Les said, the better: applications

Showing posts with label applications. Show all posts

Monday, 3 March 2003

Grad Skool

Well, I've gotten one letter from CalArts saying "yes," and have heard only rumors from other schools. I've heard via a third party that Alvin Lucier thinks I sound "interresting." A certain bitter ex-member of the Mills Community says that their financial sitution makes my acceptance there near certain. Oh, well, gee, uh. I didn't think they took economics into account for admissions, but what do I know. I don't mend benefitting from affirmative action, but I'd prefer it to be the "we need a better male-female balance" kind rather than the "we need more cash" kind. This is because I'm a contrary leftist and nobody on the right is suing to stop the second kind of class-based admission system. And I've heard from another individual that CalArts is not an easy school to get in to and that Mills has already made it's descision and the letter will be mailed shortly.

The more I think about it, the more I just want to move to Seattle and screw grad school. Honestly, it's not like my music career matters. If all 15 people who care about electronic tape music think that I'm cool, well, that's swell, but it's still only 15 people. I think that in the US art is dead. If it's not dead, it's terminal and twitching. In the 80's it was doing that reaching it's arm up towards the light thing and a bunch of folks decided it was about to go for a walk, but nope it was that increased wakefulness before death thing. (I haven't read too many hospice pamphlets, not me.) Give art some more morphine, talk quietly in it's presence, hold it's hand for a moment, hold your breath each time it breathes in, waiting to hear if it will breathe out again.

Tuesday, 28 January 2003

Computer Resume for Mills College Supplemental Application

Celeste Hutchins
Computer Resume

Skills:
Languages: Java, Perl, CGI scripting, C/C++, HTML, DHTML, JavaScript, MAX
Operating Systems: Linux, Solaris, MacOS, IRIX, NeXTSTEP

Experience:

AOL/Netscape	Mountain View, CA
AOL Online Music Product Manager	October 2000 - February 2001
Product design Writing PRDs Researching data sets
Open Directory Project Software Engineer	February 1999 - October 2000
Wrote web-based tools for editors in perl Apache Server configuration Processed and pushed RDF and search data to http://search.netscape.com

Isadra Inc.	Palo Alto, CA
Software Engineer	August 1998 - February 1999
Java Servlet programming for JavaWebServer Trouble-shooting cooperative commerce algorithms Finding and fixing software bugs Set up intranet

Whole Bean Software	Oakland, CA
Founder	December 1996 - October 1997
Attempted to start a software company to produce a real time java chat application for the web.

Multimedia Resources Inc.	Portland, OR
Intern	May - August 1996
Wrote Java applets Wrote CGI Scripts in Perl / server parsed HTML

Tetherless Access Limited	Sunnyvale, CA
Intern	May - August 1995
Tested / fixed software for wireless routers Implemented new features for the wireless router software Documented router software and networking Wrote man pages

Mills College Information Technical Services	Oakland, CA
Student Worker	August 1994 - November 1996
Maintained subnets of NeXT machines and Macintoshes System administration including user support HTML Authoring Researched software for potential purchasing Wrote user documentation

Education:
Mills College B.A. May 1998
Majors: Computer Science and Electronic Music

Informal Experience:

Belong to a co-location coop, where members share root responsibilities and keep the server up
Run and program for a MOO (similar to a MUD but object oriented)

Extra-Curricular Activities:

Expanding Your Horizons workshop leader (95 - 97)
(EYH is a math, science, and computer workshop for 6th - 12th grade girls)
Mills College Academic Board chair
ACM Programming Contest contestant (96-97)

Monday, 27 January 2003

Mills College Music Supplemental Application

1. Submit an annotated, representative list of your works, including both electronic and non-electronic works. List and describe your work in other media (i.e., film, video, theatre, dance, multi-media, etc)

In addition to the works in my CD portfolio, I

Worked on an installation in the Exploratorium as a part of their Second Wednesday Art Series. I worked with two other people to put contact microphones on three exhibits that had moving parts. We then amplified the sounds, unprocessed, and played them out of small speakers placed near the exhibits, so people could hear the quiet sounds of the machinery, which they might not otherwise hear. Also, for the same event, I wrote a MAX patch to create the kind of feedback loop that Alvin Lucier used in his piece I am Sitting in a Room.
I also wrote a Toy Piano Nonette in response to a call for scores for an installation by Trimpin. The piece was selected for inclusion. The score, the call for scores and an article about the installation are included in this mailing.
I wrote a duet for tuned percussion tubes. The piece uses differently lengthed loops set against each other, so, for instance, the first player plays a four-beat pattern three times and the second player plays a three beat pattern four times. The piece was premiered at an art opening, at a caf�, where a local artist was having an exhibition.

2. Which contemporary composers have been most influential in your own compositions? Why?

The most influential composers have been my teachers, especially Maggi Payne and John Bischoff. Maggi first introduced me to analog synthesis and modular synthesizers, which has been my medium of choice ever since. Her sound aesthetic has also greatly influenced my own. She has had a profound influence on how I think about sound and music.

Although I only took one class with Bischoff, it was my first class at CCM. He was fond of telling his students that the weaknesses of any musical system were also its strengths. Since then, I am constantly looking for artifacts of sound processing and ways to amplify them or use them in composition. One of the pieces in my CD portfolio, Breaking Waves, is based on the artifacts of mp3 conversion.

The most influential composer aside from my instructors is John Cage. I was listening to the radio when I was a freshman in high school and they started playing Lecture on Nothing. It was the version with a woman narrating. I had never heard of John Cage and I had no idea what I was listening to, but I stopped everything I was doing to listen. It was like nothing I had ever heard, but it seemed to be somehow related to the Nine Stories by J. D. Salinger that I had been reading for my English class when the piece started. The piece stayed in the back of my mind until I was at Mills I took a seminar class on John Cage, taught by David Bernstein. Since that class, I�ve read many books by and about John Cage. His thoughts have influenced me on questions such as, �what is art or music?� and issues, such as anarchism. My senior concert, a collaboration with Christi Denton, was modeled on a Musicircus. One day I hope to live in a society modeled on John Cage�s poem, Overpopulation and Art.

Alvin Lucier�s work has influenced my own, especially his piece I am Sitting in a Room. I wrote a MAX patch to create the kind of decay loop that he uses in that piece. This was written for an installation at the Exploratorium, but I�ve used it in pieces since. One of these, Drum Decay, is on my CD portfolio.

The music and writings of Pauline Oliveros have influenced me. I like her sound. I have a book of her sonic meditations that I like to use. I organized a percussion group to play my music and the music of some of my friends. Some members of the group were not always listening to each other. I found that starting rehearsals with Oliveros� Deep Listening exercises helped this a lot and that we were able to get more done as a result. I�ve talked to her and read her book Software for People and have tried to incorporate her ideas into my own thinking.

Another influence is Annea Lockwood. I�ve always liked her work, ever since Maggi Payne introduced me to it. Last year, I had the good fortune to be hired as the driver for the Other Minds festival. As a result, I had several conversations with Annea. We talked about electronic music and how sometimes it doesn�t seem to have �air� in it. This conversation inspired me to start writing a series of tape music pieces called Airwaves, the first three of which are included on my portfolio CD.

I�ve also been influenced by Phillip Glass, especially his operas. I like his style very much. I also read his writing on Einstein on the Beach. In that opera, he uses repeated phrases, but with notes added in the middle in different parts to create loops of different lengths. I�ve used this idea in some of my percussion music and also in other notated music, such as in the attached toy piano nonette, No No Nonette.

Steve Reich�s pieces that phase with each other have been a source of inspiration to me. One of the pieces in my CD portfolio, Phase, was inspired by this idea.

I�ve tried writing pieces based on the idea of Terry Riley�s In C, but so far have not met with success.

3. List the musical instruments you play and give some indication of the degree of skill you have on each.

I play the analog modular synthesizer, sans keyboard, but only to tape.
I play punk rock on bass guitar with my friends.
I played the tuba in the Mills College CPE five years ago, but have not played it since.

4. What is your level of experience with the hardware of electronic media? Indicate whether you have a comprehension of or design experience with circuitry and describe your experience with electronic music instruments, audio, recording/or other related equipment.

I can read a schematic and have experience assembling kits. I also built a theremin from parts and a schematic (not a kit). I took a class in math and analog systems and so understand how different arrangements of resistors work and could use this knowledge to build a plug for a signal that is too hot, for example. I have never designed an analog circuit, but I took a digital circuit design class as a part of my Computer Science degree.

I make extensive use of an analog modular synthesizer and understand some of the math involved in the patches I make. I also know some obscure tricks, for example, analog chaos, which I use in a piece on my CD portfolio, called Chaos Patch. I also use non-patchable analog synthesizers. My experience with digital synthesizer hardware, excluding softsynths, is limited to John Bischoff�s class in computer music.

