Author: wmglennosborne

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Summer adventures

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CarlMaultsByGlennOsborneSmGod Is Gone Up

Last Thursday, it was my pleasure to attend the festival choral Eucharist at St. Richard’s Episcopal Church in Winter Park where the St. Richard’s Schola under the direction of Dr. Carl MaultsBy gave the premier performance of my composition God Is Gone Up. I was very fortunate to be accompanied by a classmate from Westminster Choir College who blogs about her church visits. You can read her write up about the experience at Some Disagree with Mom. As it seems few churches actually celebrate on Ascension on Thursday in this area, there were several other musicians in attendance, and probably the best compliment I received was when one of the other musicians made a request to purchase copies of the score after the service was over! I want to express my gratitude to Carl for requesting this piece and giving me the opportunity to add another useful composition to my output.

Premiers and Classical

CFCArts_MozartsMass_Poster_B-667x1024Both the Bel Canto Choir of Gateway High School and the Holy Redeemer School Choir did admirably with the other premier performances last week. I am sad that I was not able to capture audio for the performance of God, Your Golden Doorway Beckons, but hopefully I will be able to post audio or video for the other two pieces sometime soon.

After a three premiers last week, this week ushers in a return of my accompanying and directing responsibilities with the kick off to the summer season of the CFCArts Classical Choir. We are still looking for singers for the Mass in C Minor (K. 427) by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Rehearsals will be on Thursday evenings with one concert performance on Friday, August 8, at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Winter Park, FL. If you are in the area, I encourage you to come and join the group!

Organ Improvisation

In addition to creating music for people such as the premiers or with people like the Classical Choir, I have been fascinated by the skills necessary to create music on the spot, especially at the organ. For that reason, I started a website a few months ago organimprovisation.com. I am pleased to announce that the site has been greatly expanded and that there is now a lesson handout on how to improvise a French toccata available when you sign up to receive the newsletter. I also just completed a newsletter series on the Four C’s of Improvisation that include a few helpful hints on becoming a better improviser. Even if you believe learning to improvise might be out of your reach, you could check out all the videos or recordings for some inspiration. I believe every musician should be able to improvise and can learn to do so if willing to practice.

Conferences

One of the events I always look forward to attending is the AGO national convention. This year it will take place in Boston, one of my favorite cities. While there are many different events to attend, you can be sure to find me at the events where improvisation will be the focus. I compiled a list of them here if you will be at the convention and wish to find me.

This year will be the first year that I attend the conference of the Association of Anglican Musicians. Last summer, I was able to attend the RSCM Course in Tulsa, so I am looking forward to attending a conference with more people who run RSCM programs. As an extra bonus, I’ll get to stop by New York City in between the two conferences and play for the Orlando Deanery Choir at St. Thomas. While I would not normally be excited about two weeks on the road, the music making and chance to see many friends make me look forward to this extended trip. If you will be at either of these conferences, I hope we can find each other and at least say hello!
Hoping you have a fun and adventuresome summer!

Glenn

Newsletter Issue 23 – 2014 06 02
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The Chariot Rolls On!

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The Chariot Rolls On

What a delight it was Monday evening to hear the Bel Canto Choir from Gateway High School under the direction of Chris Barletta give the premier performance of my composition, The Chariot. Knowing that the students had only a few rehearsals to learn the piece, I was quite pleased with the result. Check it out for yourself by clicking the picture below!

Faith Is Like a Mystic Spirit

At the conclusion of the piece as I was walking off stage, I told Chris that I’d have another piece for the group to learn for the Gateway High School Baccalaureate. By the end of the week, I had sent him a score for a new text by John Dalles, “God, Your Golden Doorway Beckons.” Unfortunately, it seems I took the text’s references to “a bold challenge we can claim…at the edge of what can be” a little too seriously and wrote a piece just out of reach for the number of rehearsal left. So I found another text (also by John Dalles) and produced something a little easier: “Faith Is Like a Mystic Spirit.” I went over to rehearse the choir last Friday and am now looking to the premier of this piece at the Gateway Baccalaureate on May 25.

Finishing a Piece

So what happens with “God, Your Golden Doorway Beckons”? The piece is written. Will it sit in a drawer until next year? Any one else interested in giving it a go? I love the text so much that I decided to program the piece with the school choir from Holy Redeemer for the eighth grade Graduation Mass. We won’t be able to sing all the harmony parts, but the melody alone (with piano accompaniment) will still provide a lovely rendition of this end of school year text. I may not have mentioned it in last week’s discussion of the 5 Ws, but it’s very difficult for me to write a piece of music if there is no ‘When’ on the calendar. Also, when the piece requires more than just one person to perform it, I never feel like it is truly finished until I’ve handed the score over to someone else to perform. This is when I realize what part of the music doesn’t exist on paper, and what I still need to write down. Even this scaled down performance with the school choir from Holy Redeemer will give me that opportunity I need to experience the piece and satisfies that “W’ that went missing on me.

