women (5%) than men (3%) thought the woman was "totally responsible" for being raped if she was drunk. ................................................................................................................................................ As we know, rape is a criminal act in which the victim often became defendants. An action that is easy to prosecute, but most difficult to prove. What can I say? What can I do? Frankly, nothing. If the whole history of human civilization has still no solution to it, what can I do? The only thing is to bring awareness that rape is not an act which lasts for a few minutes. For the rapist, of course. But for the victim, it is for life. It cannot be cured simply with "Oh it will take a long time to forget but you will" or "Just focus on peace and love from now on, dear, and you'll be able to forgive the rapist". Because you won't. Even if one forgives, she can't forget. And one can write hundreds of operas, make hundreds of films, write hundreds of books, and I doubt that things will change. What I hope from my opera is just that it could be seen by enough people so that it could raise enough money to help the victims of rape, and to keep reminding us what happened during the 1998 uprising. The person behind all that kidnapping and killings, Prabowo Subianto is a very wealthy person who was very close to becoming our president, for goodness sake. He was an abominable megalomaniac, not so much unlike North Korea's Kim Jong Un who wanted to eliminate democracy in Indonesia and declared on BBC that two thirds of Indonesian people are stupid just because we didn't vote for him. This year's election was the first elections that I participated in my whole life, not only because I admire Jokowi (who at last won the elections), but also because I just couldn't stand the idea that my country would be ruled by a ruthless dictator like him. The Prabowo issue is more important for me than the winning of Jokowi ; an admiration to a politician is not enough for me to get my ass up and vote, but if my country would be attacked (even by our own countryman) or is in danger of collapse, I would give any contribution I could to avoid it, no matter how small or insignificant my contribution is. .............................................................................................................................................. CLARA will be premiered this December in Jakarta by winners of the national vocal competition "Tembang Puitik Ananda Sukarlan" 2013: Isyana Sarasvati (Clara), Widhawan Aryo Pradhita (Policeman) and Nikodemus Lukas Hariono (father of Clara), plus a bunch of male supporting actors who act as the rapists of Clara.

