Winter YouTube Concert

Winter concert season is just about done for the year, so let's put together a YouTube concert of recent performances!  First up is the Wydown Chamber Orchestra, directed by Dr. Jan Davis of Clayton, MO performing Iroquois Journey.

Man, those kids can play! I love the tempo and their articulations are so precise. Best of all, they bring an energy and passion to the piece that pushes the performance over the top. Check out how the 1st chair violin is getting into it! Nicely done.

Next we have the MNPS Honors Orchestra performing Las Mariposas Exoticas. They don't start playing until 0:25.

It's just slightly too fast, but the group has a good sense of the style and delicacy required for the piece. Also, it's always nice to hear the optional percussion used. Way to go!

Up next is the SLJH Chamber Orchestra performing Agincourt.

This group has an excellent sense of dynamics and made the transitions and changes in energy feel seamless. They also have a good balance and intonation and kept up with the tempo beautifully. Great job!

Finally, Gauntlet, performed by the Mineola High School 8th Grade Orchestra, directed by Sarah Ramsingh.

There are a few little problems here, but I like the transitions between the fast section and the middle section and back again. I also like that they played what's written in measure three. A good performance - Nice job!

 

Sales Statement 2014

The good folks at Alfred Publishing got a jump start on their end-of-year schedule and surprised me this week with my 2014 sales statements! Every year, they send me a list how many pieces of music I sold in different formats (score and parts, score alone, parts alone, digital downloads, MakeMusic files, etc.) And every year I sort through it and see which are my top sellers of the year. So here are my top five folios of scores and parts from April 2013 through March 2014 (domestic):

1. Dragonfly
2. Across the Wind
3. Gauntlet
4. Gargoyles
5. Avatar

Nice! The two newest pieces came out on top, followed by my two all-time classics. Gauntlet and Gargoyles have consistently been in the top five since they were first released nearly 15 years ago. I'm happy to see so much enthusiasm for Dragonfly and Across the Wind as well!  Avatar dropped a little this year, but, shockingly, it remains in the top five - most likely bolstered by people who mistake it for the theme to James Cameron's movie (for the record, my piece was published four years before his movie came out). In my opinion, Cameron can't release Avatar 2 fast enough.

That was sales inside the US - now for the top-selling scores and parts in foreign markets:

1. Dragonfly
2. Gargoyles
3. Beale Street Strut
4. Samba del Sol
5. Across the Wind & Avatar (tie)

Interesting!  I can't remember when there's been this much crossover between the two lists. Usually the top foreign sellers are a completely different set of titles, but there are four names in common this year! I'm most surprised to see Beale Street Strut on this list - it's a jazzy piece and I just figured it would be too American to appeal outside our borders.

Here's the list of top-selling scores:

1. Gauntlet
2. Gargoyles
3. Avatar
4. Las Mariposas Exoticas
5. Agincourt

Teachers buy extra scores for the judges when they take their orchestras to contest and all of these pieces are popular contest pieces. I'm most happy that Agincourt getting on more and more lists.

Finally, something relatively new on the sales report is a list of print licensing and mechanical fees. When a group records a piece of music or makes photocopies for extra parts, they're supposed to notify the publisher. So thank you to all the honest directors out there who did what they're supposed to do.

This list also includes the number of digital downloads, so I'd like to remind everyone that you can listen to and download fantastic professional recordings of my works at alfred-music.com.

 

8-Bit Agincourt

Check out this amazing video - YouTuber StormWind programmed my piece Agincourt into an 8-bit music software program. The result sounds like a lost level in The Legend of Zelda.

I can't seem to embed the video, but click the image below for a link to YouTube. Please to enjoy:

Online Concert Spring 2014

The school year is wrapping up and that means lots of Spring concerts!  Let's have a look at some really good recent performances from YouTube.