I took Maggi Payne�s recording class twice for credit and have confidence recording to tape, analog or digital. For my own work, I record direct to disk using pro-tools. I have experience using protools for editing and have produced or help produce several CDs for Other Minds, an arts nonprofit in the City, to use for grant or promotional purposes.

I also use programs like Sound Hack to process recordings and mp3 converters.

I know how to use a voltmeter and a soldering iron.

5. What computer languages and systems have you had experience with? Describe the level of involvement, i.e., designer, programmer, user, etc. Include computer music systems and/or computerized musical instruments you have worked with.

In addition to studying Electronic Music, I also majored in computer science. I have worked programming in C, C++, Java, Perl, Javascript and various markup languages, including HTML, PHP, NROFF and GROFF. I have worked on systems running DOS, Windows, Linux and OS9. My preferred environment for development is Linux. My preferred environment for music is OS9 or OSX. Since OSX is UNIX, I would just as happily program for it as Linux. My last several jobs were in web programming. I have also worked as a release engineer. I informally wrote the Product Requirements Document for ChefMoz, a user-generated online restaurant database. I�ve worked for a short time as the Product Manager for AOL�s Online Music Group.

I know basic system administration. I know how to configure a web server. I belong to a co-location cooperative, where members share administration duties and costs for a colo cage in the south bay.

I started programming when I was eight years old. As soon as I started playing music, in fifth grade, I became interested in how the computer could also make music. I wrote programs in BASIC in an attempt to computer-generate music using arpeggios. In this way, I learned the difference between equal temperament and just intonation.

I now do most of my music programming in MAX/MSP. The only softsynth I�ve used since graduating is ReBirth. I would rather write a custom MAX application, usually, than go looking for software to buy or download. This takes a lot of time, so most of my music is analog. I worked for several months writing an algorithmic techno generator written in MAX. It is unfinished.

Please see attached resume for more information.

7. Is your interest in electronic media primarily for composition or research and design or both?

Both. I would like to learn more compositional techniques. I am also interested, especially, in algorithmic composition. After graduation, I would like to work as a music researcher at a center such as STEIM, IRCAM or ZKM.

8. Why have you selected Mills College for graduate work in electronic media?

Mills has a reputation for being the best place to study electronic media. It is also located in an area with a thriving arts scene. I�ve learned a lot from Mills already, and there is certainly more to learn.

Obviously, the influeces section needs work. it's really hard to write about.

Wednesday, 15 January 2003

Celeste Hutchins
Music Application
Writing Sample 1 of 2

Political Tract

It is entirely clear that in our current system, few people other than artists enjoy their jobs so much that they would keep doing them if they didn�t have to. It is also clear that our current system is entirely unsustainable. Our primary goal in our current system is economic growth. This means we must keep making more things every year than we did the year before, over and above any population growth. And such is our system that if we fail to grow in a year, we are in a recession and many people end up out of work. Popularly, this is not seen as a shortcoming of the system, but rather as a moral failing of the individuals affected. Furthermore, the system requires the middle class to consume more and more every year. There is only so much stuff that people want to have, however, so that it is necessary to make things disposable. The only way to keep the middle classes consuming more and more is to make them throw away what they already have. This ever-rising so-called "standard of living" does not grow higher when people must work at jobs that they do not like so they can buy things to throw them away. Meanwhile, the environmental and human costs of raw materials continue to mount. For a few to live like disposable aristocracy, others must live in poverty and environmental damage and wasting of resources must mount higher and higher.

Because this kind of capitalist excess is socially and environmentally unstable and unsustainable, it will fall. The only question is how. We can sit and wait until the ocean levels rise, disastrous uncharacteristic weather patterns pummel us, and asymmetric warfare rains down upon us from all sides, or we can act now and avert carnage, extinctions and continuing genocide.

Aside from these points, the primary weakness of our system is over and under centralization. Some systems are over centralized. Other systems have no central planning whatsoever. All of these systems are setup as inefficiently as possible so that elite individuals can profit off the inefficiency and pocket the difference between dollars spent and value received.

We can build a better system. We can break away from the old one.

I foresee great changes. Americans will say no more to a system where civil rights have been whittled down to the right to chose what color car to buy. We will say no more to enslaving the third world for private profit. We will say no more to people being poisoned by pesticides, condemned to poverty and stuck toiling away our lives in stupid jobs that offer us no freedom or leisure time.

We will couple automation with sustainable development. Nobody�s time will be more valuable than anyone else�s. Production will be to fit human needs rather than capitalistic growth. Things are valuable only in so much as the benefit human lives. We will cease production of pointlessly disposable items. Durable goods will actually be durable, re-usable and recyclable. Buildings will not be knocked over for no reason. Instead of principles of capital and ownership, we will have principles of use and collectivization. People will form voluntary associations locally to meet local needs. Every home will be a squat. The residents will have the means to maintain their homes and their collective living arrangements.

Corporations will cease, with all factory production automated and run by the government. Less will be made, because less will be needed. As much as possible, items produced locally will be consumed locally.

People will brew their own beer, and their own biodiesel, and generate their own power with the solar arrays on their roofs. Yet many tools will be owned in common. Few people actually need their own vacuum cleaner. Almost no one who has one uses it everyday. Because of growth, inefficiency and systems of ownership, people currently must buy all the tools they might ever need. However, alternatives exist even now. In Berkeley, there is a tool library that residents with a library card may check out tools from. I foresee a future where many tools are owned in common by neighborhoods, blocks, buildings or associations. The interconnectedness and interdependence of all people will be clear. No one�s time will be worth more or less than anyone else�s. The currency will be measured in hours.

People will still work as teachers, as nurses, as firefighters as repair people, but fewer hours will be required. These people will have time to peruse art, sports, music, crafts, and passion. No one will be made to live in poverty for the benefit of anyone else.

This can and will come about. There is no reason to continue our unequal, disposable and militaristic social systems. Too often we resemble what is worst about human nature. There is no reason not to resemble the best. The technology we require is present. All we need is the will to make our vision happen.

in the original version, foresaw the western states suceeding. this is better writing than my tuba paper, so i'm going to use it. and the notes towards a comic opera. my music counts more than my writing. i don't have examples of academic writing, but they're not necessary, and anyway between this, the tawdry fiction and my statement of purpose, at least i'll come across as somewhat literate.

Artist Statement - Calarts

When I was in high school, my two loves were computer programming and tuba playing. I chose to pursue a career in programming for economic reasons, but I've often wondered about the tuba-playing road not taken.

I went to Mills College to study Computer Science, but I quickly found myself gravitating toward the Center for Contemporary Music. I had some limited exposure to New Music before college, thanks to an excellent community radio station, but was not aware of it other than casually listening to noise bands. What I learned at Mills changed everything I thought about sound and music creation. I studied electronic music with Maggi Payne. She taught synthesis techniques on a large Moog Modular Synthesizer. The sound and the possibilities for music making were incredible. I thought that the Moog was fantastic. I loved making music with it and the approach to sound creation that went with it. I decided to double-major in Computer Science and Electronic Music.

I learned to compose music for tape by recording source sounds, such as field recordings or interesting synthesizer patches and mixing them together, so that mixing is as much composing as finding or creating the source sounds. It shaped how I think about composing. This is still the method I use for creating almost all of my pieces. Often, there is a metaphor or idea that ties all of the source sounds together, but sometimes I just record interesting patches until I have "enough" of them. Then I look for interesting ways to mix them together. I love doing this because of the focus on pure sound, rather than algorithms or theory and also because of its tactility.

In addition to studying synthesis, I played tuba in the Contemporary Performance Ensemble and also took classes in recording techniques and computer music. I learned to program in MAX and experimented with unusual input devices, like the Nintendo Power Glove. I took all of the required classes in music history and theory and also classes in Computer Science, my other major. Those classes covered programming concepts relevant to computer music including networking and programming languages. I also took an independent study class in analog electronics, to better understand the internal workings of analog synthesizers.

My senior concert was a collaboration between another composition student and myself. We decided to have multiple pieces playing at the same time, like one of John Cage�s music circuses. I wrote three pieces of tape music and one MAX patch that ran on a laptop throughout. I also wrote five or 10 small pieces for wandering trios that played throughout the program and I assembled one small installation. My partner and I collaborated on a piece for electric guitars and vibrators. She wrote most of the trios and a percussion trio with three movements. We created a web page about this concert, with information for performers and attendees. It is still on-line at http://casaninja.com/concert/.

After graduation, I worked at a startup company that made products related to e-commerce. I did web programming and worked on their server. The company was a bit chaotic. Periodically, the management would come by and tell everyone that we were just about to have an IPO, or get more funding, or be bought by someone, in the meantime, we just had to give up a few more evenings and weekends. I did not write any music at all while I worked there, because the schedule took over all of my time.