My impressions and suggestions, from the last Ananda Sukarlan Award

Now that the Ananda Sukarlan Award Competition is over, and also the elections in our country is too (this is the first time I voted! Not really because I especially admire my candidate, but because the other candidate had promised to banish all democracy in my country if he'd won, by saying that the people wouldn't have to take the hassle of voting anymore. He will rule until the end of his life!. That, plus his very bad track record of kidnappings and killings during the Soeharto era. So, of course I voted the other candidate.) I would write about my impressions from the competition. .............................................................................................................................................. The issue that disturbed me the most is that so many young pianists (read: children) play pieces that were waaaay too difficult for them. Perhaps their teacher or parents thought that it would impress the jury and that we'd give higher marks. WRONG!! We give marks according to how that pianist play. If (s)he plays an easy(er) piece well, then (s)he would receive higher marks than if (s)he'd play a more difficult piece but clearly showing that it is too difficult. I feel sorry for any students when their teacher give them challenging material to "stretch" them. A good example is my Rapsodia Nusantara pieces. Those Rapsies are just too difficult for them who just studied piano for 3 or 4 years! They are definitely not meant for them. Even I sometimes regret writing some bits in those Rapsies, since I gotta study days 'n days to play them smoothly! .............................................................................................................................................. I can't claim that I am a teacher since I have no real students, but personally, I would not assign a piece that the child can't play. Or at least, I don't assign a piece that I expect they won't be able to do well. While there are certain developmental stages, there are always children that are exceptions. But giving a piece which is still (waaay) too difficult also disturbs the natural learning process of a student. .............................................................................................................................................. Another issue was that many participants complained "... but I did it well in the classroom! Why did I mess up?" Well, playing in front of people is sooooo different than playing alone or just for your teacher in the class. So, students should have given the chance to try out his program in front of a small audience. And if possible, no, no, it's always possible and even not difficult nowadays, to record (in audio or better even video). Watch and listen the recording together with your teacher, not only to the interpretation, but also to see if there are any distracting mannerisms or facial expressions. Listening and watching yourself from the outside is a completely different experience than what you perceive from the inside. Follow along with the music like you did with the professional recording and critique yourself. In the stress of the performance, we play what we have programmed ourselves to play, not what we “hoped” would turn out right. And perhaps you'd notice that the first try out, things would turn out rather messy. So, the more try outs you do, the better. No one is ever perfect, but you want the odds to be in your favor. Being able to play through cleanly nine out of ten times is much better odds. .............................................................................................................................................. Performance anxiety is quite a popular issue too. Well, I can't help you with this. It happens to just about everybody, but there are things you can do to help. But if I, suffering from Asperger's Syndrome can overcome it, then I know that YOU can achieve it too. Here are some hints 'n ideas. First, know yourself. If you are naturally shy, more work will be needed in this area. Things that have helped me are: know the piece well enough that I can play it even while I am in a state when I can't focus, or not having had a good night sleep, or other adverse situation. Observe, correct and redirect your negative automatic thoughts, don’t worry, regulate your breathing, use relaxation techniques while waiting to play. It helps to teach students to non-judgmentally notice their random, unproductive thoughts, and learn to gently, but quickly, refocus back on the music. Again, I wanna say to you : stage fright is very, very normal, and even great performers have it. Being unfocused is very normal too. But how to go back to focus is a skill that we all have to, and can learn. .............................................................................................................................................. Certainly there are more issues that I can't remember for now (perhaps I will write another entry about this), but to end this, I would like to advice you to build up calm mental confidence towards the end. In the last few weeks before the performance, switch over from correction to praise mode. Not that you should be less critical, but you should also see the good sides of your playing. Aaaand ... time is running out! Don’t try to make any major adjustments in the last 10 days - two weeks. Focus on expression. Teachers, start pointing out all the things the student is doing right. Remind them of all the careful preparation and hard work they have done, and how ready they are. Bolster a strong sense of internal trust that what they have worked on will be there when they need it. Tell them you believe they are ready and will do well. They need encouragement and support this time, not anymore harsh criticisms! .............................................................................................................................................. OK then, good luck in preparing your next competition, folks! For now, I leave you with the winners of the youngest category of the competition. 2 winners got the First Prize of the Little Elementary category, and coincidentally both are from the same city: Surabaya. They are Hamond Rahardjo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntbAnc2lfvk , and Olivia TS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emDucHXcLtA . Now THEY didn't play pieces which are too hard for them. And listen how they could feel the music inside them. Enjoy !

Official Program Note for Chamber Symphony "In memoriam Ainun Habibie"

