Who’s on top?

Went to see a performance of ‘Songs for an Airless Room’ by my old mate Martin Parker last night at the Cameo with Rachel, Gareth and Sherri. It was good. It was one of the more ‘together’ pieces I’ve heard from Martin in a while.

Martin’s a clever guy, and he has a good sense of humour in most of his pieces.

The opening film was good. It confirmed what everyone already knew: Teenagers are angst ridden and Japanese people are fucked up (just a joke…don’t complain). I liked the transition between the pieces as well.

Best part for me had to be the frantic build-up at the end. I love rhythm. I can’t help it. I love repetitive building of rhythm. And I love the ‘chunk chunka’

A for effort.

-j

Good concert on Friday night. Dialogues has been putting on a good show this year. Before the concert I met up with the Edimprov group for a bit of free improvisation. The lineup was eclectic, to say the least:

Soprano Sax
Alto Sax
Piano
Double Bass
Violin
Harp (no shit)
Drums/Percussion
Random Stuff
Guitar
Electric Bass

A fun wee session.

I’ve been working on some sketches, and am actually going to be putting down notes on paper soon (gasp) I’ve never been a particularly fast writer. I like to play around with a concept for a long while and get it firmed up in my mind before I put anything solid down on paper.

Plus I have been sketching another work out. This is not a saxophone for alto sax & computers. I’ll need a collaboration, so I guess Mr Edwards is due a pint or two

-j

It’s been an interesting six years.

A while back, I made the decision to leave music behind. It wasn’t an easy decision. For as long as I can remember music has always been a passion of mine, as well as being something I’m good at. I’ve always played. Guitar, Sax, Drums, Clarinet…whatever it was it was a pure pleasure to just play live music with other people.

The PhD almost killed me off, musically. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s a sign of aesthetic weakness or a small amount of will on my part, but at some point I just lost the pure love of music. I lost the love of being engaged in it every day. I stopped playing. I stopped writing. I stopped listening.

I’m back. Sort of. I guess I should say I’m coming back…or maybe I’m really going forward.

Over the last couple of months I’ve been thinking about music again. I’ve started working on some pieces…I’ve started playing some ideas around in my head.

Last night was the big kicker. I played the old Mark VI again for about 30 minutes. Basic free-improvisation with Michael. I didn’t play very well. I couldn’t play for more than thirty minutes as my lips were too sore. But I had a lot of fun just playing and listening. Just finding sounds I liked and fitting in with Michael’s playing.

It felt good.

So I’m working on some new ideas and I actually have a real desire to finish some pieces and start new ones. I also have a huge desire to just play. I dont’ care what. Just play.

So thanks Mike.

-j

Nice one. After years of searching I’ve finally found a way of getting my Sibelius scores working again. I brought them in this morning and loaded them up – what a blast from the past.

I always liked looking back on old works and seeing how they stacked up. It’s interesting to deconstruct the pieces again – I should be familiar with how I wrote them but, to be honest, I was at a loss for a few of them. I remember them at a high level, but trying to figure out how I came to the material choices has been a lot of fun.

I’ll upload a couple of them here at some point. Once I’ve figured out how to do that, of course.

-j