Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta David del Puerto. Mostrar todas las entradas
Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta David del Puerto. Mostrar todas las entradas
lunes, 7 de octubre de 2013
Dedication
Now that Henoch Kristianto's CD of my piano music is released, not only with 6 of my Rapsies but also with my other pieces each dedicated to someone, most compliments that I got are not only how good they are performed, but how lucky are those people who received dedications of my pieces. Well, perhaps some of them are. This issue brings me back many years ago, and I almost forgot about it. When I was in the beginning of my career, it was very important for me to receive a dedication from prominent composers. And of course one can't go around pulling the composer's shirts shouting "dedicate a piece to me pleeeaazzze", it just gotta come from the composer himself, or if you are rich, you can commission a composer to write one for you, like all those royal families in the past or the Medici family, or patrons of the arts have been doing. Or you can commission a composer to write something ABOUT and FOR your loved ones. The process is exactly the same as asking a painter to paint a portrait of yourself or your love ones. ............................................................................................................................................ Playing "my" pieces written by them indeed boosted the number of audience, my reputation and therefore my career. The audience are sick of the same Beethovens n Chopins in concerts and they always welcome new GOOD pieces of music. Many of those pieces dedicated to me are a kind of "portrait" of the characteristic of my playing which the composers see in me and not in other pianists, and that I somehow inspired them to do it. Therefore, I can mention pieces by European composers which sound pretty "Indonesian" because of, and written for me, such as "Many Returns to Bali" by Per Norgaard (Denmark), Little Passacaglia by Peter Sculthorpe (Australia), Alio Modo by David del Puerto, Kecak Sonata by Jesus Rueda, and even that celebrated hyper-virtuosic piece Anandamania by Santiago Lanchares and many others. I am indeed grateful that I have contributed something to the development of modern pianistic techniques. Of course as a pianist those dedications come with a (huge) responsibility, since it is my task to introduce those pieces to the audience, otherwise it won't mean anything to have them. Those pieces were then accepted by other pianists who later perform them, but the birth of the piece, and how it gives the first impression, is very important and I am responsible for it. Of course the attraction of the pieces play a major role in its popularity ; the hyper-virtuosic and noisy Anandamania was so much high in demand that I've played it, usually together with the Ligeti Etudes, in more than 100 concerts and not only in Spain or even Europe. That piece alone, breaks the record of my most frequently performed piece, even more than my own ones (writing this, I now wonder if I ever played it in Indonesia). Some of those composers then wrote more pieces of music for me either for professional reasons or just as a "token of gratitude", and somehow I became "identified" with their piano music and received contracts to record their complete piano music on CD. Ah, some of them were so sweet to write (sometimes more than) a few notes dedicated to my daughter, Alicia Pirena, knowing that she used to play the piano too. Needless to say, it wasn't written for her virtuosity, but just an act of love. Usually those composers did it because they have spent some time at our home in Cantabria so they got to know her too. ............................................................................................................................................
But some of my "dedication" pieces are written not for musicians, but purely out of friendship or gratitude. Even if they are for musicians, it can be for just as simple as that, not for professional purposes. You see, I hate going to department stores, let alone shopping malls to buy presents for birthdays or weddings, and I prefer staying in bed writing music. If I give someone my music, there are some advantages for both of us: 1. usually that person knows, and likes, my music, so (s)he would like my present. 2. Now don't say that I am not spending anything. I do spend my time, and time is money. But with music, spending doesn't mean losing, and we both receive, since I don't lose anything. My time writing it usually gives me pleasure, or even therapeutic for my Tourette/Asperger syndrome when it's concurrent. 3. That "present" hopefully will be beneficial not to the receiver, but to other people, coz if it turns out to be nice it will be played by many others, therefore it is a good material either for educational or concert purposes. It is in fact a tradition in Europe to do it, perhaps the most celebrated is Edward Elgar's Enigma Variations, where each movement is dedicated, in his own words to "my friends pictured within", each variation being an affectionate portrayal of one of his circle of close acquaintances. Leonard Bernstein wrote his charming short piano pieces "Anniversaries", with each bearing a simple title "For ...", filling the blank with the name of the (nick)name of the dedicatee. In fact, it is those pieces which triggered me to do those "musical cards" which at the moment sums up to around 40+ short pieces. And 4. now it's helping to save the earth, since a musical score doesn't have to be printed on paper anymore, although poco a poco I am including them in my "Alicia's Piano Books". ............................................................................................................................................
If I write for someone, usually something in that person triggered me to write, although there are a few cases that I found a manuscript I wrote ages ago, and decided I'd dedicate it to someone, sometimes for some random reasons. And if I get the character of the piece formed in my head, I would need a concrete material for it to be developed, and usually I use their names/initials to make a motif. But hey, it doesn't have to be that way. It could be the subject of our conversation, or the place or situation where we had our chat. And I don't care who is that person, as long as (s)he means something for me. A good friend, or someone who's been kind to me. Instead of sending flowers after a dinner invitation, I could just write a musical card, if something we talked during dinner could inspire me. That piece of music usually is a record, or musical photograph of what was happening around the writing process. And if I want to express something so deep that words are not able to do, well, music is always the best means to do it. Music is so powerful to express things that can't be done in words, and mostly it's about the pain so intense inside. And in writing music for and about someone, usually I realize more things about myself in that piece. That's why the act of composing can be so scary, sometimes. Sometimes. ............................................................................................................................................
Ah yes, I am also playing some of those "dedicatorial pieces" in my concert next October 20th. Still not sure which ones, though. I am doing a survey through twitter about which are the favorite ones. You can tweet me at @anandasukarlan ... just let me know which ones you like me to do in the concert. If more people want the piece, certainly I'll play it/them. More info about the concert, and ticket reservations, please contact my manager Chendra at 0818 891038 or ycep@yahoo.com 
martes, 1 de marzo de 2011
A cat has nine lives, composers do too. But not more.
I start enjoying myself preparing programs for my radio show, Eric & Ananda Classical Eve. Since next Monday (March 7th) will be the birthday of my favorite composer Maurice Ravel, I tweeted and asked which favorite piece of Ravel should I broadcast. It turned out to be unnecessary, since we all know what it is. Hundreds of replies through twitter vote for: BOLERO! ....
... which led to another composer who I knew & worked with, the late Russian Jew Alfred Schnittke. The reason was because he parodied "Bolero" in part of his music for the film "Meister und Margarita". And that led to another topic, a conversation I had with him in one of the dinners we had back in 1993. He talked about "the curse of the 9th symphony" ; he was at that time writing his 6th. "I have 3 more to go", he said, and when I asked why, "well, noone except 'that guy' survived to write a 10th". I must keep "that guy" a secret for now, since I will reveal his name in my radio show next Sunday and tell you that in fact the curse wasn't broken at all by "that guy". Someone did die from his 9th symphony. It was from Schnittke that I learned for the first time about that particular curse, that nobody could survive further than writing 9 symphonies. Since then I lost contact with Mr. Schnittke, partly because he was already weak (he had 2 strokes in the previous years) and of course partly since communication was not that easy then as it is now, with emails. So it was my last contact with him. I performed under his supervision, by the way, his amazing Piano Quintet dedicated in memory of his mother.
Now the greatest composer of all time (at least according to me) Gustav Mahler was so afraid of this curse, that he took every way he could to NOT write a 9th after he finished his 8th. He wrote "A symphony for tenor, alto and orchestra" which is called "Das Lied von der Erde" (The song of the earth) in 6 big (when Gus said big, he meant REALLY big. The 6th and last movement "Der Abschied" alone lasts for half an hour, almost as long as the total of the 5 preceding movements) movements. He thought he could get away with it. Therefore he wrote his real 9th afterwards, and ...yes you guessed it right. He died when he started writing his 10th. He finished one movement of the 10th, by the way, but it was just one farewell too many. He succumbed to the curse : a composer should leave the earth with his 9th symphony. Just like Beethoven, Schubert, Bruckner, Dvorak, and more after him: Ralph Vaughan Williams (he died when he just started to write his 9th, therefore his "official" number was just 8), Alexander Glazounov, Roger Sessions and of course .... Alfred Schnittke (1934-1998). I think there are more names. I remember I had goosebumps when I learned Schnittke's death, especially because I talked with his publisher a few days after, asking what he was composing when he got the fatal stroke and died a few days later. He had the same fate as Vaughan Williams.
RIP, maestro Schnittke. I'll never forget our meeting, our working together and of course your great music.
This entry I dedicate to my good friends, Spain's most prominent composers of symphonies today David del Puerto and Jesus Rueda. Both of them, in their late 40s (Jesus Rueda will celebrate his 50th this year) had written 3 great symphonies. May they be granted long and productive musical lives !
... which led to another composer who I knew & worked with, the late Russian Jew Alfred Schnittke. The reason was because he parodied "Bolero" in part of his music for the film "Meister und Margarita". And that led to another topic, a conversation I had with him in one of the dinners we had back in 1993. He talked about "the curse of the 9th symphony" ; he was at that time writing his 6th. "I have 3 more to go", he said, and when I asked why, "well, noone except 'that guy' survived to write a 10th". I must keep "that guy" a secret for now, since I will reveal his name in my radio show next Sunday and tell you that in fact the curse wasn't broken at all by "that guy". Someone did die from his 9th symphony. It was from Schnittke that I learned for the first time about that particular curse, that nobody could survive further than writing 9 symphonies. Since then I lost contact with Mr. Schnittke, partly because he was already weak (he had 2 strokes in the previous years) and of course partly since communication was not that easy then as it is now, with emails. So it was my last contact with him. I performed under his supervision, by the way, his amazing Piano Quintet dedicated in memory of his mother.
