12 weeks, 12 songs: Month Two

Fail.

Since month one was all based on musical patterns and rhythms, I thought I'd try basing the next month's songs on movement. Apparently, this is akin to grating cheese using a machete: painful, slow-going, and frustrating. And ultimately, I gave up going that route.

I'm not going to link the songs or the sheet music or the notes here; it was a lot of hassle and I'm not sure if anyone was all that interested. I'll save it for the end of the 12-week session. But let's get into the songs...

Week five:

My idea for this week was to use karate as a basis of movement, using the idea of a "hard" and "soft" style in conflict/opposition. I had one side of the stage with drums on slants, and the other with them down. The slant side would be the "hard", more angular, linear movements, while the down side would be the "soft", more rounded movements.

I wound up focusing so much on what movements could be done, that I lost the feel of martial arts and they became motion for motion's sake. I made up several sequences of movement to a downbeat, with little rhythm to make things interesting. And when I didn't have any rhythms to make things interesting for me, I found myself with no direction for the song. It became a burden to work on.

I finished the minimum requirements for the week, gave it some patterns and recorded the movements, but I accidentally over-wrote the notes I had, including the frustrations I was having. The only positive thing about this song is helping me realize I do not work well with movement as a foundation for creation.

Week six:

I still wanted to try movement (glutton for punishment), but took the route of using mobile okedo. It would be too easy for me to make this all about the rhythms, so I had to take a different approach.

I experimented with holding the okedo as a object instead of thinking of it as an instrument, and also planned out making formations of players. I wanted it to be more exacting than festive or energetic, and gave the ji a very simple straight beat of two tones. Now that I didn't have to worry about making musical patterns, I felt a lot less limited by the movement and free to try out ideas.

I wound up using the okedo as a prop, swinging it in circles, spinning with it, and finding ways to twirl and twist it in the hands and around the torso to make interesting visuals. Ultimately, I have only the skeleton of a piece, but it's got some potential. Still, it's another example that movement-based pieces don't foster inspiration in me.

Week seven:

I took this week off. Things were busy and I needed to give my brain a short vacation after pushing through two less-than-enjoyable pieces, and six in a row overall!

Week seven, part two:

Ok, refreshed and ready to try new stuff. How about a taiko song without any taiko? Yeah, let's see where that goes...

So I had the idea of using a line of 4-5 people, playing with bachi on the floor, thumping and tapping and clicking patterns out. I came up with some interesting ideas, both visual and musical, but it needed something more to make it less of a gimmick and more of a complete piece.

Instead of adding percussion, I kept with the idea of "taiko without taiko" and added two okedo in the back, but playing on the ropes instead of the drum heads. I could use something like slats instead of bachi to prevent wear on the ropes and still give an audible sound over the bachi in the front. There's potential in this piece, and it's interesting enough to flesh out maybe down the line.

Week eight:

Time for some "palate cleansing" and writing something musically-based to get back into the swing of things. I listened to a heap of old videogame music, the kind I used to hear in my formative years, and got a dose of inspiration.

This time, I actually got inspiration for movement, but it came from the music. I wanted people to move around drums on upstands, but I didn't worry about the details of what it would look like. I figured if I liked the general idea and could write a basic framework, details like what the limbs are doing could come later.

I made the ji on a pod of shime and sumo taiko, giving two distinct tones. It has a beat that's not quite either on the down nor the upbeat, but simple and catchy. There are two upstands and one downstand (in the middle), for 5 players total. There are several overlapping patterns throughout the song and solos, but even though this song was the highlight of these last four weeks, it's too similar in structure to Commotion, the last piece I composed for performance. I'll have to tweak this one in structure if I want to dI anything with it, but musically and thematically I like where it's going.

Summary of month two:

I suck at having movement as the main component of a song idea. I can live with that, but it was pretty revealing to go through the process. I really need a musical component or idea, even if I have a clever idea like with week seven.

Haven't really gotten better at doing things faster, possibly because I procrastinated more as I got frustrated this past month. It doesn't make me feel like I can't incorporate movement in my pieces, but I shouldn't focus on them as a priority or worry too much about the details if I want to enjoy the process.

What's in store for the last month? Stay tuned...