Ethnic Pluralism in Composing? Yes!

Ethnic Pluralism in Music:  A Song's Journey from Klezmer to Hindu

(image courtesy http://www.jazzguitar.be/melodic_minor_modes.html)

I've been replacing my social media time with composing time at the piano.  A while ago I dove into a Jewish Fakebook for a Hanukkah party.  At the party, I found myself deeply enamored with the music, as my friend John sat by and translated the Hebrew for me.  But it was the energized sadness of Jewish music that stuck with me for weeks -- and apparently, its influence has infiltrated my composing.

So when a recent bout of insomnia hit, I resisted the urge to dip into the fomenting cauldron of social media addicts.  Instead, I hit the piano with a tune that was hopping around in my mind.  (I've actually cut back my social media time dramatically, an accomplishment facilitated by my investment in a "smart" flip phone.  Aye, it's pretty dumb by Apple standards, but it has helped me eliminated wasted time and replace it with artistic productivity.)

Back to the tune...

My intent was to compose something for a student.  I have always had a vision of composing a piece for every student and having the students perform my compositions in recital.  But I often get off course and the piece gets complicated; too complicated for a beginner.  This could be something I just have to accept.  But, nonethless, the piece became very interesting as I complexified it (that is one of my favorite made-up words).

My creation became a whimsical, syncopated dance of Klezmer Band meets Blues Pianist (of course, it is easy to take any Jewish minor piece for a detour into the blues scale, since the minor pentatonic is only one note shy of the blues scale).  As I allowed the piece to become a little more wild, it journeyed into some very long 7th chords stacked with 9ths and 11ths.  Finally, it landed on a very strange jazz chord (D-F#-G#-C) which gave me quite a stir!  I quickly discovered a delicious scale to marry with this chord, but I had no idea of what scale I'd stumbled upon.  I knew it looked familiar but I couldn't put my finger on it.  Later, at a piano lesson, I explained to my student that it looked like the A melodic minor (ascending) but it started on the 5th, so maybe it was Myxolydian Melodic Minor.  

When I got back home I looked it up.  Lo and behold...imagine my suprise that the Jewish romp-turned jazz tune had led me to a Hindu scale (also called a Mixolydian b6 or Mixolydian b13 or Aeolian Dominant Scale).  My scale was an E Hindu Scale.  This scale deceptively looks like a major in the beginning but suddenly turns minor in the last few notes.  Now my Eastern European-Jewish composition was flirting with Indian and American Blues scales...how cool is that?  Actually, I am quite enjoying it and can't wait to finish and share!

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Jennifer Warren-Baker is the owner of Piano 2 Go, a mobile music service offering in-home and Skype instruction in piano and composition, as well as piano entertainment.  Her business is headquartered in Purcellville, Virginia, USA.

A Crybaby's Pro-Arts Manifesto

Call me sensitive, but I often cry in the presence of a moving musical phrase, at the height of a crescendo, or when I witness rare talent in a young person.  Yeah, I'm a crybaby.  I wear my heart on my sleeve.  This week was full of such moments.

First, I watched a dancer perform a solo contemporary dance routine for a ballet class I was accompanying.  While I can't be certain, I suspect she choreographed it herself, to music she chose. As the electric guitar wailed, this girl was putting out everything that she had to give.  There was no holding back, and it was obviously her passion.  Her skill was second to none, but it was her feeling and passion that moved me.  The expression on her face told me that this was who she was.

Dance meant everything to her; it was her mode of being -- her life.  

I had to cry.  I couldn't help it.  At the same time, I felt embarrassed or ashamed for doing so.  But should I feel embarrassed for putting my feelings out in the open?  Isn't that the point of art?  To swell our emotions and bring joy to our hearts?  Honestly, I think our society is emotionally repressed.  That's why I feel guilty for opening my tear ducts in public.  I really think I should be Italian.