When someone I had met at an earlier interview called to ask if I would like to go work at Netscape and have more free time and make more money, I accepted. The job was interesting and I had enough time to make music and the means to obtain equipment. I purchased a MOTM Modular synthesizer and started recording tape music and posting it to Mp3.com. I also submitted a tape to Woodstockhausen 2000, which they played. My goal was to have two careers simultaneously. I would be an engineer and a composer. It might have worked except that I was commuting 50 miles each way to work and it was starting to burn me out. I realized that music had become a hobby rather than a vocation, so I started looking for work closer to home. In 2001, I was laid off.

While I was searching for another job, I continued recording tape music and posting it to Mp3.com. I joined a group of noise music composers on the service. We thought that by working together, we could raise the profile of noise music in general while also advancing our music careers. One of these artists had a small record label and released two songs of mine on a compilation disk.

Around the same time, the Exploratorium, a hands-on science museum in San Francisco, issued a call for proposals for temporary installations that focused on sonic characteristics of the museum. I collaborated with two other people on two proposals, both of which were accepted. The first installation used piezo contact microphones attached to exhibits with moving parts. The sounds were amplified, unprocessed so that passers-by could hear the quiet sounds they would not otherwise notice. For the second piece, I wrote a MAX/MSP patch to demonstrate the resonant frequencies of a part of the building. It used the type of feedback loop that Alvin Lucier used in his piece I am Sitting in a Room.

Shortly thereafter, my domestic partner was also laid off, so I postponed my job search and we spent the summer traveling in Europe. I wrote no music while I was there, but I visited several modern art museums, and went to the Venice Biennale. I also visited an online in Germany at ZKM, a research center that her commissioned to write a paper on MP3s. I was very impressed with the facilities there and the idea of music research.

When I came home, I had hundreds of musical ideas. The first was to switch career tracks to focus on composition. I wrote several pieces of tape music, and then I decided that I wanted to write more music for live performance, so I organized a five person percussion group and wrote a couple of pieces music for them. The group performed them at an art a local artist�s gallery opening. I also did computer consulting. I was not sure how to pull my work and aspirations together into a career.

At the same time, I started volunteering for Other Minds, a New Music nonprofit in San Francisco. I started as the driver for their festival. Shortly after that, they got possession of the KPFA music archives, featuring interviews with every important composer between 1969 and 1992. They are planning to use their library for a web radio project. I am helping them catalog their tape archive and pick out interesting tapes to submit for grant applications. I also work for them as a volunteer sound engineer and produced or helped produce several CDs used for grant applications and I gave them technical advice regarding the web radio server hardware and software.

Last spring I attended the Composing a Career Conference sponsored by the Women's Philharmonic. Almost everyone else there had a masters degree and the presenters all assumed they were speaking to a masters-level audience. Realizing that I needed more education, I started looking into graduate programs. I also started submitting tapes to festivals and calls for scores. One of my tapes was accepted at Woodstockhausen 2002.

Tragically, shortly after the conference, while I was on my way to visit Jack Straw Productions in Seattle, my mother was diagnosed with a brain tumor. She had surgery and started radiation treatment. All of my music work and consulting jobs were put on hold so I could spend time helping to take care of my mom. The treatment was not helpful and she died in the middle of October.

I spent several weeks after her death re-thinking my life plans. A few weeks ago, I decided that I wanted to continue with my chosen track. I submitted a score to Jack Straw Productions for inclusion in a Trimpin installation and they accepted it. I also started pulling together applications to the graduate schools that I picked out in the spring. Your program caught my interest because of your faculty, especially Subotnic, with whom I hope to study.

At Calarts, I hope to learn more about electronic music and also about composition for live performance. I would like to learn new techniques for creating music, including computer sound generation and digital synthesis. I would also like to learn about building installations and other electronic musical tools. I hope to learn more mediums for composition. I would also like to explore more writing for traditional instruments. Calarts has a reputation for performance as well as composition and I hope to be able to work with some of the performers studying there.

After I graduate with a masters degree, I hope to find success as a freelance composer. I am also interested in doing music research at a center like STEIM, IRCAM or ZKM, or a comparable center in the United States. I know that Calarts could give me the skills and education necessary to achieve this goal. Your excellent reputation would also help my professional aspirations. I hope you will consider me for your program.

Oh yeah, that's not exactly the same as my wesleyan one or anything...

Tuesday, 14 January 2003

Possible Wesleyan Writing Sample

Evolution, Physics and Usage of the Wagner Tuba

The evolution of the tuba in the nineteenth century begins with the ophicleide. (See fig 1) This instrument, inspired by a keyed bugle, was invented in 1817. (Baines 198) It was an improvement on the Serpent, a brass-type instrument from the end of the eighteenth century. Variants of the ophicleide remain in use today, such as the Russian bassoon. But this instrument is best remembered as an ancestor to the tuba.

Fig 1 ophicleide this picture exists on my website

After the invention of valves, brass was changed forever. Keyed instruments have weaker sounds when they keys are opened, but a valved instrument is strong on every note. After the invention and improvement in valves, the ophicleide was modified into the Bombardon (see fig2). As you can see from the picture, it still retains the ophicleide shape. Unlike the ophicleide, keyed in B flat, the majority of bombardons "are in tuba pitch F" and are "up to 145 cm. tall with valve bore reaching 18 mm." (250) The instrument as a whole is very close in profile and shape to its predecessor.

Fig 2 a bombardon this picture exists on my website

While the bombardons were still a relatively new invention, Moritz and Wieprecht produced the first tuba. This horn was also keyed in F, and had an unusual valve arrangement. (250) Most modern tubas follow the trumpet, where the first valve lowers by a whole step, the second a half step, and the third is equal to first two added together. On the first tuba, "the 1st and 2nd valves, for the left hand, lowered by a tone and a semi tone. The three for the right hand provided: a large tone, to make an exact two tones with the 1st valve; large semitone, to make an exact tone and a half with the 1st valve; and a perfect fourth." (250) Although some argue that this is a more useful valve arrangement, it soon was replaced with the one we are more familiar with.

The tuba, thus introduced, continues to evolve to this day. But in the nineteenth century, several people tried modifications to the tuba, with varying degrees of success, which no longer survive in regular uses. One of these people was Adolphe Sax. Sax did not primarily work on the tuba. His plan was to integrate the wildly divergent band instruments of the time into a single family of Saxhorns. These tuba-influenced instruments are narrower in bore than generally found on modern tuba. As his ideas were more of unification than modification, especially among the tenor and tuba size instruments, his changes did not significantly alter the sound or structure of the bass instrument. However, all of his changes were soon incorporated by other instrument makers into their own horns, so whatever improvements he made remain with us today, even if by a different name. (253)

Despite all this comparison between the bore of a particular horn and the "modern tuba," there was and still is a lot of variance in layout, size and bore. Two tubas in the same key with widely differing bores would be called by the same name but have a great difference between them in timbre. With this in mind, the various re-namings and deviants of tuba seem to be of less importance. They are all variations on a theme with pretty much the same sound. Yet one mutant tuba does stand out, the Wagner tuba.

The Wagner Tuba stands out not in its legacy to modern instruments, but in the wild divergence it possessed. The Wagner tuba has several construction differences which greatly later its tone. The most immediately striking thing about the Wagner tuba is the almost complete absence of a flared bell. In fact, the instrument is completely conical, including the valves. How does this change the sound? "The [sound] waves passing down a cone without a bell have their curvature suddenly changed at the open end." (Richardson 77) This makes the Wagner tuba less efficient at transmitting sound. It also affects the timbre. "If you give a tube a large flare you reduce the intensity of the upper partials in the note and render it more mellow." (78) The Wagner tuba would then have a brighter sound than either the French horn or a more standard tuba.

The next major difference between a Wagner and a standard tuba is method of sound production. "They are intended to be played by French horn players using their own mouthpieces.� (Morley-Pegge) This certainly affects the tone of the instrument in a way different from other tuba-variants. "On mouthpieces of the horn type there is no flange and therefore nothing definite to form an edge-tone, hence the player is deprived of its help, with the result of a soft tone" (Richardson p 72) Therefore, we have simultaneously a bright sounding instrument with a soft tone.

While the shape of the mouthpiece is important, it is not as important as the dimensions. "The cup volume and the diameter of the constricted passage [of the mouthpiece] have significant effect upon the performance of a given mouthpiece, with the shape being a much less important variable." (Fletcher and Rossig 369-370) The depth of the French horn mouthpiece is 44 mm (Richardson 74). The higher Wagner tuba is in approximately the same range as the horn, so this is not striking. However, the lower Wagner tuba is in the same range as a tenor trombone, which has a cup depth of 64 mm (74). The varied cup volume and constriction of the French horn mouthpiece would also give a French horn sort of sound to the instrument.