Up first is the James Bowie High School Sinfonia Orchestra of Arlington, Texas performing Avatar.  They have a very precise and articulate sense of rhythm, their intonation is really good and, best of all, they do some really interesting things with dynamics. Please enjoy:

Up next is the Prelude Chamber Strings performing Across the Wind. They do a fantastic job navigating the corners and emotional changes and technical demands of the piece.

Next is a rousing performance of Dragonfly, performed by the Marina High School Orchestra. Very precise ensemble playing. Nice job.

Finally, here's a slightly older video of the ISTA Honor Orchestra in Iowa and their intense performance of Agincourt.  I appreciate the musicality and the dynamics. The intonation is good and they finish strong. Nice job, ISTA orchestra!

A quick note to YouTube posters: There are lots of videos that I'd love to feature on this blog but I can't embed them if you don't check that box on the upload page. Please make your concert videos sharable!  Also, if you could include more info about the location, conductor, and date of the performance when you write out the video's info, that's nice to know too.  Thanks!

Sales Statement 2013

I got my annual sales report from Alfred Publishing recently, in which they compile and break down sales of all my music for the year, from April through March, 2013. Unfortunately, sales were down a little bit from last year and the report showed some interesting trends.  Here are my top domestic sales of scores and parts in 2013:

1. Maharaja
2. Avatar
3. Gargoyles
4. Gauntlet
5. Agincourt

Avatar has been the top seller for the past few years and was unseated by Maharaja. I'm still surprised at the popularity of Maharaja but that piece was all over YouTube this year. Gargoyles edged ahead of Gauntlet for the first time in a while - both are usually in the top five and are very close, but Gauntlet is normally slightly more popular. In truth, Gargoyles sold one more copy than Gauntlet this year.

It's important to note that this report predates the release of Dragonfly and Across the Wind, my newest pieces. That means that the newest pieces on this report are Harrowland, which would have come in 7th, and Beale Street Strut, which would have come in a distant 8th.

Foreign sales are a different story. Sales abroad are usually much lower, because the system of music education is different outside the U.S. and many countries don't have group music instruction in schools. Here are the top five sellers of scores and parts outside the U.S.:

1. Harrowland
2. Beale Street Strut
3. Samba Del Sol
4. Sneaking Suspicion
5. Avatar, Gargoyles, Gauntlet, Maharaja, Porcupine Pantomime

A complete inverse of the Domestic Sales list! And a five-way tie for 5th place! I honestly don't know what to make of this, other than deducing that foreign orchestras gravitate toward the newer titles. Also, there are more minor-key pieces on the Foreign Sales list than usual. Usually, this list is full of major-key tunes.

Finally, I'll include a list of the top five selling scores. This is important because orchestras buy extra scores for the judges when they take a piece to contest. And when a piece is included on contest lists, that speaks to its long-term popularity and quality.

1. Gauntlet
2. Avatar, Gargoyles
4. Las Mariposas Exoticas
5. Agincourt

Gauntlet is the runaway winner in this race, selling more than Avatar and Gargoyles combined. All are popular, time-tested pieces (Agincourt being the newest), which makes sense on this list. I'd be shocked if something from the last three years showed up here, but I expect that Maharaja will work its way up this list in a few years.

I'd also like to give a shout-out to the handful of honest folks who went through the proper channels and paid licensing fees to copy, record, and re-arrange my music.

So sales were down in general, but I got some good data from the report. Hopefully, things will turn around next year with five new pieces in the works. Look for March of the Wood Elves, Winstride, Zuma Breakers, Pioneer Sky, and Woodpecker Cha Cha later this year. Also, my next report should include Dragonfly and Across the Wind, which I suspect will make a major impact.

