Showing posts with label Haley Freedlund. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Haley Freedlund. Show all posts

Saturday, January 31, 2026

Playlist

Preface

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
"I now thought our troubles would soon be over; mine were very nearly so in one sense at least; for after Mrs. Coxe, and Jemimarann, and Tug, and the maid, and valet, and valuables had been handed across it came to my turn. I had ofter heard of people being taken up by a plank, but seldom of their being set down by one. Just as I was going over, the vessel rode off a little, the board slipped, and down I soused into the water. You might have heard Mrs. Coxe's shriek as far as Gravesend; it rung in my ears as I went down, all grieved at the thought of leaving her a disconsolate widder. Well, up I came again, and caught the brim of my beaver hat - though I have heard that drowning men catch at straws: - I floated, and hoped to escape by hook or by crook; and luckily, just then I felt myself suddenly jerked by the waistband of my whites, and found myself hauled up in air at the end of a boathook, to the sound of "yeho! yehe! yehoi!" and so I was dragged aboard. I was put to bed, and had swallowed so much water that it took a very considerable quantity of brandy to bring it to a proper mixture in my inside; in fact, for some I hours I was in a very deplorable state."

from The Comick Almanack, 1st Series 1835-1843

Texts

Live

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
January 29, 2026

Nonseq Curators Concert
Gretchen Yanover, Haley Freedlund, Cuong Vu, RM Francis
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Gretchen Yanover 

we know where the ground is
so we welcome the light
as it streams
in loop based accumulation 

build a place to stand
a floor to move upon 

narrow body electric cello

Haley Freedlund, with Brandon Carter, Ray Larsen, and Tom Varner

taking hymns apart
reclaiming free heterophony

Cuong Vu, with Greg Sinibaldi

trumpet and an electronic wind instrument device
warmly lyrical
an ocean has appeared around us

RM Francis

creative misdubbing
confusing the software
speech
that will never quite be language
music that will never quite be speech

Recorded

January 24, 2026

Shanti/Ashtangi - Madonna [from Ray of Light]

we'll be futuristically primitive
I've got just the costume

JB - Keith Eisenbrey [from Summer Songs/Winter Mix]

epistolary
working hard
at messing up any sound I couldn't polish
which is all of them

Paparazzi - Lady Gaga [from The Fame]

celebrity
selling celebritous fantasies
across the land

Conquer The World With You - Smokestack and The Foothill Fury [from Lone Buffalo]

wake up call
time to get doing

Go - Whitney Ballen [from You're a Shooting Star - I'm a Sinking Ship]

another break-up song
as though from the heat of the moment

Missionary Chant - Keith Eisenbrey [September 24, 2023]

stately proud and plain

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
January 25, 2026

Madrigals, Book IX: Sì, sì, ch'io v'amo - Claudio Monteverdi - Concerto Italiano, Rinaldo Alessandrini

the words dance from the singer's tongue

the notion of pitch-class
is a mode of thinking
in terms of the registral cyclicity
of pitch space

Durch Adams Fall ist ganz verderbt, BuxWV 183 - Dieterich Buxtehude - Simone Stella

one could conceptualize pitch space
as a registral continuum
made of pitches
related by position 

then
one could add upon that
the terrain of intervals
forming acoustic nodes
as they pulse
across the registral continuum
of pitch space 

then
one could add upon that
the cross-registral cyclicity
of pitch-class space
abstractly conceptualizing
the network of intervals
forming acoustic nodes
across the registral continuum 

and
then what?
syntaxes thereof?

Laßt uns Sorgen, laßt uns Wachen, BWV 213 - Johann Sebastian Bach - Amsterdam Baroque Choir, Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, Ton Koopman

these words float
on dancing notes 

if a figure seems to sing
we imagine a person of that figure 

Bach keeps his imaginary persons straight 

(nein echoes)
(not nine echoes)
(not necessarily)
[Ja ja! echoes]
[Ja Ja]
||:Ja:|| 

there goes that happy couple
ich küsse dich
over and over
their phonemic parts of speech
phase through each other's gender

Sonata in B-flat Major, Kk. 310 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

the count of tonal corners this music turns
daunts 

we are in the deepest cellars of B-flat now
I reckon 

worry not
we'll head back upstairs now

Kinderszene: Ritter von Steckenpferd, Op. 15 #9 - Robert Schumann - Florian Uhlig

a picture book picture

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
January 26, 2026

Buch der Lieder I: Angiolin, S531/6 - Franz Liszt - Alexandre Dossin

as the imagined melody
and the imagined lute
inform each other
the song expands
to fill its swelling heart

2 Morceaux: Désir, Op. 57 #1 - Alexander Scriabin - John Ogdon

a sketch in quick pencil

Two Deuces - Louis Armstrong's Hot Five [from Hot Fives and Sevens]

tempo shifts
sudden skitters

A Fool For You - Ray Charles [from Ray Charles Live at Newport]

each line
has a center of thrust
that must be pushed
or rolled
through
or over

the centers
of thrust
cycle heavily
but
their continuity
gets complicated
as the song moves into further verses

Chants Sacres - Henri Pousseur - Philadelphia Composer's Forum, Joel Thome, Valarie Lamoree, Eric Rosenblith, Jacob Glick, Michael Rudiakov

quasi Webernesque directness
and lovely too

Blue Differentials - Sun Ra [from Monorails & Satellites]

the cogworks
patched together

Corazón  - Carole King [from Fantasy]

exoticistic
primitivistic
but can't stick with it quite

It's Hard To Be a Saint in the City - Bruce Springsteen [from Live at the Roxy]

street mouth
spits words

40 - U2 [from Under a Blood Red Sky]

a hymn with chorus

January 27, 2026

Banned Rehearsal 163 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer [December 20, 1988]

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
in an intricately designed polyphonic passage
we participate in that design
as though we were among the parts
each voice
is a person
and our attention
traces a path
through that design
which path
is also a voice
and also a person 

this
is not an intricately designed polyphonic passage
though multiple voices are clearly present
the difference is
that it is discovering its paths
as it goes
and
we join in that discovering
as a listening
participatory voice

Cold Mountain Songs: Piano Interlude - Robert Morris - Margaret Kampmeier [from Open Space 30]

vehement words are spoken

How Many Times - Aretha Franklin [from A Rose Is Still A Rose]

commiseration pill
apparent social purpose 

but the moneyed sound
is alienating 

why can't I be more glamorously miserable?

