The Fredösphere

Futurismic points us to the story of Lisa Randall, a theoretical physicist from Harvard who wrote a book called Warped Passages, a layman's guide to alternate universes.  So anyway, Spanish composer Hector Parra asked her to turn it into a libretto (with the help of artist Matthew Ritchie), and he turned that into an opera.  It will receive it's premiere at the Georges Pompidou Centre in Paris.

New operas so rarely have legs; this one seems unusually doomed.  Keep your fingers crossed, and maybe the public will take a shine to it.

Labels: Opera, sci-fi

That's right, just keep telling yourself that these things are "clouds."  Yep.  Clouds.  That's what they are.

Alex Ross dreams of a Messiaenic inaugural, conveniently forgetting just how Nixonian presidential fixations on dowdy, devout French modernists can be.

I got this video from A Cappella News.  These guys make Anglican chant sound actually attractive (ooh, that was snarky):

Labels: Choral, Composer, fun, Spooky, VideoClip

"Those who love their vision of community will destroy it, but those who simply love will create community wherever they go."

-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Labels: Architecture, Design

So much information became known about the major scandals of the Nixon administration during the release of the Oval Office recordings, many fascinating sub-plots got overlooked.  Today is an appropriate day to draw attention to Nixon's long-term obsession with Olivier Messiaen.  Nixon consistently loathed and distrusted the French musical avant garde as personified by Pierre Boulez, but his relationship with Messiaen was more complicated.  Privately, he found Messiaen's music bewildering and decadent, but Messiaen's traditionalist religious outlook encouraged Nixon to view Messiaen as a "wedge" who could be used to divide and confuse his enemies.  The following are key excerpts from the Nixon recordings:

-- On July 1, 1971, Nixon instructs Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman to have someone break into the Darmstadt School, which refers to a group of like-minded European composers (e.g., Boulez, Stockhausen).  Apparently Nixon believed the Darmstadt School had a physical location; the school was named for a series of summer courses that ended in the early 1960s:

NIXON:  "I can't have a high-minded church organist ... I want a son-of-a-b----. I want someone just as tough as I am. ... We're up against an enemy, a conspiracy that will use any means. We are going to use any means....  Get it done. I want it done. I want the Darmstadt School cleaned out and have it cleaned out in a way that has somebody else take the blame."

-- On April 4, 1972, Nixon discusses Messiaen with Haldeman:

NIXON:  "Return the calls to that poor dumb bastard ... who I know is our friend. Now do it ... We made the same mistake [Dwight] Eisenhower made, but not as bad as Eisenhower made, because he sucked the American Guild of Organists too much ... G-d damn it, don't talk to them for a while.  Will you enforce that now?"
HALDEMAN:  "I'll try."

-- On May 18, 1972, Nixon talks to Henry Kissinger about the National Security Adviser's meeting with Ivy League composers regarding Messiaen's oratorio La Transfiguration de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ:

NIXON: "The Ivy League composers? Why, I'll never let those sons-of-b------ in the White House again. Never, never, never. They're finished. The Ivy League schools are finished ... Henry, I would never have had them in. Don't do that again ... They came out against La Transfiguration when it was tough ... Don't ever go to an Ivy League school again, ever. Never, never, never."

-- On Nov. 14, 1972, Nixon talks with his aide Charles Colson about his successful attempt to prevent Pierre Boulez from becoming President of France:

NIXON:  "What in the hell did you think of Boulez's statement on the election? Wasn't that the sour grapes crap again?"
COLSON:  "Well, it's unbelievable, the arrogance of the guy ... God, what a bad man. Just awfully glad we got him buried and put away for good. I think he is."
NIXON:  "Oh, he's buried. He's buried."

UPDATE:  Please see this explanation if you are tempted to take the Higher Truth of this post too literally.

Labels: Composer, fun

The Washington Post is talkin' 'bout my generation, and it's "green" in the least complimentary sense of the word.  I'd like to think I am an outlier; the bad news is that I had to use a Thesaurus to come up with this (lame) blog title; the good news is . . . I know how to use a Thesaurus!

(Tip o' the hat to my unusually bright coeval Renewable.  At least I think he's my coeval.)

Labels: Culture

We got word from the Ann Arbor Boychoir that our son, Der Drübermensch, would be needed for a special recording session on a Sunday afternoon.  The choir had been hired by John Higbie, a veteran visual effects specialist from Hollywood.  John recently moved to Michigan and is wrapping up post-production of his first directorial effort, a science fiction movie called Magic Mentah (previously called Amsteroid).  He wanted the boys voices to add Ligetiesque spookiness to some of the space scenes.

Science fiction and choirs?  In my own backyard?  Of course I wanted to find out more.  I attended the recording session and met John, an incredibly sane, likeable person (i.e., not what you expect in a movie director).  John's movie has been in post for some time now and he hopes to release it in 2009.  He'll work the festivals and he expects the movie to be available on DVD.  (When that happens, I'll let you know.)

I asked him why he chose science fiction as a subject.  He told me his experience in visual effects can be best put to use in that genre.  Since the movie's plot involves dead Egyptian gods as well as spaceships, I suppose a more precise categorization would be science fantasy.

The still you see here shows an asteroid in the shape of a human figure; that's one of the gods.  To the right is a transparent green brain.  In the clip John showed me, the brain rotates and approaches the camera, until you are close enough to see a live actor inside.  John has done an excellent job marrying the CG and live-action coordinate systems here; the two are linked seamlessly.  Clearly, the guy is a pro.

The big green brain is accompanied by the boy's voices:



If you had heard the original, you'd be especially impressed by John's mixing and filtering of the sound tracks.

John will be in Ann Arbor this Thursday for some filming.  If all goes well, I'll be interviewing him for the Starship Sofa podcast.  I've already discussed Magic Mentah on an earlier episode (Round Table No. 6; scroll down).

I'm terribly excited to see this kind of production happen in Michigan.  Magic Mentah is just the latest example of movies with modest budgets having a fighting chance at commercial success.  It reminds me of Primer, another SF film made on a budget of a few thousand dollars.  (Although, Primer did not have any visual effects that I remember.)   Definitely see Primer if you don't mind extremely obscure SF-al concepts bandied about with minimal explanation.

I'll be reporting again on Magic Mentah.  Watch this space.

Labels: local, movie, sci-fi, SoundClip