Now the greatest composer of all time (at least according to me) Gustav Mahler was so afraid of this curse, that he took every way he could to NOT write a 9th after he finished his 8th. He wrote "A symphony for tenor, alto and orchestra" which is called "Das Lied von der Erde" (The song of the earth) in 6 big (when Gus said big, he meant REALLY big. The 6th and last movement "Der Abschied" alone lasts for half an hour, almost as long as the total of the 5 preceding movements) movements. He thought he could get away with it. Therefore he wrote his real 9th afterwards, and ...yes you guessed it right. He died when he started writing his 10th. He finished one movement of the 10th, by the way, but it was just one farewell too many. He succumbed to the curse : a composer should leave the earth with his 9th symphony. Just like Beethoven, Schubert, Bruckner, Dvorak, and more after him: Ralph Vaughan Williams (he died when he just started to write his 9th, therefore his "official" number was just 8), Alexander Glazounov, Roger Sessions and of course .... Alfred Schnittke (1934-1998). I think there are more names. I remember I had goosebumps when I learned Schnittke's death, especially because I talked with his publisher a few days after, asking what he was composing when he got the fatal stroke and died a few days later. He had the same fate as Vaughan Williams.
RIP, maestro Schnittke. I'll never forget our meeting, our working together and of course your great music.
This entry I dedicate to my good friends, Spain's most prominent composers of symphonies today David del Puerto and Jesus Rueda. Both of them, in their late 40s (Jesus Rueda will celebrate his 50th this year) had written 3 great symphonies. May they be granted long and productive musical lives !
jueves, 10 de febrero de 2011
Some clarifications on the Jakarta Globe article
Yesterday an article, based on an interview with me, was published at The Jakarta Globe, a leading English newspaper in Indonesia. There are a couple of things which I'd like to clarify & rectify, but first, here is a copy-paste of the article, by Juliwati Cokromulio .
‘Limitation is always a source of inspiration for me. In limitation, I find freedom,’ says Ananda Sukarlan. Powerful words from a powerful pianist. Ananda may be based in Europe, but that doesn’t mean his heart isn’t in Jakarta. The 42-year-old has used the money he’s earned over the years, coupled with his talent and experience, to bring the children of the city a chance they might not otherwise have had. His foundation provides scholarships to Indonesians accepted to music schools in Europe, and here in the city it is teaching children how to play their favorite instruments. That’s music to our ears.
What can you tell us about being a musician in Spain? Can you compare it to Jakarta?
Spain is a huge country that hosts a lot of great music performances, making it quite easy to survive as a performing artist.
The same cannot be said of Jakarta. It’s rare that a person can survive here as a musician. Frankly speaking, when I’m in Europe I’m earning money, and when I’m in Indonesia I’m losing money.
Yet you keep coming back on a regular basis.
I recently established a foundation called Yayasan Music Sastra Indonesia to provide scholarships to poor students who want to learn how to play music. I come from a poor family and had a difficult time getting a scholarship, so I know what it’s like. I thought it would be great if I could get a number of sponsors, including myself, to support children here in Indonesia.
We particularly want to help kids below 10 years old who are passionate about music — such as street children — but don’t have the funds to go to the next level.
We didn’t start the foundation with the aim of turning kids into professional musicians, but we wanted to at least introduce them to music so it becomes part of their lives. We hope to increase their awareness and creativity, and reduce the odds that they’ll turn to crime.
The foundation also assists young musicians who have been admitted to conservatories in Europe but can’t afford the fees. YMSI provides financial aid for the first few months.
How do you help kids in Jakarta who want to play music?
We provide teachers, lend the kids musical instruments and assign a mentor to conduct an evaluation every six months. Most of them are beginners and we get them to start off with classics by the likes of Beethoven or Mozart. It’s not that we expect them to become classical musicians, but classical music creates a strong foundation on which to build technical skills.
How many children have participated in the foundation’s activities?
We’ve only be around since 2009. Right now there are two children funded abroad, in Germany and the Netherlands, and about 20 street children in the education program funded by the foundation.
Is it tough to run a foundation in Jakarta?
We spend the majority of our time fund-raising. If we weren’t always busy trying to make money we would be more productive. In Europe, foundations are supported by the government so long as the financial reports are transparent. The people’s taxes filter down to the foundations and organizations. In Indonesia, we never really find out where our taxes go, and the government isn’t exactly bent on developing a music culture.
Have you had any firsthand experience working with the government to promote music?
I’ll give you an example of a case of poor management of funds here in Jakarta. The government awarded Rp 4 billion [$450,000] to DKJ [Dewan Kesenian Jakarta, or the Jakarta Arts Council] in November 2010 and the money was spent by December 2010.
I’ve attended concerts under their management, and more than half of the seats are usually empty. They fail to promote events properly and often end up giving tickets away for free.
In my opinion, audiences should pay for their own seats even if that means keeping ticket prices low. This will tell Jakartans that to enjoy art you have got to pay.
Often, audiences do not respect a performance given for free and walk in and out of the auditorium during the performance. Free tickets achieve nothing in the end.
OK, switching gears, you also work with disabled children.
YMSI now has a sister foundation in Spain for disabled children. The foundation consists of composers who write music for disabled children and provide special instruments. For instance, piano music for the left hand only, a piano without pedals, French horn music written to be played only with the left hand and Braille musical notes for the blind. I’m among those composers. ‘Just a Minute!’ is a piece I wrote to be played with just the left hand.
How does a Twitter user like yourself relate technology with music?
Twitter is powerful. I use it to announce coming events. From an artistic point of view, I am inspired by a writer from Makassar, Aan Mansyur, who writes poems on Twitter using less than 140 characters. That inspired me to write a piece entitled ‘Re-tweeting @aanmansyur.’ It only took 10 minutes.
The essence of the piece is about how to express something clearly and quickly — for me in a space of just 10 minutes — for him in less than 140 characters.
--------
So, I'd like to talk about 2 things: The foundation in Spain for disabled children, and my piece "Retweeting @aanmansyur".
The foundation in Spain does NOT consist of composers. The foundation (called Fundacion Musica Abierta, or Open Music Foundation) commissions composers (most of them Spanish, such as Santiago Lanchares, David del Puerto or myself, if you consider me a Spanish composer hehehe ..) to write music for disabled children. Of course there are existing pieces for, say, left hand alone such as Ravel or Prokofiev's Concerto for left hand piano, but there are no, until this date, easy pieces for left hand alone or other disabled musicians. So that's what the foundation is contributing to the repertoire.
And about my piece, "Retweeting @aanmansyur", its duration is 10 minutes because the music consists of several tweets! You might wonder, what can one do with ONE tweet of 140 characters! I think there were 7 or 8 tweets of Aan Mansyur, I don't remember anymore. Anyway, it's not been premiered yet, since we are waiting for the winner of the Ananda Sukarlan Vocal Award in Surabaya next April to premiere it.
‘Limitation is always a source of inspiration for me. In limitation, I find freedom,’ says Ananda Sukarlan. Powerful words from a powerful pianist. Ananda may be based in Europe, but that doesn’t mean his heart isn’t in Jakarta. The 42-year-old has used the money he’s earned over the years, coupled with his talent and experience, to bring the children of the city a chance they might not otherwise have had. His foundation provides scholarships to Indonesians accepted to music schools in Europe, and here in the city it is teaching children how to play their favorite instruments. That’s music to our ears.
What can you tell us about being a musician in Spain? Can you compare it to Jakarta?
Spain is a huge country that hosts a lot of great music performances, making it quite easy to survive as a performing artist.
The same cannot be said of Jakarta. It’s rare that a person can survive here as a musician. Frankly speaking, when I’m in Europe I’m earning money, and when I’m in Indonesia I’m losing money.
Yet you keep coming back on a regular basis.
I recently established a foundation called Yayasan Music Sastra Indonesia to provide scholarships to poor students who want to learn how to play music. I come from a poor family and had a difficult time getting a scholarship, so I know what it’s like. I thought it would be great if I could get a number of sponsors, including myself, to support children here in Indonesia.
We particularly want to help kids below 10 years old who are passionate about music — such as street children — but don’t have the funds to go to the next level.
We didn’t start the foundation with the aim of turning kids into professional musicians, but we wanted to at least introduce them to music so it becomes part of their lives. We hope to increase their awareness and creativity, and reduce the odds that they’ll turn to crime.
The foundation also assists young musicians who have been admitted to conservatories in Europe but can’t afford the fees. YMSI provides financial aid for the first few months.
How do you help kids in Jakarta who want to play music?
We provide teachers, lend the kids musical instruments and assign a mentor to conduct an evaluation every six months. Most of them are beginners and we get them to start off with classics by the likes of Beethoven or Mozart. It’s not that we expect them to become classical musicians, but classical music creates a strong foundation on which to build technical skills.
How many children have participated in the foundation’s activities?
We’ve only be around since 2009. Right now there are two children funded abroad, in Germany and the Netherlands, and about 20 street children in the education program funded by the foundation.
Is it tough to run a foundation in Jakarta?