40 Days After…

Sandwiched in between the graduation pieces above happens to fall the Feast of Ascension (40 days after Easter) and the premier of “God Is Gone Up” written for Dr. Carl MaultsBy and the St. Richard’s Schola. This is the second piece I’ve written for St. Richard’s and will make three premiers in one week! What an exciting way to bring the month of May to a close!

CFCArts_MozartsMass_Poster_B-667x1024Classical Choir

With all this talk about the end of the school year, it must mean that summer is almost here. For the past two years, I have had the pleasure of accompanying the CFCArts Classical Choir in their summer concerts. This summer, I will be playing for the group rehearsals and concert as they prepare the Mass in C Minor (K. 427) by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. If you are in the Orlando area, I encourage you to sign up and join the group. Rehearsals will be on Thursday evenings starting June 5. I was able to perform this work with the New York Philharmonic under the direction of Robert Shaw while I studied at Westminster Choir College, so I am looking forward to doing the piece again now almost twenty years later.

Wishing you a happy and safe Memorial Day and a beautiful start to your summer!

Glenn

Newsletter Issue 22 – 2014 05 20
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A Year of God’s Favor

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AYearofGodsFavorCoverOriginally written for the Diocesan Youth Choir formed to sing for the Chrism Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany, NY in 2005, This setting of Delores Dufner’s text “A Year of God’s Favor” is scored for SAB choir, piano and optional flute, oboe and violoncello. The audio below was generated by the Finale music notation program.

1. Listen now     


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God, Your Golden Doorway Beckons

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Written May 9-10, 2014 for the Bel Canto Choir of Gateway High School under the direction of Chris Barletta. The text is by John Dalles. Music is scored for three part women’s choir with piano accompaniment. It was one of two pieces written for use at the Baccalaureate service at the end of the school year. The piece celebrates the success of graduation while looking forward to all the possibilities and challenges of the future. It will be premiered (in unison) at the Graduation Mass for Holy Redeemer Catholic School.

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Watchful Shepherd

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WatchfulShepherdFor Good Shepherd Sunday this year, I had programmed an arrangement of J.S. Bach’s “Schafe können sicher weiden” from Cantata 208 with an English text. At each of the choir rehearsals I had however, I became more and more frustrated with the part writing and the irregularity of the text. Finally, in a fit of frustration, I decided I would make my own arrangement and fix both the voice leading and text problems. While I considered trying for a translation of the original German, I opted instead to paraphrase Psalm 23. This is an easy anthem for the choir as they sing a simple four part harmonization of the chorale melody supported at all times by keyboard accompaniment. The piece could also be performed by a unison choir singing the soprano melody.

A performance by the Choir of the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen can be seen here.

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How to write a piece of music

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GatewayHighStravinsky

This past Friday, I went over to Gateway High School to hear the Bel Canto Choir rehearse the piece I wrote for them with a text by Emily Dickinson: The Chariot. It is always such a thrilling moment for me to hear a group actually sing something that I’ve put down on paper, and I am very much looking forward to the premier performance tonight during their spring concert! I hope to be able to post a video after the event is over. (Now available here.)

Their director, Chris, and I were still discussing interpretation ideas when the next group came in for class. He introduced me to them and offered them the opportunity to ask me questions about the composition process. The first question I was asked reminded me of the questions I had been asked when I first went to hear the Bel Canto Choir last fall, both of which were some form of: How do you choose what notes to put on the page? In each case I referenced a quote which I finally looked up from Igor Stravinsky: “The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one’s self.” I remember hearing this first from my own first composition teacher who explained that when asked simply to compose a piece of music, even the great Stravinsky was at a loss as to what to write, but as soon as you told him that you needed a piece for -choose your favorite and most peculiar set of instruments (accordion, kettle drum, flute and viola, for example)- he had lots of ideas.

Five Ws

The five Ws are questions for gathering basic information: Who, What, Where, When, Why. Just like the five vowels include a “and sometimes ‘y'”, we could add ‘How’ to this list of questions words. Just like Stravinsky, the more information I have regarding these topics, the easier it is for me to write a piece.

Who

Generally I need to have an idea of who will be singing or performing the composition I am to write. This will enable me to determine instrumentation and help identify the difficulty level. An amateur choir does not have the same musical skills as a professional octet, and if the brass ensemble is two trumpets and two trombones, writing a tuba or French horn part does not respect who the group is.

What

For choral pieces, what is the text? Is this a concert piece or a piece for worship? What addresses The answer to what sort of piece this is addresses the form the composition will take.

Where

Is this piece for a small church covered in carpet, a large resonant acoustic, or Yankee Stadium? The performance venue can influence the style of writing or the form of the piece.

When

This can be a very critical question for style. How long until the performance? How many rehearsal will the group have. I always strive to write pieces that will be successful not simply in and of themselves, but for the performers as well. Giving a group with little rehearsal time a piece that is too difficult to learn only will result in either frustration, a poor performance, or even a cancellation. Not good.