I Want Some Sugar In My Bowl - Karin Blaine [from Dirty Money]

time for some clever rhymes
and even some scat
where an instrument would have soloed

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
Gradus 150 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [December 29, 2008]

registers can move from place to place
jacked into the dynamic trunk line 

as I recollect
and I may be wrong
but I think I was using a small stereo mic
and aiming it at the wall
point blank
to mimic my PZMs
and de-emphasize the right/left up/down skew
of keyboard sound
as metaphorically conceived 

these are all A-naturals
since he said so 

but
that fact
vanishes in the experience
is not a part of it 

to name a pitch class
is to reify
a set of experience nodes
as being referential

Gonna See John Salvatier- Swingset Showdown [from Cymbal of Appreciation]

a bit of sophomoric patter song energy

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
Maple Leaf 181110 - Keith Eisenbrey [November 10, 2018]

a few minutes of squawks and screeches in the yard 

fowl language
deafened partially
by traffic noise

Soundscroll V, Part 2: Tranquil Landscape - S. Eric Scribner [from Hexaphonic]

what passes before our staring ears
washed in light

Devil's Gonna Get You - Bessie Smith [from Empty Bed Blues]

long long lane
with no turnin'
flame
that keeps on burnin' 

give up now dude
the way you're going on 

sure as you're born to die

Do I Love You? - Judy Garland [from Judy In Love]

we can see the nightclub uniforms
and matching stands 

she shapes her vowels with her hands 

and the quiver of her spine

3 Olden Style Pieces: I - Henryk Górecki - Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Zofia Kilanowicz, Antoni Wit

heart on sleeve
and little else 

brother to Hovhaness
nostalgic for a lost homeland

Turn Out The Stars - Bill Evans [from Some Other Time / The Lost Session from the Black Forest]

the difficulty
with that half step in particular 

if we remember it
in each passing chord
that moves to the next 

is recollection remembrance?
now where were we?

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
He's Misstra Know-It-All - Stevie Wonder [from Innervisions]

rewriting Mr. Nobody
for the Grifter era

Train In The Distance - Paul Simon [from Hearts and Bones]

the sound of greener pastures
everybody thinks its true
into our hearts and our brains

She Loves You - The Beatles [from Past Masters Volume 1]

high school drama rumors
don't be stupid fellow
the chum's advice

March from The Love for Three Oranges - Empire Brass Quintet [from Class Brass On The Edge]

quite amusing
but full of filler

I'm On Your Side - Bonnie Raitt [from Fundamental]

no tone exists at its inception
but only in the process of its duration

Livin' Road - Keith Eisenbrey [from Summer Songs/Winter Mix]

one song piled on another
one song pulled through another 

trying on a persona for sizes

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
January 28, 2026

Disappear - Beyoncé [from I Am ... Sasha Fierce]

word painting producer
echo effect of empty space
for disappearance

Lion Storm - Ancient Warlocks [from Ancient Warlocks]

sound intended to press against the walls

Talking to Myself - Red Ribbon [from Dark Party]

yodel register crossing

Banned Rehearsal 1084 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Aaron Keyt [September 25, 2023]

listening for how the room accepts its sounds
persons of varying persistencies 

synthetic reproduction
of the original space
or
synthetic production
of a believable space 

believing the space
is needful
for believing the sound 

we
are a box of items to rattle with

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
When I Woke Up This Morning She Was Gone - Jim Jackson [from Turn Me Loose White Man]

as though in mid weep 

song as an act
over the top simple-folk sentiment

Willow The Wasp - Norman Monath [from Songs of the Pogo]

in search of lovely lives
to shield it from the sun
wasps with wondrous wives
lyrical nonsense rhymes

From This Moment On - Ella Fitzgerald [from Love Songs: the Best of the Verve Songbook]

Vegas ready

Etcetera - Wayne Shorter [from The Classic Blue Note Recordings]

tempo on a rough road
ruts and rocks
all terrain advised

All in All - Morgana King [from New Beginnings]

sparkly evening romance
yikes where'd the choir come from? 

end of show send 'em out song
with modulations
and guitar shred break
shark jumping
can't be far off

Madison Avenue - T-Bone Burnett [from Truth Decay]

in demo clothes
highly moral in character

Banned Rehearsal 164 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Anna K, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer [December 23, 1988]

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
this is a small room
crowded with sounds
expertise is no guarantee
bam bam
short cut
motor rhythm
linked
to body feedback
what feels good to do
must be good to hear
(?) 

we find a low and rumbly sound
swathes of register
all in a sweep of zither strings 

toy reed organ
in a simulacrum of unanimity
with the big boy piano 

a singing
the pulsers get all excited
about finding a groove
but back off 

tribal vibe
lifts into incandescence
leaves room for any hosh p'kosh 

Christmas Eve Eve
a voluntary
on the near nativity 

spirited
anthemic
with descant extempore 

we cadence and regroup
play childish
and hope for the best 

almonds and nectarines

Volte - Michael Praetorius - The Baltimore Consort [from Le Rocque 'N' Roll]

written down music
and writers down of music 

for what did this survive?