Sales Statement 2012

Every year, the good people at Alfred Publishing send me a report showing how many of each of my pieces have been sold in the past 12 months. It's always exciting to get that kind of quantifiable feedback. When I first started getting them, they were much simpler, but since the advent of digital printing and different combinations of scores and parts became available for sale, the sales reports have become a lot more complicated. So, filtering through the many lines of data, here are my top-selling sets of scores and parts within the U.S. for 2012:

1. Maharaja
2. North Pole Workshop
3. Avatar
4. Gauntlet
5. Agincourt

I submitted Maharaja with little hope of it ever getting published and was shocked that it was accepted. I just thought it was too odd or too technically demanding to be taken seriously. A year later, looking around YouTube, I was shocked to discover that it's popular. And now I'm shocked to learn exactly how popular - nearly twice the sales of my next-best-selling piece! New pieces for tend to make a big splash in their first year, but Maharaja goes beyond expectations.

Gauntlet always makes the top 5 list and I'm excited to see that it remains popular. North Pole Workshop was also a new piece this year and it's great to see that it did so well.  Avatar was the top-seller for the past two years and I credited that to people mistaking it for the theme to James Cameron's movie, but it still has a strong showing, so I think it's safe to start attributing success on its own terms. Agincourt is one of my personal favorites, so I'm thrilled that it remains popular. Gargoyles usually makes the top five list but this year it was edged out by just one sale. Another newer piece, Shadows of Venice, would have taken the #7 spot.

Looking at the data for foreign sales of scores and parts is a different story:

1. Maharaja & Shadows of Venice (tie)
3. Agincourt & Sneaking Suspicion (tie)
5. Mambo Incognito & Star of Valor (tie)

There's a different system for music education abroad, which often doesn't involve classroom music ensembles, so foreign sales are far lower than in the U.S. But still, this year's numbers show an increased interest in some of the newer selections. If I was shocked to see that Maharaja is popular among American orchestras, I'm floored to learn that it's popular in other parts of the world. Major-key novelty pieces tend to dominate this list, but it's wonderful to see music like Agincourt and Shadows of Venice catching on.

Here's one more list - domestic sales of scores:

1. Gauntlet
2. Gargoyles
3. Avatar
4. Agincourt
5. Las Mariposas Exoticas

This list is important because orchestras need to buy extra scores to give the judges when they go to state Solo & Ensemble contests and high sales mean a piece is popular at contests. It takes several years for a piece to build enough credibility to be included on contest lists, so big sellers here are usually older pieces, but it's good to see Agincourt surging ahead.

There are a lot more ways to break down the data - digital scores and parts, print licensing, MP3 downloads – but that's enough for now. If you bought one of my pieces in 2012 (in any format) I want to thank you for a great year!

Online Concert

It's time for another online concert!

Up first, please enjoy Gargoyles, performed by the DPO on October 28, 2011. (Possibly California's Dos Pueblos Orchestra? There's no indication of who the conductor is or where the group is located.)

Fantastic musicianship and some great, precise playing! The articulations are perfect. It's exciting to see such a large group that doesn't feel the need to play loud all the time. Their pianos are exhilarating.

Up next is the LaVilla School of the Arts Orchestra of Jacksonville, Florida performing A Breeze In the Keys.

There's a really nice energy in that performance and good contrasts between the bouncy rhythmic parts and the legato sections. Kudos to the percussion section on this one.

Next, let's hear from the Philharmonic Orchestra of Hopkins High School in Minnetonka, Minnesota, led by Andrew Bast. They're performing Maharaja.

This is a tough piece and they pulled it off nicely. It's all about pacing, and making sure you don't get too loud or intense too soon and they did a great job. They also have a good sense of rhythm and an ear for the style.

Finally, let's jet over to Germany (Berlin, I think), where Jana Wirth leads the Kammerorchester MSO in a performance of Agincourt.

Small but mighty! Those are some good players. The crispness of their staccatos is absolutely delightful and their intonation is spot-on. They look like high school students but they sound like pros. Well, done!

 

Doug Spata's Olympic Dream

The Olympics begin this week and it's always an exciting time for the world. I love watching the opening and closing ceremonies and the Parade of Nations, though I don't have a specific sport that I follow. The first Olympics I was aware of was the 1984 games in Los Angeles and I remember that for a long time all anyone could talk about was the U.S. gymnastics team.