Today I heard my twelve-year old composition student play and sing a song that she wrote...her first song with words.  I had just started her on accompanying techniques; how to play while you sing.  I figured I was planting a seed for songwriting, but I had no idea that such a vigorous sprout would burst forth from that seed.  I was pretty sure her skill at composition and her skill at singing could be artfully joined.  The previous week, I had started her on a song I was pretty sure she knew -- "Say Something," by Great Big World. Sure enough, she had it on her iPod.  It's an emotional ballad that relies on simple chord-pulsing for accompaniment, allowing the singer to focus on her singing and not a difficult piano part.  So after playing and singing that all week, she decided to write a song last night. This was not an assignment that I gave her.

It was something she WAS INSPIRED TO DO - OF HER OWN ACCORD.  Of course, I DEMANDED to hear it!  

As she played and sang her very first original song with words, I began to cry.  I think her mom was crying too.  We couldn't help it.  On her very first effort, it was creatively harmonized, the lyrics were moving and clever, the accompaniment was imaginative, and the delivery was sincere and pure.  She wasn't trying to please anyone or meet a standard; she was just sharing her unique creative genius and her heart, something the school system rarely asks of its pupils.

Her achievement came not from following orders, but from doing what she enjoyed, and working hard at it -- because she WANTED TO.  

There were most certainly technical things to tweak, but I couldn't believe my ears; the raw talent and creativity that I heard.  Not all children/ musicians have the gift of crafting an original song that is dripping with soul, or do they?  Perhaps we are so busy suppressing their imaginations in order to meet standards. Why is it that more of my past piano students composed than most of my colleagues' students combined?  Is it because their method book told them to?  No.  Is it because my own identity as a composer inspired them to try it?  To realize it was possible?  Did my confidence as a creative artist somehow free them to explore composition?  I think so!  If teachers can't inspire, can they really expect their students to soar, just by directing and controlling?  Absolutely not!

Creative genius, whether it's dance, writing, or music, is a rare gift to those who have the privilege of being on the receiving end.  I think of what a sad world it would be without artists like this to help us feel and see life in new and beautiful ways.  And they want to cut arts budgets out of school; as if children are only supposed to be data processing machines!

Data in, data out.

Is that what we have boiled our youth down to?  No wonder -- the suicide rate nowadays.

                  We care about the numbers more than children's hearts.

My mother, a fourth grade teacher, is complaining about all the data she has to submit to the school system lately.  It's all about the data, the test scores, the graduation rates, and the college admissions. It's all one big driving force designed to produce obedient, tax-paying citizens and a thriving economy full of revenue-generating workers whose taxes can pay for the overgrown and flawed school system.  Ok, a necessary evil, perhaps, to keeping our economy afloat, but still...a vicious cycle.

But what if we cared enough to ask our children about their feelings and interests, rather than pressing them through an education factory that expects perfect well-roundedness out of every student?  What if we asked them which disciplines they would like to focus on, and gave them even more arts?  

Might we find that greater academic effort and success is a natural byproduct of emotionally healthy kids who have more say over what they study, and more artistic outlets?

What of children's emotions anyway?  Are they unimportant? How often do we ask children to write in a journal about how they feel today?  And they refuse to put drama classes in our county's middle schools because - - why???   I know I am in the presence of excellent public schools, being in Loudoun County, Virginia, but what about all the caged hearts and suppressed artists?

What happens to kids when we care more about data than hearts?  What happens when the classes are so large that the kids rarely get one-on-one instruction?  Do kids fall through the cracks?  Do loners get ignored or shunned?  Do pent-up emotions take their toll when there is no outlet through artistic expression? Do kids decide to check out of life because they are just a nameless number, and no one cares?

No one took their own life while I was in high school.  And now, it seems like there is at least one teen suicide in my town every year.  I know there are far more attempted suicides that are not completed.  Is it because we're not tending to these children's emotions?

A Dead MIDI Cable is No Excuse!

Yesterday my MIDI cable died.  It just stopped working.  When I awoke at 6am to write out my newest compostion, my trusty equipment was shot.  I troubleshot every possiblility to diagnose the problem (reversed IN-OUT config, unplugged, re-plugged, re-opened software after cable attached, switched pianos, etc), and determined that the cable was indeed kaput.  Since I need my MIDI cable for quickly scribing the notes into the computer (via hyperscribe in Finale software), it seriously hinders my data input without the cable. 

