Press Release from HalimElDabh.com

If you happen to be in Cleveland this week you can check out the performance in South Africa from the street. Details below.

Internationally recognized composer, educator and
ethnomusicologist Halim El-Dabh will be featured at
Africa's first-ever electronic music festival in
Johannesburg, South Africa, and residents of Northeast
Ohio will have the opportunity to view his
performance. The performance, billed as an "almost
simulcast," will be broadcast at the McCrory
Department Store space on East 4th Street 6 p.m. on
September 3, 2005, as part of the Ingenuity Festival
in Cleveland, Ohio. The broadcast of El-Dabh's
performance will be free and open to the public.

El-Dabh, who is one of the pioneers of electronic
music internationally, and the father of electronic
music in Africa, will be attending the UNYAZI festival
and symposium in Johannesburg September 1-4, 2005. He
will perform his works live, and will also be actively
involved in the paper sessions, workshops and in
creating an awareness of electronic and
electroacoustic music among young composers.

El-Dabh's performance (which will take place in
Johannesburg on September 2 and be broadcast in
Cleveland on September 3), will consist of old and new
works for various electronic and electroacoustic
combinations, some involving live performers. El-Dabh
will collaborate with U.S. electronic music virtuoso
and trombonist George Lewis, South African traditional
instrument expert and composer Pops Mohamed, Egyptian
drum soloist Blake Tyson, and University of
Witwatersrand gymnastics/trampoline professor Tshepo
Mfebe.

UNYAZI, the Zulu word for "lightning," also
means "electricity." In addition to his concert, on
Septembe 1 El-Dabh will also present a paper, entitled
"Unyazi Born Within," which explores the sensitivity
toward sound inherent in the African village, which
El-Dabh experienced during his many research trips
throughout Africa.

The Ingenuity festival runs Sept. 1-4 and will feature
nearly 200 events showcasing Cleveland arts and
technology. The performances and displays, which range
from cutting-edge computer-based creations and
multimedia events to classical works and family fare,
will take place at venues in and around the Public
Square and lower Euclid Avenue areas. A one-day pass
to selected outdoor events is free; a one-day,
unlimited-access pass to all Ingenuity events is $10;
and an unlimited-access weekend pass is $25. Go to
http://www.IngenuityCleveland.org/ for more festival
information.

Ready to go...almost

A crazy day! I just got home and I am still getting ready for the trip to South Africa. I am so excited about meeting so many great musicians from all over Africa and the world. I wish I had time to tell you about some of them, but that will have to wait until my return. Just follow the link a few posts below to see the festival website with all of the details.

To my students...I will be in Tuesday (tomorrow) morning, but I will be out all day Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Keep on practicing! All the info you need about rehearsals and makle up lessons will be on my door. I'll see you again on the day after Labor Day. Have a good holiday! I know the steel band gig on Thursday will be great. Be sure to be ready for the Stained Glass rehearsal on Friday!

Maybe I can post from South Africa, but if not I'll be back to the blog next week.

Blake

Berio is Full of Surprises

Check out this NYT review of a new CD that features transcriptions by Luciano Berio. I had never heard of these before. It has a couple of mp3 files to listen to. I love the way he chose to end the Contrapuntus XIX.

John's Blog

I am proud to announce a new arrival at the Blogspot. My great friend John Parks is now blogging. I'm sure it will be incredible and much more interesting than my blog, so bookmark it now and watch it grow into an unstoppable force.
Heres' the link
John's Blog

Switched ON

It's been a while since any substantial posting has happened here. That is largely because of the beginning of the semester at UCA. Things are busy. I have more students than I have ever had and I've been trying to help get the drumline off to a running start. I've also been getting the music ready for our two percussion ensemble concerts this semester. Oh, and I leave for South Africa on Tuesday morning to perform at the Unyazi Electronic Music Festival. Missing most of the first full week of class isn't ideal, so I have been trying to get a plan together to keep things running smoothly. And...I'm still putting the new piece I've written for solo marimba and 3 percussion into the computer.

Robert Moog died last Sunday. It's hard to listen to the radio without hearing his influence, and I still remember the first time I heard Switched on Bach. I hit the used record stores immediatley in search of my own copy. Someday I hope to have my own Moog, but for now it's just a dream. The NYT has a few features about him and his work. Jump on these links fast becuase the NYT will put them in an archive and charge you money for them in the near future. They are free for now.

An Appreciation
Switched On and Ready to Rumble - New York Times
Just under the picture of Moog on the left is a link to a great multimedia story with sound clips.

The Obit
Robert Moog, Music Synthesizer Creator, Dies - New York Times


There is also an interesting story about a Ward Marston, who restores old recordings of everthing from jazz to classical to presidential speeches.
A Master of Making Old Tunes New Again - New York Times

Now it's time for a little chai latte. More later.