We spend the majority of our time fund-raising. If we weren’t always busy trying to make money we would be more productive. In Europe, foundations are supported by the government so long as the financial reports are transparent. The people’s taxes filter down to the foundations and organizations. In Indonesia, we never really find out where our taxes go, and the government isn’t exactly bent on developing a music culture.
Have you had any firsthand experience working with the government to promote music?
I’ll give you an example of a case of poor management of funds here in Jakarta. The government awarded Rp 4 billion [$450,000] to DKJ [Dewan Kesenian Jakarta, or the Jakarta Arts Council] in November 2010 and the money was spent by December 2010.
I’ve attended concerts under their management, and more than half of the seats are usually empty. They fail to promote events properly and often end up giving tickets away for free.
In my opinion, audiences should pay for their own seats even if that means keeping ticket prices low. This will tell Jakartans that to enjoy art you have got to pay.
Often, audiences do not respect a performance given for free and walk in and out of the auditorium during the performance. Free tickets achieve nothing in the end.
OK, switching gears, you also work with disabled children.
YMSI now has a sister foundation in Spain for disabled children. The foundation consists of composers who write music for disabled children and provide special instruments. For instance, piano music for the left hand only, a piano without pedals, French horn music written to be played only with the left hand and Braille musical notes for the blind. I’m among those composers. ‘Just a Minute!’ is a piece I wrote to be played with just the left hand.
How does a Twitter user like yourself relate technology with music?
Twitter is powerful. I use it to announce coming events. From an artistic point of view, I am inspired by a writer from Makassar, Aan Mansyur, who writes poems on Twitter using less than 140 characters. That inspired me to write a piece entitled ‘Re-tweeting @aanmansyur.’ It only took 10 minutes.
The essence of the piece is about how to express something clearly and quickly — for me in a space of just 10 minutes — for him in less than 140 characters.
--------
So, I'd like to talk about 2 things: The foundation in Spain for disabled children, and my piece "Retweeting @aanmansyur".
The foundation in Spain does NOT consist of composers. The foundation (called Fundacion Musica Abierta, or Open Music Foundation) commissions composers (most of them Spanish, such as Santiago Lanchares, David del Puerto or myself, if you consider me a Spanish composer hehehe ..) to write music for disabled children. Of course there are existing pieces for, say, left hand alone such as Ravel or Prokofiev's Concerto for left hand piano, but there are no, until this date, easy pieces for left hand alone or other disabled musicians. So that's what the foundation is contributing to the repertoire.
And about my piece, "Retweeting @aanmansyur", its duration is 10 minutes because the music consists of several tweets! You might wonder, what can one do with ONE tweet of 140 characters! I think there were 7 or 8 tweets of Aan Mansyur, I don't remember anymore. Anyway, it's not been premiered yet, since we are waiting for the winner of the Ananda Sukarlan Vocal Award in Surabaya next April to premiere it.
jueves, 30 de septiembre de 2010
Vega and Altair (again)
Vega and Altair is approaching the end of its creative process. The more I am immersed in it deeply the more I am attracted to the combination of instruments : 1 plucked strings, 2 bowed stings and one flute. I must say I did miss at some points my favorite string instrument : the viola. So there are a couple of lyrical passages where the cello was playing the role of the viola, uttering warmly in its register. I just adore Debussy's Trio for flute, viola and harp and hope I can write for that kinda trio someday. It's not a perfect combination of instruments, but Debussy made it perfect.
One funny thing communicating with Katryna the harpist is the terminology of "1960s style". I then realized that Singapore, in spite of its developed economic situation, is just like Indonesia or other Asian countries. You see, the Europeans now use the term "1960s" for that crazy avant-garde music, which in fact is now practically non-existing (at least in the "real" world of music, though still in small "ghettos" of "artists"). What I mean non-existing is that nobody writes that kind of thing now, and the works from that period are very seldomly performed, only in educational concerts where we want to hear "history", not real music. While in a few countries in Asia (Singapore I guess is excluded) at this moment we are still in awe with the aleatoric and heavily serialistic (what's the diff? They both sound the same, eh) music of John Cage and Stockhausen are considered the hippest thing around. Yes, those crazy stuff from the ... 1960s! It is still, as I heard, existing in the academic world in the USA, and composers of the faculties of music there still write that kinda thing. So in spite of this "global communication" bla bla bla, the artistic perceptions are still very different, and even the time machine is not working for this. Oh and I heard from Chendra, the choreographer I always work with, that that "1960s" style in dance is called "post-modern". Well that's totally nuts. What was the modern one, then?? While in music, "postmodernism" is labelled to those kind of music that has surpassed the "1960s" stuff. You know, Arvo Part, John Rutter, Peter Sculthorpe, David del Puerto are "postmodern". I guess my music can be labelled with that too. In short, European music is living in a postmodern period where styles are all mixed.
Talking about dance, I also think very intensely in terms of choreography while writing music, including Vega & Altair. Certainly it's Chendra's influence that I tend to connect my music with dance. I read somewhere that at some point of his life Stravinsky also had the same attitude, due to his continuous collaboration and conversations with Diaghilev. And I tell you, it has helped me a lot, like in the section where the 7 angels descended from the sky to bath in the lake. Inevitably I had to think of 7 different characters, so I had to invent my own description of each of them. I then used the 4 temperaments (were they invented by the Greek physicist Hippocrates?) of sanguinic, phlegmatic, melancholic and choleric. I still needed three more, and of course one of them is simply "the most beautiful of them all" since she is the one who the cowherd fall in love with.
The total duration of "Vega and Altair" is about 20 minutes of music, but as the musicians move around in the end (again, it is my choreographic thoughts that constructed the music based on space) plus the rests between the movements it might last more than that. The number 7 is also the base of many things : at several points I am using a 7-note scale (4 of which are 4 notes of the pentatonic scale I use in other sections, so those 2 scales can interact smoothly with those 4 notes acting as a "bridge"). Sometimes I use it as a tone-row and work with the Schoenbergian method with it. It is also in 7 movements : Prelude, The 7 Angels, Stealing for Love, Vega & Altair's Love Song (only for flute & harp), The Wrath of the Queen (or the Creation of the Celestial River? I haven't made up my mind with the title. Anyway, it's for the 2 string instruments and harp; the flute doesn't play here since it doesn't fit with the dark character of this movement), The Lyre of the Lonely Lovers (for harp solo) and the Epilogue.
One funny thing communicating with Katryna the harpist is the terminology of "1960s style". I then realized that Singapore, in spite of its developed economic situation, is just like Indonesia or other Asian countries. You see, the Europeans now use the term "1960s" for that crazy avant-garde music, which in fact is now practically non-existing (at least in the "real" world of music, though still in small "ghettos" of "artists"). What I mean non-existing is that nobody writes that kind of thing now, and the works from that period are very seldomly performed, only in educational concerts where we want to hear "history", not real music. While in a few countries in Asia (Singapore I guess is excluded) at this moment we are still in awe with the aleatoric and heavily serialistic (what's the diff? They both sound the same, eh) music of John Cage and Stockhausen are considered the hippest thing around. Yes, those crazy stuff from the ... 1960s! It is still, as I heard, existing in the academic world in the USA, and composers of the faculties of music there still write that kinda thing. So in spite of this "global communication" bla bla bla, the artistic perceptions are still very different, and even the time machine is not working for this. Oh and I heard from Chendra, the choreographer I always work with, that that "1960s" style in dance is called "post-modern". Well that's totally nuts. What was the modern one, then?? While in music, "postmodernism" is labelled to those kind of music that has surpassed the "1960s" stuff. You know, Arvo Part, John Rutter, Peter Sculthorpe, David del Puerto are "postmodern". I guess my music can be labelled with that too. In short, European music is living in a postmodern period where styles are all mixed.
Talking about dance, I also think very intensely in terms of choreography while writing music, including Vega & Altair. Certainly it's Chendra's influence that I tend to connect my music with dance. I read somewhere that at some point of his life Stravinsky also had the same attitude, due to his continuous collaboration and conversations with Diaghilev. And I tell you, it has helped me a lot, like in the section where the 7 angels descended from the sky to bath in the lake. Inevitably I had to think of 7 different characters, so I had to invent my own description of each of them. I then used the 4 temperaments (were they invented by the Greek physicist Hippocrates?) of sanguinic, phlegmatic, melancholic and choleric. I still needed three more, and of course one of them is simply "the most beautiful of them all" since she is the one who the cowherd fall in love with.
The total duration of "Vega and Altair" is about 20 minutes of music, but as the musicians move around in the end (again, it is my choreographic thoughts that constructed the music based on space) plus the rests between the movements it might last more than that. The number 7 is also the base of many things : at several points I am using a 7-note scale (4 of which are 4 notes of the pentatonic scale I use in other sections, so those 2 scales can interact smoothly with those 4 notes acting as a "bridge"). Sometimes I use it as a tone-row and work with the Schoenbergian method with it. It is also in 7 movements : Prelude, The 7 Angels, Stealing for Love, Vega & Altair's Love Song (only for flute & harp), The Wrath of the Queen (or the Creation of the Celestial River? I haven't made up my mind with the title. Anyway, it's for the 2 string instruments and harp; the flute doesn't play here since it doesn't fit with the dark character of this movement), The Lyre of the Lonely Lovers (for harp solo) and the Epilogue.
miércoles, 23 de enero de 2008
Alio Modo, new CD
Just came out ! This is my new CD with the complete piano works of David del Puerto (Spain's National Music Award 2005, Spain's most prominent composer and .... one of my best friends!). But not only that. In this CD one can listen to all his works for accordion as well, played by Spain's greatest accordionist, Angel Luis Castaño, who has brought his instrument into a higher level. Why this combination ? Well, some reasons : 1. Because David del Puerto's piano works only add up to about 35 minutes of music, so the accordion works (which add up to about 30 minutes) is a nice couple for the CD. 2 . Because there is one piece in this CD that is for piano AND accordion. "Diario" was written for us, and this is one of the very few pieces in the world that are originally written for the duo of these instruments. And from those very few, I dare to say that for me this piece is the best of all of them. Just check out how Del Puerto exploits the resources of each instruments, and how he combines them, and all those exciting rhythms ... ah, it's such a delight to play, and even more exciting to listen to !