It is important not to underestimate the mouthpiece in sound generation and tone. Figure 8a shows the input impedance for a particular tube. Figure 8b shows the impedance for a particular mouthpiece. The impedance of the horn resultant when they are joined together and in figure 8c. As one can see, the mouthpiece has a profound affect on the impedance of the horn and the sound of the horn in general. The impedance, as modified by the mouthpiece, is also closely linked with the flare of the bell. (Fletcher and Rossig 372) The total sound of the Wagner tuba, therefore, will be unlike anything else in the orchestra, not like a tuba, and not like a French horn, but similar to both.

Despite these very unique characteristics, the Wagner tuba is really a hybrid between the saxhorn or tuba and the French horn. Aside from sharing mouthpieces and players with the French horn section, "in bore they are midway between the horn and the saxhorn." (Morley-Pegge) What lead Wagner to invent a hybrid instrument? In fact, "Wagner had already begun to compose Rheingold before he included the tubas." (Baines 263) So initially, at least, he did not even have them in mind. But in October of 1853, Wagner visited Sax. "(September 1865) A letter from the composer to King Ludwig refers to the 'extra instruments' which he had been scoring for in The Ring and which he had become acquainted with . . . in Paris 'at the maker Sax, whose, invention they were.'" (64) So at least by that time, Wagner had not thought of any innovations. Necessity, however, prompted him, as he was unable to find "those 'Sax'schen Instumente' or even possible substitutes for them in the military bands in Munich, or in Vienna either." (264) As he had already begun to compose for the Saxhorns at this point, he was faced with a dilemma.

When he finally had the instruments built, he used them as a quartet, with two Bb instruments and two F. When they are used in The Ring, "they are played by the second quartet of horns, horns 5 and 7 playing the B flat instruments, and 6 and 8 those in F� (Morley-Pegge) Unsurprisingly, given Wagner's history of building his own opera house specifically for one opera, he only uses the mutant tubas in The Ring and nowhere else in his work.

Bruckner and Strauss both made some use of the Wagner tuba. Bruckner uses them in the adagio movement of his seventh symphony and also in his ninth. Strauss made use of the horns, but later revised them out. "The Tenor Tuba in Don Quixote was evidently first to have been a Wagner tuba: Strauss tells in Instrumentationslehre how several times he has written for a B flat tenor horn, and had found that as a melody instrument the ordinary Bariton (euphonium) was preferable to the 'harsh, awkward Wagner-tubas with their demoniac [sic] sound'"(Baines 265)

Despite Strauss' criticism, it was Bruckner's seventh symphony that became his first commercial success, which must be attributed, at least in part, to the role of the tubas.

Wagner failed to create a consistent transposition for his instruments. "In all the parts . . . of Rheingold, they sound . . . respectively a tone and a fifth lower than written." Yet, "In the other scores they appear in E flat and B flat, sounding a sixth and a ninth lower." (264) He apparently though the second version would be easier for the conductor. But in yet another "exception is in the Prelude to Gotterdammerung, where they are written in B flat and F in brass-band style . . . and sound a ninth and a twelfth lower." (264) This lack of consistency may indicate a lack of certainty on Wagner's part about the best way to notate his new instrument.

In Das Rheingold, Wagner uses D flat major for the tonality around Valhalla, as it is suggested "as the most obvious contrasting tonality for the framing scenes . . . before Valhalla . . ." (Bailey 54) Thus, the Valhalla theme is in D flat.

Wagner scores this for his tuba quartet. This theme, as is this key are paralleled in Gotterdammerung and the tubas are again used. As Bailey sates, Wagner uses many such parallels between the two, "The appearance of D flat, then, at the beginning and end of the main action of Das Rheingold serves to define the dramatic structure of the work, but at the same time Wagner reinforced the structural parallel of this opera with Gotterdammerung by concluding that opera in D flat also. The parallel uses of D flat are reinforced by the association of the Valhalla music with that tonality-music which is scored for the special sound of the so-called 'Wagner Tubas' in both operas. " (54) In fact, the first time the tubas get the melody in Das Rheingold (in the beginning of the second scene) it is a variant of the Valhalla theme in D flat major.

Bruckner makes more diverse use of the Wagner tubas in his seventh symphony, which, as stated above, undoubtedly lead to its commercial success. The second movement opens with a Wagner tuba quartet. Their part is marked hervortretend, which means �from the heart�. Bruckner uses the Wagnerian tubas in this way, primarily to carry emotion, and especially sorrow.

Bruckner dedicated that movement to Wagner because he died while Bruckner was writing it. The use of "the Master's" weird little tubas is undoubtedly done in tribute to him. The use of sorrow in the tuba parts is then a reflection of Bruckner's sorrow over Wagner's death.

When he makes use of the tubas, it is in the low register and often with only minimal support from the orchestra. Their solis introduce both the first and the second theme of the movement. His tubas are scored richly and tragically.

Aside from its use by the composers mentioned above, the Wagner tuba has undergone a bit of a renaissance and is currently being used for film and television scores. Most of the other historic brass mentioned above is still here and there also. Nothing in music ever gets obsolete.

This paper sucks. Also, I no longer posses any graphs of mouthpiece impedance. How do I write around figure 8? And the bibliography is toast! arg

Possible Alternate Wesleyan Writing Sample

Notes Towards a Libretto

My great grandmother was walking down the street, arm in arm with my great grandfather. She was nine months pregnant and people scowled to see her promenading around, as they thought it wasn't seemly. But she smiled away, blissfully happy in the start of her new family. But she tripped on a curb and fell to the ground, right in front of the wheel of a horse-drawn cart that was moving too quickly. The drivers were Roma - gypsies; they stopped in town for supplies, but were told to get out, so they trotted along with the authorities behind them. The cartwheel decapitated my great grandmother. Her head rolled over next to her body and sat blinking; looking at it while her body went immediately into labor. My grandmother was born, while the head of my great grandmother lay watching. As soon as the baby started to scream and people watching could see it was all right, my great grandmother's head closed its eyes and lay still. The new father sat horrified, holding the screaming baby. Not knowing what to do, he handed it to the cart drivers, who drove out of town and never returned again.

They named the girl Sarah and raised her as one of their own. They were good parents to her, but she never felt like she belonged, since she knew her story and she didn't look at all like a Roma. When she was 18, she left them and eventually came to America. She met a recently discharged GI and married him, buying a house in the suburbs. After one year, my mother was born. After 10 years, my grandmother left to run away with the circus, as an accountant. She never felt like she belonged with the Roma, but she never felt like she should stay rooted to one spot either. She took my mother with her. My mother stayed for a while, juggling and taking tickets from customers. She became best friends with the boy in the trapeze act. His family was Roma, so they spoke Romany in common. A year and a half later, my grandfather found her and with a judge's order, took back my mother and never let her go to the circus again while he lived. When my mother was eighteen, he died of a heart attack.

My mother had just graduated from high school and had no clear idea of what to do afterwards, when my grandfather died. He had been hinting strongly that she ought to consider spending a year or two someplace where she could meet eligible young men and then get married. But he was gone now and she went to find her mother instead. My grandmother was still with the same circus, doing the accounting. My mother went out to where they were to meet her mother as a surprise. She still looked back on her time with her mother at the circus as the happiest eighteen months of her life. She saw her mother standing across the ring, in the big tent, talking to the ring master and called out to her. My grandmother recognized my mother and went running across the ring to see her. Just then, in a freak accident, the rope came undone holding the swing where a trapeze artist was practicing. He started to fall to the ground and landed on my grandmother, killing her, but he survived with only a twisted ankle. It was my mother's best friend from when she had been with the circus. They married eighteen months later.

My mother learned to juggle again and tried keeping the books to replace my grandmother, but wasn't good with numbers. In 1969, I was born. In 1970, my mother discovered feminism. My father said there was no place for any of that nonsense in the circus or in his family, so my mother took me and left. We went to live on a women's land collective in the Midwest. When it broke up, we spent several years at a yoga retreat. When the yogi was expelled, we went to live in a vegan cooperative. Eventually, I rebelled. At sixteen, I ran away and ended up becoming a makeup consultant at a department store. It didn't pay very well, though, so I started taking classes to become a CPA. Then I got a call from Michigan that my mother was dying. I went out there immediately and reconciled with her. I spent the last month of her life taking care of her. When she died, I had barely enough money for the funeral. Her friends helped out a lot. I told the mortician that I would be doing her makeup myself. He didn't argue much, like he normally would because his makeup person had just quit. When I finished with her, she looked so life-like that he offered me a job. I put makeup on corpses and did the books. Eighteen months after burying my mother, I married the mortician.

His family never liked me. They had wanted him to marry his last makeup artist and didn't forgive him when she went and married somebody else. The history of my family didn't help much. His family had lived in the same town for five generations and owned the same mortuary for three. His grandfather started out as a gravedigger and worked his way up. That stability was all I wanted, but they thought I was going to run away from him like all the women in my family ran away, and they were right, I eventually did and he ended up losing the mortuary because of me.