From a Studio in Arkansas, a Portrait of America - New York Times

The NYT has an article this morning about a photographer from Arkansas who has finally made it big. Too bad he died in 1959. His name was Mike Disfarmer. The few details of his life given in the story make me want to know more about him. He sounds like quite an interesting fellow. The article includes a slide show of some of his photographs.

From a Studio in Arkansas, a Portrait of America

Finally, more about the concert

We left Sunday morning on a four hour drive to Tulsa. Our pal Disco came along for the ride. We were very excited about the concert, but because it was outside we were a little worried about the predicted thunderstorms. We arrived at the park a little after 3:00 and were very happy to learn that the concert had been moved to an indoor venue. And not just any theatre, but the Brady theatre. It is said to be the last place that Enrico Caruso sang before he died. His ghost haunts the theatre to this day. It seems he "caught his death" during a carriage ride in Tulsa. I didn't notice him lurking about, but check out the piectures below. Maybe he snuck into one of them.

Here I am with LT waiting in line for the doors to open. We had a pretty good spot in line thanks to our early arrival. That was important due to the general admission seating.


Here's our view of the stage from our seats. The theatre only seats about 2,600 and it is very well designed. There really are no bad seats as far as I could tell. I had to use my cellphone cam for these pics. I didn't bring my good camera because I thought we were going to be outside in the rain.



Here's Ben Folds conducting the audience in a little three part harmony at the end of Not the Same. We also got to sing along on a tune by Dr. Dre (whose title I dare not mention here). This pic is from the Rufus Wainwright message board. Thanks to whoever got all hot and sweaty in the pit to take the photo.


And here's Rufus at the piano. It's also from the RW message board. I was absolutely amazed by Rufus. I think that he has to be one of the greatest musicians I have ever seen in performance. His phrasing, his timing, his songs...everything is incredible.


It's always great to see performers who are actually better in concert than on their recordings. These guys can't seem to write a bad song, which means they can't do all of their great songs on every concert. That means a few of the favorites have to be left out. Still, I'm sure no one was disappointed. If nothing else, everyone got to hear Ben and Rufus do a duet version of Careless Whisper. I hope that someone got it on tape. You won't believe how good it was until you hear it for yourself.

Ben Lee played a short (but wonderful) set to open the concert. I was only familiar with him through his collaboration with Ben Folds, but I'll be checking out some of his solo work now.

I was so pumped up after the concert that the drive home was no problem at all. We had about fifteen minutes of incredibly hard rain but after that things were mostly clear. We pulled in to Conway around 3:20 AM. I got a few hours sleep before getting up and going to work on the piece I've been writing, which, by the way, I finished today.

Blake

The Office/Fog of War/My Architect

I just finished watching two episodes of The Office (BBC version), the last half of The Fog of War, and the entire My Architect. All amazing pieces of work. Watching The Office makes me uncomfortable. Its ability to make the uncomfortable so funny is where the genius lies. The Fog of War made me uncomfortable becuase it shows that even the brightest most intelligent people continue to make the same mistakes that have been made so many times before. It seems that the saying that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it isn't completely true. It seems that those who know history will repeat it anyway. There is a recording in the movie where President Johnson says to Robert McNamara "My answer is yes...but my judgement is no." He was talking about sending massive numbers of troops to Vietnam.

My Architect, on the other hand, offers great comfort. It is a documentary full of uncomfortable people who are brought together to find answers, heal their wounds and to show us all the incredible things that human beings are capable of. One of the most inspirational movies I have ever seen.

I promise to finally get around to the road trip to Tulsa and the Lee/Folds/Wainwright concert tomorrow. There will be full color pictures of show, so don't miss it.

More on the way

For those of you waiting to read all about the Ben Lee/Ben Folds/Rufus Wainwright concert experience, I'll take care of that tonight. In the meantime you can find my brief mobile blogging reports from the concert a few posts down. They really bring the excitement of being there live and in the moment to your screen, don't you think?

Have You Heard?

Good news for those of you who love to gossip. You're making the world a better place. Read the very interesting article (linked below) for more information. And, if you haven't already, now's your chance to register for the New York Times.
Have You Heard? Gossip Turns Out to Serve a Purpose - New York Times

Ben & Ben were awesome. Rufus is next. BF&RW already did Careless Whisper. Best Duet Ever!

--

Mobile Email from a Cingular Wireless Customer http://www.cingular.com

At Ben Folds/Rufus concert in line. Rain, so moved inside to haunted theatre. Hooray! We will be dry

--

Mobile Email from a Cingular Wireless Customer http://www.cingular.com

Good advice from Hans Zimmer

I can't say I'm a huge fan of his music, but I love the quote. It's from a speech at the TCM Young Film Composers Award Ceremony.

