New Gene piece up

It's "The Paradise of Cantor", on my personal music page:

http://www.xenahrmony.org/gene.html
or
http://66.98.148.43/~xenharmo/gene.html

It's a typical Gene Smith piece, so you have been warned. When my pal
Maz gets back from his Hawaiian tour, maybe we'll see what he makes of it.

Gene,

{you wrote...}
>It's "The Paradise of Cantor", on my personal music page:
>
>http://www.xenahrmony.org/gene.html

I think people will have an easier time with:

http://www.xenharmony.org/gene.html

>It's a typical Gene Smith piece, so you have been warned.

:) Deliciously weird piece!

Cheers,
Jon

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Jon Szanto <jszanto@...> wrote:

> :) Deliciously weird piece!

Thanks, Jon.

Hi Gene,

Exept for the beginning with the very high pitched sounds, I think it's very nice. I think it explores very well some of the the possibilities out there. It's not the kind of thing I would listen to in the background, but with focused attention it's very nice.

/ Magnus

On Fri, 27 Oct 2006, Gene Ward Smith wrote:

> It's "The Paradise of Cantor", on my personal music page:
>
> http://www.xenahrmony.org/gene.html
> or
> http://66.98.148.43/~xenharmo/gene.html
>
> It's a typical Gene Smith piece, so you have been warned. When my pal
> Maz gets back from his Hawaiian tour, maybe we'll see what he makes of it.
>
>
>
>

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Magnus Jonsson <magnus@...> wrote:

> It's not the kind of thing I would listen to in the background, but
> with focused attention it's very nice.

Thanks. I've got some other projects I could finish. Has anyone ever
actually written anything in 118-et? I could finish that one.

Mostly, it seems to me, these tuning systems have remained untried.

Gene,
"The Paradise of Cantor" is another winner in the long line of
terrific Gene Ward Smith pieces. Unmistakably yours. I liked the high
notes at the beginning, though. We forget that the middle range is so
overused in music.

I had a composing teacher in college who told us to write a piece for
piano using only the highest and/or lowest octaves. Lionel Nowak.
Great guy. He told us he paid the bills during the depression reading
sheet music looking for plagiarism in tin pan alley songs.

Prent Rodgers

> It's "The Paradise of Cantor", on my personal music page:
>
> http://www.xenahrmony.org/gene.html
> or
> http://66.98.148.43/~xenharmo/gene.html
>
> It's a typical Gene Smith piece, so you have been warned. When my pal
> Maz gets back from his Hawaiian tour, maybe we'll see what he makes
of it.
>

>It's "The Paradise of Cantor", on my personal music page:
>
>http://www.xenahrmony.org/gene.html
>or
>http://66.98.148.43/~xenharmo/gene.html

It has merits, but I don't think it's one of your stronger
pieces. It's still a treat to hear your command of the
pitch spectrum, but I find myself wanting more thematic
glue.

-Carl

Magnus wrote...

>Exept for the beginning with the very high pitched sounds, I think it's
>very nice. I think it explores very well some of the the possibilities
>out there. It's not the kind of thing I would listen to in the background,
>but with focused attention it's very nice.

Most of Gene's stuff is in the 'requires focused attention' category,
though he does have some meditative pieces like Kotekant, Clinton
Variations, and Choraled.

For those of you not familiar with Gene's back catalog, I highly
recommend you have a listen. Some of my other favorites are:

Nonagenta et novem
Chromosounds

Septimal Star
Trio for clarinet, English horn, and banjo
Stained Glass
Magic Rondo

-Carl

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Carl Lumma <ekin@...> wrote:

> It has merits, but I don't think it's one of your stronger
> pieces. It's still a treat to hear your command of the
> pitch spectrum, but I find myself wanting more thematic
> glue.

Interesting reaction. I've been hearing complaints my stuff is too
static, this was supposed to help cure that.

>Interesting reaction. I've been hearing complaints my stuff is too
>static, this was supposed to help cure that.

I think I may have even made such a complaint. Or anyway, what
this conjures for me is a desire for contrasting themes / sectional
development. I should listen to the present piece again, but it
seemed like it got itself lost. Maybe I was prejudiced by the
description (large number of scales used) somewhat...

You do have some static pieces, like obviously Kotekant (but
that is the desired effect), Clinton Variations (works in a
chaconne-like way), Septimal Star (meditative repetition
and transformation of a single theme, but without the strong
chord progression of a chaconne).

Chromosounds is reminiscent of Clinton Variations, but has
a little more variety. Choraled is reminiscent of Septimal
Star in the same way.

One cheap way to get sectional development is to take pieces
like Chromosounds and Choraled and put them into a multi-movement
piece.

-Carl

> > It has merits, but I don't think it's one of your stronger
> > pieces. It's still a treat to hear your command of the
> > pitch spectrum, but I find myself wanting more thematic
> > glue.
>
> Interesting reaction. I've been hearing complaints my stuff is too
> static, this was supposed to help cure that.

Hi Gene,

I really apreciated the dynamism in this one. I enjoy your music best
when focusing on the micro level, specifically the intervallic
subleties, and for me the macro-level movement simply helps keep my
ears from getting fatigued over the duration.

Chris Bryan

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, c.m.bryan <chrismbryan@...> wrote:

> I really apreciated the dynamism in this one. I enjoy your music best
> when focusing on the micro level, specifically the intervallic
> subleties, and for me the macro-level movement simply helps keep my
> ears from getting fatigued over the duration.

Thanks; your reply makes a lot of sense to me in terms of my intentions.
But Carl is right that some further long-range structure could be
introdced; this one was in effect variation form.