It's in all the CD shops in Europe that sells classical music CDs (or through it's distributor, www.diverdi.com) , and in Jakarta you can find it in the 3rd floor of Alun Alun, Grand Indonesia, or just ask my manager Chendra Panatan (ycep@yahoo.com or 0818 891038) how to get it .
Does this sound like commercials ? Yes, but two things that differentiate this from other commercials. 1. I don't receive money from the sellings ( I got paid in advance !) , and 2. I do this because I am so proud of this CD. David del Puerto is Spain's valuable national asset and am also proud to have something to do with his music, especially "Alio Modo" which is now considered a masterpiece of Spanish piano music of this century.
viernes, 31 de agosto de 2007
In memory of the victims of Bali terrorist attack, 12-10-02
In 2003 and 2004, I gave a series of concerts in Australia, New Zealand, Europe and Scandinavian countries dedicated to the victims of this barbaric event. I wrote this article back then. Next November I will perform some of these pieces in Brisbane, Queensland, and so I retrieved this article I wrote for those concerts. This will be revised for Brisbane, and the original was as follows :
"Abashed the devil stood,And felt how awful goodness is." (John Milton, "Paradise Lost")
Unlike the previous centuries, literature music in the present day belong to the whole world ; the Mozarts and Beethovens of today live and create in every part of the world and are not concentrated in a few countries in West Europe. There is also a much wider range of expression, and much more influences to be absorbed and adapted to the musical language of each composer. Technology make it easy to listen and see, for example, a Maori dance in a living room in Scotland, and if that Scottish guy wants to see it again, he will just have to press a button. News travel faster than ever, and one can learn what had happened ten thousand miles away in just a few minutes difference, getting almost the same impact as those who were present at ground zero.Two powerful elements which contradict AND compliment each other are present in this concert ; both can be defined in just one place and one date : Bali, 12 October 2002. Before that date, Bali only meant one thing : paradise, and all that it embodies : peace, beauty and harmony. On the late evening of that date, a group of irresponsible, intolerant and ignorant terrorists brought hell to this paradise island, and therefore with all its components : evil, violence, ugliness, chaos, hate and horror. Afterwards, never before in history of mankind that a place could be perfectly associated with those two elements of good and evil. Naturally this event moved the emotion of the hypersensitive artists around the world. It brings horror, but it also serves as a catalyst for inspiration. Composers around the world now turn to the lost beauty of Bali and its culture, and with their own unique expressions, integrate it to their musical works which expresses their deep feelings far beyond anguish, anger and fear. Today we present only a few selected pieces created with that intense and traumatic memory and dedicated to the memory of the innocent victims of terrorism by the world's best composers, created not only as a manifestation of their repulsion against terrorism, but also as a wish to heal the pain and sorrow. And to heal, only our love, generosity and friendship could do.
"The excellence of every art is its intensity, capable of making all disagreeables evaporate, from their being in close relationship with beauty and truth." (John Keats)
If I have to mention a part of the world which produces the most interesting, new, honest and exciting literature music, it will certainly be Australia and New Zealand in one extreme, and Spain in the other extreme. Spain has a unique history in the 20th-century music literature : its composers were so deeply rooted in traditional music that it took decades for the next generation to free themselves from this idiom. The death of Manuel de Falla in 1946 practically left Spain a vacuum in musical creation. There were certain talented mavericks such as Federico Mompou who was completely alone writing such intimate, introverted exquisite little pieces which were totally opposed to the nature of the fiery Latin temperament, the Les Six-influenced Xavier Montsalvatge, and the younger Anton Garcia Abril (b.1933) who looks back to the tonal possibilities or Gonzalo de Olavide (b.1934) who has been living in Switzerland and looks at the atonalists around him. But the real resurrection of Spanish music arrived just around the turn of the millenium, when suddenly a group of highly energetic, prolific, sharp and smart composers emerged bringing to an end of this uncertainty. Unlike their older generation who searched inside themselves for an identity, this new generation opened up and absorbed all what is around them like a sponge. Each of them is highly individual and none of their music could be easily pigeonholed, which baffled the musicologists (especially the Spanish ones who were still shocked !), most of them still doubting how to label their music. Some of the composers, although equally interesting, are not represented in this particular concert, such as Polo Vallejo, who is one of the world's most prominent etnomusicologist in African music ; too prominent that we sometimes forget his other side of being an accomplished composer who naturally integrated his deep knowledge of African rhythms and melodies into his characteristic music. In fact, it was Vallejo who introduced African music to David del Puerto (b. 1964). Del Puerto's tightly constructed rhythms owes a lot to his studies of the intricate and refined changing pulses of African music, which makes his music -- added with his unique and rigorous treatment of mosaic forms -- so exciting, both defining and defying gravity. His masterpieces include a Violin Concerto (1998) and a string quartet, while his "Alio Modo" will be extended into a full-range concerto for piano and orchestra called "Nusantara" to be premiered in 2005 which, listening to the 6-minute Alio Modo, promises to be another masterpiece. Jesus Rueda (1961) is certainly an incurable romantic but also the most radical in this generation. Some of his works employs instruments such as gasoline tanks or gongs dipped in and out the water, but he is too musical to let these gimmicks to be just pure gimmicks ; on the contrary, they serve to open a new world of sonic expression integrated into his deeply thought and moving masterpieces such as his three symphonies. His contribution for the pianistic literature is invaluable, and he certainly is one of the most important composer for this instrument of this last few decades with highly expressive and innovative works among others two sonatas and 24 interludes as well as many pieces written for young pianists, skillfully written with his lush and luscious harmonies.Santiago Lanchares (b. 1952) is the oldest of this generation. Born 6 years after the death of de Falla, Lanchares is comfortably integrated to this new generation since he is a late-beginner in composition ; his first works --which immediately gave a huge impact-- dated from 1985. Unlike Del Puerto or Rueda who already has a huge output in his late 30s, Lanchares works slowly and continuously revises his older works ; being hypersensitive to all what happens around him, his music absorbs a variety of influences without being ecclectic. His meticulosity manifest itself in the size of his best works : they are either short in duration or compact in instrumentation, such as the 7-minute "hommage to the Arabian culture" Maqam for 11 string instruments which was written in 1991 with a strong impact by the Gulf War, "Remembering Ma Yuan" for solo clarinet and electronics or the hyperactive and supercomplex Anandamania which, immediately after the sensational premiere, was selected for the UNESCO Rostrum of Composers.
Australia and New Zealand have the (dis?)advantage of being far away from everywhere, and practically they "go their own way". That's why such different and fresh kind of music have been and is still created there. Most of the victims of the 12/10 attack were Australians and New Zealanders, which provoked a strong reaction to the artists to honour their countrymen. Being very close to Indonesia, they have always turned to gamelan music for source of inspiration. Some of them : Gareth Farr, Jack Body from New Zealand and the Australians Betty Beath and Peter Sculthorpe have been deeply influenced all their lives by gamelan music, and they have studied gamelan profoundly and even have lived for short terms in Indonesia. Peter Sculthorpe (b. 1939) is considered as the first Australian composer who received worldwide fame and the first who could be defined as the composer writing Australian music, which is very much connected with Asian and Aboriginal music. His involvement with Balinese music is not limited to the gamelan ; his 8th string quartet, for example, employed ostinato patterns taken from a recording of Balinese women pounding rice. He was highly respected as a composition teacher as well, whose student include Barry Conyngham (b.1944), an equally prolific and highly respected composer who has also studied in Japan with Toru Takemitsu. It was in Japan that he wrote his most striking music : Ice Carving, for solo violin and four string orchestras, or Water ... Footsteps ... Time, for 4 amplified soloists and two orchestras. He once stated in the fascinating book of interviews "Composer to Composer" by fellow composer Andrew Ford : "I was committed to the notion by then [in the 1970s] of there being such a thing as Australian music. I got this from Peter [Sculthorpe] of course, and it meant far more than simply writing music in Australia -- it implied a music which consciously occupied itself with things that are unique to the country. ... I also came up with the idea that isolation and loneliness could be seen as a kind of metaphor for being Australian".Born in 1957 in Uzbekistan, Elena Kats-Chernin emigrated to Australia at the age of 18 and entered the NSW Conservatory, and in 1980 she moved to Germany and stayed there for 13 years, returning to Australia in 1994. Her music is characterized by chiseled rhythmic pulsation reminiscent of Stravinsky / Prokofiev and the bittersweet melodic / harmonic language of Kurt Weill ; some modernism adds an occasional dash of vinegar. She is highly renowned for her stage works, among others two operas Iphis (1997) and Matricide, the musical (1998).Jack Body (b. 1944) has always been highly regarded for his two double careers : as a composer and as a professor in Wellington University who has produced practically all the most interesting and stylistically highly diverse younger composers in NZ who have now equally achieve worldwide recognition of their own : from the rock and techno influenced John Psathas with his incredibly energetic, funky and well-crafted pieces, as well as the Buddhist / Zen influenced Ross James Carey (b. 1968) who now lives in Canada, and Michael Norris (b. 1973) who has found his own abstract, intricate, refined and expressive voice already in his young age. Jack Body's most moving work is perhaps the piano piece Sarajevo of 1991. In honoring the 12/10 victims, he collaborates with the Balinese composer I Wayan Gde Yudane in creating the piece, and Yudane himself plays gamelan with me in this piece. Gareth Farr (b. 1968) is certainly the most flamboyant of all : not only he is famous for his brilliant, elegant, attractive and exuberant orchestral works, he also performs singing, dancing and playing percussion (he was for many years percussionist of the NZ Symphony Orchestra, which explains the strong presence of percussive elements in his greatest works) as his alter-ego Lilith Lacroix, the highly seductive queen of the South Sea.