This program note is taken from my previous entries in this blog, but with lots of additional informations, and also edited in a more "formal" language. This will be the one to be published in the program books and the CD. .............................................................................................................................................. Program note on Chamber Symphony no. 1 "In memoriam Ainun Habibie" .............................................................................................................................................. My first Chamber Symphony is commissioned by the Ainun-Habibie Foundation, and explicitly requested by Indonesia's third President Prof. Dr. B.J. Habibie himself to be dedicated to the memory of his late wife, Dr. Hasri Ainun Besari. It would be like a monument, but a musical one, not only about her, but also about their eternal love. So basically, it's a symphonic work to immortalize their love, or let's say a highly elaborated, magnified and extensive love song. .............................................................................................................................................. When I met Mr. Habibie accompanied by one of his sons, Ilham, to talk about this, he gave me the memoirs he himself wrote after Mrs. Ainun's passing away, and also the DVD of the film "Habibie - Ainun" which was made by the filmmaker Faozan Rizal. I thought that I would just enjoy the book and the film as an activity apart from my composing, but it turned out that the book (more than the film) played a big role in the music I would later make. Reading about their love life is like reading Romeo and Juliet, but instead of lasting only 5 nights, Ainun - Habibie's last for a lifetime... and beyond. It's just incredible to learn that with them, love stayed intensely beyond physical boundaries, until even after the death of Ainun. .............................................................................................................................................. The work's length is ca. 20 minutes, and is divided into 3 separate movements, for 10 musicians. Why 10? It's because it will be performed in The Habibie's library for its world premiere, on August 11th which is the birth date of Mme. Ainun. When he asked me to do that, I immediately went to the place of its premiere, and so it's tailor-made for the occasion. The instrumentation will be for flute, oboe (doubling english horn), clarinet, piano, percussion, harp, string quartet. Since it has a very reduced instrumentation, all parts are quite virtuosic, so it requires highly trained musicians and needs (for the time being, at least) a conductor, which will be me for the world premiere. When you learn about the instrumentation, you might realize that the loudness of each instruments might be inherently unbalanced with each other, so indeed I am very careful in that. Another request from Mr. Habibie for my chamber symphony was that it would have a Javanese element. I then decided to take the tune from the Javanese folksong, Lir-Ilir, as one of its melodic motifs. The piano part has become so elaborated, especially in the 3rd movement thanks to the inspiration through the rhythmic excitement of Anthony Hartono, winner of the Ananda Sukarlan Award 2014 that a big chunk of it will land into a new Rapsodia Nusantara. So one can say that the Rapsodia (until now I haven't put a number for it) grows from Chamber Symphony, or vice versa. .............................................................................................................................................. The first movement, "Time Dilation", is based on the theory of Einstein : that moving clocks are measured to tick more slowly than an observer's "stationary" clock. Also the theory of simultaneity, that two events, simultaneous for one observer, may not be simultaneous for another observer if the observers are in relative motion. For the opening, I divide the chamber orchestra of 10 people into 5 different groups, playing simultaneously but each playing their own speed. My composing method is in fact inspired, apart from by Einstein's theory, by Sapardi Djoko Damono's line of poem "Yang Fana adalah Waktu" : "memungut detik demi detik, merangkainya seperti bunga, sampai pada suatu hari, kita lupa untuk apa." (plucking seconds, one by one, arranging them like flowers, until one day we forget what for.) But those are not the seconds from just one life, they are seconds from pararel universes. And in the end, those seconds blend together and I hope the listener would forget why were they arranged, juxtaposed and harmonized. .............................................................................................................................................. The second movement is purely a love song. I tried to write it exactly like someone falling in love : I just FALL. I didn't plan the structure, I just let the melody inside me elaborate and develop itself. As I live among the hills and it's a habit for me to take long walks during sunset, I just went out of my house carrying a music paper, and the melody developed by itself during those long walks while I wrote it down. It was scary to do a piece of music like this without any previous plans, but I think it worked out well. I want this to be a contrast to the first movement which is very structured and planned up to the minute details, which reflects Mr. Habibie's immaculate precision as a scientist. I still cannot believe, even until now that the music is finished, that such a scientific person can have such strong romantic emotions at the same time, which I think is contradictive. I could see it in his eyes, when he talked about his late wife when he asked me to write this music. Just with that look in his eyes, I realized that he is a real and genuine human being, not just a president like the other politicians. .............................................................................................................................................. The third movement is the "main course" of this work. It uses the name H.A.B.I.B.I.E (H is the note B in German, and B itself is a B-flat) and A.I.N.U.N translated into musical notes (a method already done and developed by composers since Bach, through Schumann up to Shostakovich, Britten and Bernstein) as the main motif. And all the musical themes of the previous movements, including the concept of time delation are exploited and juxtaposed in this movement, bringing it into a virtuosic ending. Of course with this kind of musical anagrams --or musical sudoku, as I always think fits better with this-- , the composer (nor anybody else) could predict if the turnout would be good. One just experiment until a certain point before we decide to continue, or abandon it. Luckily, HABIBIE and AINUN fits perfectly well with each other, either horizontally (melodic) or vertically (harmonic). .............................................................................................................................................. The point of this piece, in the end, is that everything is relative. Time is not linear and it doesn't pass with the speed and direction according to our perception. Life is like music : it could be very serious if you take it as such, but it can just be a fun game of permutating letters and notes. It can be planned meticulously, or you just let things happen, and both could turn out happily. One thing is real, and it is here to stay: LOVE. And it surpasses the boundaries that we set ourselves, even the physical one. That is perhaps the essence of the poem by Sapardi Djoko Damono : Yang Fana adalah Waktu, Kita Abadi (Time is Transient, We are Eternal) .