When he and I were separated and getting divorced, I got drunk with my best friend in town. She kept asking me why it was over and finally I told her. I didn't even remember telling her the next day, but she told her best friend who told the hairstylist, who told Mrs. Lewis on account of her daughter just dying. Mrs. Lewis took her daughter's body out of town and people got to wondering why, so Mrs. Lewis told them. It was a small town, after a short while, everyone knew. He and I both had to leave town. He went east, I went west. I finally took the test to get certified as a CPA. Now I work in this building.

Advantages over tuba paper: it's done. it doesn't need a bibliography. it's all spelled ok.
disadvantages: it's tawdry. it's not necessarily well written. bizarre. also, gypsies are a very opressed minority group and it may perpetuate stereotypes or offend well-informed members of the admission committee (they're all musicians, but there's an excellent ethnomusicology department). On the othher hand, it might not be offensive at all. I have no idea.

Monday, 13 January 2003

The text for the Wesleyan Application (not counting the writing sample)

(2.) If you have attended more than one undergraduate college or have transferred from one graduate school to another, please attach a statement giving the reasons for your transfer.

I attended junior college in the evenings and during the summer while I was still a high school student. I transferred to Mills when I graduated from high school.

(3.) List any work experience relevant to this application on an additional page.

I volunteer for Other Minds, a New Music nonprofit in San Francisco. I started as the driver for their festival. Shortly after that, they got possession of the KPFA music archives, featuring interviews with every important composer between 1969 and 1992. They are planning to use their library for a web radio project. I am helping them catalog their tape archive and pick out interesting tapes to submit for grant applications. I also work for them as a volunteer sound engineer and produced or helped produce several CDs used for grant applications and I gave them technical advice regarding the web radio server hardware and software.

(6.) Briefly describe any research which you have done on a separate sheet of paper.

I have not done any research.

(8.) List standardized U.S. graduate admissions tests you have taken or plan to take (i.e., GRE, MAT, TOEFL, Graduate Foreign Language). Have scores sent to the above address.

I plan to take the GRE.

(10.) On a separate sheet or sheets, please describe in detail your academic background abilities, interests, and objectives. What attracted you to your chosen course of study and why do you feel that Wesleyan's program is suited to your needs?

I learned to compose music for tape by recording source sounds, such as field recordings or interesting synthesizer patches and mixing them together, so that mixing is as much composing as finding or creating the source sounds. It shaped how I think about composing. This is still the method I use for creating almost all of my pieces. Sometimes, there is a metaphor or idea that ties all of the source sounds together, but often I just record interesting patches until I have "enough" of them. Then I look for interesting ways to mix them together. I love doing this because of the focus on pure sound, rather than algorithms or theory and also because of its tactility.

Around the same time, the Exploratorium, a hands-on science museum in San Francisco, issued a call for proposals for temporary installations that focused on sonic characteristics of the museum. I collaborated with two other people in two proposals, both of which were accepted. The first installation used piezo contact microphones attached to exhibits with moving parts. The sounds were amplified, unprocessed so that passers-by could hear the quiet sounds they would not otherwise notice. For the second piece, I wrote a MAX/MSP patch to demonstrate the resonant frequencies of a part of the building. It used the type of feedback loop that Alvin Lucier used in his piece I am Sitting in a Room. (One of the other participants ironically remarked, after I described our installations, �So you guys are a little influenced by Lucier.�)

Shortly thereafter, my domestic partner was also laid off, so I postponed my job search and we spent the summer traveling in Europe. I wrote no music while I was there, but I visited several modern art museums, and went to the Venice Biennale. I also visited Dunaway in Germany at ZKM, the research center that commissioned her mp3 paper. I was very impressed with the facilities there and the idea of music research.

When I came home, I had hundreds of musical ideas. The first was to switch career tracks to focus on composition. I wrote several pieces of tape music, and then I decided that I wanted to write more music for live performance, so I organized a five person percussion group and wrote a couple of pieces music for them. The group performed them at an art a local artist�s gallery opening. I also did computer consulting and started volunteering for Other Minds, a New Music nonprofit in San Francisco. (See relevant work experience.) I was not sure how to pull my work and aspirations together into a career.

At Wesleyan, I hope to learn more about electronic music and also about composition for live performance. I would like to learn new techniques for creating music, including computer sound generation and digital synthesis. I would also like to learn about building installations and other electronic musical tools. I hope to learn more mediums for composition. I would also like to explore more writing for traditional instruments. Wesleyan has a reputation for performance as well as composition and I hope to be able to work with some of the performers studying there.

After I graduate with a masters degree, I hope to find success as a freelance composer. I am also interested in doing music research at a center like STEIM, IRCAM or ZKM, or a comparable center in the United States. I know that Wesleyan could give me the skills and education necessary to achieve this goal. Your excellent reputation would also help my professional aspirations. I hope you will consider me for your program.

Sunday, 12 January 2003

CalArts Portfolio Disk

Airwaves #1 2002
Airwaves #2 2002
Airwaves #3 2002. The Airwaves series will eventually include seven pieces. All of these pieces use a MOTM analog modular synthesizer and are mixed with Pro-tools. Airwaves #3 also uses a Midiverb and a recording of breathing. Airwaves #2 was played at Woodstockhausen 2002. The program notes for this series are:
Airwaves is a series of tape music featuring the sounds of analog modular synthesis. It primarily uses a MOTM modular synthesizer. Because the sound of this synthesizer is so naturally big, pieces in this series try to give the listener some space by creating music with more air in it.
Breaking Waves 2001. This piece was composed in responce to a call for tape pieces by Ibol Records. It was released on a compolation disk called Random Spheres of Influence. The source sound for this is white noise from a MOTM synthesizer. It was then processed with Audio Catalyst software, by convertng it to mp3 format and then back to AIFF format and then to mp3 and so forth, so the original sounds would degrade and alaising would become apparent. It was mixed with Pro-tools.
Phase 2001. This piece was created with a Future Retro 777 synthesizer. I used the same pattern on the sequencer in three differnt loops, but the pattern was cut to different lengths so that the lopps fall in and out of phase with each other. It was mixed with Pro-tools. This was featured in the now-defunct Nonsequiter ezine.
(de)construction 1998. This piece was created with field recordings and Mills' Moog analog modular synthesizer. It was recorded to tape and mixed with an analog mixing board.
Bitter Day 2000. This piece was created with a MOTM synthesizer, with some sounds controlled by keyboard. It was mixed and compressed with Pro-tools. This has been played on Internet and pirate radio.
Headerless Data #1 2001. This piece was created using Photoshop software. I generated an image in photoshop and then modified the resultant data with Sound Hack, by adding headers to turn it into an AIFF file. It was mixed in Pro-tools.
Chaos Patch 2000. This piece was composed with a MOTM synthesizer using analog chaos. Three oscilators were patched together in an FM loop, so that the output of each one was the FM input of the next one. It was recorded and mixed with Pro-tools in one night while awaiting returns from the state of Florida during the last presidential election.
Scape 1997. This piece was created with Mills College's Moog modular synthesizer. It was recorded to tape and mixed with an analog mixer.
Choral No. 1 2000. This was recorded using a MOTM synthesizer and mixed in Pro-tools. It was played on German radio in 2001.
Drum Decay 2001. This piece uses a feedback loop like the one Alvin Lucier used in I am sitting in a Room. The drums sounds were generated with Rebirth software and then processed via a MAX/MSP application, a bass amplifier and a microphone. The results of that were processed with Sound Hack and then remixed in Pro-tools.

Wesleyan Portfolio - disk 1

now with more songs!