Nancy v.d Vate's music goes back to lyricism and modality though with still-not-so-traditional harmonies, although she too has been very much in the forefront of avantgardism in the 1960s and 1970s. Born in the USA, she is a highly prolific composer of operas and other stage works, although her output also includes many splendid orchestral, choral and instrumental works. An inveterate traveller as well, her music reflects a wide variety of influences of world cultures, especially Indonesia where she lived in the 1980s, during which her invaluable contribution to the (very) young local musicians including me was not only letting us discover the excitement of 20th century music but also to light the spark of enthusiasm and love for music. Her greatest works are many times strongly related to the world events that provoked their creation, such as the impressive Chernobyl or Krakow Concerto.
John McLeod (b. 1944) is the only Scottish representative in this program. He has, for the last few years, very much influenced by Asian music in general, perhaps due to his constant travels to Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia and other Asian countries, and his idiom has developed into a unique kind of music which no man has heard before. Therefore, his master-pieces dated from the last few years : "The Chronicle of Saint Machar" for SATB and children choir, baritone solo and orchestra (1999), Symphonies of Stone and Water - a virtuosic concerto for piano accompanied by a highly original scoring of 3 saxophones, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones and percussion (2000) as well as a multi-media work for solo percussionist, electroacustic tape and film projection entitled The Temple of Ten Thousand Buddhas.
Ananda Sukarlan, Sept 2003
"Abashed the devil stood,And felt how awful goodness is." (John Milton, "Paradise Lost")
Unlike the previous centuries, literature music in the present day belong to the whole world ; the Mozarts and Beethovens of today live and create in every part of the world and are not concentrated in a few countries in West Europe. There is also a much wider range of expression, and much more influences to be absorbed and adapted to the musical language of each composer. Technology make it easy to listen and see, for example, a Maori dance in a living room in Scotland, and if that Scottish guy wants to see it again, he will just have to press a button. News travel faster than ever, and one can learn what had happened ten thousand miles away in just a few minutes difference, getting almost the same impact as those who were present at ground zero.Two powerful elements which contradict AND compliment each other are present in this concert ; both can be defined in just one place and one date : Bali, 12 October 2002. Before that date, Bali only meant one thing : paradise, and all that it embodies : peace, beauty and harmony. On the late evening of that date, a group of irresponsible, intolerant and ignorant terrorists brought hell to this paradise island, and therefore with all its components : evil, violence, ugliness, chaos, hate and horror. Afterwards, never before in history of mankind that a place could be perfectly associated with those two elements of good and evil. Naturally this event moved the emotion of the hypersensitive artists around the world. It brings horror, but it also serves as a catalyst for inspiration. Composers around the world now turn to the lost beauty of Bali and its culture, and with their own unique expressions, integrate it to their musical works which expresses their deep feelings far beyond anguish, anger and fear. Today we present only a few selected pieces created with that intense and traumatic memory and dedicated to the memory of the innocent victims of terrorism by the world's best composers, created not only as a manifestation of their repulsion against terrorism, but also as a wish to heal the pain and sorrow. And to heal, only our love, generosity and friendship could do.
"The excellence of every art is its intensity, capable of making all disagreeables evaporate, from their being in close relationship with beauty and truth." (John Keats)
If I have to mention a part of the world which produces the most interesting, new, honest and exciting literature music, it will certainly be Australia and New Zealand in one extreme, and Spain in the other extreme. Spain has a unique history in the 20th-century music literature : its composers were so deeply rooted in traditional music that it took decades for the next generation to free themselves from this idiom. The death of Manuel de Falla in 1946 practically left Spain a vacuum in musical creation. There were certain talented mavericks such as Federico Mompou who was completely alone writing such intimate, introverted exquisite little pieces which were totally opposed to the nature of the fiery Latin temperament, the Les Six-influenced Xavier Montsalvatge, and the younger Anton Garcia Abril (b.1933) who looks back to the tonal possibilities or Gonzalo de Olavide (b.1934) who has been living in Switzerland and looks at the atonalists around him. But the real resurrection of Spanish music arrived just around the turn of the millenium, when suddenly a group of highly energetic, prolific, sharp and smart composers emerged bringing to an end of this uncertainty. Unlike their older generation who searched inside themselves for an identity, this new generation opened up and absorbed all what is around them like a sponge. Each of them is highly individual and none of their music could be easily pigeonholed, which baffled the musicologists (especially the Spanish ones who were still shocked !), most of them still doubting how to label their music. Some of the composers, although equally interesting, are not represented in this particular concert, such as Polo Vallejo, who is one of the world's most prominent etnomusicologist in African music ; too prominent that we sometimes forget his other side of being an accomplished composer who naturally integrated his deep knowledge of African rhythms and melodies into his characteristic music. In fact, it was Vallejo who introduced African music to David del Puerto (b. 1964). Del Puerto's tightly constructed rhythms owes a lot to his studies of the intricate and refined changing pulses of African music, which makes his music -- added with his unique and rigorous treatment of mosaic forms -- so exciting, both defining and defying gravity. His masterpieces include a Violin Concerto (1998) and a string quartet, while his "Alio Modo" will be extended into a full-range concerto for piano and orchestra called "Nusantara" to be premiered in 2005 which, listening to the 6-minute Alio Modo, promises to be another masterpiece. Jesus Rueda (1961) is certainly an incurable romantic but also the most radical in this generation. Some of his works employs instruments such as gasoline tanks or gongs dipped in and out the water, but he is too musical to let these gimmicks to be just pure gimmicks ; on the contrary, they serve to open a new world of sonic expression integrated into his deeply thought and moving masterpieces such as his three symphonies. His contribution for the pianistic literature is invaluable, and he certainly is one of the most important composer for this instrument of this last few decades with highly expressive and innovative works among others two sonatas and 24 interludes as well as many pieces written for young pianists, skillfully written with his lush and luscious harmonies.Santiago Lanchares (b. 1952) is the oldest of this generation. Born 6 years after the death of de Falla, Lanchares is comfortably integrated to this new generation since he is a late-beginner in composition ; his first works --which immediately gave a huge impact-- dated from 1985. Unlike Del Puerto or Rueda who already has a huge output in his late 30s, Lanchares works slowly and continuously revises his older works ; being hypersensitive to all what happens around him, his music absorbs a variety of influences without being ecclectic. His meticulosity manifest itself in the size of his best works : they are either short in duration or compact in instrumentation, such as the 7-minute "hommage to the Arabian culture" Maqam for 11 string instruments which was written in 1991 with a strong impact by the Gulf War, "Remembering Ma Yuan" for solo clarinet and electronics or the hyperactive and supercomplex Anandamania which, immediately after the sensational premiere, was selected for the UNESCO Rostrum of Composers.