Chamber Symphony, continued in Spain

(continued from the previous entry). ... Another request from Mr. Habibie for my chamber symphony was that it would have a Javanese element. I then decided to take the tune from the Javanese folksong, Lir-Ilir. The piano part has become so elaborated thanks to the inspiration through the rhythmic excitement of Anthony Hartono 2 weeks ago at Ananda Sukarlan Award (Jeeezz, it's already almost 2 weeks!) that a big chunk of it will land into a new Rapsodia Nusantara, I think no. 14. So yeah, you can say that Rapsy 14 grows from Chamber Symphony, or vice versa. .............................................................................................................................................. I came back to Spain a few days after the ASA was done. It's a great feeling, I have 2 weeks completely free at home, just to compose. I gotta finish this Chamber Symphony soon, I gave myself the deadline of July the 11th, exactly one month before the premiere so that the musicians could learn their (difficult) soloistic parts, especially Anthony. I know I won't make it, but hey it's always good to be strict with oneself. After the 11th, I've promised myself not to drink any drop of wine until I finish the Chamber Symphony. That would certainly speed up my work ! And then I gotta work on my opera, about a Chinese young girl being raped during the end of Suharto dictatorship era. I started that opera already, but then it was abandoned due to the Chamber Symphony which will be premiered earlier (11th of August). .............................................................................................................................................. On the plane back to Spain, I thought of doing something for the piece, but its structure is too complex, so I decided I would just wanna have some fun. Long time ago I promised a young winner of ASA Junior Piano Competition, Ayunia Indri Saputro, to write her a short piano piece. So I tinkered around her name, AYUNIA to make a motif which appears in the middle section, and it gave me a happy tune. So, this became the first piece written for Alicia's 5th piano book. The piece has a Mozartian lightness, and some polyphonic part when her name appears as such. I couldn't find a title for it (I am not in the mood to find fancy titles nowadays!) so it simply became A.Y.U.N.I.A written on the plane . As is almost a habit of mine with short pieces, I totally forgot about it until this morning I found it on my computer. I tried it on the piano, and it sounded nice, so I immediately sent it to her through her piano teacher, Rosalinawati Iman. And then, I write this blog. I'll make this short then, am in the mood to finish my work. It's raining outside, but it's quite a warm summer day. An ideal day to stay at home 'n compose :) .

