December 29 - Day and Night Resolve

Harriet out for the day on a job, while on the homefront pdf of Street Songs 22 dispensed with, along with finishing the composition of Psalm 82 (14 pages total).  Also begin to address the ancillary library...

By late in the afternoon,

H has returned to the local area,

leaving her car at the repair shop overnight,

so proceed to rendezvous with her via a stop at the library

(the video enrichment including Jean-Philippe Rameau's Zoroastre [1749],

Dietrich Fischer Dieskau: Autumn Journey and A Franz Schubert Recital [1995],

Jose Cura: A Passion for Verdi [2001],

Modest Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov [1873],

Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly [1904] in two versions [1986 and

2003], a wild face-decorated and ape-driven

Igor Stravinsky The Rake's Progress [1951, with this 1996 vision from the Salzburg Festival, make that a third arresting production taken in, along with the David Hockney and oil-well ones], the 1955 telecast of

Gian Carlo Menotti's Amahl and the Night Visitors [also 1951... has it worn as well as The Rake? hmm...], and

Joan Sutherland: Bel Canto Showcase [2001]),

as the sky

turns

glorious,

then return home for more

activities including 21st-Century Music update, continued photo scans, and filing re-organization, noting that a trove of old filmstrips and slides can serve as a basis for some chronology.

December 28 - All Downhill

Do three new movements of Genre Implosions No. 3 ("Time Cyclone"), to wit: Va. Glass - Koyaanisqatsi / Vessels / Cloudscape, on a day where Philip is very much sonically present

Two Pages
Music in Contrary Motion
Music in Fifths
Music in Similar Motion
Music for Voices
Music with Changing Parts
Music in Twelve Parts
Another Look at Harmony, Part 4
Einstein on the Beach
Northstar
Satyagraha
Glassworks
Koyaanisqatsi (two versions)

Also do pdf for Street Songs page 21 and compose 13 for Psalm 82.

December 27 - Back to the Grid

Great to be home, catching up with work including another Street Songs pdf (page 20) and composition sheet re Psalm 82 (12).

Playlist for the day is:

Edwin London
Portraits of Three Ladies

Jerry Goldsmith
The Waltons

Morton Stevens
Hawaii Five-0

Robert Ashley
Private Parts

Ornette Coleman
Free Jazz

Toru Takemitsu
A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden
Three Film Score

Ghana
Tema Harbor Work Song
University of Ghana Postal Workers Cancelling Stamps

India
Bollywood Music

Johnny Cash
Folsom Prison Blues

Little Richard
Every Hour

John Williams
Jaws
Raiders of the Lost Ark

Henryk Gorecki
Symphony No. 3 ("Of Sorrowful Songs")

Quincy Jones
Sanford and Son

Hector Ribera

Yo Quisiera Ser

Cristobal Medina Colon
Las Mujeres de Borinquen
El Puertorriqueno
La Cuna de mis Amores

Elvis Presley
Heartbreak Hotel
Hound Dog
Don't Be Cruel
Love Me Tender
Jailhouse Rock
Hard Hearted Woman
Surrender

Terry Riley
In C
A Rainbow in Curved Air
Poppy Nogood and the Phantom Band
No Man's Land

P.D.Q. Bach (Peter Schickele)
My Bonnie Lass She Smelleth

Richard Rodney Bennett
Concerto for Stan Getz

Howard Greenfield
Bewitched

Steve Reich
It's Gonna Rain
Piano Phase
Four Organs
Phase Patterns
Music for 18 Musicians
Tehillim
The Desert Music
City Life
You Are

Billy Roberts
Hey Joe

Armando Sanchez
Guajira del Mayoral

December 18 - Evening Serenade

Ensuing pages of pdf Street Songs (16 - finishing II. At a Photo Shop) and composition for Psalm 82 (8),

and an awful lot of old pictures scanned and posted on the Facebook Timeline, working with excess enthusiasm through the night.

December 17 - Timelines

After uploading all the Glass, set to retire, but return to Facebook, and become curious about the upcoming of the heralded Timeline redesign, which, seemingly in the spirit of past revamps of YouTube, etc., seems to be on the horizon for everyone, for better or worse.  Visit Steven Clark's and David Weigelt's redone sites, and, lo, the new new approach and look seems a definite improvement.  So, contrary to some past practices, jump on early, and get carried away in enthusiasm most of the night.  Have always been a fan of timelines, after all.

After a few hours of morning repose, up again, doing pdf and audio for first part of Symphony No. 3: II, plus the days updates of Street Songs and Psalm 82 (pdf 15 / comp 7).  Also return to two boxes of photos, kindly sent by Carolyn a number of years back, and begin scanning some of same into computer for use on Facebook, here, etc.