Australia and New Zealand have the (dis?)advantage of being far away from everywhere, and practically they "go their own way". That's why such different and fresh kind of music have been and is still created there. Most of the victims of the 12/10 attack were Australians and New Zealanders, which provoked a strong reaction to the artists to honour their countrymen. Being very close to Indonesia, they have always turned to gamelan music for source of inspiration. Some of them : Gareth Farr, Jack Body from New Zealand and the Australians Betty Beath and Peter Sculthorpe have been deeply influenced all their lives by gamelan music, and they have studied gamelan profoundly and even have lived for short terms in Indonesia. Peter Sculthorpe (b. 1939) is considered as the first Australian composer who received worldwide fame and the first who could be defined as the composer writing Australian music, which is very much connected with Asian and Aboriginal music. His involvement with Balinese music is not limited to the gamelan ; his 8th string quartet, for example, employed ostinato patterns taken from a recording of Balinese women pounding rice. He was highly respected as a composition teacher as well, whose student include Barry Conyngham (b.1944), an equally prolific and highly respected composer who has also studied in Japan with Toru Takemitsu. It was in Japan that he wrote his most striking music : Ice Carving, for solo violin and four string orchestras, or Water ... Footsteps ... Time, for 4 amplified soloists and two orchestras. He once stated in the fascinating book of interviews "Composer to Composer" by fellow composer Andrew Ford : "I was committed to the notion by then [in the 1970s] of there being such a thing as Australian music. I got this from Peter [Sculthorpe] of course, and it meant far more than simply writing music in Australia -- it implied a music which consciously occupied itself with things that are unique to the country. ... I also came up with the idea that isolation and loneliness could be seen as a kind of metaphor for being Australian".Born in 1957 in Uzbekistan, Elena Kats-Chernin emigrated to Australia at the age of 18 and entered the NSW Conservatory, and in 1980 she moved to Germany and stayed there for 13 years, returning to Australia in 1994. Her music is characterized by chiseled rhythmic pulsation reminiscent of Stravinsky / Prokofiev and the bittersweet melodic / harmonic language of Kurt Weill ; some modernism adds an occasional dash of vinegar. She is highly renowned for her stage works, among others two operas Iphis (1997) and Matricide, the musical (1998).Jack Body (b. 1944) has always been highly regarded for his two double careers : as a composer and as a professor in Wellington University who has produced practically all the most interesting and stylistically highly diverse younger composers in NZ who have now equally achieve worldwide recognition of their own : from the rock and techno influenced John Psathas with his incredibly energetic, funky and well-crafted pieces, as well as the Buddhist / Zen influenced Ross James Carey (b. 1968) who now lives in Canada, and Michael Norris (b. 1973) who has found his own abstract, intricate, refined and expressive voice already in his young age. Jack Body's most moving work is perhaps the piano piece Sarajevo of 1991. In honoring the 12/10 victims, he collaborates with the Balinese composer I Wayan Gde Yudane in creating the piece, and Yudane himself plays gamelan with me in this piece. Gareth Farr (b. 1968) is certainly the most flamboyant of all : not only he is famous for his brilliant, elegant, attractive and exuberant orchestral works, he also performs singing, dancing and playing percussion (he was for many years percussionist of the NZ Symphony Orchestra, which explains the strong presence of percussive elements in his greatest works) as his alter-ego Lilith Lacroix, the highly seductive queen of the South Sea.
Nancy v.d Vate's music goes back to lyricism and modality though with still-not-so-traditional harmonies, although she too has been very much in the forefront of avantgardism in the 1960s and 1970s. Born in the USA, she is a highly prolific composer of operas and other stage works, although her output also includes many splendid orchestral, choral and instrumental works. An inveterate traveller as well, her music reflects a wide variety of influences of world cultures, especially Indonesia where she lived in the 1980s, during which her invaluable contribution to the (very) young local musicians including me was not only letting us discover the excitement of 20th century music but also to light the spark of enthusiasm and love for music. Her greatest works are many times strongly related to the world events that provoked their creation, such as the impressive Chernobyl or Krakow Concerto.
John McLeod (b. 1944) is the only Scottish representative in this program. He has, for the last few years, very much influenced by Asian music in general, perhaps due to his constant travels to Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia and other Asian countries, and his idiom has developed into a unique kind of music which no man has heard before. Therefore, his master-pieces dated from the last few years : "The Chronicle of Saint Machar" for SATB and children choir, baritone solo and orchestra (1999), Symphonies of Stone and Water - a virtuosic concerto for piano accompanied by a highly original scoring of 3 saxophones, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones and percussion (2000) as well as a multi-media work for solo percussionist, electroacustic tape and film projection entitled The Temple of Ten Thousand Buddhas.
Ananda Sukarlan, Sept 2003
domingo, 29 de abril de 2007
Happy Birthday, David del Puerto
Tomorrow the 30th is the birthday of my friend and one of the most prominent Spanish composer of today, David del Puerto. This previous week has been indeed a "Del Puerto week" : our CD of his Second Symphony "Nusantara" and Violin Concerto has at last arrived in the Spanish shops ; I performed many of his piano pieces at the Spanish Residence (a historical place where Ravel, Stravinsky and others had stayed and presented their works when they were alive) last Thursday, and on Friday his ethereal, dark and deeply moving orchestral work "Variations in memory of Gonzalo de Olavide" was succesfully premiered, and repeated during the next two days. I could only go to the general rehearsal in the morning previous to the concert since I had to leave back home after lunch, but it was already excellently played by a young promising and highly talented conductor with whom we went out for lunch afterwards, Pablo Gonzalez. And he is very very nice as well, so he has a double merit ! The orchestra, by the way, was Orquesta Nacional de España who sounded brilliant under his baton, who I also heard with Beethoven's Second , to end the program.
I have known David for more than 12 years now. During those years our collaboration has given birth to many piano and chamber works, and culminated (but hopefully won't be the last !) in his masterpiece "Nusantara" for piano and orchestra. Now "Nusantara" has been hailed as "the great Spanish symphony", but I consider it as THE great Indonesian symphony as well, since it deals with many issues and even musical material from my country. It is rather ironic, isn't it, that the first symphony in history dealing with Indonesia is written by a Spanish composer ?
We both are a big fan of Death in Venice (both Thomas Mann's novel and Benjamin Britten's opera), and we took these photos during the Italian premiere of "Nusantara" in Teatro La Fenice, Venice last October 2006. That was the hotel where Mann was inspired to write his masterpiece ( it was David who told me that Tadzio was inspired by a real boy bathing at the beach right in front of the hotel) and also where Diaghliev died in one of its room. And we visited the tomb of our other idol, Igor the greatest, at the memorable Isola di San Marco. During this visit, David was inspired to write his Third Symphony, which he is writing now. Hopefully another masterpiece from the 43-year-young great composer.
lunes, 23 de abril de 2007
Orchestral spring
There has been a lot of world premieres of orchestral pieces here in Spain during this month, and I heard that they are very exciting. I haven't heard any of them (spent too much here among the hills writing my own music !), but hope to listen to them when the Radio Clasica broadcast them in a few weeks time.
The first was Apertura by Santiago Lanchares. The title, meaning "Opening" refers to the commissioner, which is the new Auditorium of Music in Valladolid to house the Orquesta Sinfonica de Castilla y Leon. The conductor was the Columbian Alejandro Posada
Then there was Hyperion II by Jesus Rueda, also commissioned by the same orchestra mentioned above and done by the same conductor. Jesus Rueda's "Tierra" ("Earth") will be premiered by the Orquesta Sinfonica de Sevilla next month with Pedro Halffter conducting. This piece, hopefully, will compliment the missing planet of Gustav Holst's "The Planets", although naturally the musical language of both composers are very different.
And in 3 days I hope to hear David del Puerto's Variaciones en memoriam de Gonzalo De Olavide , played by the Orquesta Nacional de España in Madrid. Also next month is the premiere of Santiago Lanchares' 3 episodes from Castor & Pollux, by the Orquesta de la Comunidad de Madrid, conducted by the woman conductor Gloria Isabel Ramos .
Here in Spain we are back in the period like in the 1950s, where everybody was excited to hear the new things of Britten, Shostakovich and Stravinsky. And another war is going on, unfortunately -- although not in Spain, but Spain is very much involved --, and not a cold one. But musically speaking, we are so lucky to have our brilliant composers hanging around here, writing brilliant masterpieces to be enjoyed equally as we enjoyed music by dead composers. And orchestras and musicians being enthusiastic in playing them, and those composers having lots of fans of their music.
Now, who said that the orchestra is a thing of the past ?? C'mon, get serious.
The first was Apertura by Santiago Lanchares. The title, meaning "Opening" refers to the commissioner, which is the new Auditorium of Music in Valladolid to house the Orquesta Sinfonica de Castilla y Leon. The conductor was the Columbian Alejandro Posada
Then there was Hyperion II by Jesus Rueda, also commissioned by the same orchestra mentioned above and done by the same conductor. Jesus Rueda's "Tierra" ("Earth") will be premiered by the Orquesta Sinfonica de Sevilla next month with Pedro Halffter conducting. This piece, hopefully, will compliment the missing planet of Gustav Holst's "The Planets", although naturally the musical language of both composers are very different.
And in 3 days I hope to hear David del Puerto's Variaciones en memoriam de Gonzalo De Olavide , played by the Orquesta Nacional de España in Madrid. Also next month is the premiere of Santiago Lanchares' 3 episodes from Castor & Pollux, by the Orquesta de la Comunidad de Madrid, conducted by the woman conductor Gloria Isabel Ramos .
Here in Spain we are back in the period like in the 1950s, where everybody was excited to hear the new things of Britten, Shostakovich and Stravinsky. And another war is going on, unfortunately -- although not in Spain, but Spain is very much involved --, and not a cold one. But musically speaking, we are so lucky to have our brilliant composers hanging around here, writing brilliant masterpieces to be enjoyed equally as we enjoyed music by dead composers. And orchestras and musicians being enthusiastic in playing them, and those composers having lots of fans of their music.
Now, who said that the orchestra is a thing of the past ?? C'mon, get serious.
sábado, 14 de abril de 2007
You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile.
That's what Borg always says. They are the no.1 enemy of any living being, member of the Federation of Planets. Even Captain Jean Luc Picard was once captured and assimilated by them. Assimilation is very powerful.
But I want to talk about gamelan music. What Debussy did, what Britten did, what Geoffrey King did and the most recent, David del Puerto. Our new CD of his Symphony no. 2 "Nusantara", by the way, is doing quite well in Italy, but it hasn't arrived at the Spanish CD shops ! Just yesterday David got a phone call from Juan Lucas, director of the Spanish distributor Diverdi, who has received the CDs from Milan and was absolutely, crazily, madly IN LOVE with his Symphony. David del Puerto will be featured in the next month's magazine of Diverdi, and they will start distributing them very soon. Anyway, it can be purchased at www.stradivarius.it .
