New Work for Bass Clarinet in Progress

 

"Fluoride Joker" For Viola (PDF Score)

"Fluoride Joker" 

For Viola 

Bil Smith Composer

(PDF Score)

Commissioned by BHP Billiton

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByXT8veODB_TZVlEWG9RVE50bUU/view?usp=sharing

"Changes to a Gleam-Ring" for Harpsichord. Bil Smith Composer

"Little Galvanic Halo" for Dunnett M2 Magnesium Snare Drum

"Compositional Surrogates: Translating a Theoretical Treatise"

“A Series of Storms” Bil Smith Composer (2012-2013)

"Compositional Surrogates: Translating a Theoretical Treatise"

SCORE: “A Series of Storms” Bil Smith Composer (2012-2013)

For Benedikt Eppelsheim Contrabass Saxophone (conversely Contrabass Clarinet); Tambourine: Retresium Trumpet in ‘A’; Inderbinen Wood Flugelhorn,: Eva Kingma Contrabass Flute; Celestonite Modified ‘A’ Clarinet with Slide ‘Pirix’ designed by Richard Fulbright; Angh, and Maser 2 Snare Drum.

In this work ("Series of Storms"), translating this theoretical treatise under this very broad definition; systems like Morse code, Ventisma, Fortola Codex, flag semaphore, secret speech, and other types of signals that share little in common could also be included. Tristan Murail has used the term “talking musical instruments,” which provides a clearer set of fundamental boundaries.

Even this term highlights a significant cultural bias. For many of the cultures studied under this lens, speech and music are not so easily partitioned.

In this work, “A Series of Storms”, I attempt to articulate the theatrical ambivalence towards these theorems, yet with great respect, illustrate a ritualistic musical tablature which has been buried.

In the words of Elliot Fereder, speech surrogates are the “conversion of human speech into equivalent sounds for transmission in vestigial systems”. 

He goes on to define percussive and whistle languages as well as surrogates played on other musical instruments.

The term “drum and whistle languages” has been used by several authors when describing systems that are neither drummed nor whistled but rather played on musical instruments. 

In this work, the customized Maser 2 Snare Drum, Tambourine and Angh are aligned with this evidentiary platform.

Drum and whistle languages and talking musical instruments share an important feature: the conversion of speech into a musical medium. The signal is based on pitch, rhythm, timbre, and other characteristics shared by speech and music, but it is performed by musical means—drums, whistling, flutes, etc.

Perhaps the best term to describe these related phenomena is “musical speech surrogates,” which has been used by Jeremy Blaise and Todd Reese among others.

“Acknowledging The Equinox In A White Suit And Panama Hat” for Tuba

“Acknowledging The Equinox In A White Suit And Panama Hat”

For Tuba

Bil Smith Composer

2018

A Numerics Tablature

Published by LNM Editions

"Remnant Fantasy". For Echo Cornet.

"Fundamental Overture" and Performativity

"Fundamental Overture" 

Bil Smith Composer

On SoundCloud:

https://soundcloud.com/bil-smith/fundamental-overture

Performativity is the hallmark of thinking in accordance with immanence.

Agree?: {Clap along if you feel like a room without a roof}

It provides the cri­terion for an important contrast between the self­ sufficient or musical practice of composition and its empirical activity whose claim to theoretical legitimacy is only ever assured through its performance.

{I know that I'm carrying on, never mind if I'm showing off...I was just frontin'}.

It may be that this Fundamental Overture's crisp, sharply delineated mode of abstraction turns out to be far more concrete than those nebulous abstractions which composers try to pass off as instances of concretion.

Agree?: {Clap along if you feel like that's what you wanna do }

In other words, the criteria for evaluating the worth of 'Non-Compositional'­ function are not available to composers, who know not what they do.

In 'Non-Composition', radical axiomatic abstraction gives rise, not to a system or doctrine inviting assent or dissent, but to an immanent methodology whose function for music no one is in a position to evaluate as yet.

{Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth}

Ultimately, then, 'Non-Composition' can only be gauged in terms of what it can do.