TV coverage does a good job of highlighting the dramatic stories that drive the competitors and led the athletes to the games. They all have that "Olympic dream," to achieve at the highest level in front of the whole world.

Even though I'm not an athlete, I have an Olympic dream of my own: it would be an epic thrill to hear one of my compositions used in during Olympic competition. I'm not talking about the opening and closing ceremonies – that's way too much to ask. But it would be amazing to hear one of my pieces accompany a gymnastics floor exercise, a synchronized swimming routine, or, at the Winter Olympics, figure skating or ice dancing.

As a kid, I especially enjoyed hearing the music used in the gymnastic competitions because it's so full of color, energy, and emotion. I think some of my pieces would be suitable. Need something with a dark energy? Try Avatar, Elementals, or Storm Trail. Something more rhythmic and angular? There's Agincourt. Need a bright explosion of sound? Quicksilver or Star of Valor. For something more lyrical, have a listen to A Hero's Welcome. And if you need something fun and sassy, I recommend Violet's Tango, Samba Del Sol, Lemon Twist, or Mambo Incognito. Of course, Gauntlet is good for any occasion.

Professional recordings of all these and more are available at alfred-music.com.

So if you're an Olympic-level gymnast, synchronized swimmer, figure skater, or ice dancer... you're probably training really hard and don't have time for music classes, so you've never heard of me. But if you're someone who knows an Olympic-level athlete, maybe suggest one of my pieces and help make my dream come true!

 

I Take Requests

Occasionally, I'm lucky enough to get fan mail. My e-mail address is pretty easy to find and I've received messages from teachers, students, parents, and even audience members who have questions or comments about what they've heard or played. It's always wonderful to get feedback right from the source. I got an e-mail recently from a student in Texas and it was a little different:

 I love your compositions, and so does my high school orchestra director! 
We play your pieces all the time and they are our all time favorites. I was wondering if for your next submission to Alfred Music Publishing, could you compose a piece that has these components:

• Written in the style of an overture like, "Gauntlet" (ABA form)
• Set in a minor key 
• Quick tempo
• Dark motifs using sixteenth note and eighth note passages
• A slower more lyrical and expressive middle section (it would be cool if it could alternate between major and minor keys/modes), that then quickens back up into the beginning themes
• And be the grade level of 3-4

Performing a piece like that written by you would be the coolest thing EVER!

Students frequently ask me to write something "like Gauntlet," but I've never been sure what that means. I've written lots of other overtures in minor keys with fast tempos and I'm wary about repeating myself - if it's too much like Gauntlet, then what's the point? But this was the first time that someone actually delineated what that means. And the thing that sticks out is the mention of Gauntlet's middle section (a.k.a "the hard part"). This e-mail made me realize that I'd never done a slow section quite like that in any of my other pieces. I responded:

I've written a few minor key pieces for more advanced orchestra, but I don't think any of the published ones have slow middle sections.  Still, if you haven't heard them already, you many enjoy Storm Trail, Elementals, and Agincourt.  Next time I work on a fast minor key piece for advanced orchestra, I'll be sure to include a slow middle section before the recap.

 I've always kind of assumed that students don't enjoy Gauntlet's nebulous, melody-free middle section. It is, admittedly, a weird 25 measures. In recordings and videos it's the place where counting most frequently breaks down, entrances are missed, and musicianship is lost. I hadn't considered that  the challenge of that passage of music was appealing to students.

So after thinking about this, I set out to start a new piece of music. I didn't want it to be the same ability level as Gauntlet, so it has some advanced technical demands. I'm pleased with the piece and thought I'd share with my fan what came of his suggestions:

I just finished a new piece based on your recommendations and I thought you'd like to hear it - the sound file is attached. It's a fast Grade III piece with 16th note syncopations and optional shifting, it's in C minor with a few key changes, and it uses overture form with a lyrical middle section similar in style to Gauntlet's. I also included snare drum, bass drum, and tam tam parts for this one. I'd love to hear what you think.

