That was one of the questions posed to a group of 50 young musicians last Saturday at ‘Money From Music’ – a workshop presented by the Australian Youth Music Council (which I currently chair) in my home town of Canberra. We asked the participants to answer questions such as:

- Why do I want to be a musician?
- Do I expect to be paid as a musician?
- Do I expect to earn other sources of income to sustain my Arts Practice?

Despite a lot of last-minute organising and preparing, the day seemed to be incredibly successful in terms of having musicians dissect broad questions about the wider industry and interact with difficult issues. We played a ‘game’ (likened by a few to be somewhat similar to Stephen Fry’s QI), where teams of musicians had to answer a range of situational questions, and got points according to how popular their answers were. The idea was to get people to think about broad issues, not to disseminate information. To provide a context we featured 8 diverse speakers to give a snapshot of their own careers – Griffyn compatriot Matthew O’Keeffe from the RMC band, Boy and Bear manager and AYMC member Rowan Brand, Fourplay musician and Senator Christine Milne’s adviser Tim Hollo, and film/TV composer Art Phillips to name a few. We then challenged the groups to answer questions such as:

You’re auditioning for a job in a Stage Band that tours. They select you, but realise that they pay you as a casual for the first 6 months before they commit to a full time contract. You currently are a music teacher with 50 students. Do you cancel all your students, knowing that will not be able to get them back to take the risk and commit to the trial?

This blog isn’t the context to summarise the responses – what was most important was that it got people thinking about larger issues of music and how to make a living out of it. (…although the group that answered the above question suggested that if they were a good teacher that if they were a good enough teacher their students would come back to them if it didn’t work out – so they should go for the gig!…) However, the responses were incredibly interesting and we’ll be working to follow up on some form of summary, which will be presented at the International Music Council’s World Forum on Music in Tallinn later this year.

Most illuminating for us [the AYMC] was how this seemed to be an effective model for youth advocacy. How did we achieve this? We hunted around for a few answers to this post-workshop: It was free, there was a mix of ages and genres, it was about exploration instead of disseminating information, it was interactive, it was about global issues affecting primarily a local audience, and there were strategic local connections. More important was how everyone had fun and were able to share their own diverse experiences as an aspiring, emerging, or established musician.

So what next? Perhaps a ‘Watch This Space’ for how such investigation can continue to be promoted throughout communities around the country, and hopefully illicit debate and discussion among young musicians as to how their Practice fits in with the broader economy and society.

I have always been terrified of writing a string quartet – what could a developing Australian composer possibly have to offer the genre which boasts hundreds of masterworks by luminaries such as Beethoven, Ravel, Shostakovich, Haydn, etc. Perhaps my love for the string quartet repertoire was the reason I had avoided it for so long. Fortunately, the opportunity to have a piece workshopped and performed by the Australian String Quartet was too great for me to pass by – it took me out of my comfort zone and forced me to face my fears and put notes on the page.

And so emerged ‘So she moaned, and as she uttered her moans…’. It is an adaptation of a work I had written several years earlier, The Raw and the Cooked – an impression of an Amazonian myth explaining the origins of death and disease. Adapting a pre-existing work was ideal for me: I had always known, in the back of my mind, that it could be turned into a string quartet, and this allowed me to concentrate primarily on the colours and combinations that have been so well developed in the string quartet for the past 250 years.

The Australian String Quartet had done an amazing job in interpreting what I had written, and in the workshops I was able to focus purely on the technical elements of the piece – hearing a different tone colour here and there, perhaps a change in tempo, dropping an octave once or twice – greatly increasing my understanding of the string quartet dynamic.

Watching five of my colleagues work with the quartet in a similar way was equally (if not more) valuable – a tactile awareness is so important for composers. Future hints will hopefully be stored in the memory banks for a while (for instance: did you know a second violinist strings their instrument differently from a first violinist for a deeper tone colour in the bottom strings? It seems so obvious now…)

Over the weekend I made a few alterations – nothing substantial, although upon reflection I have been toying with the idea of making some more fundamental changes to the piece. I think this is one of the hardest things for a composer – to know when to change something and when to leave it alone.

The Australian String Quartet performed my piece magnificently – that murky quality which I wanted, coupled with a melodic ground that was more or less in-stasis, and a gradual dynamic rise from beginning to end. But as a composer, at what point does murky become too ambiguous? When does melodic-stasis become too repetitive? I know I will never find answers to such subjective questions…

The hunt for definitive answers can be a risk of such occasions where peers and mentors meet – that every comment and suggestion made can become permanently ingrained in your consciousness, forever dictating the way you write as you aspire for that chimerical ‘perfect’ piece of music. Fortunately I was lucky enough to be in the company of not only inspiring musicians and composers but wonderful people – reminding me that after all ‘it’s only music’ – and departed with what feels like a greater musical freedom of expression. It was a joy to share my music with such fantastic people, and to have learnt much along the way.

