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Greetings I'm currently working on:
[5-5-2006]O Salutaris Hostia Dirk Maes, a Belgian music director for Voces Capituli which is a small TTBB ensemble made up of former choir boys of the cathedral in Antwerp, commissioned this piece, also available for SAATBB, that will be sung in concert and at Mass in the Netherlands and France this summer. How cool is that? [5-5-2006]Mattinata A young filmmaker needed an underscore seasoned with Italian opera and suitable for a morning scene. I set Leoncavallo's text to a new melody and orchestration. The filmmaker ended up changing the film entirely, so this little aria wasn't used, but I liked it enough anyway to transcribe it and post it online. [4-24-2006]Psalm 34 - Taste and See for assembly, choir, and keyboard Commissioned by St. Robert Church's music minister, Peter Kurdziel, this piece was written for a choir I worked with for nearly 15 years and miss greatly. The piece is in a quasi-contemporary style with simple, but hopefully enjoyable four-part choral verses. [2-1-2006]Psalm 150 for chorus and organ or piano Commissioned by my daughter's high school for their 100th anniversary, this piece uses fanfare-like material in the beginning that is shaped into different musical gestures to imitate in a straightforward way the various instruments called upon in the psalm. The piece is 100 bars long and uses a motto based on the initials of the school, "C C". [11-25-2005]Caccini "Ave Maria" and Bach's "O Jesulein S��" for harp and flute The latest arrangements are two wonderful classical pieces, the Bach specifically for Christmas, the Caccini wonderful anytime. For now, they are on my Christmas page for ordering. [11-23-2005]Suo Gan for Harp and Flute I've just completed a new arrangement of this tune for a harpist I just "met" online. She's given me a list of requests, so I expect to write more for harp and various instruments soon. You can get it from the link or order it through this site. See the Christmas page for ordering options. [11-6-2005] Two Christmas pieces for Chorus and String Orchestra (or piano) "A Christmas Lullaby (Suo Gan)" and "In the flurry of a snowfall" [9-28-2005] I've finished Christmas Music for String Quartet, Vol. 2! To order, go to my Christmas music page and click on the Volume II link. [April 30, 2005] I've started a blog. Maybe I'll keep it more up-to-date than this page! |
Recent Obsessions I enjoyed my Creative MP3, but found it clunky. I was given an IPod recently by a wonderful and generous group of people and I love its software and hardware design-- it really is a pretty piece. No more wishing I had the better product. It has several hundred tunes on it already and I'm hooked. But...When I first got it, I learned that IPod plays only Apple-format audio, a vaguely disturbing thought. I had ITunes already, since I need QuickTime and now they are bundled, so it was easy to convert all my tracks, no problem there, and the sound is clear and completely enjoyable. What bothered me a little is the whole Apple/Microsoft thing, of proprietary file formats. It doesn't make sense for me as a consumer to place the bits and pieces of my electronic life in boxes that only one kind of machine can open. I like rtf, ogg, txt, ASCII, HTML, gif, jpg, tif-- suitable formats that work everywhere. I just read an editorial that brought my vague feelings of unease into a clearer sense of what the danger of this practice is. The author sums up the problem: "Data readable by only one application is a big risk factor, because the application won�t be around forever. If that application only runs on one operating system, that�s even worse, because the operating system won�t be around forever either. If that operating system only runs on one hardware platform, that�s even worse still. No hardware lasts forever..." Amen. Amen. I'll be listening to my IPod till it crumbles. My next player will play ogg and be the size of my finger, no doubt. This is the coolest computer program I've seen in a while. Go to the Google download page and check out "Google Earth". Maybe this is old news, but I didn't know it existed. All the satellite images of the earth are recorded and at your mouse click, from over 10000 miles out down to the roof on your house. Really! This is one of those things that makes me glad to be alive in 2005. Ouch, that rhymed. I have been drooling over Ipod and IRiver products, especially the 40 GB players that basically store your entire CD collection (assuming about 10000 CDs or less, heh). I went with the Creative Player because it was a little less expensive and received excellent reviews. Well, it works great but for one thing: it doesn't categorize by composer. Artist, Album, Track, Playlist (you create these), Genre, all there, but not Composer. darn. So, if you are a classical music lover, find another player until Creative comes up with another way to organize the database. The workarounds are to 1) name the track "composer - title - movement"-- a little clunky, but OK; 2) change the artist to the composer name, or 3)create a playlist that contains only one composer, a de facto new category. I'm getting a kick out of random play-- I never know what will pop up and I enjoy figuring out composer/songwriter/whatever without having the CD cover in front of me. INTERESTING PICS FROM THE WEB
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Here's a great idea I saw on a friend's site-- use a Gaudi design that was intended for New York long ago for the new WTC. It looks like a fountain to me and what a beautiful addition that would be to NYC. Unfortunately, this entry was submitted too early for consideration.
This is a photo from the Iraq War (3/25/2003) of soldiers in a sandstorm at sunset (AP/John Moore).