Track 7 - Students of Joan Schoepflin [June 9, 1998]

every piece
includes its program
as announced
to teach stage presence and poise

A Woman Like Me - Bettye Lavette [from A Woman Like Me]

a literature of complaint
and accusation
and exploration

Closer - Vince Mira [from The Cash Cabin Sessions]

campfire strum tempo
cowboy sincere

Second Thoughts - Jesse Canterbury, Greg Sinibaldi [from Ascendant]

reeds imitate a bell's resonance
and move from within that space

Skyline Trail, Mt. Rainier National Park
January 29, 2026

Gradus 342 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [November 12, 2018]

completion
up to
the penultimately to be added B 

we open
with notes of pointedly determined durations
mostly short
and spread from there 

de rigueur long pauses
allow the space
and the ear
to regroup
a disciplined articulation 

as esoteric as the project
is explained to be
the fact of it
in action
is ceaselessly intimate and personal

Whirlybird - Steve Layton [from Bedtime Stories]

procedure of manufacture
kept in line
by timing belt 

so many ticks
for each step 

heat pound wash
heat pound wash

In Session at The Tintinabulary

January 25, 2026

Winter - Keith Eisenbrey - Keith Eisenbrey

January 26, 2026

Banned Rehearsal 1143 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer

Postscripts

Drops

Music of Kosály-Meyer, Verrall, Palmer, Baker, Oldham, Osborn, and Cobb

This album is a selection of music by various Seattle-area composers, composed between the 1940s and 2010 or so.

recordings of my compositions (and more!) can be found at keitheisenbrey.bandcamp.com - free to download or stream

Saturday, July 19, 2025

Playlist

Subvector Colloquy
Preface

"This experiment is related to language: how is language involved in the processing of sensory phenomena? How does language modify (filter, modulate, truncate, reduce, amplify) the fullness of the sensory experience of an external object: Language is not a neutral recollection of facts, events or past experiences; it changes the memory of a past experience through a rationalization performed in the present moment. Language works along paths of metaphors and associations to produce an intellectualization of the sensuous processes, by selecting what to remember and what to forget, what to paste together and what to separate, what to emphasize or understate. This linguistic process ushers in more questions: how does the sense of time alter as we encode an experience in memory? How incomplete is our representation of objects which change and decay over time (since we often store only a snapshot in our memory)? And a question specific to this experiment, which took place in the presence of an audience: are there differences, perceptually, between the species of time of the performer and that of the observer?"

Sascia Pellegrini, from The Amplification of Sense

Texts

Live

July 16, 2025

Subvector Colloquy
Chapel Performance Space, Good Shepherd Center, Seattle
Tom Baker, Keith Eisenbrey, Haley Freedlund, Leanna Keith, Jim Knodle

The Wizards Returned with Reinforcements to Once Again Corrupt the Young and Confound The Ancient!

Tom "Green Eggs and Ham" Baker, guitar
Keith "The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins" Eisenbrey, piano
Haley "Would You Rather Be a Bullfrog?" Freedlund, trombone
Leanna "Oh, The Places You'll Go!" Keith, flute
Jim "Horton Hears a Who" Knodle, trumpet

It was the hottest day of the year
(so far)
but the Colloquial Wizards cast cooling spells

a completely wonderful evening
in my ever so humble opinion
(recordings linked below)

Recorded

July 12, 2025

Sordid Crude - Keith Eisenbrey [April 30, 1988]

forcing the limits
of signal retention
and fidelity
on magnetic media
through
repeated tape speed alterations
using
a Teac reel to reel tape recorder
in conjunction
with a cassette tape deck
for years now
the Teac has been retired
and leads a quiet life
as my bednight table 

original intent
was to discover
what
if anything
the process might divulge
about the shape
of my Sonata in 2 Movements 

conclusion
many aspects of it
hold their own quite well
still quite pleased
with how the 2nd movement
simply replaces
the ongoingness
of the first
as though
it
had never been
the highest tones
have little left
but a sound
like distant firecrackers
the tape wobble
becomes quite dramatic
prefiguring Ms. Found In A Bottle

Washington Arboretum
Branle de Montirande - The Baltimore Consort [from La Rocque'n'Roll - Popular Music of Renaissance]

melody constructed for clear segmentation
into isometric portions

Glory To God (rehearsal take 1) - Keith Eisenbrey - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey

these takes were indifferently dated
but were within a year or so of composition
so 1998-2000 range
likely more toward 1998

The Gnossienee #3 - Brave Combo [from Box of Ghosts]

in the same lame bin
as
the various classical melody collections
(as seen on TV
just the parts you love
none of the boring bits)
but now
with drum tracks
and cabaret arrangements 

grotesques in vitrines

Gradus 141 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [June 16, 2008]

Bloomsday (Jim's Day) 

a vector of perception
a thing
a pitchy thing
a thing
of two pitches
a coordinated thing
of two pitches
already
some aspects overlooked
perhaps
aspects appear simultaneously
but
along different registers of perception
multiple paths
converging
within the specious now
of consciousness
only
the path of attention
that provides
an illusion
of sequential experience 

music
as a mode
allowing perception
of simultaneously unfolding processes
organizing them
so that
we can flirt
with bewilderment
or wallow in it
your call
or subdue it
or rationalize it
and yet
we hear sounds
as objects
in the world around us
that sound
that object
that note
that twitter
that boom
that crash
that bang
that clank

no amount of repeating
can make a note
the same note
as another
howsoever functionally similar they may be

