-Anthony Davis, Composer
As a composer, I find myself defending at times my love for jazz, R&B, and hip-hop with some of my academic colleagues. This battle has been on-going since I first stepped on the University of Michigan's campus on August 21, 1995. What has irked me is when people hear my "classical-style" compositions, they would say remarks such as "Oh, it's so jazzy" with a tone of belittlement. At times, I almost felt ashamed to incorporated the influences of my youth in my symphonic repertoire.
However, when I look at the music of Bright Sheng, a composer I respect highly, he incorporates Chinese-influenced melodies in his music repeatedly with no shame. The same of Arturo MÃ rquez, composer of the famed "Danzon No. 2", and Zhou Long, Pulitzer Prize winning composer.
In Fall of 2002, I stopped composing in the classical style. I focused on marching and jazz band arranging, composing tunes, and learning how to be a good teacher in the Detroit Public School (which I loved). Why? I was tired of competing with dead Germans and Austrians. How frustrating is it to pour your heart out on a twenty minute opus only to be turned down routinely by conductors? Yet, I would arrange the hottest song on the radio and it would be played immediately by any marching band in the city. Better yet, I would arrange a chart for Ben's Friends Big Band and it would be programmed on the next concert.
With years of coercing by Damian Crutcher, Armand Hall, Jamal Duncan, Kelvin Washington, and Ed Quick, I turned to the concert band. I loved it. I wrote five band pieces in fourteen months and I thank them for their support and encouragement!
Another change of events happened which I thought would never happened. I returned to academia in the fall of 2010 to finish my Master's of Music at Kansas State University. I then returned to orchestral composition. Craig Weston was an amazing teacher and was open to the incorporation of non-European styles in my music.
With all this being said, I still see a problem with trying to compete with Dead German's Greatest Hits. Orchestras still won't play my music. Maybe it sucks. Maybe it doesn't; however, the issue is the same with fellow composers.
Solution:
1) I am no longer by the LEAST apologetic for my love for jazz, R&B, and hip-hop. That's right. Hip-Hop. While I am reading essays of Joshua Rifkin, it is accompanied by KRS-One or CL Smooth. When I read biographies of the Second Viennese School, be sure to know that Basie is being played.
2) If I write a non-commissioned composition, I understand that it probably won't be played any time soon. I am okay with that. No one asked me to write it so they won't program it. In the words of myself, Brandon Williams, and Ibrahim Jones, "It is what it is!"
3) I attempted to write a "what is this?". What's a "What is This"? I wanted to write a large opus that had all my musical loves: classical, jazz, R&B, and hip-hop/rap. Think about West Side Story. Is it a musical? Operetta? Who cares, it's great music.
In my youth, I didn't understand how to put it together. I did everything backwards. I wrote the music first and then tried to write a script/libretto. Not too smart. I abandoned the project.
I will never forget the words of my friend and Sinfonian brother William Tonnisen, "Hey man, you should finish that opera. There was some good music in there." Jay Berckley also gave me similar encouragement.
In December of 2009, I recorded one of the arias from that unfinished "What is this" with the group Relativity/Trio Nomadian (Damon Warmack, Demetrius Nabors, and Nate Winn aka Tightus Pocketus) . It was a composition entitled "Daddy's Little Girl." By the time I added the orchestra to the recording, I realized I finally had the composition EXACTLY how I wanted it.
I then thought to myself, "Maybe I should finish the 'What is this'"?
As time went by, I knew I needed to write a story FIRST before composing (that didn't always happened but I did finish the story this time. )
I remembered earlier on in 1997, Bright Sheng gave me some suggestions for my libretto (great ones I must add) but it just wasn't coming together. However, after an in-depth conversation with Anniece Warren in January 2011 about my music, I finally came up with the story. Actually, I came up with several different stories which I'll eventually (Lord willing) write to all of them.
I officially wrote the storyboard in October 2011 (I came up with the storyboard in Feb but I didn't write it down). Initially, I was going to just place a short synopsis in the liner notes of my CD; however, thanks to the critique ofLaKindra Parker, I went ahead and wrote it as a novel. However, this lead me to another issue: what about the music? How is this going be labeled? It can't just be a "What is this?";
One of my good friends asked me why not make my book, A Tale of Two Fools, an opera, oratorio, or musical? Problems and more problems.
A) An opera company wouldn't play it..flat out...refer to the title of this blog and change the word ""German" to "Italian".
B) A musical COULD happen; however, I don't want to have a pit of seven people. This isn't the fifties. How many musicals have the large pits that is required of West Side Story? In the age where Broadway is using a Motif instead having live trumpets, I can forget about having my dream-sized pit. Plus, there is not trumpet synth in the world that could come CLOSE to sounding like Jon Faddis, Sean Jones, Byron Stripling, and Oscar Brashear put together. Also, four string players are not going to cut it. I want to tell this story symphonically and I'm sticking by it.
C) Oratorio/Concert Version could work also and be financially feasible. I may do put it in this format later on.
