Posts

Bora Yoon - Sound Architect

The idea that resonated most with me from Bora Yoon was her interest in imbuing her music with a sense of transport, where the music can take the listener into a different space and/or time. When I hear new music and I’m alone (and my goal is to listen with an open mind), I often close my eyes – which places me in an inexorably individual and simultaneously infinite space: the space inside my imagination. Whatever memories, ideas, sounds, images, etc. that come up while hearing the song I tend to associate with the song and vice versa. Since Yoon’s goal is to write pieces that evoke specific imagery, she must have a strong understanding of this for herself. Yoon conceives of music as tangible, which motivates her to create pieces that employ imagery of the human experience, nature, and other facets of real life. There can be a tendency for many composers of a certain kind (a kind I believe to be myself) to really lean into the complexity of their musical ideas and they can end up with
1 comment
Read more

Welcome To Composers' Forum!

Welcome to the Spring 2019 Composers' Forum blog! Here we'll collegially discuss the music of our many fascinating guests. Each semester, you're required to write one blog post (about 500 words) discussing your reaction to a guest's music and/or their talk. It would also be great to relate the guest's music to your own compositional work as well. When you're not blogging about a guest yourself, you do need to read other people's posts and leave a comment . This needn't be very long, and is a great way to stay engaged with each other's ideas. We'll be keeping track of who participates in the online discussion, so please chime in whenever there is an opportunity to write. We do not write about guests if they are NYU faculty , so there are weeks in which we won't be writing on the blog. When you accept your invitation to the blog, please take a moment to set up your profile so we can all get to know each other! Fill in your Blogger pr
1 comment
Read more

John Zorn

John Zorn is the quintessential New Yorker. His unabashed sense of self is apparent in every part of his persona–the way he talks, dresses, walks–it's so distinctive and so east village that I feel like I'm watching a movie. And it's awesome. There's an intense of amount of character and experience that seems to emanate behind every sentiment he shared that I'd rather get a beer with the guy as opposed to having him sit in a stuffy classroom. Either way though, it was a talk I thoroughly enjoyed, even though I disagreed with parts of it. Firstly though, let's start with the parts I liked, which were a lot. I think there is something to be said about how intensely focused is on humanity. I've been in this place recently where I've been looking at my work as a tool of expression, rather than a "goal". In other words, I think it's important to think of art as a ways to expand the mind, expand the ways we see the world, which when you're i
Post a Comment
Read more

John Zorn - Reflection

John Zorn - Reflection From a distance, John Zorn sounds like one of those very successful people in the world who has figured a lot of stuff out, and has no problem “enlightening” everyone around them, like they alone have any answers. Especially looking back at my notes from his visit to class, and seeing quotes like “limitations are liberating” and “I don’t play the sax—I play the room”, it really feels like he should’ve been an insufferable guest to host. However, I can honestly say that I never got that impression the whole time he was visiting, even when he would bite back at students’ questions, or challenge Julie herself every now and then.   The vibe that I did get from him was brutal honesty, with other musicians, with other people and with his own experience. The advice he gave—which also included things like “balance challenge with ability” and “with every piece I write, the first thing I ask is ‘Does the world need this?’”—seemed to stem from his own in
1 comment
Read more

TBT Bora Yoon: Cut From a Different Cloth

Let’s throw it back to late February when the celestial Bora Yoon came to visit us at forum. Yes, it has been over a couple months, and yes I’m still thinking about her visit. Because for the first time at forum, I was able to sit in on a talk given by a young woman of color, more specifically, a young Asian-American woman. Most weeks at forum I would prepare myself to sit and listen to another man or another white person talk about their successes in the composition world and beyond, but as a young Asian individual, that sense of resonance never existed between me and one of our guest speakers. Until Bora Yoon. It is not very often at NYU that I come across professional Asian-American musicians whose work is outside of The Box––The Box defined as anything inherently classical in genre or those stereotypes of piano prodigy Asians. I’ve been craving a connection between my Asian culture and my music and my choice of career for the longest time––I needed a sign that my choice to study co
Post a Comment
Read more
  Zorn...of course seek out the "best" people to perform your music I became familiar with John Zorn’s music in the mid 80’s when I moved to New York City to attend the New School’s Jazz Program. John had formed a bond with the then new Knitting Factory (and its owner Michael Dorf). The Knitting Factory in its original location (on Houston Street just off Elizabeth) as well as in its second location (in Tribeca on Leonard Street) was a home for experimental and/or improvised Jazz and rock music and Zorn had regular appearances at both. Tonic was another spot where he would perform on a fairly regular basis.  John Zorn’s recorded output is somewhere in the hundreds whether credited as saxophonist, composer, arranger or producer. While his work was released on American, European and Japanese labels from his emergence in the mid 70’s to the early 90’s, it was in 1992 when he formed his own Tzadik record label to release not only his own recordings
2 comments
Read more

be true to your own music————some thinkings after John Zorn's speech

John Zorn, the guest speaker last week in the composers' forum, is the cooooooooooooool artist that I really appreciate. He is true to himself and his music. As a young nobody-knows composer, it’s very common that the musicians you cooperated with are not that serious to your music, they may play the music correctly, but they refuse to dig further your piece to make an excellent interpretation. John Zorn is the person that will not yield to this situation, he suggests composers should be the “band leader” of the music group: Composer has the responsibility to inspire other people and make people become emotionally committed to the music. As John Zorn said he is the composer that got high standard and low tolerance. I think nowadays composers are easy to compromise to orchestra ， ensemble, or musician because they hardly get an opportunity to officially perform their piece. So, I and my friends established our own contemporary ensemble in China in order to give more opportuni
Post a Comment
Read more