A musical "Taj Mahal", or how to immortalize love

Remember my last entry about me being stuck in my big work, and that my piano piece "In the Nick(s) of Time" saved me? Well, I'm gonna talk about it now. What I am writing now is a Chamber Symphony, for 10 instruments. It's commissioned by Prof. Dr. B.J. Habibie, Indonesia's third president and now retired from politics but still very active in the field of technology (he is a brilliant engineer and THE person who made Indonesia's first airplane back in the last century). .............................................................................................................................................. Why a chamber symphony ? Well the commission is a kind of "musical monument" to commemorate Mr. Habibie's late wife who died recently, Mme. Ainun Habibie. The love between them has been legendary, it's been written by Mr. Habibie himself, and even made into a film. So, this is like a commission from Shah Jehan to build Taj Mahal to immortalize his wife. This time, the Taj Mahal is not a building, but a musical one. The title for now is "Chamber Symphony, in memory of Mrs. Ainun Habibie". Mr. Habibie himself explicitly asked me that this should not only be a monument to cherish her memory, but also to cherish the love between them. Therefore, I use my usual method of using names as the main motif of the work : H.A.B.I.B.I.E and A.I.N.U.N . .............................................................................................................................................. Why 10 instruments? It's because it will be performed in The Habibie's library for its world premiere, on August 11th which is the birth date of Mme. Ainun. When he asked me to do that, I immediately went to the place of its premiere, and so it's tailor-made for the occasion. The instrumentation will be for flute, oboe (doubling english horn), clarinet, piano, percussion, harp, string quartet. Since it has a very reduced instrumentation, all parts are quite virtuosic, so it requires highly trained musicians and needs (for the time being, at least) a conductor, which will be me for the world premiere. When you learn about the instrumentation, you might realize that the loudness of each instruments might be inherently unbalanced with each other, so indeed I am very careful in that. The challenge is how to make an illusion of a grand work played by a small group. However, the performance of the winner of Ananda Sukarlan Award Piano competition last week, Anthony Hartono, inspired me a lot, and I will give more prominence to the piano part. Apparently I wasn't the only one who was so impressed with his performance, but the whole audience too. After the announcement of the winner last week, I immediately asked him if he would be available to do that, and luckily he would be. Another thing that inspires me is that Anthony is at the moment very much in love with his girlfriend, so one could feel it in the air during the competition. Together they make such a beautiful couple, that touched me deeply too. .............................................................................................................................................. I did listen to several chamber symphonies before I determine the structure and instrumentation of the work. Mostly the major ones in musical history : Arnold Schoenberg's 2 Chamber Symphonies, and that masterpiece of masterpieces of chamber music: Aaron Copland's "Appalachian Spring" that never fails to amaze me, how the 25 minutes pass by as if it were much shorter. However, I realized that I can't listen to music anymore like a "normal" person listens to music. I am sure people are touched by beautiful melodies and harmonies, but I am touched by the intervals, the permutation of notes and how sections contrast each other. Musical anagrams work hyperactively in my head. I wonder if my Asperger Syndrome has something to do with it. Anyway, I am so immersed writing it, and it's a nice challenge for me to write intricate polyphonies for such a reduced instrumentation, so it's not improbable that there will be a Chamber Symphony no. 2. :)

Beat It, Michael Jackson. (A tribute)

This year marks the 5th year of the death of Michael Jackson. For me he's probably THE musician of the 20th century, together with Igor Stravinsky (Stravinsky wasn't even born in the 20th century) who I admire the most of that fascinating century. He was a symbol of perfection in everything he did. I admire him not only as a musician, but of course as a dancer as well, and he will be long, very long remembered for these 2 fields in his art. If Stravinsky revolutionized classical music, then MJ revolutionized pop music. Both with the elements of the music itself : the melodies (sometimes so simple : like those simple ones in IS's Rite of Spring and MJ's They Don't Care about Us). Still listening to him, I thought it's just appropriate to write a few lines about him in this month, June, of his assasination, 5 years ago. Dr. Conrad Murray, who had been caring for the pop star at the time of his death, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter on November 7, 2011, later receiving a four-year prison sentence. .............................................................................................................................................. I remember the first thing of him that took my breath away was in fact not his music, but something else. Here's the scene: Michael Jackson, dressed in white suit and hat like a gangster guardian angel walks into a bar full of thugs, gamblers, and flappers, the music stops and everyone stares at him; he reaches for a gun - no, it's just a quarter, which he flips all the way across room where it slides perfectly into a jukebox coin slot. The song starts with a synthesized crash: As he came into the window / it was the sound of a crescendo....You've been hit by a Smooth Criminal. Dancing, fighting, dramatic pauses, a weird slow-motion interlude, and more dancing and fighting follow. Then it happened: Michael gives a smile, tilts his hat, and leans. Yes, he LEANS. He leans an amazing, impossible lean. It seems so simple but it's just. so. cool. When I saw it for the first time on screen, it was surely the coolest thing I had ever seen on TV. Later I believe he received a patent for the special device he used to do it. .............................................................................................................................................. But then of course his musical side was the thing that attracted me the most. Those riffs in Billie Jean, Bad and Thriller are just amazing ; they are the predecessors of the rhythms of today's Britney Spears, Lady Gaga and even Shakira. The album "Thriller" alone mixed the dark, serpentine bass and drums and synthesizer approach of "Billie Jean," the grinding Eddie Van Halen guitar solo on "Beat It," and the hiccups and falsettos on "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'." There are until now two works of mine that paid tribute to MJ : one is that short piece Thriller Fugue & Postlude (based on the name "Randy Ryan", my young pianist friend who's now studying at the Juilliard School in New York), and Vivaldi's Winter of Discontent (based on the music of Vivaldi's Winter, and a MJ-ish ostinato bass. In fact that ostinato was made up by myself, but it certainly wouldn't have existed without MJ's music. If you wanna listen to it, here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik1IeZfMRKI ). .............................................................................................................................................. It's been 5 years, but it seems a long time that we have missed a really fresh, innovative and daring kind of music. Rest in Peace, Michael Jackson.

