No Brakes Feeling a little sluggish on that work in progress? Struggling to get from the current chapter of your six-year marathon manuscript to something nearer, my God, to “The End”? You’re in luck. Composer Michael Gordon’s new album Dystopia from Cantaloupe Music is here to shove you right to the last punctuation point. And thanks… Read More
Music For Writers: The Good, The Bad, And The Soundtrack
‘So Many Ideas Coming At Me’ The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly is just the one you know off the top of your head. Hundreds of film scores later, a 24-hour marathon of music by Italian film composer Ennio Morricone, has provided a compelling opportunity for authors to dip into the world of “contemporary… Read More
Music For Writers: Gregory W. Brown’s Natural Selections
Missa Charles Darwin — And Amino Acids In order to bind the work together I devised an opening idea linked to Darwin, evolution, and genetics. Using a portion of the genetic sequence from Platyspiza crassirostris(a bird from the group commonly known as Darwin’s Finches), I translated the amino acids into notes, thereby deriving a melody. And Gregory W.… Read More
Music For Writers: The Pettersson Legacy Of Fire And Ice
‘When Inspiration Flows’ The opening tone — lonely and anticipatory — is the last serene moment of the late Allan Pettersson’s Symphony No. 4. Whether he has his strings rush up to a precipice and hold while the woodwinds dither on the edge — or sends whole sections of his orchestra chasing each other, repeating… Read More
Music For Writers: ‘Self-Publishing’ Cellist Kate Dillingham
Crossings: ‘A Whole CD Of New Music’ It’s a big change that’s happened in both literature and in music. The DIY aspect of it. Do it yourself.The necessary focus that many of us maintain these days on the development of the self-publishing sector in the books world can sometimes cause us to look right past the fact… Read More
Music For Writers: The Colorist Kaija Saariaho’s ‘Instants’ Of Love
‘Perfume Of The Instant’ While writers talk of “color commentary,” they actually mean something not that different from what in music we might call great “colorists” among composers. And in world music, Finland’s composers are surely among those most prized for their work in creating sonic “color.” Einojuhani Rautavaara is perhaps chief among the great… Read More
‘Who Decided Our Worth?’ Do Free Books Give Away Authors’ Value?
‘There’s Something Badly Wrong’ For those following the industry! the industry! in its digital melodrama, tossing books to the crowd free is not new. But the question of whether today’s plethora of free offers may devalue books and/or authors in readers’ minds is not going away as easily as some folks wish it would. Roz Morris… Read More
Music For Writers: Playful Andrew Norman
‘Every Now And Then, I Just Want To Throw A Wrench In’ Imagine the orchestra as this sort of complicated 19th-century futurist machine, all moving parts and cogs and gears, and little people. I find that sort of fascinating. But every now and then, I just want to throw a wrench in and see what… Read More
Music For Writers: John Luther Adams – ‘To Become An Aeolian Harp Myself’
‘The Sheer Sensuous Pleasure Of Sound’ Having heard and re-heard the three movements of John Luther Adams’ The Wind in High Places many times in its new recording from Cold Blue Music, I knew exactly what I wanted to ask the composer about it. John Luther Adams His speed. These ineffable tempi. Like Robert Wilson’s… Read More
Music For Writers: Martin Bresnick And The Terrible Beauty Of Sorrow
‘We Will Always Sing Such Songs Of Longing’ Each time I visited, my grandmother wept bitterly about the murder of her parents, her brother, her two sisters, and all their children. Can a child comfort a grandmother, a grandfather? I became a witness, a musician, and a composer. Martin Bresnick is a native New Yorker.… Read More