And no one yet knows what 'Non-Composition' can or cannot do.

Clap+

Lucy's Sequenza for Piano

FEB 5 2023 UPDATE: "A Special New Work In Progress for Solo Viola" (A Continuing Preview)

Final pages of seven total measuring 30" X 30" for new work for solo viola.  There will be two scores that will be used during the performance, this one consisting of seven 30" X 30" pages and the other bound score of 16" X 6" color scores (see examples below).  The 16" X 6" will also contain a special prelogue which showcases a new tablature system consisting of banded circles.

Final four pages of seven total measuring 30" X 30" for new work for solo viola.  There will be two scores that will be used during the performance, this one consisting of seven 30" X 30" pages and the other bound score of 16" X 6" color scores (see examples below).  The 16" X 6" will also contain a special prelogue which showcases a new tablature system consisting of banded circles.

Example page from the 16" x 6" score

Several weeks ago I posted the beginning pages of score for a new work for solo viola.  Below are updates and continuations of this multifaceted work. 

 It will be comprised of two separate score documents, one document consisting of a 16"x 6" page dimension and the other 30" x 30".

Performance guidance will include instructions as to how the two scores are interlaced and will define further detail as to the treatment of the various neologisms, symbology and notational elements found on the staff.

The 16" X 6" score document will also contain a prelogue of which this is the opening page.

The above pages measuring 30" X 30" will consist of 7 pages in total and will be used in conjunction with the smaller score during performance.

For the last six months I have been working on a special piece for Solo Viola. People ask why I have so many solo instrument works in my ouvre.  Simply put, as a teenager I was deeply inspired by Berio’s Sequenzas.  The beauty of an isolated instrumented performing in ways never previously heard were profound to my ears.

The central theme in this work is that of virtuosity, evident not only in the technical difficulties presented, but also in the treatment and writing style for the Viola.

In this new work, I employ a different type of tablature; a new musical lexicon which is inspired by Enrico Castellani and Paolo Scheggi along with my own foundational knowledge as a neologist and composer. 

Each page of the score is measured at 16” X 6”.  It embraces imagery (mostly of a partly metallographic in nature, (hence the nod to Castellani) as well as neologisms which are intended to shape the performer’s characterization of the work.  The neologisms are intended to act as an intransigent, emancipatory narration of the notational elements.

Fortunately, I have received funds to implement several recordings of the work which, when the work is completed next year, I will reach out to three of the most unmatchable violists in the world to each perform a rendition of the work. 

I would like to start with Renee Baker of the AACM, as I render her profound substaunce and conceptual genius as a perfect example of what this work should represent.  An intelligible communication of the work demands increased accuracy from the transmitter, and I can think no one more formidable than Ms. Baker to carry out this mandate.  Nils Mönkemeyer and Tabea Zimmermann are two other remarkable talents I will pursue for this adventure.

Cognitive Enhancing Drugs and Contemporary Performance

As a composer, let's advance our thinking for a moment into a taboo directive of performance notes for the instrumentalist/vocalist/performer.

I have looked at many of the fascinating ethical and philosophical issues that are raised by the use of enhancing drugs. But throughout all this writing, there is one topic that I have studiously avoided. This is surprising given that, in many ways, it is the most fundamental topic of all:  do the alleged cognitive enhancing drugs actually work in the improved performance musicians?

One reason for avoiding this topic is that philosophers like to pursue hypotheticals: to imagine possible worlds and trace out their logical implications. And this can be all well and good, but, there is a danger that it leads one to commit the “vice of in-principlism”. 

That is: the vice of talking about enhancement purely in terms of “well if, in principle, cognitive enhancing drugs worked, then the following would be true…”. 

This is a vice because there are many real-world substances that are alleged to have an enhancing effect. And it’s important that in all our philosophizing we don’t ignore the real-world.

As composers, I say "Ahhh, so melancholy when we consider our vice-performers."

Can one imagine prescribing medication as part of a score?  Asking the performer to ingest a Schedule 2, 3 or 4 substance to crate a new landscape?

Just questions for now.