Washington Arboretum
July 13, 2025

In Jiro's Room - Lori Goldston [from Film Scores]

a film score standing alone
can be both music and film 

as a film
standing alone
might be
both film and music 

one might imagine
a film
with music
in which
both film and music
are
those modes
and
that the modes
film as music
and music as film
become a synthesis

Banned Rehearsal 955 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Neal Kosály-Meyer [March 26, 2018]

if I leave the listening room
to retrieve my water bottle
as my recorded voice
is announcing the date and participants
then
when I return
the session
is already fully engaged 

pitched instruments
can be polyphonic
because pitched structures can be 

if sessions
were conceived primarily
as a social experiment
a postulation
about people being together
and if
and to the extent that
Banned Rehearsal
has been
such sessions
then
as that social experiment
has continued to run
these 40 years
a social cohesion
has arisen
and a music has been formed
within that social cohesion
a music
that is us
and is
of us
being together
unique
to the particulars
of the parties involved

whistle like a frog 

the little midi man
says three and four 

who wrote the book on love 

randomization
to sort
without a finger on the scale 
to mix a metaphor
or more 

now the little midi man
is tootootootootootooing 

T Ux2 O (Tea, You twice, Oh)

Ux2 = double U 

so two
is four letters
not three 

I wonder
wonder
I won

Four Places on Planet Earth - S. Eric Scribner [from Adjacencies]

I think I may have been involved in this {nope}
or at least participated in something
from the same score
on a different occasion 

there is (are)
(a) persistent tone producing device(s)
in this music
that is out of place
as a place on earth
in the sense
the other sounds in this music
are
but
not out of place
in this music 

the limits of the space
in which the places on earth are placed 

some music is spacy
this music is placy 

a place
is a sense
of how sounds transpire
these sounds transpire
in different sensations of placeness 

count of places
is immaterial  

there are only
one of many
spontaneously generating polyphonies 

ribbit
ribbit

Washington Arboretum
July 14, 2025

Madrigals, Book VIII: Altri canti di marte: No. 2, Due belli occho fur l’armi, onde traffitta - Claudio Monteverdi - Concerto Italiano, Rinaldo Alessandrini

in general
song is a different mode of expression
than poetry
more translation into
than presentation of 

choral song
even more so

Kommt her zu mir, spricht Gottes Sohn, BuxWV 201 - Dieterich Buxtehude - Simone Stella

a comforting and tender presence
a color of light

Premier livre de clavecin: Deuxieme Ordre (fin) : Les Idees Heureuses. Tendrement, sans lenteur - François Couperin - Kenneth Gilbert

graceful growth

contour accent
combined with figuration
between the parts
is where
and what
the meter is

Herr, gehe nicht ins Gericht, BWV 105 - Johann Sebastian Bach - Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, Amsterdam Baroque Choir, Ton Koopman

confession
reckoning
penance
the work
of repentance
a ritual
by which
we accept forgiveness
(grace) 

oboe dances
palm to palm
with voice 

these notes
are countable pulses

Sonata in D Major, Kk. 282 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

we will attend to each
in good order
and completely 

now to new business 

a delicate matter
requiring some care be taken
and discreetly 

all done

Sonata in F Major, K. 494 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Kristian Bezuidenhout

1
balanced repetitions
fool us
into thinking
repetition
is where the action is
only later
are we pulled into his story telling
they become place-holders
so that
we know
we have arrived
somewhere
solid
for a time 

2
the motions required
to trace dreamy paths
through tonal space 

3
this figure
insists on itself
so that
we recognize its reappearances

"Solo e pensoso" - Aria from "Il Canzoniere" - Franz Joseph Haydn - Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, Armin Jordan, Edith Mathis

an operatic aria
is a major production
time must be allowed
for the singer to collect their wits
and maneuver their costumed self
to their mark
and so
to shine
most respendantly 

you can always count on Papa Haydn
to do a good job of it 

and time
for the audience
to throw flowers

Prelude in E-flat Major, Op. 28 #19 - Frédéric Chopin - Garrick Ohlsson

a young sprite flits
that's all

Album für die Jugend: Volksliedchen, Op. 68 #9 - Robert Schumann - Eric Le Sage

each syllable speaks

Poème Tragique, Op. 34 - Alexander Scriabin - Dmitri Alexeev

such a handsome figure of a man
passionate and true
begins to ponder
in the night
the cares of a nation

Washington Arboretum
July 15, 2025

West Indies Blues - Piron's New Orleans Orchestra [from That Devilin' Tune]

we hear long ago
through a compromised aperture

Come Over Here - Elder R. Bryant [from Turn Me Loose White Man]

inviting as to a lively party

I'm All For You (take 2) - Billie Holiday [from Lady Day, The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia]

language infects our perception of music
but
that tune
is doing a number
on those cornball words

Sonatas and Interludes: Sonata VI - John Cage - Boris Berman

figures such as harp music
could be arranged?
treating the harp
as a different preparation?

