Scavenger Group Movies

On the last Tuesday's class, I was very excited because of making the "Scavenger Group Movies," which was an assignment of that day. All classmates participated in making the movies in each group. I and Yun-Ju were members of the "Water Group," the name of which was just for the purpose of a label. After getting instruction of the equipment, including the video camera, from Dr. Gilbert, I and Yun-Ju went to "out world." We captured movements, sounds, and something interesting we thought. This was the creative process of scavenging.

First of all, we went to the Washington Square Park where was attractive. We captured movements of animals such as squirrels, pigeons, and sparrows. We also took many pictures of children, who played in the playground, and couples of people some of who acted variously. The most interesting we found in the park was that three guys practiced some scenes for a movie (or play). They prepared and practiced action scenes which were very safely organized well although many of the action scenes were seemed to be dangerous.
Next destination of our group was the 6th floor of Kimmel center because we supposed that there were many musical things. When we looked around the practice rooms, we found a male student who practice some scenes for a show held by TISCH. He allowed us to observe his practicing time spent and to record.

After thirty-minute observation, we were back to the class room and all of the fellow students, including me, shared our scavenger experiences and found common movements such as movements of the flags and squirrels. When demonstrating, I and Yun-Ju expressed the guys who practiced action scenes in the park. Although our trying looked very dangerous, we did our best and it was fun.

Through these experiences of our scavenger groups, I enabled to organize myself in free manner and to observe environment carefully. I was often unconscious about routine movements, but they can be good sources for improvisation and free play.


You can see our video clips in the following site. Go to the "Scavenger Group Movies." Enjoy them.
http://www.nyu.edu/classes/gilbert/creativeprocess/

Playing Together

For the last Tuesday class, I wrote Playing Together: Theme and Variations for Two Pianos. Although it was my first time to compose theme and variations so that the piece was not mature, I conceived the term variation as a technique as well as a structure. The melody of the theme was quite simple in relation to the note "A." I also intended to contrast black keys and white keys, one of the representatives of the piano. The piece consciously had "two" variations, whose characters were contrast to each other.

One of the unsatisfied things was that the first audience of the piece, including me, could not listen to perfect sounds of the complete form because our classroom had only one piano. However, overall, it was satisfied and very precious experience for me. I recognized the importance of balance between the theme and variations. Unlike other forms, variations should be considered as abstract of the theme. The variations should be familiar with the theme, but should alter rhythm, tempo, dynamics, or context in order to create new modes of music.

In addition, by the experience, I thought myself as a musician, not only pianist. The composition of the theme and variations helped me develop in relation to the thinking of other composers and performers. While composing the particular piece, I depended on established models and criteria of compositional practice, and as a result, I could decide to adjust, redevelop, and transcend my musical ideas. Furthermore, I was necessarily asked to seriously think about the instrument, piano. In terms of writing the piano piece, I should understand special and unique features of the piano. The appreciation of the instrument also helped me, as a pianist.

Study of Variations

Improvising on a tune to accompany dancing has ancient roots, but the form know as variation form is a sixteenth-century invention, used for independent instrumental pieces rather than as dance accompaniment. Variations combine change with repetition, taking a given theme - an existing or newly composed tune, bass line, harmonic plan, melody with accompaniment, or other musical subject - and presenting an uninterrupted series of variations on that theme. The goal was to showcase the variety that could be achieved in embellishing a basic idea and, often, to provide a technical challenge as the figuration becomes increasingly complex, but the result was a very practical solution to the problem of how to achieve length and coherence in a piece without words. For this reason, perhaps, it became the formal type most favored by composers of instrumental music in the early seventeenth century.

After Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), variations was built on motives derived from some part of the theme but altered in rhythm, tempo, dynamics, or context so as to produce a new design. And many nineteenth-century composers worked in this genre. For example, Franz Liszt (1811-1886) came under the spell of the great Italian violinist Niccolo Paganini (1782-1840), one of the most hypnotic artists of the nineteenth century. He directly imitated the master in his six Etudes d'execution transcendante d'apres Paganini (Transcendental Technical Studies Based on Paganini, 1851), transcribing four of Paganini's solo violin Caprices, Op.1 and his La Campanella (The Bell) from the Violin Concerto No.2 in B Minor.

After Liszt, influence of the Paganini's Variations lasted. Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) also wrote virtuoso music and focused on variation form. His Variations on Theme of Paganini, Op.35 (1863) is sets of variations. The piece Op.35 is called as one of the most difficult and etude-like pieces.

Until now, composers are loving to write variation form and many of the contemporary composers also used the Paganini's theme for their variation forms.

References

Gordon, S. (1996) A History of Keyboard Literature, Schirmer Books

Hanning, B. R. (1998) Concise History of Western Music, Norton