EXTRA CRITICUM

Dave Frishberg dies and I miss Blossom Dearie all over again.

Dave Frishberg (Schoolhouse Rock) died the other day. And that sent me looking for video of Blossom Dearie singing some of his great hits like, My Attorney Bernie. Here she is singing Peel Me a Grape.

 

And while we're on the Blossom Dearie train, why not enjoy this brilliant song, not by Frishberg. This one's by Francesca Blumenthal.

Quiz: Name 3 or 4 musical or dramatic elements of this song that make it amazing.

Put your songwriting know-how to the test. Listen to this song 2 or 3 times and then either post a comment or shoot me an email with your thoughts on what might be a few of the most interesting, smart, special or unforgettable things about this song.

I happen to think it's a pretty wonderful song. 

What do you think?

And why do you think I love it so much? And am I right or am I wrong? Be opinionated!

Dear Radio, Television & Podcast Producers: Please take your jobs more seriously. Do the work.

It has become routine to see/hear/read an interview with the same book author/film director/songwriter etc. etc. on not one, not two, but 5-7 supposedly independent unique shows or columns. 

You know what I'm talking about.

Terry Gross will interview the author of X book.

Two days later I'm hearing Allison Stewart interview the same person.

Another day or two go by and--oh, look who's being interviewed again! (Will I learn something new this time?)

What does this tell us?

Producers of these shows are either lazy or underpaid/over-extended or both. 

The programming producers of radio, television and podcasts need to step it up a notch.

This is ridiculous. We live in a country with thousands and thousands of artists and projects and there is no reason (other than casual semi-conscious sleepwalking through your job descriptions) for us to be learning of 3 or 4 new projects when we could be discovering 40 or 50.

And while we're on the subject I would like to report that having just promoted a production of my own, I was repeatedly amazed at the degree to which coverage I read in newspapers or online sites simply repurposed entire paragraphs from our press releases with zero editorial input.

This is all yet more evidence of the fact that we have allowed our media outlets to be starved to near extinction.

What the hell are we prepared to do to save them?

These five artists I love.

There have been more than a few happy byproducts of the year+ spent at home during Pandemic Pause. One of the most meaningful in my life has been the weekly hour I now spend online with 5 former members of New Opera Theatre Ensemble, the improvisational opera company I founded and directed in Boston toward the end of the 20th Century.

Sylvie lives in New Hampshire. Vicky lives in Keene, New Hampshire, which frankly doesn't really feel like the rest of New Hampshire. Merle lives in Boston. Mary Ann lives in Northampton. And Jon lives in San Francisco. There was a time when we all lived and worked in Boston. And as former musical collaborators, gathering for one hour on Zoom each week has reconnected each of us with a part of our artistic selves we may not have accessed in quite the same way in recent years.

How best to explain this?

When you open your mouth to sing but you've no idea what pitch, rhythm or words (if even there are words) might come out it takes a special kind of letting go and trusting and allowing for what might be considered "ugly noise" to come out if it will. In my opinion it's an act that taps into one of the deepest levels of trust we can access. It implies:

I'm going to sing now and it might be ugly or boring or trite. But I know I'm in the company of love. And so anything is possible and nothing will be fatal.

The five people who join me each week for one hour of exploration and conversation are among the most remarkable and wonderful artists I know. And I wanted to just share a few bits about each one of them in the hopes that how they live their artistic lives might offer you all some inspiration.

Our pasts -- recent and distant -- collide on E. 4th Street

Members of New Opera Theatre Ensemble (the opera company I founded in 1988) have been meeting once a week for an hour via Zoom ever since the pandemic arrived. During the hour we spend together online, we often improvise musical etudes. One great byproduct of the pandemic has been reconnecting with this bright brilliant endlessly inventive musical family that I've missed but that now live scattered here and there. Pictured clockwise from upper left: Vicky Pittman (Keene, NH), Mary Ann Lanier (Northampton, MA), Jon Rosenthal (San Francisco, CA), Roland Tec (New York, NY), Merle Perkins (Boston, MA), and Sylvie Stewart (Nashua, NH).

During Pandemic Pause, I've been consciously pushing myself to get out of my comfort zone artistically. What does this mean for Rolando Teco? Well, I've always enjoyed performing to a point but I do suffer from exaggerated stage fright. Sometimes my performance anxiety grabs hold of me mid-morning and doesn't let go until the moment I'm taking that final curtain call at night. It's one of the many reasons I never seriously considered acting or performing music as a career. The nerves (mine, to be exact) might've consumed me.

