05/15/2012
Brief Interviews with Black House: Teri Ann Quinn
Our next interview is with multiple resident, Teri Ann Quinn. This is Teri's second workshop as a clarinetist and her first as a composer. It takes a brave soul to wait until the Gamelan workshop to bring in your first piece.
Where are you from and how did you end up in Kansas City?
I am from a small farm town called Sparta right outside Grand Rapids Michigan. I came to Kansas City back in 2009 to finish my bachelor’s degree in clarinet performance. However, I promptly switched my major to composition after my eyes and ears were opened in a composition 101 course.
Who are your musical heroes and why?
I have favorite bands and songwriters whose music consistently gets me going and inspires the frame work as well as the title for most of my pieces. Such as: Interpol, Wilco, The Mars-Volta, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Sigur Ros, Mark Kozelek (Sun Kil Moon), Jeff Buckley, Fionn Regan, Gillian Welch, Feist. (These are a few of my long time staples.) However, when it comes to heroes, I would say all of my friends and colleagues here in Kansas City. Such talent! All of my friends are either composer/performer/singer-songwriters or in a band/ensemble of some sort. I have had the privilege of making music with most of them. All of them are inspiring and make me strive to be a better composer and performer. There are some big dogs here in Kansas City that I hope to be like when I grow up!
How much jazz experience do you have?
Honestly, very little. I mean, I was in jazz band in high school on tenor sax. I was pretty into it. But then I discovered the beast that is the bass clarinet and ended up playing in a youth symphony, which fueled my decision of studying to be an orchestral clarinetist. I joined a less than mediocre jazz band at a community college back in Grand Rapids, but that was only because I was chasing the drummer.
Where do you see yourself going with your music?
I see myself going all sorts of places. I feel I am constantly collaborating with other artists. I see myself being in and writing for ensembles such as Black House. I would like to put together ensembles and write with the intent of playing at different venues around the city. I am really getting in to the Jazz scene here in Kansas City and it has been freeing to both my mind and ears. This is something I would like to pursue more of, performance wise as well as compositionally. I have also been really getting in to electronic music. I would like to incorporate that into my singer/songwriting as well as other things if the opportunities arise. I don’t see myself writing ‘academically’. By that I mean, writing for string quartets and wind ensembles. I believe I will always be out there somewhere doing something collaborative, new, and possibly exciting.
This is your first time writing a piece for Black House. What has the experience been like?
The experience has been both terrifying and amazing. This is the first time I have written a piece for an ensemble of this sort. Not to mention the Gamelan. I decided to take a leap and throw myself into the fire and write. The great thing about writing for Black House is the instant feedback. I feel this is the best way to learn and grow as a composer. I feel myself tense up and become tongue tied when it comes time to rehearse my piece but everyone has been wonderful to work with. The musicianship in the ensemble has been a real treat. This group doesn’t mess around. I am happy and excited with how everything has turned out and can’t wait for the concert! I definitely plan on writing more for this group.
How familiar with gamelan were you before this workshop?
Not familiar at all. Well, I did take a world music class. By that I mean an Asian music class. I was introduced to gamelan then but it was brief. I saw the Gamelan ensemble perform once at an Art Sounds concert and thought it was really neat. But I didn’t know anything about writing for gamelan or the pitches/rhythm that makes it unique. I also didn’t know how hard it was going to be combining western instruments with the gamelan ensemble. These instruments have a unique tuning system that seems to shimmer and envelope the room. It has been real interesting trying to make it work with the Black House ensemble. However, although this is the first time Black House has collaborated like this, I feel it has been pulled off pretty well.
05/08/2012
it pays to be a winner
Pat's face is very expressive.
I just want to congratulate Pat Conway on being announced a 2012 Charlotte Street Generative Performing Artist Fellow. Pat has worked with Black House as a guest clinician in the past and currently as a collaborator and workshop participant. I've been a fan of Pat's work ever since hearing his compositions for the People's Liberation Big Band and I couldn't be happier for him.
