Cantata Diary

In the March 19 issue of the New Yorker, the poet Dan Chiasson wrote a review of a new book of poems by Li-Young Lee, called The Undressing”.   li-Young is one of my favorite poets, and I consider a friend – having had a great Dim Sum lunch with him a few years back in his hometown, Chicago.   I have written music to two of his poems.  I read the review, then bought the book. I began looking for a new poem I might write music to.   The title poem of the book is very long – much too long- I initially thought for a song.  I put it aside, then on the way back from our trip to Israel in October I opened my Ipad and started seriously reading it -twice on the plane from Tel Aviv to London – three times on the way to SFO.  No turbulence on the flight – except in my brain, where I slowly developed the idea of writing a suite.   I later came up with the cantata idea, including  doing the orchestration

The problem I know zilch about orchestration.

For the 45 or so songs I’ve written to poetry I have written the melody and the harmony.  Then I hand it over to my amazing teacher – Ken French – and he outlines the orchestration, letting the musicians improvise most of it.   I’ve been working with Ken for 12 years.  At that beginning, I was in 3rd grade musically, thanks to Ken I’m now in Junior High.

The poem is a dialogue between a man and a woman.  To quote Chiasson “The woman is the searchlight of the poem, exposing its tensions between “flesh” and “spirit”.  The man, a pitiful animal at the mercy of his appetites, is her plaything”  The poem will be a musical conversation between them.  I’ve added a chorus for some of the woman’s lines.

I knew that my first task was to ask Li-Young for his blessing, which I received in mid-October.  He wrote “I’m so moved by your appreciation for the title poem of the book.  I have no words to express the gratitude and honor feel.”

He then went on to explain much of the meaning of the poem, which was of immense help to me in approaching it.  ” the poems is a dialogue between the Lover and the Beloved, and it depicts my own concrete struggle to understand and desire to know the Feminine more fully.  It’s been a lifelong adventure and misadventure clarified by my practice of what the ancient Chinese called “the study of the dynamism of opposites” or taiji, and understood by that wise, ancient Greek Heraclitus as The Logos, what he described as the strife and harmony of opposites that undergirds all manifestation, physical and mental”

I suspect this project will take at least a year – probably more like 2. Today I decided to keep a diary of my progress with it, and to make it public to anyone who would care to follow.

The book is called “The Undressing”, it’s available at your neighborhood bookstore or on Amazon.

(Although I’m starting the diary today, I’ve made prior entries as though they were made contemporaneously)

 

2018

10-20.   Open up Sibelius, computer notation program, arbitrarily choose Dminor as the opening tone center- start singing some melodic ideas, which is a problem since I can’t really sing.  Keyboard wandering is next.

10-22  Decide to start with an 8 bar theme on the chromatic harmonica – leading to the opening word of the poem “Listen”.  The woman is saying that to the man. I suspect that is what Li-Young is saying to his readers and, yes,  what I hope to say to our audience. (Interesting that it’s also the first word in the fundamental prayer of Jewish liturgy)

10-24   Begin discussion of the concept with Ken, hoping he will be my guide through this challenging jungle.  As a result of this conversation I come up with a tentative plan: 1.  write the melody – including instrumental interludes as I now hear them – for the entire work 2.  Go back through it and build the harmonic structure – the chords. 3.  Put it on the shelf for perhaps 6 months, letting it jell in my mind.  4  Take that time to read every book I can about orchestration, and to study actual scores of great composers as I listen to the work.

10–27  Writing the melody is very hard work.  My approach is similar to the songs I’ve been writing over the last 9 years:  The melodies d=should be accessible and easy to hear and must reflect the mood of the poem and the intent of the poet.  Whenever possible they should help interpret the meaning of the poem.

10-28  I realize I can steal melodies from myself.   Each of the songs I’ve written has a main section (A) and what we refer to as a bridge (B section).  Three of those bridge sections seem to work very well here, with some modification.

10-31  Ken takes me on a tour of the fourth floor of the San Francisco main public library – a wealth of information about all things musical.  I come home with an armload of books – including the score to Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana and “The Idiot’s Guide to Orchestration”

11-4  Initial thoughts about the orchestra.  Initially, I thought brass and woodwinds.  Now I realize that some of the longer passages spoken by the woman need the deep emotions only strings can provide.

10-5   Little awkward to keep referring to them as “the man” and “the woman” so I’m giving them names, for my own reference:  Cyrano and Roxanne (I know they don’t really fit, but it does have a nice ring)

11-6.  Center stage will be a jazz band   ( piano, bass, drums, guitar, trumpet, tenor sax, harmonica).  Behind Cyrano’s parts will be improvised jazz.  The music accompanying Roxanne and the chorus will be more “classical” – and strictly following the manuscript. I believe this further’s Li-Young’s concept of the dynamic of opposites.

11-14  Ken persuades me that the basis of the orchestration must be a study of  counterpoint.  I begin my detailed analysis of Bach’s Two Part Inventions for piano.

11-24  – About halfway through on melody.  Now guessing total length of 1 -1.5 hours. It is exciting, I’m truly turned on by this project.  It may come to nothing or – who knows – get a Grammy.  Either way the journey is the best part.

11-27  The action so far has Cyrano describing either his actions or ambitions in his pursuit of Roxanne’s body.    She never responds to this, but talks about the world, and dreams and words  “There are dreams we dream alone, there are dreams we dream with others, then there’s the lilac’s secret life of fire”  Occasionally she talks to him about his life “Your lamp has a triple wick: Remembering, questioning and sheltering”.  Then suddenly 2/3 of the way through the poem, she takes him on. “You’ve done all your teaching thinking only of yourself. Saving the world you oppress people.”  This is a 6 line lecture where I let the chorus speak for her.  It’s fast, hammering notes, backed by brass and timpani.  Then suddenly for the first time she responds to all his pawing and probing: “I want you to touch me as if you want to know me, not arouse me.””

My daunting challenge is to find a melody for those 16 words that express their profundity and tenderness – and will make listeners think “wow” or “right on”.

11-29      A rare flowing happened this morning at about 6 a.m.  – An idea for a great melody comes to me in bed. I think it’s happened twice.  Great melodies don’t come in a vacuum.  One needs to be solving a problem.  I worry, however, that it might not be original.  Paul McCartney had the same problem with “Yesterdays”. He composed it in a dream one night in his room at the Wimpole Street home of his then girlfriend.  His initial concern was that he had subconsciously plagiarised it.  “For about a month I went round to people in the business and asked them whether they had ever heard it before.”

I don’t plan to do that…….steaming  ahead.

 

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