To a degree, the safety of the barrier that is Zoom by way of my laptop has let me experiment in this arena more than I might be comfortable doing otherwise.

Anyway, when the first email from Gaven Trinidad came in inviting folks to participate in a virtual open mic co-hosted by New York Theatre Workshop and Poetic Theatre, I didn't immediately move on as I might have were it any other year. Let me pause here to observe that just about 6 months before the pandemic hit my friend Yvonne Delet and I had gone to a Moth Slam at Housing Works and I'd put my name in the hat to tell a story. And I was a bundle of nerves. The beer I had did little to calm me. They pull the names out of the hat at random and throughout the evening. When the first name was called that began with an "R" I almost choked from fear. "Don't call my name, please don't call my name" I heard myself whispering.

But then an interesting thing happened. 

They called my name. And in that moment when I registered that they'd said "Roland" I was filled with an unexpected emotion.

Joy.

And I got up and told my story and it went well and I was runner up and when I got home, I grabbed a big 5x7 pink index card and scrawled on it in Sharpie: 

As nervous 
as I was, the moment they called
my name, I was
T H R I L L E D

Making new work for the world is anything but selfish. In fact, I'd argue it's an act of wild generosity.

The other day I received an email from a delightful writer, a member of one of the online writers workshops I'm now teaching. It was a really simple email but it contained one detail that leapt right out and slapped me across the face. So I knew I'd have to hop on Extra Criticum to get this off my chest.

Two of the online writers workshops I teach are winding down in the next month or so. Over the course of our months together inevitably, some workshop members write less than they'd hoped to. Others write more. And so as the final sessions approach there's always a certain amount of negotiating to try and find time to address as much new work as possible before it's time to say goodbye.  I always remind everyone at least a month ahead of time of the last session date and I make it clear that anyone who wants to claim time during our last workshop simply has to email me to say so. If we have too much work for the 2.5 hours scheduled, we'll just squeeze everyone a bit to make sure everyone's stuff gets heard and addressed.

One Thing Coronavirus Taught Me About Myself

For most of my adult life, I've been a composer who was afraid to play the piano in front of anyone.  I can trace this mostly to my lack of discipline as a child who, confronted with the choice between practicing my Mozart and just making up my own improvised pieces, always ended up choosing the latter. I'm forever grateful to my first piano teacher, Ruth Steinkraus Cohen, who upon discovering my lack of discipline did not react with anger but instead asked if I might like to learn "how to write down some of those pieces."

Still, my lack of piano technique has meant that I've been extraordinarily shy about playing for others, especially strangers.

So how could it have come to pass that just the other day after logging into an online gathering of the group, POPS the Club, I found myself saying "sure" to my friend Amy's request that I get the meeting started by playing something on the piano for the 20 students and teachers gathered via Zoom?

Cosy Sheridan Asks: "Do You Love the Life You've Made?"

Another Tuesday morning bit of inspiration. This time, courtesy of my talented pal, Cosy Sheridan. 

Complete lyric below:

Tuesday Morning Inspiration Courtesy of Patty Griffin

For those of us who keep on hiking up the road, making more stuff to share with the world, even when sometimes it feels like no one's listening, don't give up. Don't ever give up.

Thank you, Ms. Griffin. 

Lyrics copied below for those of you who (like me) like to follow along, word by word.

For Music-Theatre Collaborators, It's the Questions You Hardly Ever Think to Ask That Can Make the Biggest Difference

In a music-theatre context, there are a number of questions that must be answered before any song can be completed. Often when lyricists and composers collaborate on songs for a new show, these questions may be answered unconsciously or internally by each collaborator or not at all. If one person were writing a show all by herself, that might be just fine. But in a collaboration with one or two other artists, it’s critical that everyone on the team articulate these questions together, discuss them and come to agreement on each answer. If this is done before starting work on a given song, it can save everyone a lot of extra work, frustration and other unpleasant feelings. Take the time to be just a little bit pedantic when it comes to songs you’re co-writing for a new musical and you’ll be much happier with the results.

A note about these questions. Some concern lyrics. Others concern music. And others concern both. Some composers may read a few of these and bristle at the thought of opening such questions up for discussion with a lyricist. I’d argue that while musical decisions should be the final domain of the composer, talking about such things together will likely help the collaboration work in a more strongly aligned way with the overall story being told on stage. It may not be comfortable to talk about all these things right away. But give it a try. I think you’ll find surprising results await you if you come at it with an open mind and patience borne out of knowing you’re trying something new.

