Music is a complex subject. How can we understand it fully without studying it professionally? I’m talking about classical music, of course, or as they call it in Latin-American countries, “serious music”. Of course, the more you know, the easier it will be for you to relate to this type of music, particularly to the contemporary brand of it; however, I think that we can communicate better about it and thus achieve a better understanding if we relate to music though the use of dichotomies. I mentioned this in my last blog post, almost a year ago, but I didn’t get to develop the concept. I intend to do so now. Paragraph by paragraph I will endeavor to post regularly until the basic terms and parameters are defined and then I intend to talk about the music of our times.
The Latest News
It is now the Winter of 2024. I finished several new works at the end of last year: Overcoming, for the John Muir High School Choir, Hineni (Here I Am) for the San Fernando Valley Master Chorale and Jarocho L.A. for the Centennial High School Band. In December, my work Echoes of Mexico was premiered by the Pierce College Band. I am involved with the Helfman Composers Group in the setting of poetry by Israeli authors about the October 7 attack. Additionally, I am at the research phase of a new work for choir called Galut (Exile), a cantata which will portray the Jewish exile from the year 70 A.D. to the present. Right now I am looking for original writings, including diaries, poems, letters, describing the different Jewish communities in Europe and Asia after the fall of the Second Temple. And I’m trying to get The Nightmare and the Dream; Herzl and the Creation of Israel, in the hands of a small group that can perform the work at low expense in different venues.