05/07/2012
Brief Interviews with Black House: Ashley Hirt
We’ll start our batch of interviews with Black House newbie Ashley Hirt. Ashley has been a bit of a surprise in that she plays the euphonium quite well AND is a musicologist at the same time. Now that I think about it, there are no less than three musicologists in the ensemble this workshop. This is a disturbing trend. You can follow Ashley's musical perspective here.
Where are you from and how did you end up at KU?
I am Kansas City born and Kansas City bred. Well, to be more specific, I grew up in Overland Park. Please don't throw anything at me. After high school I did a number of different jobs before being sucked back into music almost against my will, and did a Bachelor's degree in music at Pittsburg State down in southeast Kansas. After that, I had an itch to see a new part of the country and so I did a Master's degree at the University of Idaho. It didn't hurt that UI has a pretty great music school, the Lionel Hampton School of Music. After getting my Master's, the doctorate was a logical next step and so I returned "home" to the region and wound up at KU.
What are you impressions of the music scene in Lawrence in comparison to Kansas City?
I am ill-qualified to answer this question, as it has been a decade since I was in my going-to-concerts-every-night stage. I will say that jazz performed by individuals not somehow affiliated with KU seems to be difficult to find in Lawrence, but there's something like 80,000 Yonder Mountain String Band concerts in this town. Maybe there's some really awesome stuff going on in Lawrence and I sound completely ignorant, but Kansas City is where I go to get my live jazz fix. I do appreciate that Lawrence is something of a haven for alternative acts who are trying to get noticed, as the vibe of Lawrence seems to pivot on this axis of cutting-edge musical thinking - the people seem to enjoy nurturing new music. At least that's how it was back when I lived in the area. Keep in mind I lived in the Pacific Northwest for a while. I'm sure someone will write you and tell you that I'm a moron for saying this. C'est la vie.
What exactly is a musicologist?
Someone who wants to know why music makes them feel the way they do. We look at culture, context, social change, gender, race, etc. all through the lens of music as this abstract collective experience. There are of course the names and dates of great masterpieces and famous composers, but in the last 20 years or so there has been an increased focus on vernacular music, the musical experiences of minorities and women, and the commodification and capitalism surrounding music. Basically, we are musical anthropologists; we dig up dirt on what it might have been like to be in the audience at the premiere of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring or how Wagner's mental illness contributed to his legacy or how Charles Ives made his music over-the-top dissonant because he thought dissonance was masculine and consonance was feminine.
For me personally, it's a discipline that allows me to ask really difficult questions, like "Why did people call Ellington's Cotton Club works 'Jungle Music?' What about the music planted that particular imagery in the heads of the audience?" And then I study the cultural attitudes of the day and I can start to unearth an answer.
Who are your musical heroes and why?
First, because it's fresh in my mind, I have to go with my dear friend Jenny Kellogg, who is currently in a graduate program at the University of North Texas and plays trombone in the pretty-damn-famous One O'Clock Lab Band; she also writes tremendously creative jazz compositions that will hopefully make her the next Maria Schneider or Darcy James Argue. It is rare that you meet someone with that level of natural musical skill who is also a gracious, humble, lovely human being. I wish I could borrow her ears and hear the world with them for a day.
Secondly, I'd have to go with my high school jazz band director, John Selzer. He is a consummate educator, terrific mentor, wonderful person, and absolutely burnin' trumpet player. I learned how to improvise from Selzer, and we did it like this: He played a lick on his horn, and we all played it back. No notation involved, just listening. He took a chance on me, a green, completely self-taught trombone player, and allowed me to play in his band and discover that my musical identity SWINGS. I had a rough time in high school, as many of us creative types do, and Selzer was the primary reason I didn't drop out. I played in a jazz festival several years after graduating high school, and he pulled me aside after the performance to tell me how proud of me he was, and I cried like a baby. Having his respect meant the world to me.
I have a couple of others, but those are my main "I hope I can be that awesome when I grow up!" heroes.
How much jazz experience do you have?
