Another Semester End

I've been pretty busy this semester, and I'm almost done.  I have some pretty cool projects to show everyone when I get back to Minnesota, some of which I'm quite proud of.  The music technology open house was this afternoon and I showed the beginnings of an interactive installation I'm working on.  I got some really good advice from all kinds of composers, artists, curators, music tech gurus, even Erick Imbertson stopped by!  I'd like to finish up the piece and install it somewhere in the Twin Cities this summer.  Any suggestions?  I'll keep my eyes open for possible galleries and museums and such.  If you want a sneak peek at what I've been up to, I'm about to post a lo-fi version of my Software Music Production final on MySpace.  If you can't remember the address, just think about my last name and you'll soon be there.

Noah

As I was with Noah today, he spontaneously told me that I am his best babysitter.  If that didn't make my day, what happened next did.  We were on the crowded F train heading back to his place from the NYU study he's part of when he began telling be about the epic battle between good germs and bad germs:

"You have good and bad germs fighting inside your body.  The bad germs try to make you sick, but the good germs fight the bad germs and put them in germ jail."

"And where is this germ jail?" I asked, trying to keep a straight face.  Without any hesitation, Noah stated rather matter-of-factly, "downtown Brooklyn."

Take Back NYU?

You may or may not have heard about this yet, but there's been some action happening here at NYU over the last couple of days.  It's actually been going on for two years since Pres. Sexton refused to acknowledge a grad student union.  There's been a lot of frustration about University policies such as the 6% tuition increase during a recession and Sexton giving himself a substantial raise a few years back while cutting record numbers of administrators from the payroll.

An organization that claims to be speaking for the student body called Take Back NYU! took over and occupied the 3rd floor of the student center for some 40 hours or so.  It was bizarre because all of my classes are just a block away, yet I had no idea this was happening until I walked right by it.  There were students on the balcony with big banners, and the street in front was packed with hundreds more protesters chanting, singing, and cheering in solidarity.  Of course New York's Finest showed up later last night to pepper spray, tase, or do an old fashioned nightstick-whoopin' on anyone that came within arms' reach.  Okay, not that bad, but still pretty strange to see in my own stomping grounds.

I think I may have been a supporter of the occupation had the ringleaders not been such disoriented novices.  Here's the list of their 11 demands, none of which were met:

1.  Amnesty for all parties involved.

2.  Full compensation for all employees whose jobs were disrupted during the course of the occupation.

3.  Public release of NYU's annual budget and endowment.

4.  Allow student workers (including TA's) to collectively bargain.

5.  A fair labor contract for all NYU employees at home and abroad.

6.  A Socially Responsible Finance Committee the will immediately investigate war profiteers and the lifting of the Coke ban.

7.  Annual scholarships be provided for thirteen Palestinian students.

8.  That the University donates all excess supplies and materials in an effort to rebuild the University of Gaza.

9.  Tuition stabilization for all students, beginning with the class of 2012.  tuitionrates foreach successive year will not exceed the rate of inflation.  The University shall meet 100% of government-calculated student financial need.

10.  That student groups have priority when reserving space in buildings ownedor leased by New York University, including, and especially, the Kimmel Center.

11.  That the general public have access to Bobst Library.

Do you see why I cannot support these people?  It's clearly the laundry list of demands that diluted focus from any aspect of the protest.  How do I know what these students were protesting when it could have been any combination of 11 things?  Moreover, how can they be taken seriously if the FIRST demand is amnesty?  The most powerful aspect of civil disobedience is the knowledge that there may be consequences for any actions taken.  Henry David Thoreau wrote that famous essay while in a jail cell.  Martin Luther King Jr.'s most inspiring letter came from the Birmingham Jail.  These students are saying, right away, either they are not responsible for anything they do or they are cowards.

Why should NYU investigate war profiteering?  This isn't the UN and it isn't the Hague.  This is a place of research and education.  The Coke ban lift I totally agree with.  It's become something of a fad for American colleges and universities to ban Coca-Cola from their campuses because of the human rights violations the company is known to uphold in Central and South America.  But this leads to a nearly exclusive contract with Pepsi-Cola, which is faced with similar allegations of human rights abuse.

I really want to know why NYU should provide scholarships to not one, but 13 Palestinian students each year.  Why not 13 NYU students from any nation?  There's no reason NYU shouldn't help rebuild the University of Gaza, but there's no reason it should either.  If the budget is done well, there should be no excess resources to send to Gaza.

Finally, public access to Bobst Library?  That is crazy.  I know what kind of people hang around Washington Square checking out the NYU hotties, and I do not want them in NYU buildings posing a threat to my classmates.

