Month: May 2010

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In the booth for Theatre For One

I just got back from the official opening of Theatre For One. Before I write about my experience performing in the booth, I want to state how amazing Christine Jones has been through this entire process. Not only is she an amazing designer but she has been such a great spirit to be around and incredibly generous throughout the process. As the artistic director and creator of Theatre For One, Christine made a unique performance space for one performer and one audience member with music road cases and plush red velvet on the inside. It’s hard not to be reminded of the Time Square peep show culture when seeing the booth. Several years ago, Christine had this idea  and decided to collaborate with NY architects LOT-EK. Theatre For One has really been a beautiful partnership between these artists’ visions.

I played for about 30 people on Saturday night in a 2-hour shift. Each time the door opened,there was someone else there that felt entirely different. Since I have been performing music , I often prepare for shows by focusing my energies internally toward myself. The other thing about piano recitals is that there is never any eye contact that is made. Since I do not use my voice to sing, most of the focus of attention is really in this intimate space between my arms in front of my belly between myself and the piano. In the T41 booth,  I felt that I could direct my playing towards a specific person.This really changed the way that I listened to myself and opened up a lot more vulnerable space. To be honest, I’m not use to being  in touch with a specific single person as I am playing, especially someone that is a stranger. I felt that this really affected my playing and general feeling each time.

T41 has been extended! Be sure to catch i Memorial Day weekend May 29-31st in the afternoon and evenings.

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random opinions

Reflections on “performance”

Yesterday, I met up with an old friend of mine (who shall remain nameless) for an early happy hour drink.  I was surprised to hear that he had taken up the interest of writing jokes. The more I spoke to him about his pursuit in being a comic, the more I found it similar to my world in performance, particularly on the toy piano.

The artistry of being a good comic is obviously one that involves more than just good jokes, but also good performance. I asked him if he would ever consider printing these jokes in a book form ( perhaps something like David Sedaris) or writing for an actor, for example. He said that part of it was about getting up on stage and doing it yourself: You have nothing to hide behind and there is not another person/actor that will bear the pain of embarrassment if the jokes fail. It is the truest form, I suppose, of “putting yourself out there.”

The other thing about jokes ( so I’m told) is that the bottom-line goal is laughter–How a comic is doing on stage should be audible by the sounds of the audience. This particular aspect made me think a lot about music performances. I sometimes feel a connection to the audience that feels very alive, but am unsure how it is actually being received. I have played many concerts where the feedback I get afterwards seems completely surprising and nothing like what I thought I experienced. It has taught me that people hear what they want to hear, regardless of what I am doing. Most of the time, our reactions to performances depend solely on what we have experienced in our life that serves as a point of reference. I sometimes wonder, how open are we really to listening to one another?

I have often felt that my music , in some sense, is just a big “inside joke.” It makes sense to the people who know me that have already accepted me into their hearts for one reason or another. Just as some of the best jokes are the ones that are shared among friends, I feel some of the best concerts are also the ones performed by people  that I already have a relationship/point of reference.

All of this reminds me of a quote by John Cage when he was writing the prepared piano piece, Perilous Night. He said, “I had poured a great deal of emotion writing this piece, and obviously I wasn’t communicating this at all. Or else, I thought, if I were communicating, then all artists must be speaking a different language, and thus only speaking for themselves. The whole musical situation struck me more and more as a Tower of Babel.”

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Drawings from Look & Listen

essl-72dpiThere were a number of artists at the Look & Listen concert last Saturday sketching during the performance. I found a few drawings from Julia Sverchuk and wanted to share them. They are so alive and seem to really capture the feeling of performance! I especially like the picture of Karlheinz sitting and listening/recording the performance. Many of her drawings can be viewed on her blog.

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new music projects

Look& Listen on Saturday with Karlheinz

12Karlheinz Essl and I had our first meeting for his new piece, Whatever Shall Be, for toy piano, quadrophonic surround sound and gadgets today. After a few hours of trouble-shooting technical issues, we are now finally ready to unleash his new work this weekend! I am so honored that he wrote this piece for me and believe that it will be a real favorite among fellow toy pianists. Aside from some of the experimental and playful techniques he uses, the piece also has a richness and fullness to the sound world that really creates a whole new dimension to the toy piano. Concert is at at the Gary Snyder/Project Space (Chelsea) and begins at 7:30 pm. I will be sharing the concert with So Percussion and Merionalis. Laura Pellegrini will be hosting the concert and interviewing composers throughout the evening.  I hope to see you all on Saturday !

Here are some of Karlheinz’s program notes on Whatever Shall Be:

At the beginning of the 3rd millennium, I had a strange encounter with a strange instrument: the toy piano, which – at the first glance – didn’t attract me that much. On the contrary, I didn’t properly estimate its restricted sound possibilities and regarded it quite uninteresting and boring. My immature prejudice changed entirely when I borrowed a toy piano from Isabel Ettenauer who was asking me since years to write a piece for her. And now, after being forced to dedicate myself to this instrument I soon understood that it has nothing to do with the piano as we know it.