Breaking Waves 2001. This piece was composed in responce to a call for tape pieces by Ibol Records. It was released on a compolation disk called Random Spheres of Influence. The source sound for this is white noise from a MOTM synthesizer. It was then processed with Audio Catalyst software, by convertng it to mp3 format and then back to AIFF format and then to mp3 and so forth, so the original sounds would degrade and alaising would become apparent. It was mixed with Pro-tools. I called it "Breaking Waves" because the white noise was reminiscent of ocean sounds at the beach and also because the sound breaks apart into something different.
Phase 2001. This piece was created with a Future Retro 777 synthesizer. I used the same pattern on the sequencer in three differnt loops, but the pattern was cut to different lengths so that the lopps fall in and out of phase with each other. It was mixed with Pro-tools. This was featured in the now-defunct Nonsequiter ezine.
Bitter Day 2000. This piece was created with a MOTM synthesizer, with some sounds controlled by keyboard. It was mixed and compressed with Pro-tools. This was posted to Mp3.com and has been played on Internet and pirate radio. The notes for it are based on Amos 8:10:
Your festivals will turn into mourning
And all your songs into lamentation;
It will be like a time of mourning for an only daughter,
And the end of it will be like a bitter day.
Monopoly Capitalism 2000. This piece was created in responce to a call for works by the Woodstockhausen festival and subsequently played there in 2000. It uses sounds from Casio Tone, a Moog Taurus II, a Jomox Airbase, a MOTM, midi control via a custom MAX patch, and vocals processed with a Midiverb. It was recorded to ADAT and mixed with an analog mixing board. The program notes for it were:
I was at the world's largest chain of copy mats when the guy standing next to me was busily copying an article called "Monkeys and Monopoly Capitalism." I got to thinking about how monkeys follow supply and demand. And about religion and the Wall Street Journal. But mostly about a neglected MAX patch that wanted to be recorded.
Headerless Data #1 2001. This piece was created using Photoshop software. I generated an image in photoshop and then modified the resultant data with Sound Hack, by adding headers to turn it into an AIFF file. It was mixed in Pro-tools.
Chaos Patch 2000. This piece was composed with a MOTM synthesizer using analog chaos. Three oscilators were patched together in an FM loop, so that the output of each one was the FM input of the next one. It was recorded and mixed with Pro-tools in one night while awaiting returns from the state of Florida during the last presidential election.
April Noise 2000. The sounds for this were generated with a MOTM synthesizer and an Evenfall Minimodular synthesizer, all during April 2000. It was mixed with Pro-tools.
Choral No. 1 2000. This was recorded using a MOTM synthesizer and mixed in Pro-tools. It was played on German radio in 2001.
Drum Decay 2001. This piece uses a feedback loop like the one Alvin Lucier used in I am sitting in a Room. The drums sounds were generated with Rebirth software and then processed via a MAX/MSP application, a bass amplifier and a microphone. The results of that were processed with Sound Hack and then remixed in Pro-tools.

Wesleyan Portfolio- disk A

Airwaves

Airwaves #1
Airwaves #2
Airwaves #3

The Airwaves series will eventually include seven pieces. These were recorded in 2002 and are my most recent pieces of tape music. I had the idea for them while I was the driver for the Other Minds 8 music festival, after a series of conversations I had with Annea Lockwood, while chaufeuring her around town. We were discussing how somtimes electronic music that is recorded digtally from a direct line out sounds like it does not have an "air" in it. All of these pieces use a MOTM analog modular synthesizer and are mixed with Pro-tools. Airwaves #3 also uses a Midiverb and a recording of breathing. Airwaves #2 was played at Woodstockhausen 2002. The program notes for this series are:

Airwaves is a series of tape music featuring the sounds of analog modular synthesis. It primarily uses a MOTM modular synthesizer. Because the sound of this synthesizer is so naturally big, pieces in this series try to give the listener some space by creating music with more air in it.

Three Movements for Tape

(de)construction
Scape
Leftovers

These pieces are my oldest. They were composed in 1997 and 1998 while I was a student at Mills College as projects for classes taught by Maggi Payne in electronic music and recording techniques. All three use sounds of Mills' Moog analog modular synthesizer. (de)construction also uses field recordings, mainly of machinery and other metal sounds recorded using pieze microphones and processed using the Moog and a Quadraverb. They were all recorded to tape and mixed with an analog mixing board. I used these three pieces in my senior concert. They got individual names when I posted them to Mp3.com.

Name-dropping ok? this is not yet spellchecked.

Friday, 10 January 2003

Portfolio for Calarts

Not yet in order

(Many of these are on Mp3.com if you want to give feedback on the order, or whatever)

Airwaves #3 Composed in 2002 using a MOTM analog modular synthesize, a Midiverb II, and breathing.
Breaking Waves Composed in 2001 using a MOTM analog synthesizer and AudioCatalyst software. This piece was created by recording white noise to disk and then converting the AIFF file to MP3 and back again multiple times, resulting in aliasing that becomes more noticable with each re-conversion. It was released by IBOL Records on Random Spheres of Influence in 2001.
Virtual Memory Exerpt Composed in 2001 using Macintosh Virtual Memory with an AIFF header added, a Jomox AirBase drum machine and a Midiverb. Note: Only the first few minutes of Virtual Memory #1 will be included in the exerpt.
Phase Composed in 2001 using a Future Retro 777 analog synthesizer. This piece was featured on the now-defunct Nonsequiter ezine.
Choral No. 1 Composed in 2000 using a MOTM analog modular synthesizer. This piece was played on German radio in 2001.
Drum Decay Composed in 2001 using Rebirth software and a custom Max application. This piece was composed using the type of feedback loop that Alvin Lucier used in I am Sitting in a Room. It has been featured in pirate and internet radio.
Chaos Patch Maybe? If you have feedback about whether you think this is a good piece or not when compared to the other things on the list, I'd like ot hear it. Composed in 2001 using a MOTM analog modular synthesizer. This piece was composed using analog chaos, so three oscilators were patched together in an FM loop. Is that clear? the output of one oscilator was going into the FM input of the next, whose output was going into the FM input of the next one, whose output was being recorded and going into the FM input of the first one. This creates mathematical type chaos. Very unpredictable. It was recorded and mixed in one night while awaiting returns from the state of Florida during the last presidential election.Should I include that note? The whole Florida thing is what made me thing of trying something with chaos in the first place. anyway, the technioque for recording this is unusual and demonstrates some knowledge of very obscure analog techniques that nobody tends ot use or care about and anyway... i should go listen to this one right now. should I use Bitter Day instead? the original title of "Bitter Day" was "Danica's Lament"
(de)construction Composed in 1997 using a Moog analog modular synthesizer and field recordings. This was one of my first compositions, recorded while I was at Mills College. Most of the field recordings were recorded with a piezo microphone and processed using the Moog Fixed Filter Bank. This was my most popular piece on Mp3.com. Include that last note about popularity? People really like this one, but it's very old. It worries me sometimes that I did my very best piece when I was just starting out. My theory is that it's the Moog that makes people like it. Also, the sound of andra jumping on the bed came out really well in stereo. I should tell Andra that she was an anonymous mp3.com star.
No No Nonette (Printed Score) Composed in 2002-3 in responce to a Call for Scores issued by Jack Straw Productions in Seattle (see attached sheet), for a MIDI-controlled toy piano nonette. This score was selected and will be featured in Jack Straw's New Media Gallery in February - April 2003.

Wow, this makes me look kind of successful... weird.

Thursday, 9 January 2003

Really, the very last revison of the Personal Statement

When I was in high school, I had to decide between pursuing a career in computer programming or in professional tuba playing. Tuba playing is a low-paid profession, so, on the economic advice of my tuba teacher, I chose computer science. This was a logical choice for me. I started programming in BASIC when I was 8 years old and had been programming ever since. I grew up in the middle of Silicon Valley. My great grandfather, grandfather, uncle and father were all engineers. When I was a child, I spent Saturdays with my dad while he worked at his startup.

I went to Mills College to study Computer Science, and I very quickly found myself gravitating toward the Center for Contemporary Music. I had some limited exposure to New Music before I went to college, thanks to an excellent community radio station, but was not aware of it other than casually listening to noise bands. What I learned at Mills changed everything I thought about sound and music creation. I studied electronic music with Maggi Payne. She taught synthesis techniques on a large Moog Modular Synthesizer. The sound and the possibilities for music making were incredible. I thought the Moog was fantastic. I loved making music with it and the approach to sound creation that went with it. I decided to double-major in Computer Science and Electronic Music.

After I graduated, I got a job at a startup company that made products related to �Cooperative Commerce.� I did web programming and worked on their server. The product I was working on helped people buy things. A user could say that they wanted to buy a size 16 men�s blue shirt and our server software would give the user information about every size 16 men�s blue shirt that it could find on the web. All of the results were generated in real-time, using Artificial Intelligence. The company was a bit chaotic. Periodically, the management would come by and tell everyone that we were just about to have an IPO, or get more funding, or be bought by someone, in the mean time, we just had to give up a few more evenings and weekends. I did not write any music at all while I worked there, because the schedule took over all of my time.

When someone I knew from a previous interview called me and asked if I wanted to go work at Netscape and have more free time and make more money, I accepted. I started out writing scripts in Perl for the Open Directory Project, the largest human-edited directory on the web. I was also the release engineer and made the directory data publicly available every week. I also informally wrote the Product Requirements Document for ChefMoz, a restaurant database.

The job was interesting and I had enough time to make music and the means to obtain equipment. I purchased a MOTM Modular synthesizer and started recording tape music and posting it to Mp3.com. Another Mp3.com artist had a small record label and released two songs of mine on a compilation disk. My goal was to have two careers simultaneously. I would be an engineer and a composer. It might have worked except that I was commuting 50 miles each way to work and it was starting to burn me out. I realized that music had become a hobby rather than an avocation, so I started looking for another job, closer to home. At the same time, management decided to move my team over to online music.

My boss suspected that I was going to quit and asked me to stay on to write the Product Requirements Document for AOL�s online music service, a marketing job. I accepted and soon learned that I am not at all suited to marketing. My job was to write hundreds of pages of documents that nobody read and to go to meetings. At the same time, AOL had at least one other team on the East Coast working on the same project and Time Warner, whom AOL was purchasing, had several redundant teams. In 2001, I was laid off.