So the schizophrenic list of demands and disorganized chaos of the demonstration puts me in a bit of a position.  I certainly agree with the protesters on issues relating to a unionized workforce, disclosure of endowment and budget (at least to employees and students), a tuition freeze (temporary if not semi-permanent), and revised system of financial aid.  To be fair, NYU is currently going over the financial aid system and has eliminated all merit-based scholarships to make room for more need-based scholarships in an effort to attract more students from middle- and lower-income backgrounds (hey, that's me!).  And to be fair to the protesters, many large private universities have disclosed their annual endowment and budget to the public, but NYU refuses such transparency which seems a little suspect.  Almost like those Wall Street executives who gave themselves enormous bonuses while their companies crumbled.  Of course the financial exec's eventually came clean and allowed public access to their records.

Even though the occupiers failed to get NYU to meet their demands (including amnesty), I hope they have gotten the attention of the University administration, especially Pres. Sexton.  I hope NYU will come to realize how powerful it has become and how tarnished its image has become in the eyes of New York City, the USA, the World, and even its own students.

A Little Kyle Story (Kinda)

The long months of vexing freeze-thaw cycles have arrived here in New York City.  Last Friday's high peaked near 50 degrees Fahrenheit, Saturday approached 40, and now the cold wind has chilled the city to a modest 15.  This pattern will continue with an occasional break for snow or sleet until the First of April.  New Yorkers don long black coats over their thick black suits; complementing the lifeless concrete pouring down the city streets like ancient lava flows.

As Kyle leaves his relatively warm apartment and steps into the raw, icy morning he looks up to the dismal sky above, down to the colorless pavement below, and smiles.  Kyle has received a great task: a commission of five minutes to be written in three weeks.  Easy enough without constraints or limitations, but Kyle must write, record, and produce this music to fit choreography he in entirely unfamiliar with.  Can he do it?  Yes, he can.

Semester End

I just finished my final paper for archaeology and now my semester is done with!  I just have a recital on Wednesday and then I'm coming home!  I also did some not-so-deep soul searching and figured out my favorite thing in the world [warning: Christmas present ideas following].  My favorite thing in the whole world is hugs.  I know it sounds sappy to say that, but that's only because it is sappy - even if I'm not.

I just wanted to say that after one semester of "Elementary Russian I," I feel I'm finally ready to tackle "Братья Карамазовы" Фёдора Достоевского по-русский (that's "The Brothers Karamazov" by Fyodor Dostoevski in the original Russian, for all you capitalists).  Maybe not.

Olivier Messiaen

So this afternoon I went on up to Saint Thomas Church in Midtown to hear a recital of Olivier Messiaen's sixth and final work for organ, "Livre du Saint Sacrement." I'll be writing up some notes about it along with some other concerts I've seen this semester in my logs for the Composers' Forum, so I thought I'd do a little test-run with you guys.

In Olivier Messiaen's "Livre du Saint Sacrement" the composer seeks to speak heart-to-heart with his audience about God, nature, and music. He is able to use his synesthetic gift and ornithological obsession to this advantage. Messiaen's music is rarely music in the most base sense: it is an atmosphere and an echoing of all that surrounds him.

Olivier Messiaen's unique harmonic structures carefully filled with rich dissonances give way, at times, to incidental major triads. This is striking to those of us familiar with Messiaen. Yet, these "common chords" are unlike anything heard in Wagner or Strauss. They do not bring a resolution or a break from any dissonance; these chords simply are. Arising from these thick harmonies are subtle overtones dancing above the sustained organ parallel to bird songs above the din of a secluded forest. Through the use and variation of many vertical harmonies and organ stops, Messiaen presents all aspects and colors of music to the attention of the listener--an understanding of supernatural reality.

Interspersed within these large organ chords Messiaen is so famous for are quotations of medieval plainsong and, of course, birds chirping. Messiaen does not develop these melodic ideas in the same fashion Bartók would develop a Hungarian folk song, nor does he treat them as Stravinsky treats Russian folk music in his ballets and symphonies. Messiaen presents these melodies, and leaves them almost immediately. Though the contrast may be stark, these transitions from heavy harmonies to empty chants and bird songs is intrinsic to the concept Messiaen is writing about.

Olivier Messiaen does not write about "God, creator of Man" as Bach did in his organ toccatas preludes. Messiaen instead writes about "God, creator of Everything." This music is a confession of Messiaen's faith echoing natural law, both physical and cognitive, Pythagoras' "Music of the Spheres."

And that's what I think about that. Right now I'm listening to a recording of Messiaen's "Quartuor pour la fin du temps" ("Quartet for the End of Time"). It's for piano, violin, cello, and clarinet. He wrote it while in a German POW camp during WWII and chose the instruments because those are the ones he could find among the fellow prisoners and guards.