Why open a door if you don't enter?

My friend, pianist Henoch Kristianto is "going 1000 kms/hour" as we say in Spanish. He's sending all the finished tracks for the Vol. 2 of his CD of my piano music to be commented by me. Most of my comments are "no comments" since they were so brilliantly played, but I did correct and commented some bits of his playing. Until now he has recorded 10 of my Rapsodia Nusantara, and around 20 of my shorter pieces, so I can say that in Indonesia he is the pianist who really knows my music the most, with all its quirkiness, idiosyncracies and vulnerabilities. .............................................................................................................................................. But today was special, because he sent a recording of my piece that I've almost already forgotten, In the Nick(s) of Time. That piece was an experiment, it was published in Alicia's First Piano Book from 2009, but in fact written much earlier, in the late 1990s. It was done according to Einstein's theory of time dilation that moving clocks are measured to tick more slowly than an observer's "stationary" clock. Also the theory of simultaneity, that two events, simultaneous for one observer, may not be simultaneous for another observer if the observers are in relative motion. So I wrote a piece about tickings, all in different speed. It's quite difficult to play especially with only 2 hands. This particular piano piece is short, and I must say though interesting to listen, it is quite unmusical. Afterwards I forgot about it, mostly due to its "unmusical" content. It's like I found the key to a door, opened it, but never entered. Now after about 20 years later listening to it again as a different person already more mature (hopefully) musically, stylistically and technically, I think I can use it now for musical purposes. In fact, I've been stuck for quite a while with a long piece for chamber orchestra, and I guess this is the key to its structure. .............................................................................................................................................. Other pieces that will be included in "Ananda Sukarlan : Rapsodia Nusantara and various shorter piano works, Volume 2" among others are some Lullabies (for James J. Neeman son of good pianist friends Edward & Stephanie Neeman, for the 3 young pianist brothers Hamond, Hansel & Hagen and for Arnell daughter of another pianist friend, Kaka the 5-year-young son of Lusi my friend), two pieces for friends Johan Djayanto and Lina Chan, and some popular pieces like Little Variations and Slow Waltz. Oh yes, and 1 minute for Japan, that piece I wrote immediately in the train in Spain while watching the news of the tsunami in Japan in 2011. Jeeezzz, it was already 3 years ago. .............................................................................................................................................. And Henoch even managed to record my brand new piece, the 9-minute Variations on I. Marzuki's "Rayuan Pulau Kelapa". Check my entry earlier in March, titled "Inspired". I am very grateful that this piece is bought by Rina Zoet, to be donated to our Indonesian Classical Music Foundation, for free education for underpriviliged children. Therefore you can read the dedication : "Aan Daan, mijn lief, van Rina" (to Daan, my love, from Rina) above the title. This CD is planned to be released around the date of Ananda Sukarlan Award Competition at the end of June. It's less than 1 year since Henoch released the volume 1 of my works. He said he wants to release at least 1 CD per year. OMG, that means lots of work for me too!