He responded:

Wow! It sounds awesome! The middle section sounds really good. I also really like the percussion sound. It gives color and a really cool adventure/quest sound. The intensity builds all the way to the end and that's what I love about all your pieces! Do you have a title for this one yet? 

I wrote back:

Success!  No title for this one yet, though. Writing music is easy - writing titles is difficult.

I'll send this piece off with my submissions next spring and I have high hopes for it!

 

MP3 Downloads 2012

One of my absolute favorite things about working with Alfred Publishing is hearing their promotional recordings of my music.  The studio orchestra does a great job every year and I always look forward to their professional interpretations.  This year's recordings are no exception.

The links below are to Alfred's music download website, Alfred-music.com, and my three new pieces for 2012-2013. You can listen via Flash or download each piece for only $.99 USD.  You can search for my name or for any of my pieces and you can download those as well. For example, Gauntlet, Gargoyles, Agincourt, and Maharaja. Enjoy!

 

Sales Statement 2011 (Part 1)

I got my annual sales statement from Alfred Publishing recently! When I first started getting these, they were listings of how many copies each piece of published music was sold that year and, while that's the same basic principle for current statements, there are major changes from those early days. Now, each piece of music is available in multiple forms: Score and parts, score alone, parts alone, digital parts downloaded through SmartMusic, digital score downloaded through SmartMusic, print licensing, mechanical licensing, and photocopy licensing.  Then all of those are divided into domestic sales (inside the U.S.) and foreign sales (everywhere else), meaning that each of my published works has a potential for 16 revenue streams.

To be honest, though, each of those revenue streams accounts for very little on its own. My foreign sales are a fraction of a fraction of my domestic sales and only one honest director paid Alfred after making photocopies like he's supposed to do. But those few dollars here and there accumulate and, added to sales of scores and parts (which make up the bulk of the sales), they added up to a significant increase in overall sales from last year.  So if you bought something of mine this year, thank you!

Now comes the fun part: discovering which were my best sellers of the year.  Here are my top five best selling folios of scores and parts (domestic sales):

1. Avatar
2. Gauntlet & Sneaking Suspicion (tie)
3. Gargoyles
4. Las Mariposas Exoticas
5. Agincourt

Avatar was last year's number-one seller as well and I credited that to people mistaking my piece for the soundtrack to James Cameron's 2009 movie. I suppose this either means that people haven't caught on yet or they really like my piece.  Gauntlet and Gargoyles always seem to make the top five and Sneaking Suspicion did well, mostly because it's brand new.  Star of Valor and Storm Trail were also new and had respectable numbers, but didn't crack the top five. Agincourt stays strong, but this year's surprise is the resurgence of Mariposas. It's an older piece that usually stays in the middle of the pack, but has rallied for some reason this year.

Overall, it was a good year! I'll have more information and top five lists in a later post.

New Commission!

I'm very proud to announce that I'm working on a new commission!  Every once in a while, someone contacts me and asks me to write something special for them.  In this case, that someone is the Charlotte, North Carolina chapter of the MENC (Music Educators' National Conference). They've asked me to write the sight-reading selections for their Spring Contest!

I get quite a few international visitors, so I'll explain: Here in the States, many school orchestras participate in  "contest" in the Spring, where they perform a short program and get criticism from a panel of judges. The judges then award ratings and it's a source of pride (and stress) for many music programs.  Along with prepared selections, orchestras are also judged on their ability to read a short selection of never-before-seen music.  That's where I come in.

The Charlotte MENC has asked me to write a short piece for each of four ability levels. They even provided a list of what keys, meters, rhythms, bowings, articulations, and techniques that each level of orchestra should be able to sight-read.

Obviously, I can't give any specific details here about how my pieces will look or sound, but I can reveal that they're all around 30 measures.  I'm sure judges get bored hearing the same pieces over and over all day long, so I want to make them all as different as possible.


I really can't sell 30-measure pieces for publication, and because they are all written for different ability levels, they won't hang together as a suite.  So the plan is to take each one later, spin them into full-scale pieces and submit them to my publisher.

