Rehearsals have been underway for the past week and a half, and De Profundis is starting to sound like an actual piece of music (!) — encouraging. I have received several comments about the impressiveness of having actually corralled fifteen people into one room in order to make it happen, but better yet I’ve gotten comments from several performers about how much they like the piece. It is very difficult, so these comments are that much more appreciated when I know performers are sweating over some sections.
So I invite you who are nearby to the premiere this coming Monday, April 7, at 8pm. The performance will be in Sursa Hall at Ball State University as the opening of the Student Composers Forum. Given the distance and the Monday-ness of the concert, I don’t imagine I’ll see many (or any) people from out of town, but I will have a recording of the concert, and with luck also a video to share.
Because I’ve been asked by a couple of people about the meaning of it all, I’ve pasted my program notes for De Profundis below. Enjoy.
It’s hard to teach when the sun is finally out again. A full wall of windows looking at an actual blue sky lends itself to focused work for neither myself nor my students. Ugh. At least I have flashy new dry-erase markers.
New Music Festival this weekend at BSU. Friday night at 8pm my Elegy will be performed by the BSU Graduate String Quartet, for those (I’m reasonably certain non-existent) Muncie-based readers.
By the way, last week (spring break) was spent in the company of Tracy’s brother and his wife, along with their nearly new baby. While pretty much no productive work was undertaken during the trip, we slept a lot and greatly enjoyed the company of our hosts. Thanks, guys. 
Tracy and I both optimistically brought some theological reading with us, which lay fallow in our bags… it turns out babies are much more immediately interesting than books.
We also got to visit with my former office- and house-mate from WMU, Luke Dahn, who’s now teaching music theory at Northwestern College (where Dan-in-law teaches). It had been nearly 5 years since the last time we saw him, and he’s since married a charming Korean woman who invited us over for bibimbap (with which our friends Nate and Mee Heh used to stuff us back in Pasadena)… oh, so good. It was great to catch up with him and hear some of his more recent music.
Our return trip from western Iowa was uneventful until somewhere in Illinois, when suddenly our car took to insistent vibration whenever we ventured above 60mph or so. We found an open Sears Auto center, who looked at the front wheels (where we felt the trouble was located) and found only one somewhat loose lug nut. I’m sure we annoyed more than a few fellow drivers by crawling along well below the speed limit for the next 4 hours or so, but we finally got home safely and will be going to the car doctor soon.
For now, for me, it is back to the grind. I go now for coffee, and then to teach again.
(w/apologies to Gabriel at Going Along for the stolen format)
With apologies for lengthy absence (who knew doctoral programs could be so busy?), this is just a brief note to break the surface tension. We’re midway across Iowa at the moment, heading toward the home of brother-in-law Dan and his wife Teresa–and their brand new baby! Fun fun. I’m on spring break for the next week, and looking forward to spending it with fam friends such as these. I’ll also hopefully be visiting with my old office- and house-mate from my first foray into grad school, Luke Dahn, who is now teaching at Northwestern College–the same school as Dan-in-law. Funny how these things turn out.
Side note: De Profundis has been trimmed from two to one performance, only in April now. Late empty slots on the performers roster necessitated a change in plans, but at least it is still on the docket for later in the spring.I hope to take the time to write a bit more here over the coming week.
I’ve been listening widely, as usual, with ears particularly tuned to sounds like Steven Mackey, Louis Andriessen, and that whole Bang on a Can crowd. I’ve also managed to bring along some theology books, the lack of which in my regular reading has been sorely felt over the past months: C.S. Lewis, Bonhoeffer, and Bishop Kallistos Ware. An interesting mix, I think. We’ll have to see how that works out.
Tomorrow begins the second week of classes for spring semester. “Spring.” That’s what they call it, at least. When it’s not wet and cold out there, it’s generally dry and cold (rain or snow being generally ubiquitous lately). No matter, such is January back here in the midwest. Ah, how distance makes life out west all the rosier in retrospect!
There have been some changes for this semester. I am no longer tutoring a small army of theory students, but now am actually in front of their class talking. It’s been 5 years since I last taught in a classroom, so it’s taking a little re-getting used to, but I really enjoy it. This is what I’ve wanted to do for a long time. I’m teaching two sections of what is informally referred to as “Sight/Ear,” and which has many other possible names–aural theory, or ear training and sight singing–, along with a few composition lessons. This also means I’ve picked up another 10 hours of work each week, which means a stipend on top of tuition. Definitely welcome.
Over December I managed to find a final barline for my De Profundis, although I’ve been letting it percolate for the past few weeks without looking at it because I know there will be some tweaking and revisions to be made. Overall, I would say this is the most ambitious, and probably best executed, piece of music I’ve written, and I’m anxious to hear it performed (hopefully this spring). The next project is in the brainstorming stage, the only detail decided for certain being that it will be orchestral. I’ve been thinking thoughts about it, but that, dear reader, is all you get for now.
Classes this semester: Analytical Techniques (music theory), Principles of Music Theory (music theory pedagogy), and (of course) composition lessons. That, along with my teaching load, is enough to keep me quite occupied.
And away I go…
Fr. Alvin Kimel, whom some readers may know from his former blog Pontifications, has written a new post discussing why he does not believe in absolute predestination. It is, as are all writings of Fr. Kimel, excellent and well worth the time for those with interest in such things.
More specifically, it voices with much greater precision the same somewhat unformed impulse behind my own rejection of my former Calvinism. It was a revulsed impulse, and though I have not put the concentration into formulating precisely why that is (beyond a sense that it profoundly offends God’s justice and love and, hence, God’s core character), Fr. Al has: the doctrine of absolute predestination makes God capricious and unreliable–it makes of God a horror from which humanity needs salvation! It is responsible for the unhealthy fear in which at least Western Christians hold God (not the fear which more precisely signifies awe, and which is itself proper). This, in turn, lies at the root of the Medieval theological troubles which lead up to the Protestant Reformation–which unfortunately kept the same poison for itself, but dressed it in new clothes (I’m lookin’ at you, Calvin). Of course, Fr. Kimel spells all of this out in much greater detail.
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