Like the Borg (no plural, please. They are one.), assimilation is always done to "improve the life quality". Britten was stuck, you see, when he wrote his great ballet Prince of the Pagodas. In the middle of the (un-)creative process he travelled to Indonesia with Peter Pears, heard gamelan and then discovered how he should continue with the piece. Well, Debussy, David del Puerto and Geoffrey King haven't been to Indonesia, nevertheless they were very much influenced by gamelan music in some of their pieces. It's not just borrowing ; it's assimilation. Assimilation of different cultures. Not like Borg, and not like MacDonald or George W. Assimilation, not colonization. That's the future of classical music, I believe. Now that avantgarde is dying, and proved to be completely useless, assimilation is a good path to follow. Resistance is futile ! But let's talk about it in a few days time .... I have been composing many hours today and not feeling like sitting again in front of my computer ! I'll have a walk in my garden which now is totally covered with flowers of spring.
But I want to talk about gamelan music. What Debussy did, what Britten did, what Geoffrey King did and the most recent, David del Puerto. Our new CD of his Symphony no. 2 "Nusantara", by the way, is doing quite well in Italy, but it hasn't arrived at the Spanish CD shops ! Just yesterday David got a phone call from Juan Lucas, director of the Spanish distributor Diverdi, who has received the CDs from Milan and was absolutely, crazily, madly IN LOVE with his Symphony. David del Puerto will be featured in the next month's magazine of Diverdi, and they will start distributing them very soon. Anyway, it can be purchased at www.stradivarius.it .
Like the Borg (no plural, please. They are one.), assimilation is always done to "improve the life quality". Britten was stuck, you see, when he wrote his great ballet Prince of the Pagodas. In the middle of the (un-)creative process he travelled to Indonesia with Peter Pears, heard gamelan and then discovered how he should continue with the piece. Well, Debussy, David del Puerto and Geoffrey King haven't been to Indonesia, nevertheless they were very much influenced by gamelan music in some of their pieces. It's not just borrowing ; it's assimilation. Assimilation of different cultures. Not like Borg, and not like MacDonald or George W. Assimilation, not colonization. That's the future of classical music, I believe. Now that avantgarde is dying, and proved to be completely useless, assimilation is a good path to follow. Resistance is futile ! But let's talk about it in a few days time .... I have been composing many hours today and not feeling like sitting again in front of my computer ! I'll have a walk in my garden which now is totally covered with flowers of spring.
viernes, 16 de marzo de 2007
Article by Erza Setyadharma
Got the email with the article by Erza Setyadharma (founder of Indonesian Opera Society) in the "Kabar" magazine of last February. He is a big fan of my vocal music, and is busy at the moment in mounting Menotti's "The Telephone" in Jakarta for next month. Here is the article , cut & pasted from that mag :
Ananda Sukarlan, The Spider and Silence
Erza Setyadharma meets two of the most talented people performing in Indonesia at present: pianist Ananda Sukarlan and dancer and choreographer Chendra E. Panatan.
Ananda Sukarlan returned to the stage this New Year with A Trilogy Concert, a series of performances that took him from Bandung to Bali and back to Jakarta, where I was fortunate to witness Indonesia’s premier pianist in action.
As with many of his previous concerts, simplicity was the key to both performance and staging.
Opening the concert in a lively fashion with the funky rhythms of Igor Stravinsky’s Tango & Piano Rag Music, Ananda followed this catchy piece with his own composition from last year, Kama, with Farman Purnama as the tenor soloist. Based on the poetry of Ilham Malayu, written while he was in Bangkok prison on drug charges, Kama is truly unique; not only the words but also the musical composition, which draws on gamelan influences.
Later, another Ilham Malayu poem was the inspiration for a world premiere of Ananda’s new work, Spider’s Ballad, again with Farman Purnama as the tenor soloist. This is a piece that brought a wide grin to my face; the song is about an imprisoned man who experiences a moment of joy while watching an industrious spider as he creates his web. Ananda injects brilliant comical tones into the ballad, with the evocative arpeggio increasing in volume and speed as the spider weaves and weaves…
The David Del Puerto composition Alio Modo was truly intense. A piano piece created by David Del Puerto and dedicated to the victims of the Bali bombing on October 12th 2002, the song was visualized by Chendra E. Panatan’s contemporary choreography with dancers from Sumber Cipta Ballet. It started in silence, with empty chairs on stage. Dancers rolled in, dancing in silence. Ananda and Farman Purnama were also part of this life installation. The dance captivated the audience absolutely until suddenly the silence was broken with the first note of the piece. The movement thus became assimilated with the music; a very powerful collaboration.
Freedom from fear was the overriding theme of this collaboration. “The dancing movement in Alio Modo is about how to be free from being scared and worried,” Chendra tells me the next day when I meet him and Ananda in suite 1809 at the Shangri-La. “The chairs have two functions; partly as stage décor for the second half, partly to represent and symbolise the place of human existence. I would also like to emphasise the emptiness of terror or fear caused by violence acts. Through my choreography, I want to evoke visually the ambience of the music itself.”
Chendra’s choreography uses silence as its core and this is what inspired Ananda to adapt it to his music compositions. Chendra finds that Ananda’s music has the same background as his choreography. “For us the idea and concept should come first, music will follow. That’s why I always work in silence. I believe that silence is the mother of sound.”
Ananda describes his own music as “eclectic.” “It will always have elements of rhythm and certain chords that reflect my musical characteristics. If you notice, my music and singing always separate in order to create a different texture. It’s like a mini opera where they have recitative, interlude, instruments and the aria. It’s different to usual songs where the lyrics and music are all together.” He has been writing his own compositions since 1991 when he wrote a piece for string quartet. Not until 1998 did he feel that he had become truly fluent with composing.
“For me, composition is what to write, not only how to write. The depth and content are very important, not only beautiful notes and melodies.”
Indonesia itself is an important influence on Ananda’s work. “As a composer, I want to be more Indonesian, whether it’s the music or my inspirations. I think it is important to have a national identity as a composer.” His next project will be an opera that relects contemporary Indonesian life. “I am trying to define Indonesian opera and that is why everything in my opera will be Indonesian: Indonesian musicians and bahasa Indonesia as the language.”
Ananda is also keen to change people’s misperceptions of contemporary music, which he says often gets confused with a rather less accessible genre, avant-garde music. The basis of avant-garde music is atonal, meaning literally “not tonal”, a genre introduced by Arnold Schoenberg around 1912. Atonal music is that in which the composer systematically avoids reference to tonal centers by avoiding harmonic and melodic formulas. Contemporary classical music, on the other hand, keeps changing and evolving through time. “The current perception of contemporary music is that it is hard to understand, but it is not. The tendency of contemporary music these days is to go back to what classical music used to be. People often get mixed up between avant-garde music and contemporary music.”
So apparently contemporary music and dance are not scary or difficult: they are enjoyable! Bravo to Ananda Sukarlan and friends, this was really a delightful start to the year.
Ananda Sukarlan, The Spider and Silence
Erza Setyadharma meets two of the most talented people performing in Indonesia at present: pianist Ananda Sukarlan and dancer and choreographer Chendra E. Panatan.
Ananda Sukarlan returned to the stage this New Year with A Trilogy Concert, a series of performances that took him from Bandung to Bali and back to Jakarta, where I was fortunate to witness Indonesia’s premier pianist in action.
As with many of his previous concerts, simplicity was the key to both performance and staging.
Opening the concert in a lively fashion with the funky rhythms of Igor Stravinsky’s Tango & Piano Rag Music, Ananda followed this catchy piece with his own composition from last year, Kama, with Farman Purnama as the tenor soloist. Based on the poetry of Ilham Malayu, written while he was in Bangkok prison on drug charges, Kama is truly unique; not only the words but also the musical composition, which draws on gamelan influences.
Later, another Ilham Malayu poem was the inspiration for a world premiere of Ananda’s new work, Spider’s Ballad, again with Farman Purnama as the tenor soloist. This is a piece that brought a wide grin to my face; the song is about an imprisoned man who experiences a moment of joy while watching an industrious spider as he creates his web. Ananda injects brilliant comical tones into the ballad, with the evocative arpeggio increasing in volume and speed as the spider weaves and weaves…
The David Del Puerto composition Alio Modo was truly intense. A piano piece created by David Del Puerto and dedicated to the victims of the Bali bombing on October 12th 2002, the song was visualized by Chendra E. Panatan’s contemporary choreography with dancers from Sumber Cipta Ballet. It started in silence, with empty chairs on stage. Dancers rolled in, dancing in silence. Ananda and Farman Purnama were also part of this life installation. The dance captivated the audience absolutely until suddenly the silence was broken with the first note of the piece. The movement thus became assimilated with the music; a very powerful collaboration.
Freedom from fear was the overriding theme of this collaboration. “The dancing movement in Alio Modo is about how to be free from being scared and worried,” Chendra tells me the next day when I meet him and Ananda in suite 1809 at the Shangri-La. “The chairs have two functions; partly as stage décor for the second half, partly to represent and symbolise the place of human existence. I would also like to emphasise the emptiness of terror or fear caused by violence acts. Through my choreography, I want to evoke visually the ambience of the music itself.”