These questions are questions I’ve thought to ask in my own collaborations but it is probably not exhaustive. I encourage you to add a few of your own at the bottom to make this document an even more powerful tool for your own creative process.

The Day I Became a Composer

When I was eight or nine I'd been taking piano lessons for a couple of years. One day I arrived at my weekly lesson unprepared and my teacher noted the fact that it seemed as though I hadn't practiced much since our previous lesson.

 

At first I was shy to admit it but eventually she teased it out of me.

 

I had started to make things up at the piano through improvisation. And had been having too much fun playing my own "songs" to practice my Mozart.

 

As I look back this was a key turning point in my life as a musician.

 

Some teachers may have responded to my confession with anger. But Ruth Steincraus Cohen did something so simple and so inspired that it changed me forever.

Transcending a Natural Need for Certainty

At the midway point of a summer teaching gig at Hollins University in Roanoke, I find myself thinking a lot about uncertainty and how damned uncomfortable it makes us, particularly when faced with new ideas or new areas of exploration. At the end of a recent class in which I was attempting to introduce a group of graduate students pursuing their MFAs in Playwriting to the theatrical genius of Mozart one student sheepishly asked whether we'd be learning "the do's and don'ts of writing musicals."  One thing I know for sure about my approach is that I cannot be prescriptive. It's just not in my DNA as a teacher. I don't honestly think it's the way we best acquire new skills. I think there's so much more to be learned in the doing, failing and examining and dissecting the failure than in handing out a how-to instruction manual. 

As is explained to Dorothy at the end of the Wizard of Oz, being told you simply have to click your heels three times and think of home ain't the same as making the frightening trek yourself. Who tells her that? I can't recall. Is it the Wizard or the Glinda the Good Witch? 

But I digress. This morning I awoke with a vivid memory from my days at the Santa Fe Opera. And I'm pretty sure that's what's inspired this post. I was working as the House Manager there for two summers during college. And one of the fringe benefits for me was that whenever there were rehearsals called on the mainstage, I got to sit in the empty house and watch.

My first summer there Charles Ludlum (of Ridiculous Theatre fame) was there as a guest director; he was directing Die Fledermaus, a lighthearted operetta by Johann Strauss, (the accessible Strauss, not to be confused with Richard, the Nazi.)

Hadestown vs. The Total Bent (or) The Importance of a Good Book

In the past week I happened to see two musicals built in similar ways -- HADESTOWN at NYTW and THE TOTAL BENT at The Public. One really grabbed me, whipped me around, shook me up and spit me out the door of the theatre a limp wet rag. The other one left me cold.

Both have wonderful songs, clever and razor-sharp lyrics and musical risk-taking that I always find both appealing and moving.

BSO vs. NYPhil: Windows into a cultural divide?

Last night we attended another tour de force performance given by the New York Philharmonic. Featured artists included violinist Joshua Bell, who dug into the Glazunov violin concerto like a teenager behind the wheel of his first car. It was thrilling to hear and watch. And at the podium was assistant conductor Case Scaglioni, age 31, who conducted two of the three pieces on the program from memory with great artistry and depth. There was real joy in watching him coax various nuances out of Prokofiev's Fifth Symphony. There were shouts of "Bravo" from all corners of Avery Fischer Hall. That Prokofiev symphony has some magnificent textures and really difficult passages for the entire orchestra. I, for one, was so thrilled with their skill and enthusiasm that I lept to my feet to initiate a well-deserved standing ovation.

I was reminded of similarly thriling performances given nearly 20 years ago by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, then and now considered to be the superior of the two orchestras. Here's the thing. It's true that the musicians in Boston were then and are now among the best in the country. And, sure, the New York Philarmonic has improved over the years so that the gap between the two in terms of skill is now not what it once was. But you want to know what the key difference between these two orchestras is?

It's the audience.

Concert Window: A new cyber-intimacy between performer and audience

The other night my friend Ann Klein, a fabulously talented singer-songwriter with amazing guitar chops gave a concert in her livingroom. The audience, however, were all in our own homes. I was on my sofa. This new form of performer-audience interaction is made possible by a website called Concert Window.

And I must admit, despite some deeply held Luddite tendencies, I was charmed.