This is turning out to be a really fun project!  I've already finished the Grade I and II pieces, I'm about halfway done with the Grade III piece, and I hope to finish Grade IV by the end of the year.  Then I'll submit them to my contact in Charlotte and we'll work together to make adjustments and corrections so they comply with the criteria in each grade level.

Online Concert

I thought I'd program a short online concert of some of my more popular selections today. 

Up first is the Cleveland School of Arts Orchestra performing Gauntlet.  They do a lot of tuning and warming up (and it certainly pays off), but if you're interested in getting to the good stuff, skip ahead to the 1:45 mark.

 Nice job! I especially like what they did with the "hard part" (mm. 56 - 80).

Up next is the Shaw Middle School Orchestra performing Zydeco Two-Step:

Excellent!  The keyboard player did a great job.

Our final group is the Traverse City Symphony Strings - a civic orchestra - performing the heck out of Agincourt.

"Out of This World" is certainly an apt description of this group!  They're a small ensemble, but they play with all the ferocity and musicianship of a group three times their size.  I was also blown away by the production of this video - the multiple angles and great editing do the ensemble justice.  Here's my favorite shot:

"Energy" at the end! A well-marked part is a joy for a composer to see. 

Royalty Statement 2010 - Part 2

In my last post, I mentioned that most of my music sales come from within the US, but a small portion comes from other countries.  I can't be sure which other countries, but this blog has received hits from Canada, Sweden, Slovenia, Argentina, China, and Spain, just to name a few. I've also found my music for sale on German and Japanese online music stores, so that may also give some indication. 

As I understand it, many other countries don't have the same model of music education that is common here in the US and most ensemble playing is done in private after-school groups, so there's far less demand for string orchestra sheet music.

Anyway, here are my top foreign sellers for the past year:

1. Agincourt
2. Gargoyles
3. Gauntlet & Porcupine Pantomime (tie) 
5. Hot Potato

Interesting results!  It seems that my most popular pieces abroad are very close to my most popular pieces in the US.  Porcupine Pantomime and Hot Potato are relatively new, which may account for their higher sales. 

Something else to keep in mind: several pieces on the royalty statement are listed multiple times, because they're sold at different rates in different countries with different currencies and exchange rates.  There are four different listings for foreign sales of Gauntlet because it was sold at four different prices around the world.

There's no record of foreign sales of scores only or parts only, which leads me to believe that either those options aren't available in foreign markets or there's no demand for extra scores and parts.

Royalty Statement 2010 - Part 1

I got my annual royalty statement from Alfred Publishing recently, which outlines how many of each of my pieces they've sold in the past year, and first, let me just say

THANK YOU JAMES CAMERON!

You see, James Cameron decided to name what would become the highest-grossing movie of all time after a piece of music I wrote five years ago (kidding - the fact that we used the same titles was a complete coincidence).  Anyway, it seems a lot of people mistook my music for James Horner's film score. Or they really enjoyed my music on its own considerable merits.

Here are my top five sellers this year (4/1/09 - 3/31/10):

1. Avatar
2. Gauntlet
3. Gargoyles
4. Agincourt
5. Quicksilver

So Avatar comes out of nowhere to become this year's number-one seller.  Gauntlet and Gargoyles are perennial favorites and always seem to make the top five and I'm pleased to see that Agincourt has retained its popularity.  Quicksilver was a new one last year and music often sells well in its first year.  Plus, Quicksilver was performed at the Midwest Conference last December, giving it a huge boost.

Last year's other new pieces were Porcupine Pantomime, which would have come in sixth place, and A Hero's Welcome, which has a place further down in the rankings.

Now, this is just domestic sales of scores and parts. Scores are sold separately, for when orchestras go to contest and the judges need to follow along.  Here are the sales of just the scores:

1. Avatar
2. Gargoyles
3. Gauntlet
4. Crusader
5. Westward Motion

Interesting - perhaps Avatar is becoming a contest staple like Gargoyles and Gauntlet.  Or maybe people just want to see the score to Avatar, thinking that it's the film score.