P.G. Wodehouse once said something along the lines that his writing was a ‘light musical comedy’ compared to other more ‘serious’ endeavors, with a flippancy that is moving and at times mysteriously profound. Birds of East Africa has that Wodehouse charm about it. It tells the story of two competing Indian Kenyans – Mr. Malik and Harry Khan, competing for the right to ask out Scottish bird enthusiast Rose Mbikwa out to the Annual Hunt Club Ball through a competition proposed by the esteemed men of the Asidi Club: who can identify the most species of birds first hand in the space of the week.

Although there may be no Jeeves, post-colonial Kenya is evocative of Wodehouse’ colonial England with a gentleman’s club and all (although I doubt Bertie ever got attacked by Somali militia). The premise sets up an incredibly unbelievable series of incidents midst the race to count as many birds as possible. It is hilarious, charming, sweet, and thrilling, and I (obviously) found it hard to stop reading.

It sometimes amazes me how many talented artists we have in a place as small as Canberra – for someone who thinks that a light musical comedy is just as artistically valid as a Wagnerian opera, I found Drayson’s Birds of East Africa tremendously inspiring… so to stay true to form i have to wait for a pair of binoculars to write my next work… maybe for guitar duo… the Birds of North Canberra anyone? Someone please stop me…

There is quite a diversity of activity here – the Australian Youth Orchestra are running a chamber music program in conjunction with the Festival, with masterclasses from Festival Artists Pekka Kuusisto, the Eggner Trio, Takács Quartet, and Goldner String Quartet. I’m particularly looking forward to the Takács’ complete Bartók cycle (who wouldn’t?!?!); and George Crumb’s Black Angels on Sunday – I’m not sure when it has last been performed in Australia, but I presume the opportunity to hear it doesn’t come too often.

Paolini's Bacchic Concert (1625)

Dear Griffyn-ites

From the Baroque to Rock n’ Roll, The Griffyn Ensemble returns to Belconnen Arts Centre and open the brand new Calwell Performing Arts Centre on April 1st-2nd with two special concerts of inflamed desires and rapture. We’ll be performing music exploring the sordid side of love with music inspired by carnal lust, women of the night, and tortured romance.

We’ve been exploring music from the past four hundred years that share a common theme found throughout the ages – that of Illicit Passions. The program begins with a piece from Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin’s Lady in the Dark, which relates the moral indignations of a woman who just ‘would make up her mind’. The Ensemble then takes us on a journey through the seduction, love, and sexuality one may experience through a lifetime – including a resetting of The Police’s Roxanne; variations on a well-known theme sung by an iconic pop princess; an excerpt from Oscar Hammerstein’s Carmen Jones (a reinterpretation of Bizet’s Carmen); resetting of the text from Bob Dylan’s Forever Young by American composer John Corigliano; and Antonin Dvorak’s divine Song to the Moon.

Also woven into the program are Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune – the famous Ballets Russes relating the story of a faun impressing a group of nymphs; seductive sounds from tango master Astor Piazzolla; and the world premiere of Letter to a Greek Nymph by Griffyn composer Michael Sollis for solo celesta – each piece contextualized to question a different side of Illicit Passions.

For the first time, the Griffyn Ensemble will be presenting both a Northside and Southside concert, with the Southside concert at the brand new Calwell Performing Arts Centre.

The Griffyn Ensemble – Illicit Passions

Friday April 1st 7pm – Calwell Performing Arts Centre, 111 Casey Crescent Calwell
Saturday April 2nd 5:30pm – Belconnen Arts Centre, Emu Bank Belconnen
For bookings/details go to https://griffyn.iwannaticket.com.au or email griffyn@live.com.au
For Enquiries, contact Belconnen Arts Centre on 6173 3300
Standard Seating – Adults $35, Concession $25
Premium Seating (includes food and wine, Belconnen concert only) – Adults $55, Concession $45
(N.B. This concert contains mild adult themes)

Hope to see you there!

The Griffyn Ensemble

~Kiri Sollis~Matthew O’Keeffe~Carly Brown~Meriel Owen~Wyana Etherington~Susan Ellis~Michael Sollis~
~flute~clarinet~horn~harp~percussion~soprano~composer~

… so really,…. does this award have any point other than trying to earn a cheap headline????. Lowlands is clearly a musical work. It is no more ‘sound art’ then Beethoven’s 5th being played in urban train stations to discourage youth loitering, or Metallica’s Nothing Else Matters being played on the loudspeakers of a local pub.

the work seems pleasant enough although I have never ‘seen’ it – the lack of any visual element or dependence on a particular space doesn’t really inspire a need to fly over and ‘see’ the $40,000 prize-winning work. in a Cagean way, Beethoven’s 5th at the train station would seemingly be more visually engaging, assuming the existence of some graffiti and moving billboards. but, according to the Turner judges, the work expressed an ‘intelligibility’ as well as an ‘unknown something’ that all great works of art have.

so, how adventurous, how daring, of the Turner prize to include ‘music’ in ‘visual art’, and celebrate a recording of Scottish folk songs as “new developments in contemporary art” (can you hear Pierre Schaeffer moaning and playing from his grave an selection of musique concrete??). I’m sure there will be many skeptics who agree with British art critic Richard Dorment who mentioned in his blog:

