10. Lightforms
Denton, 1985 — One of Schoenberg’s Five Pieces for Orchestra , Op. 16, subtitled “Summer morning by a lake,” evokes the color (farben) of light. Another work, by Schoenberg’s Vienna colleague, Webern, to me is metaphorically also about light and color, though abstractly titled Variations, Op. 30. Brief flashes of light come out of silence,…
9. Mapping
Leelanau, 1983 — My last summer working at what was then called the National Music Camp in Interlochen, Michigan was 1983. We spent as much time off as possible on the nearby shore of Lake Michigan. Three spots on the western edge of the Leelanau peninsula were favorite magical places. Otter Creek played out into…
8. Zeitmasse
Interlochen, 1976 — The German word Zeit means “time.” While masse sounds like “masses,” it actually tranlates “measures.” The two together make the musical term “tempos”. Karlheinz Stockhausen composed his “Time Measures” in 1956, N. 5 Zeitmasse for five woodwinds. Time is unmetered, rapidly and unpredictably ebbing and flowing in a dense texture of highly…
7. Carte du Ciel
U.Mich. Electronic Music Studio, 1975 — Mapping the stars — My 2024 book, Mapping the Music Universe, begins with recognition of historic, world-changing pioneers in science and the arts. It includes Carte du Ciel (“Map of the Heavens”), an ambitious second phase of an international star-mapping project initiated in 1887 by Paris Observatory director Amédée…
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MAPPING MUSIC 