Chippie - Ornette Coleman [from Something Else!!!!]

this road
has bumps
but our shocks
are in good order
so
we speed on down
take them
in stride

Little Child - The Beatles [from With The Beatles]

harmonica explosion to open
which then steps back from the microphone

Midnight Mood - Bill Evans [from Alone]

chords to wrap around oneself
to warm
hot chocolate

Time - Pink Floyd [from The Dark Side of the Moon]

time is allowed its alarm
these songs are such a production
before we get to words
which are quite few
compared
to the heft of the instrumentals
the poem
is included with other objects
actually two songs
from a certain point of view

Rock & Roll N***** - Patti Smith Group [from Easter]

like the Pink Floyd of Time
this is a comment upon the world in general
and a posture within it

Badlands - The PKs [from Live in The Living Room]

for drums
tambourine
and distant guitar
and vocals
elaborately arranged

Washington Arboretum
Helter Skelter - U2 [from Rattle and Hum]

Bono's cover
is constrained
in comparison with the original

Quartet for Oboe, Violin, Viola, and Cello in F Major, K. 370 (K. 386b) - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Itzhak Perlman [from The Art of Itzhak Perlman]

one presumes
written for an oboist he met somewhere 

this music
is for the musicians playing it
the audience
are just eavesdropping
all those voice-leading figuration games he plays
are for their amusement
and our vicarious delight

Heartbreak Hotel (feat. Faith Evans and Kelly Price) - Whitney Houston [from My Love Is Your Love]

epistolarily yours
wish you were here
so blame
could be arranged

Gradus 48 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [July 14, 2025]

of such vastly inconceivable extent
that any moment of it
is all there is of it
however
it is only the conceit of its discipline
that makes it so
the sounds are
of themselves
the same sizes and shapes
as other sounds can be 

a rhythm like tapping codes
that discover themselves
in conversation
by a language
arising
to the occasion 

two tones
chattering freely with each other

raw census of notes
a crude measure

Autumn Island - True Bugs [from 25 Songs]

the thoughts so free
with duck weed

Banned Rehearsal 845 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer [September 30, 2013]

chamber music
with harmonica and birthday card 

forest critters
at peace

without failure to distinguish
any signal's source object

One Man's Ceiling Is Another Man's Floor - Paul Simon [from In The Blue Light]

revisiting songs from old days

Sinfonia 2 (clavichord) - Keith Eisenbrey - Keith Eisenbrey [recorded August 5, 2023]

explains itself as it goes
as best it can
its clockwork is deceptively clever

Washington Arboretum
July 17, 2025

Ida Red - Tweedy Brothers [from Turn Me Loose White Man]

fiddling and strumming for mutual pleasure
dance song
designed to be cycled
as directed
by the dance caller

They Are There!, first take (abandoned) (1943) - Charles Ives - Charles Ives [from Charles Ives Plays Charles Ives]

enthusiastic and wordy

Someone To Watch Over Me - Sarah Vaughan [from Sarah Vaughan Sings George Gershwin]

introductory stanzas
as in the original show version
followed by the tune everybody whistles in the lobby

On Christmas Day In The Morning [from The Life Treasury of Christmas Music]

before Commercial Christmas in Middle America
could afford to be seen
as Commercial Christmas

Cogitation - Sun Ra [from Monorails and Satellites]

leads into
and just past
a groove 
veering freely up its sides
dune jumping
then they get to talking 

angular
simpatico

As Long As He Will Stay - Morgana King [from New Beginnings]

these musicians are playing the part assigned them
professional suppression
of anything that might get in the way of the vocals 

it's a paying gig

Morning Sun - Carole King [from Welcome Home]

modulate towards the hook chorus key
so the consumers can find the record
to buy it 

flirtatious fade on the instrumentals

Talk Talk Talk Talk Talk Talk - T Bone Burnett [from Truth Decay]

recorded in an empty room
journal of observations

Washington Arboretum
Agnus Dei - Keith Eisenbrey - Bellevue First United Methodist Church, Huntley Beyer [recorded in rehearsal May 12, 1988]

back when I was trying on anything
that was composition
before I discovered myself again
as my own best performer
and
more crucially
keyboards as my natural voice 

not actually poorly written
just what?
inert?
the part-writing is quite clear
a valiant attempt
very much in the manner of a serious piece of choral music 

the choir is game
and is doing quite well
in the difficulties
I threw at them 

I do tend to treat the words
as polyphony-fodder

God Is Seen - Robert Shaw Festival Singers [from Amazing Grace]

familiar to me
from the inside
our choir sang this at least once

July 18, 2025

Subvector Colloquy - Tom Baker, Keith Eisenbrey, Haley Freedlund, Leanna Keith, Jim Knodle [recorded live July 16, 2025]

respiring corporately
we breathe an image
into aural space
cooling spells
for a warm evening
not
of a one-mind
but
a mind
of one us
inhabiting
the combined ear
of all present 

playful fugato in the second set
as we fancy 

Seattle's spacy muse

In Session at The Tintinabulary

July 13, 2025

St. John's - Keith Eisenbrey

July 14, 2025

Banned Rehearsal 1129 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Anna K, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer

Postscripts

Drops

Music of Aaron Keyt - Part 1

My decades-long collaboration/conversation with Aaron Keyt has been among my most valued musical relationships. I have two more volumes of recordings waiting in the wings, and quite a few scores queued up to learn and record. This first volume includes pieces written over the last four decades and more. The recordings were made from 2005 through 2014, except "Monsters" for piano 4-hands, which were recorded live in 2022. Jennifer K. Chung plays the Primo and I the Secundo.