4) In the end, I decided to make this a Novel/CD companion (James Aikman calls this project a musical drama). There would be great possibilities from this. I could get the singers I want whenever they were available (the beauty of multi-track recording [thank you ProTools] ). I could also use whatever instrumentation I wanted. Let's talk about the cons. I would be forced to stay within the 80 minutes confinement of a CD. Aikman also suggested that I stay around 75 minutes to avoid possible CD-replication errors (great advice). Granted, I could do a two-CD set but that would drive my cost up astronomically. In the end, I went with about 76 minutes of music having to drop three songs off the CD (about twelve minutes worth of music.)
What about digital download? There's not a time-frame for that I'll answer that one later.
In conclusion, I realize many conflicts are internal. I have resolved mine. This CD, my musical drama A Tale of Two Fools: A Soundtrack of a Universal Language will have classical, jazz, R&B and hip-hop and I make no apologies for the amalgamation of styles.
I look at musical trailblazers like Daisy Newman who created the African-American Reading sessions with the Detroit Symphony; Anthony Davis, the father of opera politica america; and Henry Lewis who are/were unapologetic of their vision and passion. I stand to imitate.
Now that I have started this blog, I will use this to talk about my creative processes of my compositions, librettos, novels, videos, and in-depth writings/discussions about A Tale of Two Fools.
PS: I currently have a commission with the University of Alabama. I asked Demondrae
Thurman, the conductor/soloist I am writing for, that I wanted to write a jazz movement in his euphonium concerto. He said "Go for it!"
Much Love,
Chad "Sir Wick" Hughes
PS: I currently have a commission with the University of Alabama. I asked Demondrae
Thurman, the conductor/soloist I am writing for, that I wanted to write a jazz movement in his euphonium concerto. He said "Go for it!"
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ReplyDeleteA reply from Facebook:
ReplyDeleteI have very similar feeling regarding classical saxophone and the style of music I have always longed to play but didn't for fair of rejections from the classical sax world...I finally can now say confidently to them all" forget you!" ...hahaha!...I gotta do what makes me happy and what I can feel good about doing...I really feel that God wants me to go in this direction more than ever now...RnB and Soul that is...anyway
Another Reply from FB:
ReplyDeleteInteresting, to say the least. Your frustration in competing with "dead Germans" is something I can understand. I have often wondered why certain forms within the arts are considered "classic" and other forms are discarded as lowbrow. Literature has similar bias. I mean, Dickens and Twain are considered masters. Their works have been dissected by literary scholars for decades now. But they weren't any different than Michael Crichton or John Grisham. They wrote novels for the appreciation of the people.
It never ceases to amuse me when those same scholars ascribe all sorts of hidden meaning and allegory to the characters and plot points of those novels. They were writing to entertain, not to create something that students could later write essays about.
In a similar vein, composers like Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart don't necessarily merit more esteem than more modern composers like Gershwin, Copland, or even John Williams.
All that said, while I share your appreciation for jazz and R&B, we'll have to agree to disagree about hip hop. I've rarely found anything of value in that particular genre. The topics they choose to sing/rap about are often offensive to me.
Great Blog! Chad, this was very informative, entertaining and thought provoking. I am going to have to keep up with this. Thanks for sending this to me.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog Chad..... in the arts it seems that you always compete with dead Europeans. I experienced the same kind of narrow-mindedness from some chefs early in my career. They were stuck on dead French people like Escoffier, and believed that any deviation from his teachings and philosophy were culinary blasphemy. Continue to be a trailblazer !!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteTroy, it's amazing how music, art, and food share similar histories esp. in France.
ReplyDeleteI know EXCTLY what you mean. Then again, resistance to the "old" or tradition always meant something new and fresh. Pretty soon, young culinary artists will be studying the Milton Method!
Hmm. I think you need to be careful about throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. You are right to not want to compose in a style that competes with dead European composers, and such an exercise would be futile anyway, as you are simply producing inferior copies of existing cultural artefacts by doing so. However, I don't think it is wise to reject all of this rich cultural tradition just because you have negative associations attached to it. Classical music is no longer used to subjugate jazz and other black popular musics and you will find that many classical musicians have tastes in these styles. Moreover, there is much that each world can, and have been trying to, learn from each other. Many contemporary classical works are nothing like those of the 19th-century and manage to incorporate modern idioms without rejecting the symphonic tradition. Similarly, jazz compositions have tried to create symphonic constructions within their tradition. Finally, it is seldom a good idea just to try and be different for its own sake. Every new work is different, but this is moderated by the novelty being applied to whatever new idea the composer is trying to articulate.
ReplyDeleteUnderstood. I'm not saying throw everything out; what I am pointing out is that negativity does exist when you try to infuse styles. I've been fighting this for seventeen years. I've always wanted to incorporate these things. Unfortunately, not even counting the elders, folks within ten years my age look upon this as futile and insignificant. Maybe it's not looked that way in the UK, however, amongst many place here in USA, the "elitism" mentality holds strong. I appreciate your thoughts, Simon! I hope my other writings will keep you here!
ReplyDelete