What's a composer to do without her MIDI cable in 2014?  I could have walked away from the computer and folded laundry.  I could have run to the music store to get one, but music stores aren't open at 6am on Sunday mornings.  So I decided to quit making excuses and use this handicap as an opportunity to learn a new skill.  There are, indeed, a couple of ways to enter notes without a MIDI cable.  One is simple entry, a method that uses tedious mouse-clicking.  And there's speedy entry, a method I had yet to really learn. 

Within Finale, I had been relying on combination of hyperscribe, cut-and-paste, transpose, and simple entry to quickly scribe my scores, but I had been avoiding speedy entry.  My hybrid method worked very well, and was pretty efficient.  But an orchestrator colleague I know only uses speedy entry in Finale (absolutely no hyperscribe).  It is a typing-based entry method in Finale, and there's a learning curve involved.  But once you learn it, it's like touch-typing on the computer...you become very, very fast.  Some people swear by it, so I decided that my lack of a MIDI cable set up the perfect scenario to learn a new skill.

I delved into the online manual and googled for answers to my questions.  I learned that 4 stands for eighth note, 5 for quarter, and 6 for half.  See, I'm not looking them up on the chart and I already have this memorized.  I learned that you can navigate from one beat to the next with the arrow keys, and that you can use the + symbol to raise a note a half-step, and the minus symbol to lower it.   I did get a little frustrated when I went to enter three and four-note chords.  I realized that, once again, I kind of need MIDI input via a MIDI controller/piano-- that is, if I want to be fast!  I also reached a roadblock when I tried to enter triplets via speedy entry.  It appears some MIDI input is necessary for this as well.  So, given that my music has a lot of chords and triplets,  I decided to abandon speedy entry for the moment and will re-explore this method once I get a new MIDI cable. 

Bottom line - I started mastering a new skill this morning, and I will build on my new knowledge later.

But wait!  I had nothing to show for my work this morning; no notes input, no score produced.  I decided not to make excuses, so I spent the extra time needed to simple-entry my notes, a tedious process, but with cut-and-paste and transpose, the process is a little faster.  And I have the start of "Moving On".  

Arranging Mermaid Music: The Artistic Process

Knowing that my work was going in a more creative direction, I accepted an offer to be the musical arranger of a new musical early last year.  This is the third musical I have had a creative role in.  I also arranged the music for Tom Sweitzer's "Sky" in 2007, and I composed the music for "Twelve Dancing Princesses," (Very Special Arts of Loudoun) in 2005.  The new musical is titled "The Little Mermaid," and is written by my longtime colleague, Dolly Stevens.  This is a much larger-scale expansion of a short musical she co-wrote with Tom Sweitzer in 1995.  In addition to re-writing the script, Dolly added 19 additional musical numbers to the original production, including about five instrumental/ dance numbers that I would be in charge of composing. We have a sample of some of the music here:

So what does the arranger do?  As musical arranger, I work with the composer to develop her basic ideas and interpret them into a more sophisticated end-product.  Not only do I arrange the piano accompaniment for the show, but I also arrange the music for a 3-piece trio to play.  An overview of our artistic process helps others understand how the composer and arranger work together to bring the music to its final form.

"Little Mermaid" Playwright & Composer Dolly Stevens (L) Works With Arranger Jennifer Warren-Baker (R) 

1.  COMPOSER composes and records the songs.  First, Dolly (the composer) would record mp3s of the vocal numbers she composed.  She would e-mail these or put them on a CD for me to work with.  Sometimes she also gave me a hand-written lead sheet with chords, melody, and accompanying lyrics.  Most of the time she didn't give me the rhythm, though, and it was my job to figure out the time signature and rhythms she sang.  The recording I got was of her singing, along with basic piano chording.  Dolly is very strong with her theory and chords, and she has basic piano skills, but she needed someone with more advanced piano skills to develop the piano accompaniment into something more sophisticated.  She also needed someone experienced with notation software to write out her music professionally.  Enter the arranger (me).  