Um, lots, I guess. At least 12 or 13 years' worth, if you're looking for a concrete number. I taught myself trombone at age 15 so I could play in jazz band, and it's been a part of my life ever since. I've done combos, big bands, tuba jazz quartet, all kinds of interesting stuff. And not just playing - I'm really into jazz as an academic subject so I love to nerd out on recordings and force myself to do the Leonard Feather Blindfold Test. I want to be a jazz scholar who can play so I'm actively cultivating both of those sides of my musical personality. I think I can hold my own with "real" jazzers. It's a weird place to be because I'm sure no one considers me a jazz musician, but in my mind I am one because I can swing.
And I don't solo often, but when I do, I can really only solo well over ballads. Giant Steps would give me an aneurysm. I'm not a technique superstar. As verbose as I am in writing and in conversation, when it comes to improvisation I am a woman of few "words."
Where do you see yourself going with your music?
The answer to this question changes on a regular basis. I used to want to be a straight-up musicology professor and read books and write articles for a living. Then I hung out in Denton, Texas with my supremely gifted friend Jenny and went to several of her gigs and met her jazz circle and I am starting to lean more towards "musicology professor who directs a big band and plays in a combo." I try to weasel out of playing my horn and I just can't ever walk away completely. I periodically get reminders like that - that I HAVE to play or at the very least direct.
Actually, I'm a candidate for a job teaching music history in a Recording Arts program at a fairly prominent university. I would adore that, because I would be teaching students within my area of expertise (American popular music since 1950) and rather than it being an abstract "Gen Ed" concept, I would actually get to see them implement the things they learn from me in the recording studio. I love being around working musicians and collaborating with people who play, so that is highly appealing.
Why the euphonium?
Million dollar question! Haven't you heard? Euphonium is an ancient Greek word meaning "unemployed."
It's insanely versatile, it's fun to play in nearly every setting (band, occasionally orchestra, jazz), and it sounds good. No, really, euphonium is Greek for "beautiful sound." I was kidding about the unemployed thing. But it is a reality that we deal with because the euphonium was perfected long after the other brasses and doesn't really have a "niche" in ensembles. Orchestral composers don't use it; I can cite the rare exceptions to this rule off the top of my head, because there are so few. It's used in the wind band, but the modern wind band is barely 60 years old and there just hasn't been enough time for the euphonium to find its permanent, respectable home.
The technical capabilities of the euphonium are vast, as you might expect given that it's essentially an overgrown trumpet. But since the bore is shaped differently, it has a rich, warm, velvety tone color that lends itself very well to expressive playing. (And ballad soloing in jazz. Cough.) To relate the euphonium to the jazz idiom, I usually tell people that it is like a large flugelhorn - mellow but can still bite.
The short answer to that question? Because I am an emotional person and euphonium is my preferred method of emotional expression. It's like a brass cello - lyrical and passionate.
Does jazz have to swing?
Ask Nicholas Payton this question. #BAM. Haha. I crack me up.
There is no easy or short answer, so hang on.
When I was in my undergrad, our jazz band opened for the Count Basie Orchestra at a jazz festival. We played a Gordon Goodwin chart that started with an intense, unaccompanied saxophone soli. (The chart is "Hunting Wabbits," by the way.) I'll never forget it - the bass player for the CBO was standing in the wings watching our sax section warm up on this soli, and he was shaking his head in disgust. He looked at me and said, "That ain't jazz!" Which was a perfectly acceptable thing to say - at that moment, there was no jazz going on, just five saxes playing something that sounded like French chamber music - but he was making a distinct value judgment on the chart, implying that we were not real musicians because that section of the chart wasn't jazz. He was pretty grouchy, if I recall correctly.
I really don't like putting music in a box by making value judgments about the elements it does or doesn't have. That kind of conservatism just makes no sense to me, when I see music as this fluid, organic, constantly evolving thing that sort of reacts in response to what the world broadcasts to it. So I think having rigid parameters for what is and isn't a particular kind of music can be rather damaging in the long run. The bass player's comments certainly made an impression on me, as I was still pretty new to this "modern big band' thing at the time (2006). That same gig, we played one of the Bob Curnow arrangements of a Pat Metheny tune. Did it swing? Yes. Have you heard Curnow's stuff? MY GOD. That chart ("Minuano 6/8") changed my life.
