The most powerful inspirer (continuing my previous article)

I always say, no matter how powerful someone, a piece of art or an event can inspire you to create an artistic product, the biggest inspirer of all time (and it never fails) is THE DEADLINE. Since Erstwhile is an intense essay about love, I have put the Valentine's Day this year for my own deadline to finish the voice parts. Well I missed 2 days, but since it's my own deadline, it wasn't as inspiring as deadlines which are imposed by external forces :) .......................................................................................................................................... Therefore all the soloists, even the choir, have received their parts through email by now. The orchestration, especially the orchestral sections without singers involved, is not finished ; I guess it will be finished just when I have to send the parts to the orchestral musicians next month, as I have this sick obsession of revising and re-re-re-revising my music before the musicians get the score. Oh, I didn't tell you the names of the soloists involved, right? Well, you would know their names since they are all the winners of the National Voice Competition "Tembang Puitik Ananda Sukarlan" (TPAS) 2011, but mostly not the ones who sang in my previous chamber comedy operas MENDADAK KAYA and LAKI-LAKI SEJATI. So, they are : Ivan Jonathan (as Rafael), Evelyn Merrelita (as Madame Vaillant) -- both are characters living in the 21st century, in fact they met aboard the Singapore Airlines. The ones from the 13th and 14th century are Albertus James Sofyan (as Picaro), Christine Tambunan (as Soléne) and Anggana Bunawan (who only sing 2 arias but playing the role of 2 characters, as Gajah Mada -- a historical character from the Majapahit era in Indonesia -- and as a priest at the Notre Dame Church). All characters of the story, except Gajah Mada, are purely fictional, and any resemblances with real life characters or happenings (such as a broken heart of 7 centuries!) are purely coincidental. As I wrote you before, Erstwhile is a work in progress, so at the moment it will just be recorded and performed in a "concertante" way, although I do ask the singers to do some very small gestures (such as shaking hands when they first met, and other things that connect each other at the duets). Will they wear concert costumes or theatrical ones in the premiere? I still dunno. .......................................................................................................................................... Ah, talking about the National Voice Competition, in case you are a vocalist, you might be interested in joining the next one, in September this year in Surabaya. The city is coincidentally very close to one of the locations where Erstwhile took place, but that's not the reason. It is simply because the initiator, founder and executor of the competition happens to be Amadeus Performing Arts, a company based in Surabaya. You can tweet them to @KompetisiTPAS for more info, and do be quick since I heard that the end of this month February is the last day to register for the "early birds" (this term couldn't be more appropriate for you singers who sing like nightingales!). Anyway, I am so proud and happy to know and work with the previous winners, they are amazingly and surprisingly brilliant, but am still curious in discovering new & unknown great new vocal talents. They are another source of inspiration for me, just like deadlines. And I love those inspiring vocalists. In fact, I love all people and everything else that inspires me, except deadlines. Unfortunately we have to know the difference between love and inspiration ; you don't have to love the people (or things) that inspires you. That, my friends, is what you call life.

Within me, Without me

(This is a continuation of previous entry, "Thank you for the music").

I must admit I regret that my project ANANDASUKARLAN@MUSICASA with the 27 vocalists terminated last week. The final concert was really marvellous, with those musicians putting all their passion in singing. But it also marked our last day of having fun, learning from each other and from my part a process of rejuvenation, working with the young & passionate vocalists.

Next week is the turn of the students and teaching staff of the Music Faculty of the Pelita Harapan University, one of the most prominent private universities in Indonesia. Thanks to its previous Dean of Music Faculty, Johannes Nugroho (a wonderful pianist & composer himself) who invited me, I will coach them in the interpretations of my music. Again, I won't talk about executional techniques since as with the Musicasa vocalists I am not able to play many of the instruments. I know how they work, what kind of sound I heard in my head, but not how to produce sounds with the instruments.

However, from the interpretational side it could be dangerous to "give away" a lot of my interpretational side to the musicians. After working with 27 vocalists last week (I call them "the 27"), I am even more convinced that the composer is the most narrow-minded person in the interpretation of his own piece. We composers of the particular piece only know and see from one side, while musicians (the good ones, naturally) see many possibilities of its interpretations. I always experience it when I am interpreting other composers' music. With the passing of time, the composer starts to see the piece clearer and more from a distance, objectively. It is always interesting to hear interpretations of my music without my involvement in preparing the performance, like the case of the fantastic performance by the tenor Samuel Tandei & pianist Ruthanne Fulton recently in Louisville, giving the world premiere of my 3 songs for tenor, "3S dalam Cinta". Just listen to it here : http://www.wuol.org/2010/11/tenor-samuel-tandei/ . A few details in his performance were not as I imagined it to sound, but since he expresses what he wants to communicate very well and convincingly, I really don't mind. It's still a poignant and touching performance, not mentioning his marvellous singing technique in singing my not-easy-at-all songs. A more "authentic" performance of those songs would be the ones we did at the Anandasukarlan@Musicasa concert since the tenors I accompanied (Justinus Budi Santoso & Ivan Jonathan from Musicasa) worked very closely with me, but then only time (not the composer) will tell, and judge, which performance will claim as the better one. And in fact, they don't have to be judged, both performances --and hopefully further performances by different tenors-- are artistically valid. There is no reason why Sam Tandei's performance couldn't be called "authentic". They all possess high musicianship anyway.

So, as much as I have learned from the 27, I am very much looking forward to the UPH project next week. Especially because they are, again, young people full of passion. And yeah, although now all of them are my instrumental music, they are not far from my favorite theme: sorrow, loneliness and (unrequited) love. Without words, they can even be better expressed. And understood.


The final concert of Universitas Pelita Harapan Conservatory of Music presents the music of Ananda Sukarlan will be held at Gedung Kesenian Jakarta, December 11, 2010 at 8 p.m . More info & tickets through Chendra at 0818 891038 or ycep@yahoo.com