Three Bagatelles (1999)
Occasional Pieces (1984-1989)
Monsters (2022)
Three Pastorales (1984)
Sonata (2012)

recordings of my compositions (and more!) can be found at keitheisenbrey.bandcamp.com - free to download or stream

Saturday, July 4, 2020

Playlist

Preface

"We cannot afford to deprive ourselves of our own expression by conventionalizing or institutionalizing our talk, or our thought, or our music; not because that is wicked, but because it deprives us of what we most need from those outlets, what we lusted after in the first place so as to find ourselves energetically engaged, for life, with them."
- Benjamin Boretz "Talk: If I am a musical thinker. . . " from "Being About Music Textworks 1960-2003 J. K. Randall Benjamin Boretz Volume 2: 1978-2003"

Texts

Streamed


July 1, 2020
Free - Kaley Lane Eaton, Jesse Myers

lesson plan
shaped like a wave in a mirror
with commentary
in both vid & aud

language and shadow

Wayward in Limbo

"With the Chapel closed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Wayward Music Series now moves from the concert hall to the living room. In place of our usual ten monthly concerts, Nonsequitur is curating and commissioning ten Seattle artists each month to create a series of streaming audio sessions of exclusive material. Many of these will be essentially 'live' performances recorded at home for this occasion. Others may create a mix of pre-recorded material that has not been previously released elsewhere."
- from the Wayward Music Series website at https://www.waywardmusic.org/.

June 27, 2020
Young Scientist - James Husted, Marc Barreca

dawn on the sea of electric doohickies
weather mild
breezes wafty

gentle bells clang the hull
solar cells upcharging
we start to move

we may be further out there
than we had imagined
in no hurry

escape assured
contact intermittent
inconsequential

the ministrations of the maintenance mechanisms cleanses our solitude

June 28, 2020
Rae - Abbey Blackwell, Ronan Delisle, Evan Woodle


bass, guitar, drums
moods with rooms to wander into
or that wander through
solos supported with care
(early Renaissance Fancies with Points go similarly)
(see Fitzwilliam or My Ladye Nevell)

compositional idea:a strand that stays throughout, though decorated and melodically and rhythmically following a set of stylistic/structural guidelines. The delight is in just how subtle one can manage to be.

July 3, 2020
Haley Freedlund (w/ Kyle Bruckmann, Evelyn Davis, and Phillip Greenlief)

chattery introductions to start
get an ear for the room

now we are all looking in the same direction, at the same body, on the same slab
our activities congrue
we are shown elicitations of phenomena
arcane potions aerify
in the billows of which refractions of light configurate
the results are discussed

see here
one says

some issues are well known
so we can scroll quickly through them
to show the larger shape of the argument

this one has a squeaky wheel
what can we do about it?
it is counterexemplified

episodes are punctuated from each other with episodes of silence and relaxation of attention
(the social cues for one piece then the next piece)

pre-planning is allowed, score-like
another social cue for this is a piece:
a piece: the set of all physical objects, inscriptions, episodes of sound, episodes of production activity, and episodes of experiential activity, which congeal into a mental image of itness or thatness

{stray spontaneous spoonerism: Teeming Power of Leeza}

we've played this game before
and play it again
because it is a fun game to pleasure our time with

a performance practice is a shared concept or set of concepts

game-based, as in play a game of piece making
(blessed are the)
this one may as well have written down notes
probably does, without problems, they are perfectly fine notes for this game

when musicians gather to listen to each other wonderful things happen often

Recorded


June 27, 2020
Sonata Fantaisie in G-sharp minor - Alexander Scriabin - Michael Ponti

The fantasial introduction finds an uncertain path to a key region with restless portions, not just working out how Chopin's fingers felt, but also how meta his use of tonality was.

Symphony #2 - Charles Ives - New Philharmonia Orchestra, Harold Farberman

The National Composer of Cranky New England
(counterpoint was not his forte)
with an overlay of americana scrapbook and library paste
inert

Try as he might, and try he does, there is no way he is capable of constructing a tonal process that doesn't strangle itself immediately. His mind wanders in dreary slogs. Music is above him, hence his cantankerous defensiveness.

modulations in gray
prose and dull prose at that
the plod thickens

patriotic sentimental quod libet
try some fire works to finish it off

Symphony in C Major (#3) - Jean Sibelius - Grand Orchestra Symphonique Radio Television USSR, Guennadi Rojdestvenski

Now there's an ear for vital tonality, we're with him all the way. So sly! The ground here is alive with urgency, vistas open and come alive. Virtual head rush.

Those folk-like tunes: (he owns these, knows where their weaknesses lie). Duration games to distract us as the eruption prepares, strung out along the motor chain. Triumph so proud!

June 28, 2020
A Winter Landscape - Charles Tomlinson Griffes - Michael Lewin

an apassionato landscape
some particular painting?
or a music as a painting?

4 Canciones Campesinas - Igor Stravinsky - members of the Orquesta del Teatro Nacional de la Opera de Paris and Coros del Teatro Nacional de la Opera de Paris, Pierre Boulez

bespoke ensemble
two brass instruments and women's voices
sharply drawn

a set of matching greeting cards
the balance or ratio between what matches between the cards and what kinds of details count as identity

Finnegans Wake Chapter 1 - James Joyce - Neal Kosály-Meyer (December 2014)

spacious opening
long spaces between word groups
word groups of numerous lengths and complexities.
It's a while to go so it's a while in getting going. I think he'd rehearsed himself hoarse.

grace before glutton

echo heh.
active audience noise is never in the way, but sudden, repeatedly

thing mud

A story is a kind of thing that might show up in this string of text. Was I holding it? Chapel ghost in fine form

||:||: thing :||: mud :||:||

the hub bub caused in Edinburough

June 29, 2020
Háry János Suite - Zoltán Kodály - Seattle Symphony, Gerard Schwarz

five-note melodic groups

amplified mandolin or dulcimer?

cimbalom

I looked it up
the amplification of it is a problem

there is an issue with non-standard-issue-orchestra instruments, having to do with cultural supremacy. noted. but also they need to be hired special under the current regime. which is more a reason to avoid orchestras than to not use the instrument.