That said, the swing IS the thing. In our modern culture, the lines between musical genres are blurrier than ever and the line that separates "art" music (what the rest of the country refers to as "classical music") from "pop" music is razor thin. And I think to an extent, we NEED to preserve swing as part of the jazz identity. If you examine the historical roots of the music, swing is the heartbeat and people have been trying to notate it and describe it for decades and no one has been able to do that accurately in all this time. Swing is something that requires an emotional engagement, and an understanding that it came from human suffering and it can be a rhythmic element of lamentation, prayer, joy, whatever - it can be all of these powerful things at once. It's not something a robot or a machine is EVER going to be able to replicate. You need a pulse to do it, and you need to be in the right mindset. I don't think you can truly call yourself a jazz musician until you can swing, but not every chart has to swing, if that makes sense. It's a hallowed individual experience.
This is an inherently muddy issue, which is why guys like Nicholas Payton get so worked up about it. He's pissed off that jazz has become so commercialized and that there's this garbage out there called "smooth jazz," and that impostors are playing this music with no relation to its heritage and meaning, but that's a discussion for another day. Shit, there's a reason they call it "roots music." Know why it's called the blues, for god's sake.
Short answer: YOU, the player, have to swing. In the final analysis, music is music, man.
What made you want to come do a Black House workshop?
I was pretty stoked to get an opportunity to check out what the KCMO music scene is all about. I'm proud to say that I'm a Kansas Citian and I've been sort of waiting to see if there is a musical Renaissance waiting to happen in KC. It's a cool time to be a musician in the area, with the Kauffmann Center opening up and there being a growing demand for new music. And Black House is obviously open to experimentation and using unusual instrumentation, which I find pretty appealing. I enjoy trying on different sets of ears. I also think that every gig you take has something to teach you, and that we never stop learning to be musicians. That is why I will take gigs for no pay if I think they are exciting or have something really awesome to teach me.
That, and I love nerding out on music with complex textures, and the incorporation of the gamelan into the group just sounded too cool to pass up. Like I said, this is a great time to be living here and getting the opportunity to take musical risks with people who will prop you up.
04/17/2012
the home stretch
The interruptions are over and now we’re on the home stretch of the spring workshop. We’ve got four rehearsals left and two of those include the full gamelan ensemble. We now know what pieces we are performing, which is always a relief. We’re far enough into the workshop that the character of the group is starting to really come through. A big part of that character is the coolest brass section we’ve ever had in a workshop.
We’re also at the point when we have moments in rehearsal that I can start sharing without embarrassing ourselves too badly.
This Friday is the second performance of Black House Blue Label and we’ll have some new music to premiere. Ryan Heinlein has finally taken the plunge and written a couple of nice pieces. I really proud of this group and Take Five is a great place hear music. So come out on Friday!
04/09/2012
04/03/2012
Sound Painting
This coming Sunday from 3:00pm to 5:00 Black House is hosting a Sound Painting Improv Workshop at the rehearsal space at City Center Square. Dennis Shafer is in town to do some work with the RAT ensemble and Paul Rudy put him in touch with me. Sound Painting is a system of sign language used to direct a large ensemble of improvisors. I've never met Dennis but I have done some sound painting a few years ago while I was at the Banff workshop. It's a pretty fun way to conduct a large group of improvisors somewhat similar to John Zorn's game pieces. In Zorn's game pieces it's more common for the players to have more input but in sound painting the director literally conducts the action in a more hands on way. Personally I prefer sound painting to game pieces. Anyways, this workshop is open to any musicians who may be interested, not just Black House residents. Come learn with the rest of us. Anyone interested will just need to send me an email (blackhouseimprov@gmail.com) so that I can let them in the building.
04/02/2012
03/27/2012
Brief Intermission
Hunter Long, Nick Howell, Peter Lawless
This past Sunday the workshop took the day off so that Black House Blue Label could record. The idea being that, if this goes well, we'll be able to release a "Blue House Mixtape" of sorts. I feel reasonably hopeful about the results having heard only a small and rough portion of the recording at this time. This recording session is helping us ramp up for our next performance at Take Five on Friday, April 20th and we're planning on having a few new tunes to try out.
Next week the Collective is back at it with the deadline for compositions rapidly approaching and Russell Thorpe's newest work awaiting its first reading.