I instead of looking for a job right away, I decided to travel. I spent the summer in Europe. This was an important trip for me, because it allowed me to escape the culture of Silicon Valley and to look at a lot of art. I didn�t write any music while I was gone, but I visited several modern art museums, including the Venice Biennale. I also visited an online friend at ZKM, in Germany where she was writing a paper on mp3s. I was very impressed with the facilities there and the idea of music research.

When I came home, I had hundreds of musical ideas. The first was to switch career tracks to focus on composition. I wrote several pieces of tape music, and then I decided I wanted to write more music for live performance, so I organized a percussion group and wrote some music for them. The group performed some of my work at an art opening. I also did computer consulting. I wasn�t sure how to pull my work and aspirations together into a career.

At the same time, I started volunteering for Other Minds, a New Music nonprofit in San Francisco. I started as the driver for their festival. Shortly after that, they got possession of the KPFA music archives, featuring interviews with every important composer between 1969 and 1992. They are planning to use their library for a web radio project. I am helping them catalog their tape archive and pick out interesting tapes to submit for grant applications. I also worked for them as a volunteer sound engineer and produced or helped produce several CDs used for grant applications and I gave them technical advice regarding the web radio server hardware and software.

Last spring I attended the Composing a Career Conference sponsored by the Women's Philharmonic. Almost everyone else there had a master's degree and the presenters all assumed they were speaking to a master's-level audience. Realizing that I needed more education, I started looking into graduate programs. I also started submitting tapes to festivals and calls for scores. One of my tapes was accepted at Woodstockhausen.

Unfortunately, shortly after the conference, while I was on my way to visit Jack Straw Productions in Seattle, my mother was diagnosed with a brain tumor. She had surgery and started radiation treatment. All of my music work and consulting jobs were put on hold so I could spend time helping to take care of my mom. The treatment was not helpful and she died in the middle of October.

I spent several weeks after her death re-thinking my life plans. A few weeks ago, I decided that I wanted to continue with my chosen track. I submitted a score to Jack Straw Productions for inclusion in a Trimpin instillation and they accepted it. I also started pulling together applications to the graduate schools that I picked out in the spring. Your program caught my interest because of your faculty [� talk about faculty.]

At [school] I hope to learn more about electronic music and also about composition for live performance. I would like to branch out into writing for live electronic performance, something that�s difficult to do with a modular synthesizer. I hope to learn more mediums for composition. I would also like to explore more writing for traditional instruments. [school] has a reputation for performance as well as composition and I hope to be able to work with some of the performers studying there.

After I graduate with a Masters degree, I hope to find success as a freelance composer. I am also interested in doing music research at a center like STEIM, IRCAM or ZKM, or a comparable center in the United States. I know that [school] could give me the skills and education necessary to achieve this goal. Your excellent reputation would also help my professional aspirations. I hope you consider me for your program.

Much more honest, but also darn darn long. I don't have much time to change it anymore. If CalArts only wants half a paragraph, too bad. Suggestions, especially for cuts, welcome.

Statement of Purpose - bigger, better!

When I was in high school, I had to decide between pursuing a career in computer programming or in professional tuba playing. On the advice of my tuba teacher, I chose computer science. I went to Mills College to study Computer Science, but very quickly found myself gravitating to the Center for Contemporary Music. I studied electronic music with Maggi Payne. She taught synthesis techniques on a large Moog Modular Synthesizer. The sound and the possibilities for music making were incredible. I had some limited exposure to New Music before I went to college, thanks to an excellent community radio station, but was not aware of it other than casually listening to noise bands.

The music classes I took at Mills changed everything I thought about sound and music creation. Even though Mills is a liberal arts college, I took almost nothing but Computer Science classes and Music classes. At the end of my sophomore year, my advisor informed me that I had completed all of the classes required for my major and that I needed to either take all the rest of my classes outside of the Math and Computer Science department or transfer to a different school. I calculated how many units that I needed to graduate and how many additional music classes it would take to major in music and decided to double-major.

Taking all of the lower-division theory classes as an upper-division student was a little frustrating. I had previously taken a seminar on John Cage that was offered in conjunction with the John Cage conference that Mills hosted. The teacher told us then that we didn�t need to know music theory to be composers. Between that and the Moog I was fascinated and hooked, but then, as a major, the same teacher later explained to me that I did need to learn theory if I wanted to be a composer, at least at Mills.

After I graduated, I started a professional career in computer programming, the plan I chose for economic reasons. Economically, the plan worked out quite well and I was able to acquire a new modular synthesizer, and a nice computer with Pro-tools and some other music software on it. Otherwise, it did not work out as well as I hoped. Buying gear did not prevent music from being marginalized in my life. Despite my best efforts, it began to be a hobby rather than an avocation. Also, it was not long before I realized that studying computer science is interesting, but day-to-day programming is much less so. I had a hard time fitting in the culture of Silicon Valley. When I got laid off in 2001, instead of looking for a job right away, I decided to travel.

I spent the summer traveling in Europe. The first non-English speaking country I visited was Russia. Communication was difficult because of my inexperience, few English-speakers and an unfamiliar alphabet. While I was there, several people asked me if I spoke Esperanto. Also, by some coincidence, the route I took while traveling put me in every city in northern Europe one week behind a band called "Esperanto Desperado."

This trip was an excellent idea for me because it allowed me to escape the values of Silicon Valley. The culture there was scornful of anything related to art or culture or of anything not brand-new. This was the exact opposite of what is valuable to tourists in Europe. [For Wesleyan, talk about meeting Judy in Germany]

When I returned home, I decided to switch career tracks from computer programming to composition. I also enrolled in an Esperanto class, at Stanford. I wrote several pieces of tape music, which I submitted to several festivals. Woodstockhausen decided to play one. I decided I wanted to write more music for live performance, so I organized a percussion group and wrote some music for them. The group performed some of my work at an art opening. I also did computer consulting. I was not sure how to pull my work and aspirations together into a career.

Last spring I attended the Composing a Career Conference sponsored by the Women's Philharmonic. Almost everyone else there had a master's degree and the presenters all assumed they were speaking to a master's-level audience. Realizing that I needed more education, I started looking into graduate programs. Yours caught my interest because of your faculty [- talk about faculty.]

This is much longer, but I think it's better because it actually talks about music, which is something my old one had probably too little of. It's choppy and scattered especially in the middle. I must rearrange it so the parts that go together end up together. I think I should probably cut the part about having to learn theory after being told i didn't need theory, since it's neither here nor there and it might make me look lazy, which would be bad. Do I talk too much about Esperanto? I think putting all of it next to each other would help make it more compact. It's also beside the point, but it's unusual and might make me seem more interesting. Lou Harrison is a fluent esperantist. I should definietly add something about Other Minds, especially since one of my refrences comes from there. Maybe I could work in something about speaking esperanto with Lou, or would that be silly name-dropping? Arg, I need to finish this, especially for CalArts, tomorrow! I haven't put together a portfolio yet. Some of these school want three works. How can I possibly communicate my skillset in just three works?? I think I'd better send email and ask if that's a minimum or what. I must definitely fight the urge to make a new recording to show off every possible skill at once. "This piece is written for a vocalist (note esperanto text), a synthezier, a marimba, 5 found objects, a contact microphone and a special piece of software written just for this one piece." nononono

What I did today... er... yesterday

Finally lined up my third letter of recommendation. Christi's boss is going to write one. He's the director of Other Minds, which I did some volunteer work for. Actually, kind of a lot of volunteer work, some of it skilled w/ pro-tools and stuff. It's so awesome that he's going to write a letter.

Wesleyan wants a writing sample. I have exactly one paper left from school. It's the tuba paper on my website. The spelling is being fixed. God knows why I handed in a paper without running a spell check on it. As I recall, finding research materials on the history of the tuba turned out to be somewhat challenging (go figure) and I think I turned in the paper late. This is an ill-omened paper all the way around. The graphics and the bibliography all got lost in the giant system crash of 1997. (Teeth were gnashed. Wails arose from the valley. The one server at Mills that handled everything had a head crash and all was lost and the campus was offline for a month or maybe just a week, anyway, I was lucky even part of my paper survived. All the rest of my papers were lost when the disk on my old server gave up the ghost. I think that if I reassembled the computer with the old motherboard, the old disk controller and the old disks, they would probably work again, if I could re-discover all those hardware settings from the time before auto-detect. But that's a lot of work for what might be a low payoff. Academic writing was never my strongest point. I used to joke that's why I took music and computer science, because of the dearth of required papers.) Well, it wasn't entirely ill-omened. I got email from the principal tubist of the Vienna Philharmonic asking about the biliography because he was interested in my paper. I'm going to be able to email him back with some answers, because today I went to the Mills library to try to re-construct my bibliography. I was not 100% successful in this quest, but I did manage to identify who all the authors are (probably) and direct readers to their web pages or books by them that are at least on the same subject. Christi is telling me not to worry about this too much and maybe I should just submit one of my many political manifestos.