2. ARRANGER transcribes the songs.  Step 1 of my job was to listen to her songs, figure out the rhythms, sometimes the chords, and the melody, so that I could correctly transcribe the music in Finale (my notation software).  This part of the process is called transcription.  It is tedious work, and it is my least favorite part of the process -- but necessary.  Once the music was transcribed into professional-looking lead sheets that she and the actors could read (chords and melody), she could teach it to them, and I didn't have to be there.  As a rule, I create a PDF of all my Finale sheet music files, then load the PDFs to my iPad so I can read the music without fumbling with papers (more on this process in another post).

"Song of the Sea" Lead Sheet, viewed on Jennifer's iPad

3.  ARRANGER develops piano accompaniment.  Once I had transcribed her songs into a clean-looking, professional lead sheets, I developed vibrant piano accompaniments to accompany the singer/s. This is when I start having fun, because this is the creative work.  After developing the accompaniment, I recorded it for rehearsal purposes.  Dolly and I use Audacity because it is freeware and can make nice, compressed mp3s that are just the right size to e-mail back and forth.  

4.  COMPOSER edits/ approves arrangments.  After e-mailing the composer a recording of the piano accompaniment, she either approves or makes edits to the arrangement.  It is my job to make sure these edits are applied to the final score and rehearsal track.  The finalized rehearsal track then gets sent to the school's webmaster, who puts them on a webpage for the kids to practice with at home.  

5.  ARRANGER notates final piano accompaniment in Finale.  If I had time, I would write out the full piano accompaniment in my notation software after recording it, but oftentimes, this would have to wait until later.  I had all the piano accompaniments memorized and the lead sheet could function as a cheat sheet for me.  To save time, I could play the full piano score without having it fully notated.   

6.  ARRANGER composes instrumental and incidental/ scene change music.  In reality, not all arrangers are composers, and this doesn't ordinarily fall in the arranger's lap.  But knowing my strength with composition, Dolly asked me to compose some amazing instrumental numbers for the show (no vocals).  This is where I thrive.  I love creating music from the ground up.  I composed the dance numbers and scene change music for the show, which was my favorite part of this project.

7.  ARRANGER develops piano accompaniment into orchestral accompaniment.

The final step is expanding the piano score into an orchestral score, and making sure the other instrument parts are fully scored, with enough lead time for the other musicians to learn their parts.  I suppose this task could be handed off to an orchestrator for a Broadway-scale production, but this is not Broadway.  A middle school show doesn't have the budget to pay a large ensemble (nor does it need one), but I like to have a 3 or 4 piece band.  This time I'm scoring the show for Piano 1, Piano 2, and Drummer.  When I need bass, I'll double the bass with the left hand of the piano 1 part, or I'll have piano 2 play bass.  When I need orchestral sounds like woodwinds, brass, and strings, I'll score those in the piano 2 part.  Except for the drummer, my musicians get a mp3s to practice with and pdfs of their sheet music.  I do know how to write percussion, but I find that most drummers aren't going to read that sheet music.  They like to do it by ear.  So our drummer will just listen to all the rehearsal tracks with notes of my ideas.  We'll polish his bells and whistles in rehearsal, adding specific fills, intros, and endings.  My piano 2 will practice along with the rehearsal tracks, reading the sheet music I've given her.    

With 22 musical numbers, you can imagine the time this takes.  But the good news was that I could do all this work on my own schedule, and I didn't have to be at the first two months of rehearsals.  With my commitment to spending more time with my kids, this works well for me.  I can arrange music and record the rehearsal tracks when my kids are sleeping.  We have worked this way before, and it's only necessary for me to come in a week or two before the show opens and start rehearsing with the kids.  Since I write the piano and band music, I know it very well, and I tend to memorize it before the show opens. That way, it is easy to just step in the last week or two and play the show/ put the band together. 

The show opens at Blue Ridge Middle School in Purcellville, VA on February 28, and runs through March 9 (two weekends).  Ticket information is here.