Ryan Heinlein
Matt Leifer, Ben Leifer
03/20/2012
Three Views of a Secret
Last week I was fortunate to enjoy the greatest concentration of quality live performances in my life. Saturday, through a well-connected friend, I was able to attend “Nixon in China” at the Kauffman Center. It was my first time in the building and I was really impressed. The hall was beautiful and the sound was fantastic. I’ve heard people complain about the use of microphones during the opera but it didn’t bother me. Seems like a silly thing to nitpick. I loved the score and the first act was easily the most enjoyable hour and a half of opera I’ve ever experienced. Things seemed to be somewhat historically accurate until the second act when a woman shot Henry Kissinger and things turned symbolic and arty. I continued to enjoy the music and the fantastic female soloists even if I stopped trying to understand what was happening. It was also fun to see audience members get uncomfortable when the word “motherfucker” was used in the third act.
The tickets for this show were over $100 and I would not have gotten to go if it had not been for special circumstances. It’s easy to lament the price of tickets and even make facile claims about elitism and class. Having seen the show, it’s obvious that they lost quite a bit of money even if they sold out every night at that price. Operas are not cheap to produce. To have that many musicians of that caliber it must have cost over $10k for each rehearsal. The production was obviously very expensive. You can’t put on work of that scope and quality and charge $25 a seat. The numbers don’t even work at $125 a seat. Please spare me your “one percent” bullshit when it comes to the opera.
On Sunday I saw Radiohead at the Sprint Center. I’ve wanted to see this band for many years so this show was a “big deal” for me. Going to a big rock show is a welcome palette cleanser. I couldn’t get over how good the sound was in such a large venue. Perhaps it had something to do with it not being stupid loud so you can actually hear everything instead of a deafening roar.
Halfway through the show I couldn’t help but feel like I had waited 5 years too late to see them. I enjoy their newer work but it’s not the soundtrack to my teenage years like their earlier work is. The band is in a position that they don’t need to play their greatest hits to sell out arenas and was content to play a lot of their more obscure work. I was starting to get worried that I would leave the show disappointed when they started to play just enough of my favorite tunes. I told my friend at the show that I wouldn’t complain as long as I got to hear “Ideotique” and I did. So I won’t.
On Wednesday I saw the SFJazz Collective in Lawrence. I love this organization and always make a point to see them whenever they come through town. I’ll admit that this is not my favorite line up of the band. Nor is it my favorite season of repertoire but I did enjoy this performance quite a bit. It was my first time to see Mark Turner and Antonio Hart, both of whom have their pictures up in my practice studio, and they were as wonderful live as I had hoped. The entire band lived up to their individual reputations in a big way. Unfortunately I don’t think they were playing strong arrangements. Stevie Wonder is a genius and his music speaks for itself but for me it didn’t translate well for a mid-sized jazz ensemble. I couldn’t help but feel that the show was yet another example of the all too common phenomenon in jazz of some of the best musicians in the world playing over not-so-good music. That being said, it was worth the price in admission to hear Antonio Hart’s second solo.
Since I was seated in the front row, I was free to examine the performance habits of some of my heroes on a very intimate level. I was struck by how world class players deal with the same issue that we all do: What do you do when you’re not playing? Once a solo starts they awkwardly walk to the side of the stage just like the rest of us. The idea is that you get out of the way of the audience’s view of the soloist. Unfortunately it’s always distracting to walk across the stage. Once you’re safely out of the way, you have a few different behavioral options. You can fiddle with your instrument, bob your head, stand there with an expressionless stoicism, or chat with your bandmates. It’s an imperfect practice that works best in clubs, but on a concert stage its deficiencies become glaringly obvious . Perhaps the only solution is for everyone to play all of the time? I don’t know what the solution is but I will say that during the course of a performance you start to pick favorites and I found myself drawn to the musicians that seemed to be enjoying themselves. Just saying.
In looking back on the three performances, the biggest thing I take away is in the different way the audience related to each. The audience was delighted by the opera and they admired SFJazz. But they loved Radiohead.
Black House
- Kansas City's experimental music laboratory.
This blog is maintained by Hunter Long.