There are still foreign sales and mechanical fees to report on as well as a certain long-standing bet to settle, but that's for a later post.

Too Difficult?

Here's a quandry I thought I'd express to you, interwebs: when it comes to music for student orchestras, how difficult is too difficult?

In the past I've written music with rhythms that makes students' eyes cross.  Despite taking it slow, counting it out, teaching by rote, and being very methodical, I find that these rhythms are completely un-performable. And yet, the same students have no problem singing the exact same rhythms when they appear in pop songs.  It must be something about the written music. Needless to say that I'll either simplify it before submitting it to my publisher or just abandon it altogether.

On the other hand, when I write a purposely challenging piece (like Agincourt in 7/8 time) I hear kids say "Pffft.  That's totally easy.  We could play that in sixth grade."  (Though how well remains to be seen.)

Shifting is challenging, part independence can be challenging, and so can triplets against duplets, fast technical passages, key changes, and good old-fashioned expressive musicianship.  I've thrown all of those things into various pieces and kids blow it off like it's nothing and my publisher rates the difficulty 2.5 out of 4. These are all things that students should be able to do at some point as they advance at their instrument.

Question #1: Where's the line?  Does it depend on the individual player or group? Or am I being lied to when it comes to how challenging to make a piece of music?

Question #2: Are students being pushed too far too soon? Are teachers pushing advanced music and techniques too soon at the expense of fundamentals and basic technique? 

This also brings up the controversy of "teaching to the music," to which I am opposed.  My philosophy is to use music to reinforce the lessons, but many teachers choose the music first and then teach students the techniques they need in order to play it.  In my mind, when you teach to the music it sets up a very specific context for the technique and students find it harder to apply that technique to another piece of music.  Teaching the lesson first and then applying it to a piece ensures that students understand the fundamentals first - the whys and hows - before trying it out.

The reason I ask is because I'm working on a challenging piece that I intend for high school groups.  I'm including all the challenging techniques listed above and if I've done my job right, the orchestra, director, and audience should be completely exhausted by the end of the piece.  But is is too hard?  Am I writing myself out of an audience?  What say you, interwebs?

More Like Gauntlet

I recently decided to do something about the rhythm that has been nagging me from the back of my mind and incorporate it into a new piece.  The result is a fast, advanced-level piece in D Minor (occasionally going into F Major and flirting with Phrygian mode) with frequent meter changes.  I originally thought Agincourt, with its 7/8 time signature would be a good rhythmic challenge for advanced students, but now I see that middle school kids are playing it with no problem.  This new one (still untitled, of course) should be suitably difficult.

But while writing this new one, I got to thinking about something.

People always ask me "why don't you write something like Gauntlet again?" To which I have two responses.  First: I thought I have.  I'm not sure exactly how I bottled lightning with Gauntlet - it seems to be a product of the very specific state of mind I was in for two weeks in 1998 and, despite my best efforts, it remains a unique anomaly.  I think that Agincourt, Elementals, Avatar (no relation to the new movie), Gargoyles, Crusader, and Storm Trail all have that same "dark and fast" quality.  I also have dozens of unpublished pieces in the same milieu, but I still get asked why I don't write more pieces like Gauntlet.  I'm not sure what quality it is that people respond to and want me to reproduce, but it seems beyond my grasp.

My second response is: why would I want to write the same thing twice?  Even if I could write a piece like Gauntlet again, would you really want to play a piece that's exactly like Gauntlet but not Gauntlet?  Would teachers buy a piece that's really really similar to a piece that they already have in their library?  I still like Gauntlet, but all these years later I see a certain naivete in its construction and I'd like to think that I've grown as a composer since then.  While I sometimes try to emulate the dark style and fast tempo that made Gauntlet popular, I'd rather write a piece that is unique and interesting on its own merits than a complete re-tread of something I've already done.