"Never let your wife prevent you from buying equipment. A house will not buy a synthesizer, but a synthesizer can buy a house." - Hans Zimmer

Here's the link to the post on boingboing.net
Music thing: Hans Zimmer on synth shopping etiquette

A lot of the post's comments disagree with Hans, but they have apparantly not heard of the housing bubble.

Let me clarify that you need to actually do something productive with that synthesizer or else it won't buy you a house. If you are just going to sit around all day making helicopter sounds and playing the opening measures of Jump by Van Halen over and over again, you should probably buy the house instead.

Cool Hunting: Toilet Bowl Restaurant

Well, this looks delicious. Click on the link and then click on the tiny pictures for the full-sized details. And, yes, it's SFW.

Star Wars (sort of)

I read a review for this one man star wars trilogy in the New York Times. Not the most flattering review, but the thing that really bothered me was that the reviewer decided to try his hand at comedy.

For example
"After curtain call Mr. Ross tells his audience - composed largely of very intense-looking overgrown boys wearing Coke-bottle glasses and Darth Vader jerseys - to follow their dreams. I suspect their mothers might disagree."

Cheap shots. It's just not funny on so many levels, and...it makes me think that he may be lying. The word "largely" means "most". I doubt that "most" of the people in the audience were wearing coke bottle glasses and Darth Vader jerseys. "Overgrown boys" is probably a nice way of saying "fat". And, come on...don't tell me that the mothers want to crush the dreams of their overweight, fashion-challenged, legally blind sons. I'll bet that they just want them to be happy.

Despite his constant need to belittle something he doesn't understand, I can't disgree with his review completely. I watched the video on the website, and while I thought the actual delivery of the dialogue was funny, other things need some work. His imitations of the musical score are quite weak in comparison to his dialogue delivery (tune it up...and don't rush!). I think that lack of attention to detail detracts from the overall effect. And, when he inserts his own words to move the plot ahead, that doesn't work very well either. Could be a timing problem. Timing...is.....everything (or so they tell me)

Still, it's still worth a look. Head on over to the website and click on the video link.

Here's the website link again

JT, Gadd, UCA Steel, etc...

Ok, I'm back. I promised a full report on the James Taylor concert, but I don't really know what to say except HOLY COW! It was great. I won't bore you with too many details, but here are a few. First of all, Gadd was incredible. I don't know how much James Taylor is paying him, but it's not enough. We had great seats. I don't think that there was a better view of Gadd in the whole place. We were about 80 feet from the stage and positioned so that the only thing between us and Gadd was his hi-hat (and occasionally the bass player when he stepped forward). Our view was assisted by a dedicated "GaddCam" and a number of large video screens. As a bonus, Luis Conte is on tour with James Taylor playing percussion.


And of course, let's not forget James Taylor. After all these years he still sounds great. He put on an incredible show with an incredible band. We got our money's worth, too. He started playing about 8:10 and finished up around 10:50. If he's coming to your town, you better get some tickets.

Here's a pic taken from my seat.



By the way, because we were running a little behind schedule we had to eat at the Starwood Amphitheatre where the concert was held. How bad could it be? Pretty bad! Have you ever gone to your local grocery store and bought the 89 cent store brand cheese pizza? OK, now imagine that you cooked it in your microwave and then let it sit uncovered on your countertop for about 17 hours. Then you reheated it and then another 2 hours later reheated it again. Sound good? It sure does to me after eating what they serve at Starwood. And, it's 4 dollars and 11 cents more expensive. But, it gave us enough fuel to rock out with Gadd and JT all night, so it was worth it (sort of).

Before the Nashville trip I did a performance with the UCA Steel Drum Combo at the ABA convention in Little Rock on Thursday and then a clinic there on Friday. The clinic went pretty well and I had a good crowd. I got a lot of positive responses afterwards and I hope that most people found it helpful.

Here's a shot of the combo sporting our now and very colorful t-shirts.



Then, Friday night my friend Andy Harnsberger was in town playing with the Jack Daniels Original Silver Cornet Band. After the show we had a chance to go out to the Flying Saucer and Willy D's piano bar. It was 80's night at Willy D's, so we got to hear a lot of our childhood favorites (Journey, Loverboy, Whitesnake, Hall and Oates, etc...) performed on dueling pianos.

Yesterday I did a lot of work on the new piece I'm writing. I am really pushing to get it finished by this weekend. Things are really starting to move on it, so I am hopeful.

More later,
Blake

ABA/Nashville Roadtrip/Anniversary

Today I head to Little Rock with the UCA Steel Drum Combo to perform at the ABA convention. Tomorrow I head back down to do a clinic. My friend Andy Harnsberger will be in town tomorrow night playing with the Jack Daniels Silver Cornet Band. I'm looking forward to hanging out with him after the show.