Why

This question for we is the one most closely related to musical style. What sort of affect is desired or intended by the composition? Is this a piece meant to convey joy or grief? Anger or delight? Severity or lightheartedness? Music has a message to convey, and that message is the why of the piece.

Craft vs. Inspiration

I studied harmony and counterpoint for several years, in addition to creating music on the spot through improvisation. Through a regular process of writing psalm settings, I feel I have developed a solid craft of composition. While a dash of inspiration may help the process along, as Stravinsky also said, “Composers combine notes, that’s all.” Plumbers and electricians do not wait for inspiration in order to work. People don’t wait for inspiration to have conversations. If music truly is a language, musicians should be skilled in the craft enough to converse and not have to wait for inspiration or rely on the “words” of someone else. In the past, formation as a musician included the ability to compose. Could the lack of instruction in composition now be one of the reasons “classical” music, including symphony orchestras and opera companies struggle to continue operations?

Writing a piece of music for me involves answering the 5 Ws and then applying the skills I have learned to communicate (or enable the performance group to communicate) a message appropriate for their skill level, the forces available, the venue, time and occasion of the event. Each of the three premiers coming up this month were easy to write because I had lots of solid answers to those questions. Do you need a piece for your group? Can you answer the 5 Ws for me? If so, send me your answers and I’ll see if I can add you to my calendar of events.

Wishing you all the best!

Glenn

Newsletter Issue 21 – 2014 05 05
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God Is Gone Up

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God is gone up with a merry shout.
Alleluia.

Written on April 29, 2014 for Dr. Carl MaultsBy and the St. Richard’s Schola of St. Richard’s Episcopal Church in Winter Park, Florida, this piece in Baroque style is written for two-part choir. It could be done by women alone, a mixed adult choir, or even a children’s choir. The harmonic language is simple with very few accidentals. The accompaniment is a simple three-part texture that could be played on organ or piano.

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The Chariot

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Written on April 16, 2014 for Chris Barletta and the Women’s Choir of Gateway High School in Kissimmee, Florida, with an expected first performance in May 2014. The students selected a poem by Emily Dickinson as the text that they wanted me to set for them. The Chariot begins “Because I Could Not Stop for Death” and is a somber piece that suggested a chromatic language to me. While there is four-part divisi, the piece remains homophonic and there are many passages in only two parts. The choir is supported by the piano with a brief unaccompanied passage. A video of the first performance can be seen here.

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It is finish-ed!

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ColorLogoRGBLogo chosen!

It was a tough choice, but I awarded a winner in the competition at 99designs.com for a logo for Audubon Park Music. Thanks to everyone who voted or offered their opinions on the submissions! Net up will be a website redesign to incorporate the new logo and start moving my catalog of music for sale from wmglennosborne.com over to audubonparkmusic.com. I hope to have the site fully functional by the time the bishops grant me permission to publish my psalter.

Bi-location?

Any musician at a reasonably large church is familiar with the difficulties of having to be in two different places at the same time. While science may have advanced enough to provide clones of certain animals, I’m still waiting for the technology that allows us to bi-locate. How much more practice time could I get if I could actually be on the organ bench AND at the staff meeting? If you could be in two places at once, where would you choose to go?

Sadly, we can’t divide ourselves yet, and as the sound system in the social hall at Holy Redeemer was my most stressful part of this past week, I am extremely grateful that my choir was willing to change venues and move from their traditional location of the church to serve the overflow crowd in the social hall. While I normally like to have everything well-planned in advance, I am still an improviser and will go with the flow when necessary. Thank you to all the singers and musicians at Holy Redeemer for a wonderful week of liturgies and for going along with the flow when change was needed!

Because I Could Not Stop for Death

Death seems to be the theme of this week. Not only at church, but in real life. One of my colleagues from Westminster Choir College passed away just over a week ago from cancer. While sad, this was expected. The unexpected event was the sudden death of one of my classmates at a rehearsal at Disney Hall in Los Angeles. Jeff Dinsmore and I graduated from Westminster twenty years ago this May. I still feel young enough that learning of the death of someone my own age creates a pause for reflection: am I spending my limited time here on earth doing the best that I can? How about you?

The students at Gateway High School chose a text by Emily Dickinson for me to set for them titled The Chariot. Because I Could Not Stop for Death is the first line, and it seems very fitting that I managed to set this text during this week surrounded by death. We are still working on the potential performance date. There will also likely be another piece written for Gateway this year to be sung at their baccalaureate service at the end of May. No one wants to hear about death at a graduation ceremony, so I’ll be looking for a happier topic….

The next performance I do have scheduled is the Classical Choir Concert of the Central Florida Community Arts on May 3 and 4. The program includes The Seven Last Words of Christ by Theodore Dubois (referenced by today’s subject line). Luckily, this concert also includes some happier tunes by Mozart, Rossini, Thompson and others. I’m hoping this week of death is now finish-ed and more pleasant times will arrive in this Easter season.

May you live long and prosper!

Glenn

Newsletter Issue 20 – 2014 04 22
See the complete list of newsletter issues here.