In the evening, off again with Harriet, down the 80 corridor, looping through electrically-bedecked palms in Emeryville, over the Bridge, south on 101 to the vicinity of

Paul Avenue, for dinner and conversation with Michelle, Andy, Jonathan, and Vera -- a very pleasant time, touching on Business As Usual, Camino Real, Firesign Theater, geography, opera, traffic, and weather -- among other matters.  Home late, but evidently there are more enthusiasms ahead...

December 16 - If We Only Knew

Up early (or late, depending on the point of view), doing all the covers of albums for this year's Christmas gifts, to wit: East-West Dissonance,

Animal Farm,

Henry Miller in Brooklyn,

Stories with a View,

and

Mythos in Tempore Belli  (yes, seemingly a preponderence of scantily-clad women -- but it's all great art, right?... sure, sure, and, to be fair: Dali's St. Anthony is rather revealing, and who knows what's under Mateo Ricci's Chinese Jesuit robes?...).  After some inanimate hours, up again, beginning the February 2012 issue of 21st-Century Music, with news of the incredible Elliott Carter, whose 103rd birthday is being well-deservedly celebrated.  Take in Carteresque and Steve Reichian videos at Boosey & Hawkes (the kind of choices possible on a day of semi-leisurely catch-up -- re various fronts -- after the often-breakneck pace of the recent past semester), and import a fair amount of Philip Glass into iTunes, including complete versions (only little teaching-excerpts heretofore in the computer, having acquired the CD's years back) of

Two Pages
Music in Contrary Motion
Music in Fifths
Music Similar Motion
Music for Voices
Music with Changing Parts
Music in Twelve Parts
Another Look at Harmony
Einstein on the Beach
Glassworks
Koyaanisqatsi
The Photographer
Passages
Symphony No. 1 ("Low")
Music from "The Screens"
Hydrogen Jukebox
Symphony No. 4 ("Heroes")
Kundun

-- some of this as the chic Harriet steps out for a fundraiser.  Also do ensuing pages (14 / 6) of the pdf for Street Songs and composition of Psalm 82.

By evening, time to join H in the stepping out to Chamber Arts and the monthly Goat Hall Productions / San Francisco Cabaret Opera Board Meeting, planning for the new year, and

returning in the old.

December 15 - Towards the New Year's

In the evening, begin to confirm arrangments for he December 31 Bash, and promote it a bit via a Facebook Event Invitation.  Upload a new "profile" picture at the site, as above -- figure this will serve as secondary promotion.  With Harriet out on a job in the morning and early afternoon, finish the grading of both the Music History and Theory courses, posting same on the website (which is up for change in a none-too-clear fashion at present).  Also begin planning Christmas card and gifts for the season as part of the day's musical labours, as well as doing pages 13 and 5 for pdf Street Songs and composition re Psalm 82.

December 14 - Shoe-Ins for Success

Grade a lot of papers, then head off mid-day, via new footwear,

down the

great corridor

to Diablo

Valley, grading even more tests, etc, then rendezvous'ing respectively with Music Historians and Theoreticians for 11-hour work, through hours of dark,

finally returning past fire and smoke for more late-evening musical endeavors (pages 12 and 4 respectively for Street Songs pdf and composition of Psalm 82).  That's it: last academic round-trip of the semester and year...

December 13 - Final Brilliance

Wait,

haven't

we seen

this

movie before?

But, no, it's a brilliant new soundtrack, thanks to the Music Theoreticians, who on this last day of class (the Final Exam, Part II), sonically weigh in with wonderful compositions -- a fantastic class whose 26 proudly surviving members are:

Joe Caron, Zach Carrasco, Jonathan Coyle,

      
Chris Curtis, Greg Fogg (electric violin), Jane Fowler, Rob Fowler, Sean Frigillana, Chris Haman, Noe Hernandez,

Sarah Hernandez, Philip Jenkins, Andrew Kaufman, Chris Knight,

Thomas Levy, Hannah Mae Lipa,  

Lucas Llamas, Melissa Matas, Brendan McMahon,    

Victoria Ng, Miles Preclaro,       

Anthony Ragus (trumpet),       

Paul Villa, Jake Weden, Ji Yoo, and Anand Zala.

Linger thereafter with many, after a concluding presentation of  

Business As Usual: Ib. Six Friday Nights, which seems a winner,

then

homeward to Harriet, planning to what looks like a new Kurt Weill Threepenny Opera production and other musical magic, including finishing reading Volume 13 of

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1980), doing pdf of page 11 Street Songs, and composition third sheet for Psalm 82.