Bugle Call Rag - Elmer Snowden [from That Devilin' Tune]

hop the beat
keep it tight
keep it hot

21 Years - Carson Robison Trio [from Evans 78s]

relic of a slice
of america outside of blues & broadway
small theater variety show early radio
non-threatening folksy

My local colleague Nat Evans recently shared a collection of 78 RPM records that his grandfather had collected.

June 30, 2020
Symphony #1 - Bohuslav Martinů - Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Vaclav Neumann

maximum lush
everything is choral
a joint effort
no sound is made alone

there are not trees
only forest
ritmato tunes bounce off the geologic shelves of other tunes
bouncing

everybody is dressed alike
sinking back behind the curtain soon

The Minotaur - Elliott Carter - New York Chamber Symphony, Gerard Schwarz

a shift in point of view
this is witness music, not hero music
newsreel post cinema music
a new mimesis of time
not opera scenes, ballet works better
bodies without words

July 1, 2020
Castor & Polux - Harry Partch - Gate 5 Ensemble

robust

These are people making these sounds for those gathered in a real room.

full frontal

Peggy Sue - Buddy Holly [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]

I think the drummer left their snare on.
or an echo that responds differentially to each tom tom tom

the guitar solo comes on a bit strong, over done

Reap What You Sow - Billy Stewart [from The Best of Billy Stewart]

"a what a"
echoed by sax

Eye Myth - Stan Brakhage

caught in ecstatic webs
the device is deactivated

nine seconds goes by fast
watched it 5 or 6 times

When Children Pray - Lake Washington Singers, Betty Eisenbrey, JoAnne Deacon [from LWS Betty's Picks]

low hum constant relic, artifact

God Save The Queen - The Sex Pistols [collected from Dave Marsh's The Heart of Rock & Soul]

carefully arranged and recorded with nothing left in that doesn't sneer

July 3, 2020
Hi Ho - Aaron Keyt - Jill Stroming, harp; Monique Buzzarté (members of the UW Contemporary Group (ca 1982))

Aaron Keyt, seated, with guitar and case
asks the unanswered question
rubs chin (avuncular)
starts to really look
at the question

what else is it asking?

that spaced out harp rhythm is making it for me tonight

could it be arranged for piano solo, or clavichord? I'd like to play it.

Totus Tuus - Henryk Górecki - Robert Shaw Festival Singers, Robert Shaw [from Evocation of the Spirit]

wallows in it
a souped up anthem with pretensions of big A Art
for cathedral, but honestly, kind of tacky in comparison

the ending keeps on ending without end

this could go on all night

and he signals the actual end
at far too long last at last

with yet another

presumably written out

in rhythms

ri-

tar-


dan-



do




In Session at the Tintinabulary

June 29, 2020
Banned Rehearsal 1004 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt, Neal Kosály-Meyer



It was the 36th Bannediversary. Karen, Steve, Aaron, and I gathered in the yard and porch, masked, and Neal phoned in from Lake City Outpost. It was our first session together since March 9.

Postscripts

eighty-seven slim nil and none
incredible that she should perform her
work of love in god effects how comes it

remove quantification
focus on reality
for a change

Saturday, June 8, 2019

Playlist

Preface

"Stimulating Speculation no. 1: What something Is is merely our way of indexing the context to which we ascribe it."
J. K. Randall "Compose Yourself: A Manual for the Young" 1970

Texts

Live

June 1, 2019
Sunnyside, Washington
Sandel & Karrick
Robin Jackson and the Caravan
Wilsonville Festival of the Arts
Wilsonville, Oregon

And this is why I didn't blog last week. I spent the blogging time driving to and from Wilsonville (3+ hours each way).

Sandel & Karrick and two others were a light swing jazz band that gained my trust with some fine playing and by the covering of an obscurish song I actually knew! "The Frim Fram Sauce." Delish.

Robin Jackson and the Caravan had some more fine fiddle playing and a woman that switched between accordion and trumpet. Robin sang a fine original song about the best way to find the one of your dreams: on the dance floor. Get out there dudes! Shake that thing!

June 7, 2019
Lori Goldston: Rivulet
Chapel Performance Space
Good Shepherd Center, Seattle

Dave Abramson, drums & percussion
Haley Freedlund, trombone
Kole Galbraith, bass guitar
Lori Goldston, cello
Greg Kelley, trumpet
Austin Larkin Violin

Pre-auditory sentences:

The drum set sports a large square cymbal. Trombones, as a whole, are not built straight up and down. There is a warp. Microphones are discretely obvious spies. As are many ears. The large square cymbal is holy.

sound:

ultra slow
rococo chorales
rochocho corals (e)

Ben said of Bruckner "I'm in favor of anything that goes that slow." This is Bruckner in a cold dark land. Muffled blows on the bass drum.

Superb stuff Lori! I'm glad we got out to hear it. And then the next morning we had your strawberry jam on sourdough waffles. Equally intense.

Recorded

Sunnyside, Washington
May 25, 2019
Sonata in G minor, K. 12 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

no slack, taut
a discourse of taut pushing form to the front

Upon a . . . - Lake Washington Singers, Betty Eisenbrey, director [April 1966]

as the aperture closes gently
the silent movie kiss on the sward

Beyond and Back - X [from Wild Gift]

shit-kicker punk
bouncy battle verbal
shuffle

Lonely Girl - Screaming Trees [from Clairvoyance]

instrumental solo
or simply band without voice
impression live is different in kind from impression on recording:
live: a flow of focus among visual and audio
recorded: no "and"

Symphony in A, op. 141 (#15) - Dmitri Shostakovich - Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Vladimir Ashkenazy

the parts don't hang together
they combine and cross combine
attempt a consensus among a ghostly hall of shape-shifting changelings

1. emptiness (silliness) of the powered

2. weary suffering anger seething repressed, ignored, banished with the old faith lava monster doing biding time :: frivolous chains, but chains at that :: breaking point

3. meanwhile in plain day / gradations very fine indeed / between bureaucratical webs, secret handshakes, (the High Sign) /?/

Plato's shadow and aesthete's image in counterpoise

4. now is fate's time (it's a bitter comment upon two fellow political-minded composers: Rossini and Wagner)

under night's secrecy
it will come to it
(here be the stakes)

:skeleton key ↑↑↑↑↑↑

"...woe my road is spoken..." draft 5.4 Final - Keith Eisenbrey [July 2006]



If, in 21st Century contrapuntal practice, we have moved our focus along the axis toward individuation of voice and from the harmony of the whole it is because we understand that a new axis has arisen.