And, while at Mills, I got my transcript requests. I still need to worry about transcripts from the Junior College I went to a long long time ago. I was still in highschool at the time. My theory is that it shouldn't count, even if I did transfer in credits towards my degree. Sheesh, I transfered in AP Test credits too. I hope I don't need to go scare those up.

Mills is on break, but I still ran into several people, including a CS professor, Susan Wang. We chatted a bit. And I ran into Maggi Payne, my composition teacher who is writing a letter for me. We talked about people she knew at all the schools I'm looking at. Everyone went to Mills. I need to talk a lot more about CCM in my statements. And then, in the library, I ran into Sharon. It's nice seeing familiar faces.

And then I had to run someplace else to drop off forms and then I had to get Christi and take her someplace. And then we went to Gaylords for coffee and ran into Luoi, Fausto and Timananana. Yay! More happy people! I usually don't see so many people in a week.

And now I am somewhat procrastinating on filling out my calarts application, since I'm not sure about listing my Community College stuff or not. I guess I have to. Something is amiss with my printer and the colors are not lining up 100%, so everything is slightly blurry. The application is in color. None of the text is actually black, it's some trendy shade of grey. I understand being as artistic as possible when designeing printed material for an arts college, but when you're publishing a PDF on the web for folks to use, it's important to consider technological limittations. Gray-scale is good. Black text is good. Design for the common-person and her cheap printer! Oh.... I should make Mitch print it.

Anyway, all of this is wayyyy too last minute. I haven't been this last-second since I was an undergrad. I'm too old for this now. I might put it off till next year, except now I've got all these other people involved. Anyway, I'm so busy, I hardly even have time to mourn! I think I want to go crawl into a hole and lie there quietly for several days.

Wednesday, 8 January 2003

Statement of Purpose - CalArts

When I was in high school, I had to decide between pursuing a career in computer programming or in professional tuba playing. On the advice of my tuba teacher, I chose computer science. In college, I finished all the requirements for my major by my junior year, so I took music classes and got interested in composition. I graduated with two majors.

I started a professional career in computer programming, the plan I chose for economic reasons. It wasn't long before I realized that studying computer science is interesting, but day-to-day programming is not. I had a hard time fitting in the culture of Silicon Valley. When I got laid off in 2001, I didn't look for a job right away, but instead considered making a career change to music, but as a composer, rather than as a tuba player.

Last spring I attended the Composing a Career Conference sponsored by the Women's Philharmonic. Almost everyone else there had a master's degree and the presenters all assumed they were speaking to a master's-level audience. Realizing I needed more education, I started looking into graduate programs. Yours caught my interest because of your reputation and your composition � new media program.

I am a noise artist. Primarily, I do tape music, but I would like to branch out to writing for live electronic performance. Your composition-new media program is exciting since it seems to be set up for people with my goals and experience. Your reputation and faculty greatly impress me. I hope to study with Mortin Subotnic, because of his work with MIDI performance tools. His MIDI Jacket is fascinating because of how it links music to gesture. I would like to study the creation and usage of similar tools for application in my own compositions.

Did I spell Subotnic's name right? Did he really invent the MIDI jacket or do I have him confused with someone else? Must double-check. Subotnic, along with Pauline oliveros, was a cofounder of the SF Tape Music Center, which later became CCM. I should talk more about stuff I did at CCM. I saw the MIDI jacket live in concert at the SF Electronic Music Festival. I stood behind Subotnic in line for the bathroom and asked him a million questions about it, sicne it's just so dern facinating. He didn't seem to mind at all and was very cool about answering questions and talking about things he built. I think he used to to be at STEIM. STEIM is really awesome center for new sounds creation devices (especially MIDI stuff in the old days) that's in Amsterdam. When I was in Amsterdam, I stopped by STEIM, but they were busy setting up for a concert in Switzerland and sisn't have time to talk to tourists. I name-dropped like crazy and half the names were set to perform in their concert. anyway. maybe i should try to get an interview with calarts.

Tuesday, 7 January 2003

Um ok, so what have I done since college. I had a couple of programming jobs and then I was uh consulting. And um finding myself. (Can you still do that or is it a generational thing?). um I travelled extensively. I volunteered for Other Minds. I wrote some tape music. I had a promising percussion ensemble which evaporated after it's first gig, since i didn't schedule any rehersals after my mom got sick. Um I flaked on a lot of things. Um, I learned esperanto. I worked on libretto which I couldn't finish. I played in a band that couldn't quite get it together and then broke up. I think I could put a positive spin on this... This is to give to somebody to write a recommendation anyway, not for the school, so maybe I can be a bit more honest.

After I got laid off, I started consulting, and did an installation at the second Wednesday art series at the Exploratorium but then within a couple of months Christi got laid off too, so we spent a few months traveling in Europe. Then, when we got back, I started volunteering at Other Minds, since Christi had a job there. I did some tape editing for them in addition to grunt work, of course. Christi and I organized a percussion ensemble and I wrote some percussion music and, of course, some tape music. I submitted tapes to a bunch of festivals, but only Woodstockhausen wanted to play one. The percussion group played at an opening for somebody's art showing at a cafe. I got some songs played on pirate and internet radio and Ibol Records put out a compilation with a couple of my songs on it. I wrote a max application that generated algorithmic melodies. I took an Esperanto class at Stanford and can now speak it, but not fluently. I had been kind of "finding myself" and things were really coming together last June. I was the web engineer for the International Iguana Foundation and Jack Straw Productions (Joan Rabinowitz, specifically) was interested in a trombone piece I wrote. But then my mom got cancer and I haven't done anything since except submit a score to Jack Straw for a toy piano nonette. They were supposed to let people know yesterday, but I haven't heard anything.

Calarts applications are due today. Well, clearly i'm on top of things...

The Fall 2003 application deadline is Monday, January 6, 2003. All applications which are complete by the deadline are reviewed by the faculty; those received after the deadline are reviewed in the order received if there is still space available in the program applied for.

I must resist the urge to call them tomorrow and ask if there is space left. No I should call them and ask if they think there might be space left.

So this leaves me with Mills, Wesleyan and maybe Bowling Green, but probably not, since none of the faculty's name rings a bell and it's in Ohio and the only reason I've heard of them is cuz they run a big festival every year that rejected me last year. I can't beleive that I missed the application deadline for one of my three main schools. aug, i don't deserve to get into grad school. If I don't get into Mills or Wesleyan, I'm going nowhere.

nothing is going according to plan. i had a big five year plan. i was on my way to seattle last june, as a part of my plan, to visit a studio run by a firendly woman i met at a confrence, when i got a panicked phone call from my dad. since then, my plan has been off track.

there is a gigantic blister on the middle finger of my right hand from adventures in bass playing (second rehersal of the new band) and from using oil pastels on the cover of an old pizza box. Did you know that Munch painted almost a hundred versions of The Scream and many of them are on cardboard? There's a Munch museum in Oslo with all of them on display. Travel broadens you.

My Wesleyan alum contact told me to try to get a letter of recommendation from Pauline Oliveros. I can imagine this conversation, "Hi, do you remember me? I was your driver at the OtherMinds festival last year. You've never heard my music, but I really need a letter of recommendation."

Or maybe I can use other famous composers I met at OM. "Hi, Annea Lockwood, I lent you a jacket and you sent me a record. . .." If I were smarter I would have given all of those people CDs. Missed opportunities. 20/20 hindsight. I'm screwed.

Monday, 6 January 2003

When you are trying to decide who to ask for recommendations, kep these criteria in mind. The people you ask should:

have a high opinion of you

know you well, preferably in more than one context

be familiar with your field (It won't do you much good to have a glowing letter of recommendation from your manager at the insurance company if you are applying to a program in history or social work.)

be familiar with the program to which you are appling

have taight a large number of students (or have managed a large number of employees) so they have a good basis upon which to compare you (favorably!) to your peers

be recognized by the admissions committe as someone whose opinion can be trusted

have good writing skills

be reliable enough to write and mail the letter on time

A tall order? Yes. It's likely that no one person you choose will meet all of these criteria, but try to find people who come close to this ideal.

Um, so that gives me, um, my composition teacher from Mills and ummm... maybe some other mills music faculty whom i have not talked to in five years. Maybe I coudl get some generic statements from old bosses about how i was hard worker... except that i was mostly lazy... um...

Join the fun, fast-paced world of writing recommendation letters!

Feel like you could write a letter of recommendation? Do you meet the above requirements, or at least some/most of them? Then, for the love of god, drop me a line, since I have no idea where or who you might be (that's just a joke! of course I was thinking of you! How have you been! Great hearing from you! heh heh help.)

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