Let me put it this way: What if the Beatles kept writing songs like "Love Me Do"  over and over for their whole career?  It was a huge success for them early on, but what if, instead of exploring new sounds and growing artistically, they kept focusing on the same jangly rockabilly sound they started with?  Another example: Hootie and the Blowfish, a band that stuck with its middle-of-the-road frat rock long after the public's taste for middle-of-the-road frat rock had faded.

My hero, Igor Stravinsky had this problem (on a much larger scale).   He spent a long lifetime writing an amazing string of masterpieces, but all anyone wanted to hear were the three ballets he wrote in his early 30's.  He never revisited the early style that made him famous and instead, focused on constantly exploring new sounds.  Still, he made a career out of it, so it's not the worst problem to have.  Another extreme example is Carl Orff, who lived to be over 100 and wrote tons of beautiful music, but all he's known for is the first five minutes of one piece that he wrote back in the 1940's.

So this new piece I just finished is like Gauntlet in that it has a fast tempo, a minor key and a legato section in the middle, but it also has unique challenges.  If it gets compared to Gauntlet that would be great, but I hope that it stands apart and can be appreciated on its own merits.

New Videos - Agincourt & A Hero's Welcome

Agincourt really seems to be catching fire, based on the appearance of a new batch of videos on You Tube.  Please to enjoy a very good performance by the Bowditch Advanced Orchestra:

Not bad!  A good performance makes up for the fact that they mis-pronounced my name in the intro.  But up next is the thundering herd known as the Clay, Carmel, and Creekside Middle School Symphony, also playing Agincourt.  The tempo is great in this one and I really like the enthusiasm that they bring.

Go, middle-schoolers, go!  You rock that advanced-level piece!  I'll end this post on a somber note.  Here's the Sierra Vista High School orchestra playing A Hero's Welcome.  Very expressive and  beautifully done - bravi.

I just wish the YouTube postings gave more information about the groups.  I'd love to know where each of these schools are, so I can add them to my map.

Agincourt Video

After updating my website recently, I came across a YouTube video that I didn't get to include. It's a really good performance of Agincourt. Check it out:


They do a nice job! Good work!

In other news, I got my upgrade of Finale in the mail yesterday! I've been using Finale 2007b and upgraded to Finale 2010 (I've mentioned it before, but Finale is the computer program I use to write music). The improvements over three years are negligible and mostly cosmetic, but the longer I wait, the more expensive the upgrade gets. Now I just have to find a way to get it on my computer. Hopefully, I'll have it installed this weekend.

Royalty Statement 2009 (Part 2)

The listings for foreign sales are shrouded in mystery. Though I've heard of a few performances in Austrailia, have found an online German sheet music vendor that sells my music, and got word of a performance in Canada, I'm not exactly sure who it is outside the U.S. that's buying my music. I would hope that it would sell in Japan, home of the Suzuki Method, and in Europe. From what I understand, other countries don't have school music programs analagous to ours and wouldn't need school-level string orchestra music. Here are my top-selling sets of scores and parts in foreign markets:

1. Agincourt & Mambo Incognito (tie)
3. Hot Potato
4. Gargoyles
5. Violet's Tango

As you can see, there's a marked difference from the top five sellers in the U.S. I should note, though, that foreign sales make up a tiny fraction of a percentage of my total sales. Also, the printout that I received shows that several of these pieces sold at different rates - probably in euros, Canadian and Austrialian dollars, and yen.

Last year I got a sheet showing sales of digital downloads from alfred-music.com. This year, there's no record of sales of MP3 files - maybe bacuase they're so few that it will be rolled into next year's statement.

Finally, I did get a notice about liscensing. When orchestras record their concerts, they're supposed to get permission from the publisher and pay a small licensing fee. A few honest souls actually did that this year and I thank them. Liscensing also includes a few listings from "Make Music," a program where directors can access notes from the composer with tips on how to rehearse and perform their music more effectively. I wrote a few of these two years ago and think that I might want to do some more in the future.