#11: Balancing silence and “Sweet and Crunchy” Suite for Violin and Cello
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Relief (February 2020 - MBD)
Depending on internal focus in a moment, silence can feel awkward or thought-provoking, or anywhere between.
Sometimes, silence is more riveting than words or music.
Slowly, I am learning that space and rest are as important as sound and productivity.
Thoughts can be unwound with care, or thrown away like a tangled ball of yarn you deem impossible. This is my brain processing social anxiety, too many years spent being scared to trail off or not know what to say next, recirculating responses in my mind until I feel like I can say them without a mistake.
At the same time, I have always found solace in playing music, writing words, and doodling. This is where I am now, working to share outside my bubble, taking notes throughout the days as ideas come, and exploring thoughts with friends close to me (and far away, too!) so I don’t distort my imagination into believing I’m alone.
A dream day for me balances creative work and outward commitments to others, minus those outward commitments. These are by far the hardest days to pin down because days weighing heavily on the creative or on self-care still feel self-indulgent.
Why does art feel like an extra rather than a part of everyday life? Even as a musician doing this for a living, I battle to keep the hope alive that what I do isn’t just for me.
In music, what is the parallel to small talk? To silence? (Sight-readable music and John Cage’s 4’33”?)
The piece I’m sharing a video of today is not silent, but when we performed the first movement for the very first time (before I had written the rest), someone did walk out. It probably wasn’t personal, but I like to assume it was because of the few crunchy sounds.
“Sweet and Crunchy” Suite for Violin and Cello is the first string chamber music I wrote, from early last year. I wrote mostly solo and varied ensemble music in college and afterwards for the Sl(e)ight Ensemble (where Erika Oba - flute, Jacob Lane - piano, and I played each other’s music), but I finally couldn’t help it and wrote for Lewis Patzner.
Lewis is a wonderful, versatile cellist and human being that I played with mostly in the Town Quartet starting in 2012. I remember working on the Kodály Duo for Violin and Cello for my senior recital and feeling amazed that he was down to meet 2-3 times a week. It has been amazingly hard to come by musicians who want to work deeply on pieces, and I feel lucky to have worked regularly with Lewis for many years in Oakland. His own music and projects are varied and beautiful, so check them out. I heard him last year in the spectacular Proteus Trio with Evan Price (violin) and Jonathan Alford (piano). Check out their 2019 album here (I highly recommend it): store.cdbaby.com/cd/proteustrio
How valuable it is to play your own music with other people as it is being sent out in the world for the first time! My inspirations and ability to put things on a page have changed over the years, but my hope of sinking into sound has always been there. I start writing pieces on buses, in cafes, late at night, in the middle of practice, all kinds of times. Never when I’m on Facebook.
String instruments are often likened to the voice, but classical music can lack playfulness, just like life at times. I battle with feeling groove and flow, as I think a lot of us do, and each of the movements in “Sweet and Crunchy” started with an earworm of a rhythm, which might have included me dancing around our apartment. It was fun to write and I look forward to exploring it further in the future.
With the rigidity of method books and section playing and auditions, I often forget that improvisation has been part of classical music since the beginning. Some say you have to learn the rules before breaking them, but are there rules to creating and who set them in stone? I prefer to believe we all connect the dots in different ways and are always working to communicate our visions.