This weekend Liana and I head out to Nashville to see James Taylor. We are excited not only to see James Taylor, but also Steve Gadd. The first time I remember hearing Steve Gadd was on AM radio in my Dad's old Plymouth. I didn't know it was Gadd at the time, but I have a very clear memory of hearing Paul Simon's 50 Ways. It was years before I knew who the drummer on that track was, and even longer before I understood the true significance of the groove.

The first time I saw Gadd play live was in a small room at the Eastman School of Music. Gadd lives in Rochester and he and John Beck are good friends, so he comes in and does a clinic at least once a year. Seeing him play from about 7 feet away was really a life changing experience. Since then I've seen him a few more times in clinics and at the American Drummer Achievement Awards in Boston, but I've never seen him play a full length concert (except on video).

So, is it worth a six and a half hour drive to Nashville to see him play?
Six and a half hours is a bargain!
I will, of course, post a full length report upon my return.


In other news, I am still working on finishing my percussion quartet (which is becoming more of a marimba solo with percussion trio). I plan to have it finished by August 17th. Why? Because my tenth anniversary is August 18th. I want to be done before then so I don't have it running through my brain anymore. Since Liana and I got married close the anniversary of our first date, it is not only our tenth wedding anniversary, but also our seventeenth year together.

By the way, the 10th anniversary is the "aluminum" anniversary. Anyone have any gift ideas?

And, while things are generally good, I am a little depressed. It seems my name was left off the list AGAIN!

Downloading the Classics

Looks like LvB has still got it. Good news, but the article finally gets to what I think may be classical music's biggest problem. It is not as accessible online as other genres. Finding decent recordings (particularly complete ones) of the masterworks on Napster, Rhapsody or Yahoo! Unlimited is difficult and most contemporary works aren't available at all. Also, the search engines on those sites are set up to deal with pop music, which can make finding specific classical recordings almost impossilble. The closest we can come is a $19.95 per year subscription to Naxos.com where you can stream over 5000 CD's worth of recordings. A great resource, but most people have never even heard of it.

You can sell anything to anyone with even an average marketing campaign (have you seen the stuff they unload by the thousands over at QVC and HSN?). I guess this is proven by the junk music labeled "classical" that is pushed down people's throats (Il Divo for example). If they marketed Steve Mackey, Steve Reich or Michael Torke with the intenisity that they market Il Divo, they would be very popular as well. Contemporary music is the only hope. I have at least 3 recordings of every symphony by Beethoven and Brahms, from Toscanni to Bernstein to Norrington. It is going to take some kind of great recording to get me to part with $15 or $20 for another "Eroica". But, new music is a different story. It's exciting and vibrant and not just being written by guys who are good at math anymore. Unfortunately, recordings of new music are hard to find unless you are really, really looking for them. No one is going to stumble across it the same way they'll stuble across a new CD by Gwen Stefani. I'm not saying we need more women in short skirts (we have plenty of that already), just more accessibility.

A few things

I woke up way too early this morning. I worked on my presentation for the ABA convention in Little Rock this week, did a little reading, and watched most of Sunday Morning on CBS. Sunday Morning isn't what it used to be, but today's show was a pretty good one. They did a story on the artist John Currin. His art will probably look familiar to you, because if you pick up a newspaper, magazine, or just watch TV every now and then you have probably seen it in passing.

They also did a story on Carole King. Her songs are so omnipresent in our lives and our collective history that they become like the air around us. It is easy to forget, but every now and then it is a good idea to think about what an amazing thing the air around us is. And, it is good to be reminded of the enourmous talent of Carole King and the influence her work has had on the music of our time.

If you want to see something impressive, go the the "songs" listing on her website. It will take you a while to get through them and you'll probably wind up saying "Wow, I didn't know she wrote that!" at least 15 times (probably more). If you need a faster path to amazement, you can check out this over at Wikipedia.

And then there was this story. We seem to have a problem. Maybe the old line "Clean your plate, there are children starving in China" (which never made much sense to me) should be replaced with "Don't clean your plate, there are kids starving in China" (I know, that doesn't make sense either). But seriously...we need to collectivly try and do a little better, don't we?

Also this morning in the New York Times is an op-ed piece on why we shouldn't be afraid of the things that we seem to fear the most. AFter you read that, you might want to follow it up with a viewing of a Daily Show clip which really drives home the point. For that, click on the link below and scroll down to the July 12th entry entitled Over There
onegoodmove: Daily Show Video Archives


Enjoy your day!

How's Your Geography

People from the United States have a reputation for not really knowing much about the rest of that big old world out there. That stereotpe may not be completely fair, but there is no denying that most of us could use a little help in the geography department. Go to this website and have some fun with all of the geography quizzes. Start off with level 1 of each region if you need a refresher. By the time you get through the levels, you'll know where every country in the world is.

Want a quick sample? Try this one.

Remember...Learning is Fun.

Sheppard Software - We Make Learning Fun!