ryanscpsarts-blog

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Final song

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final reflection

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Learning agreement

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Last week I went to a lecture held by my history professor, Dr. Robert Chiles, where he presented about the new book that he recently published. The book, entitled “The Revolution of ‘28″, described the meteoric rise of Al Smith’s political career. Al Smith became governor of New York, and ran against Herbert Hoover as the Democratic candidate in 1928. Despite losing to Hoover, Smith was able to gain an unexpectedly large amount of traction and earned a lot of lower-class votes. The “Revolution” that Chiles said this embodied was that the lower-class voters of NY (and across the country) began to vote democratically. Overall the talk was very interesting, and I plan on buying and reading his book.

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This weekend, I saw the Maryland Shakespeare Players production of Twelfth Night. This is a Shakespearean comedy that I hadn’t seen before, and I wasn’t quite sure what to expect coming in. That being said, I left very pleasantly surprised. Twelfth Night is very funny and a very interesting play; it was the first time I really laughed during a Shakespeare comedy and it also left me thinking about a number of things. Shakespeare talks about gender and sexuality in the play, in a way I find really interesting. The acting was very good, and the small stage made for a very intimate performance. Overall it was a fun show and I’m glad I went.

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This week, I finished a rough draft of my composition. I feel pretty happy with the way it turned out, and I will edit and finalize it next week. Additionally, one goal I have to come is that I will need to write lyrics for the song. That being said I already have some lyrics written and a rough idea on how the lyrics are going to progress, so I feel pretty confident. I will probably begin rehearsing the song in 1.5 weeks so that I can have a finalized recording for arts fest.

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Last weekend I went to the portrait gallery with my parents. While I had always known that the portrait gallery in D.C. was there, I never actually took the time out to look at it! It was really fun and had some awesome paintings. My favorite one of the day was this portrait of one of my favorite jazz musicians, the pianist Thelonious Monk.

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The CRP feedback process was very interesting and very illuminating. Evan offered good advice, and overall I think it went well. His ideas included that I could possibly introduce a different feel to the tune, and even describe it in a different time signature. I don’t think that I will follow up with that criticism. However, he suggested that I put more chords into the chorus, which I will definitely follow through and do. He liked the bridge a lot, which felt good because it was something I was proud of, so it was nice to recieve positive feedback on something I felt positive toward. Overall, the CRP process was great.

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This past week I’ve been analyzing the music of Wayne Shorter. Wayne Shorter was an innovative composer who experimented with a variety of non-functional harmonic techniques. Along with this, I have read through the first two chapters of Mark Levine’s “The Jazz Theory Book.” The theory book is slow to start, and most of the material I already know, but I think there is still much to be learned. Additionally I had a few ideas about a song that I have written down, and will continue to develop them in the coming week.

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This week I’ve been thinking a lot about composition. Additionally, this past week I have been getting into a lot of radiohead. This song is such an interesting example of how harmonic simplicity can be turned into a complex and beautiful song. There aren’t many chords in this tune, but it’s still extremely interesting to listen to. When I’m writing I will try and think about how songs can be interesting and fun to listen to without changing around too much. Additionally, the music video to this song was really weird and I enjoyed watching it. But this past week was a week of Radiohead, and they’ve been inspiring me to write my own music.

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Last weekend I saw Dan Deacon at Milkboy Arthouse. I hadn’t listened to a lot of his music, but my girlfriend introduced me to it and I ended up enjoying the performance a lot. He produces electronic music, and is from Baltimore, and I know a lot of people that really enjoy his stuff, so I decided to try it out, and it was fun! His performance was wild, and he loved to do different crowd interactions. He even set up a massive circle where a dance battle took place. Overall, good time. Glad I went.

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On Saturday, December 6th, I saw a screening of “Call Me By Your Name” at the U Street art movie theater. The movie tells the story of a love affair between two teenage italian boys. It is a heartwarming coming-of-age film, and a couple of selections in the music were written by indie pop artist Sufjan Stevens. I like Stevens’ music a lot, so it was very interesting to see a film accompanied with it. Overall it was a good experience and a film I’d recommend anyone to see.

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On Saturday, December 9th, I went and saw the Maryland Shakespeare Players production of Henry V. This was an interesting play, and it is considered one of Shakespeare’s “Histories”, so it contained a lot of historical depictions of real events, specifically the battle of Agincourt in the Hundred Years’ War. Frankly, it was not my favorite Shakespeare play, but it was acted very well. The lead was a junior theatre major, and my good friend (and ex-arts scholar) Robert Dries had a role as well. Overall, it was a good experience.

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On October 21st, I saw indie rock artist King Krule at the Black Cat in Washington DC. The performance was very fun, and King Krule’s music has a very unique sound. Pictured above was his opening band, Show Me the Body. Their music was jarringly different from King Krule’s performance: while King Krule’s newest album contained many slow contemplative tracks, Show Me the Body is a New York-based hardcore punk band. Their show was great, and frankly I enjoyed the concert for the opener more. It’s always great to go out and find new music.

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On Friday, Nov. 3rd, jazz vibraphonist Warren Wolf gave a master class at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts center. The night before he gave a concert, but his class was fantastic. He told the story of his career, and then opened things up to the audience for questions. He has an awesome approach to his instrument, and one interesting thing he mentioned was looking at classical music for inspiration in jazz music. He then showed us an exercise he did where he slowly transitioned from playing a tune in a “classical” fashion to playing it in a traditional swing manner. The presentation was informative and fun.