Chendra’s choreography uses silence as its core and this is what inspired Ananda to adapt it to his music compositions. Chendra finds that Ananda’s music has the same background as his choreography. “For us the idea and concept should come first, music will follow. That’s why I always work in silence. I believe that silence is the mother of sound.”
Ananda describes his own music as “eclectic.” “It will always have elements of rhythm and certain chords that reflect my musical characteristics. If you notice, my music and singing always separate in order to create a different texture. It’s like a mini opera where they have recitative, interlude, instruments and the aria. It’s different to usual songs where the lyrics and music are all together.” He has been writing his own compositions since 1991 when he wrote a piece for string quartet. Not until 1998 did he feel that he had become truly fluent with composing.
“For me, composition is what to write, not only how to write. The depth and content are very important, not only beautiful notes and melodies.”
Indonesia itself is an important influence on Ananda’s work. “As a composer, I want to be more Indonesian, whether it’s the music or my inspirations. I think it is important to have a national identity as a composer.” His next project will be an opera that relects contemporary Indonesian life. “I am trying to define Indonesian opera and that is why everything in my opera will be Indonesian: Indonesian musicians and bahasa Indonesia as the language.”
Ananda is also keen to change people’s misperceptions of contemporary music, which he says often gets confused with a rather less accessible genre, avant-garde music. The basis of avant-garde music is atonal, meaning literally “not tonal”, a genre introduced by Arnold Schoenberg around 1912. Atonal music is that in which the composer systematically avoids reference to tonal centers by avoiding harmonic and melodic formulas. Contemporary classical music, on the other hand, keeps changing and evolving through time. “The current perception of contemporary music is that it is hard to understand, but it is not. The tendency of contemporary music these days is to go back to what classical music used to be. People often get mixed up between avant-garde music and contemporary music.”
So apparently contemporary music and dance are not scary or difficult: they are enjoyable! Bravo to Ananda Sukarlan and friends, this was really a delightful start to the year.
sábado, 13 de enero de 2007
My Top Ten list
Just came back from Belgium, where the Vlaams Opera invited me to do recitals. All went very well, nice public, nice acoustics (they have a special hall for chamber music concerts, unlike my last "opera" concert in La Fenice, that breathtaking opera house of Venice, where I actually played ON the stage of the opera, the same stage where Stravinsky premiered his "Rake's Progress" ...) . Some young people interviewed me for their magazine, and even asked me to fill up a questionnaire about my Top Ten favorites. Here is what I wrote :
My favorite Top Ten Movies
1. The Godfather I, II, III
2. Scent of a Woman (prefers the Al Pacino version)
3. Citizen Kane
4. And Justice for All
5. Dead Poet's Society
6. Cinema Paradiso
7. JFK
8. La Dolce Vita
9. Westside Story
10. Any films of Zhang Yimou, especially House of the Flying Daggers, Cursed Flowers, Hero .
My favorite Top Ten Symphonies
1. Shostakovich :Symphony no. 7 "Leningrad"
2. Beethoven : Symphony no. 7
3. Brahms : Symphony no. 4
4. Aaron Copland : Symphony no. 3
5. Sibelius : Symphony no. 5
6. Dvorak : Symphony no. 9 "From the New World"
7. David del Puerto : Symphony no. 2 "Nusantara"
8. Jesus Rueda : Symphony no. 3
9. R. Vaughan Williams : Symphony no. 4
10. Mozart : Symphony no. 40
My favorite Top Ten Pop Songs
1. Michael Jackson : Smooth Criminal
2. Michael Jackson : Thriller
3. Elton John : Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
4. Beatles : Come Together
5. Gary Barlow : Love won't wait , and also his latest "Patience"
6. Queen : Love of my Life
7. John Lennon : Imagine
8. Elton John : The Last Song
9. Queen : Bohemian Rhapsody
10. George Harrison : Within You, Without You
My favorite Top Ten Books
1. Complete Works & Sonnets of W. Shakespeare (OK, if I have to choose the top 3, it will be Hamlet, Romeo & Juliet, Richard III )
2. Complete Poems of Walt Whitman ( my favorite : The Sleepers, Hours continuing long)
3. Sun Tzu : The Art of War
4. Miguel Cervantes : Don Quixote
5. A.A. Milne : The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
6. Goenawan Mohamad : Sajak-sajak lengkap 61 - 2000
7. Ayu Utami : Saman
8. W.H. Auden : Collected Longer Poems ( my favorite : For the Time Being)
9. Alfred Lord Tennyson : Poems (especially In Memoriam)
10. Gabriel Garcia Marquez : Cien Anos de Soledad
My favorite Top Ten Operas :
1. Benjamin Britten : Peter Grimes
2. Benjamin Britten : Death in Venice
3. Igor Stravinsky : The Rake's Progress
4. Per Norgaard : Siddharta
5. Pietro Mascagni : Cavalleria Rusticana
6. Maurice Ravel : L'Enfant et les sortilèges
7. Oliver Knussen : Where the Wild Things Are & Higglety Pigglety Pop !
8. D. Shostakovich : The Nose
9. Georges Bizet : Carmen
10. Sir Michael Tippett: The Midsummer Marriage
My 10 most annoying persons :
1. George W. Bush
2. Tony Blair
3. Osama bin Laden
4. Donald Rumsfeld (oh well, he is sacked now, so he won't be too annoying anymore)
5. Karlheinz Stockhausen (a German lunatic who says he came from the planet Sirius and calls himself a composer )
6. Tom Cruise after being "married" to Katie Holmes and jumping on Oprah's sofa
7. Pierre Boulez (a Parisian conductor who likes to ban people's music while he would like to compose but couldn't ... for whatever reasons)
8. Anne Sophie Mutter (who now is looking for an over-80 male, single/widower and rich after the break up with Andre Previn who apparently lives longer than she imagined)
9. ETA, the Basque terrorists, .... and
10. me, myself, especially if I am writing music and got no inspiration
My favorite Top Ten Movies
1. The Godfather I, II, III
2. Scent of a Woman (prefers the Al Pacino version)
3. Citizen Kane
4. And Justice for All
5. Dead Poet's Society
6. Cinema Paradiso
7. JFK
8. La Dolce Vita
9. Westside Story
10. Any films of Zhang Yimou, especially House of the Flying Daggers, Cursed Flowers, Hero .
My favorite Top Ten Symphonies
1. Shostakovich :Symphony no. 7 "Leningrad"
2. Beethoven : Symphony no. 7
3. Brahms : Symphony no. 4
4. Aaron Copland : Symphony no. 3
5. Sibelius : Symphony no. 5
6. Dvorak : Symphony no. 9 "From the New World"
7. David del Puerto : Symphony no. 2 "Nusantara"
8. Jesus Rueda : Symphony no. 3
9. R. Vaughan Williams : Symphony no. 4
10. Mozart : Symphony no. 40
My favorite Top Ten Pop Songs
1. Michael Jackson : Smooth Criminal
2. Michael Jackson : Thriller
3. Elton John : Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
4. Beatles : Come Together
5. Gary Barlow : Love won't wait , and also his latest "Patience"
6. Queen : Love of my Life
7. John Lennon : Imagine
8. Elton John : The Last Song
9. Queen : Bohemian Rhapsody
10. George Harrison : Within You, Without You
My favorite Top Ten Books
1. Complete Works & Sonnets of W. Shakespeare (OK, if I have to choose the top 3, it will be Hamlet, Romeo & Juliet, Richard III )
2. Complete Poems of Walt Whitman ( my favorite : The Sleepers, Hours continuing long)
3. Sun Tzu : The Art of War
4. Miguel Cervantes : Don Quixote
5. A.A. Milne : The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
6. Goenawan Mohamad : Sajak-sajak lengkap 61 - 2000
7. Ayu Utami : Saman
8. W.H. Auden : Collected Longer Poems ( my favorite : For the Time Being)
9. Alfred Lord Tennyson : Poems (especially In Memoriam)
10. Gabriel Garcia Marquez : Cien Anos de Soledad
My favorite Top Ten Operas :
1. Benjamin Britten : Peter Grimes
2. Benjamin Britten : Death in Venice
3. Igor Stravinsky : The Rake's Progress
4. Per Norgaard : Siddharta
5. Pietro Mascagni : Cavalleria Rusticana
6. Maurice Ravel : L'Enfant et les sortilèges
7. Oliver Knussen : Where the Wild Things Are & Higglety Pigglety Pop !
8. D. Shostakovich : The Nose
9. Georges Bizet : Carmen
10. Sir Michael Tippett: The Midsummer Marriage
My 10 most annoying persons :
1. George W. Bush
2. Tony Blair
3. Osama bin Laden
4. Donald Rumsfeld (oh well, he is sacked now, so he won't be too annoying anymore)
5. Karlheinz Stockhausen (a German lunatic who says he came from the planet Sirius and calls himself a composer )
6. Tom Cruise after being "married" to Katie Holmes and jumping on Oprah's sofa
7. Pierre Boulez (a Parisian conductor who likes to ban people's music while he would like to compose but couldn't ... for whatever reasons)
8. Anne Sophie Mutter (who now is looking for an over-80 male, single/widower and rich after the break up with Andre Previn who apparently lives longer than she imagined)
9. ETA, the Basque terrorists, .... and
10. me, myself, especially if I am writing music and got no inspiration
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