When I hit a key on a regular piano, I am not just hearing a note, but also the whole history of this instrument with its repertory from Bach to Boulez that the piano sound transports. This fact always makes it difficult for me to compose for piano as it always reminds me of historical music that I love – and also abhor.

This didn’t seem to happen to me when I was playing on the toy piano because its sound has nothing to do with a conventional piano. Instead of strings this instrument has metal rods which are hit by a hammer, producing sonic qualities that rather remind me of bells or a celesta, Asian gamelan, or even an African kalimba.

After writing my first toy piano piece in 2005 called Kalimba, I became more and more interested in scrutinizing the possibilities of this instrument. A few months later I composed WebernSpielWerk as a tombeau for Anton Webern. Here, the toy piano was utilized as a carillon – a very tiny one -, and in fact the piece was modeled after the generative sound installation WebernUhrWerk which was played at the 60th anniversary of Webern’s death from a loudspeaker hidden inside a roof at the market place of Mittersill where the composer was shot in 1945.

But that was not enough: In 2008, when I started my Sequitur project for various solo instruments with live-electronics, of course a piece for toy piano was on my agenda. But then, after having written already several toy piano pieces, I met Phyllis Chen in New York. It was a hot and humid summer day in 2009 as we sat together in a tiny park in Midtown, exchanging our experiences with this strange and fascinating instrument. That’s when Phyllis suggested to write another piece, for her. And I immediately said Yes!

In my previous toy piano composition, my aim was always to find a new perspective to this instrument. In order to break up the restricted sound world, I was hiding a tiny loudspeaker inside the toy piano for Kalimba which played back pre-produced sounds. WebernUhrWerk, however, is only played on the keys, and Sequitur V uses live-electronics which create a sonic house-of-mirrors solely from the live input of the instrument.

This time I concentrated on the “ugly” parts of the instrument which are commonly not regarded as musical: the guts apart from the keys – the body of the instrument. So I was approaching the toy piano like an innocent child who looks into the belly of the instrument and starts scratching and knocking here and there. In fact, due to the acoustic properties of the sound boards, this produces very rich and fascinating sounds. Then I mounted a contact microphone on the downside of the the sound board which was connected to a special computer program that I had conceived for this composition: a kind of sonic “particle accelerator” (like the ill-fated CERN in Geneva) which creates a maelstrom of sounds, swirling around the audience.

But there is yet another story which I have to mention in the end: When experimenting with the entrails of the toy piano, I realized that its sound board acts as a splendid amplifier for tiny sounds and noises. When putting a small music box inside, its lanky sound becomes strong and mighty, mixing nicely with the key sounds of the toy piano. That happens at the very end of the piece. And in fact everything that is heard before – rhythmical cells, melodic motives, even the harmonic structure – has derived from this little music box melody which arose from the great movie “The Man Who Knew Too Much” by Alfred Hitchcock. And the refrain of the song reads: “Que sera, sera, whatever will be, will be.”

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Gilmore Keyboard Festival

phpthumb_generated_thumbnailpng I am on my way back to New York City after my debut at the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival. I had a fantastic experience at the festival and hope that I will have a chance to return again!  Several months ago, Gilmore reached out to Concert Artist Guild and asked them if I would be interested in performing some works on toy piano and prepared piano. I jumped at the opportunity instantly because most venues try to discourage me from preparing their concert pianos. At the Gilmore Festival, there are numerous Steinway pianos being used for the festival. There is even a Steinway on-site manager that looks after the tuning and condition of the instruments. Since I was performing a prepared piano work, Perilous Night by John Cage, as well as a acoustic piano piece, Nothing is Real by Alvin Lucier, Gilmore provided me with two Steinway Grands models D and O. I will mostly likely never have the opportunity to do this program again unless I find another venue/festival that is as generous with their pianos as the Gilmore Festival.

The Gilmore International Keyboard Festival has established itself as one of the most prestigious keyboard awards and festivals. Every four years they award a pianist of any age and nationality for their promising career as a concert pianist. This year, the award went to Kirill Gerstein who performed last night. Given the kind of classical piano festival this is, I was really honored that they were willing to incorporate me as a toy pianist, recognizing it’s unique place in the keyboard world. I found the audience members to be curious, knowledgeable of keyboard music and aware of contemporary arts/music. It was the first time several people after the concert mentioned to me that they thought my concert was inappropriate for young kids and found it amusing that people decided to bring their kids to a toy piano concert. I think because of the nature of the festival, audience members seem to “get it” a lot more than other venues where people automatically think the toy piano is for kids.  I wouldn’t say that the toy piano concert is not for kids, but I would say it is as kid-friendly ( or non-kid-friendly,for that matter) as any other classical music concert.

Tomorrow I begin my rehearsals for the world premiere of Karlheinz Essl’s new toy piano piece, Whatever Shall Be that will be premiered this weekend at the Look &Listen Festival. Read more later this week to keep up!