“I’ve often noticed that people who don’t have the talent to make a TV commercial have no trouble passing their static black and white films off as high art. Maybe that’s what’s happening here and with her Turner Prize money Ms Philipsz will go off and start a choir.”

mmmm… hear the sound of artists from all over the world collectively sigh…

Or are we the ones who misunderstand it?  It ashamedly occurred to me that I had never actually seen the Rite in it’s ballet context.  Somehow ‘Music’ has taken all the credit for the 1913 riot.  So I watched it.  For me, the Rite, in it’s proper context, is a confronting work.  The ballet is violent, it is sex, it is unnatural, it evokes the same feelings inside you that you get watching The Exorcist. It is brilliant, but it is not light entertainment.  It is masculine, it is feminine, it is primitive, it is scary, it makes you want to move – and the choreography seems to be the driving force behind this artistic confrontation.  Yet, we seem to focus on the music – i guess what exactly caused the riot, we will never really know.

So if the Rite was performed today would it cause anything close to a riot?  Probably not – I was talking to a music-lover today about this, and his response was ‘well people would be too scared to say they didn’t like it’ (Composers Unite! – see how far we have come!).  But what would people think?  Would the audience feel confronted in the same way?  Possibly.  Critics and academics would have a field-day criticising the work for it’s orientalist depiction of pagan Russian culture, that’s for sure.

Apparently after the work was written, Jean Cocteau insisted on having a typewriter and foghorn in Erik Satie’s Parade, performed later by the Ballet Russe, with the aspiration of inciting another riot in Paris.  Although the typewriter featured in the score, the riot never ensued, and at the end of his life Stravinsky proudly proclaimed he was responsible for the biggest ever musical riot.  We don’t really associate Nijinsky in quite the same way, and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring has kind of developed in the popular consciousness in isolation from the choreography.  This is a shame, and perhaps misleading composers into a false sense of comfort that all music was hated once.  Irony.

Dear Griffyn-ites

A (gentle) reminder to book tickets for this Saturday’s Griffyn American Songbook at Belconnen Arts Centre, 5pm.  We’ve been putting the last pieces of the jigsaw together in rehearsals, with music and words from American jazz, musical theatre, opera, avant garde, pop, and film.  Do you know who said the following quotes???

When I’m dead twenty-five years, people are going to begin to recognise me.

As far as my planless activities are concerned, I have done the following:

Had a couple of songs which have attracted some attention, been recorded and made a little money.

I have become involved with one more impossible woman

Don’t ever feel discomfited by a melody

Well he [Walt Disney] couldn’t explain just what he wanted, at times.  We’d go crazy trying to figure out what he wanted.  But he inspired us that way.  We wanted to help him, we wanted to do it, and we all worked together in that respect.  That was his genius, I think, inspiring the people who worked for him to come up with new ideas.

Find out who said what on Saturday!

Bookings for catering close this Thursday – the Black Pepper Café & Bar have produced a mouth-watering American style menu with Corn Fritters, New York Style Sandwiches, Mini Cheeseburgers, and Apple Pie ( go to http://www.belconnenartscentre.com.au/whatson/americanSongbook.html for more details).  Tickets can be booked by calling The Belconnen Arts Centre on 6173 3300 Tue-Sat, or by replying to this email (griffyn@live.com.au), which we will then forward on to the Centre.  You can purchase both catered ($45 full, $35 Conc/U27, $15 U18) or non-catered ($30 full, /$20 Conc/U27, U18 – Free) tickets.  All tickets come with a glass of wine!

From the Griffyn Ensemble

~flute~clarinet~horn~harp~percussion~soprano~composer~

~Kiri Sollis~Matthew O’Keeffe~Carly Brown~Laura Tanata~Wyana Etherington~Susan Ellis~Michael Sollis~

Miller will best be remembered through his iconic Sing Along With Mitch t.v. show in the 1960s, which was credited for popularising the ‘bouncing ball’ as an audience guide to following lyrics.  He ‘discovered’ Aretha Franklin, and produced/signed iconic singers such as Doris Day and Tony Bennett.  He was a noted conductor and for at least one generation was a household name.  There is an obituary for Miller here.

I think Miller exemplifies the chasm between institutionalised art and the real world.  Mitch Miller was a musical identity – familiar to many, and someone who brought music into the homes of everyday people.  On the other hand, within the culture of the artistic establishment he is someone who is rarely mentioned (if even thought of).  Mitch Miller began his career as a classical oboe player (and it was his performance in the Alec Wilder Octet’s where I first came across him).  In this sense, it’s ironic that Miller is possibly the ‘real’ world’s most well known oboist, at least amongst those who remember Sing Along With Mitch.

Rosenfeld, who passed away in 2003 was best known for his opera works (you can find an obituary here), but other than that there seems to be very little information about him.  However, all roads lead to Canberra, and late last year I was very interested to learn that local harpist Alice Giles met him when recording his beautiful Requiem fur Kaza Katharinna for chamber ensemble, mezzo-soprano, and folk instruments.  It stands as one of the only recordings of his work, so hopefully the humble CMO can add to that in the near future – everything I’ve heard so far of his is interesting, and wish there was more out there…