Les said, the better II

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?

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. 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.

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. One of your alumn(ae?), Judy Dunaway, contacted me about a paper she was writing on the mp3 phenomenon and we began a correspondence.

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.

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 Professor Lucier, with whom I hope to study.

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.

Wesleyan Portfolio – disk 1

now with more songs!

1. 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.
2. 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.
3. 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.

4. 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.

5. 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.
6. 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.
7. 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.
8. Choral No. 1 2000. This was recorded using a MOTM synthesizer and mixed in Pro-tools. It was played on German radio in 2001.
9. 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

1. Airwaves #1
2. Airwaves #2
3. 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

4. (de)construction
5. Scape
6. 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.