In the deep background this is a late generation riff on the good old 4-3 suspension chain.

May 27, 2019
Whiskey In The Jar (mix B) - Train Case [July 2011]

I adjusted the balance in the vocals and brought guitar in on verse 2, or rather suppressed the guitar track until then.

Intro - Ease [from Roots]
Sunnyside, Washington

working on precise sound
listen to the guitar how it pulls the cymbal sound tight
multi tempo
sequentially
big pretense of Manly Sound

Sonata in G Major, K. 13 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

loops and gates
proceeds like an algorithm: counters, stepping
music for the age of thinking clearly

Red River Blues - J. T. Adams [from The Art of Field Recording Vol. 1]

blue river reds
with some talk beforehand

Winnebago Warrior - Dead Kennedys [from Plastic Surgery Disasters/In God We Trust]

cheap laugh and not all that funny

Banned Telepath 6 Berkeley - Aaron Keyt [June 1986]

some other session (#65) plays off to the left
a bit of close sound hints that Aaron may be in the room
an abwords list: abandonment abatement abduction abeyance
Dong!! a potlid perhaps, cookware
we call Aaron. It's OK.
We hear a session stop during a session
Australian clicking sticks (see 982 below) in Seattle are recorded in Berkeley and sent back to Seattle
an audio-only skype session to be assembled as a whole only later but lined up ill so you'll have to put it together in your head on your own
our rows are not the same
NEWS! 2nd Bannediversary (the 35th will be 983 or 984 I think) Amontillado
a dial-up phone
where are Neal and Anna?
Oh. No.
paperformants by Neal Meyer
a problem with numbers
(there's that royalties tax spiel)

Trailer - Ashtray [a Rescued Record]

the dramatic appearance rising through the smoke effect from beneath the stage
one wonders: a collection of things she has heard guys say (or others) as political commentary.

Gradus 101 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [July 2006]

outside a distant plane makes mealy-mouth flange of the A naturals vibrating free
producing tones

a moment of silence
a time for prayer

On Ear and Ear - Hilary Tan [from Milton Babbitt: A Composers' Memorial]

Debussy smiles
restless motion
not afraid to end it twice

Shine Rock - Low Hums [from Shine Rock]

Lots of guitar and some vocalism making sounds that are like the shape of storytelling.

May 28, 2019
Gradus 294 - Neal Kosály-Meyer [July 2016]

being peaceful and dyadic
enjoying those low notes played quietly

Sonata in G Major, K. 14 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

the floor is slick
take care

Rock and Roll Music (live) - The Beatles [from Anthology Volume 2]

Not even The Beatles could compete with that screaming shrill.

Tiag Guls - Throbbing Gristle [from Greatest Hits]

disconnect as to how they arose through the visual arts and how they found me as sound, as a band, which isn't what they ever were either way.

Good Christian Men Rejoice - London Symphony Orchestra [from Listen to the Joy]

makes a halfhearted feint at development

You Speak Jealousy - Unwound [from Kill Rock Stars]

to imagine as the voice of one articulating something
the feeling of it?
sung as a box to put a thought in
this one is not a nice thought

Take Me To The Water - Rollo Dilworth - University Temple Chancel Choir; Chris Vincent, director; Howard Wolvington, piano]

(my church's choir, in which I sing tenor, performed just the Sunday before, disclosure done)

from an arrangement tradition (still trying to figure out what I mean by that, more later perhaps)
riffing on an older tradition

to what extent is it exacerbated rather than assisted by the music publishing industry

Whiskey In the Jar (Mix B Reverb) - Train Case [July 2011]


add light reverb
all it needed

Ko - Paul Kikuchi - Paul Kikuchi, percussion; Taina Karr, oboe and english horn; Ivan Arteaga, clarinet; Greg Sinibaldi, bass clarinet; Natalie Mai Hall, cello; John Teske, contrabass [from Autonomic]

recorded right up in their faces
pitches within tones
embodied boulders
it might take a river to move

May 29, 2019
Sonata in E minor, K. 15 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

the power of contrary motion
or of motion at all
sparingly applied

the bewilderment momentaire
when suddenly we know we have moved on
but know not whither

It's Worth Anything - Earl Gains [a Rescued Record]

this bounce bed is not smooth
is not without underlying peas of anxiety
but it is for real
and to be sure it do bounce

Think About It - Stevie Nix [from Bella Donna]

encapsulated message
take a pill
a capsule
mantra suggestion
advice
to be taken aurally
before leaving

May 30, 2019
Banned Telepath 6 Greenwood - Karen (Meyer) Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey [June 1986]

we each seem to be handling our microphones
or (ah ha!)
we are recording the taping of the microphones to the wall
it will all be on 101, stay tuned
and of course the Amontillado (see Berkeley above)
and cookies too
tweety birds are heard but they are the loud ones outside now not anything on the tape
I poked my self outside to be sure

We speak to Aaron at the same time, but offset, perforce

clicking sticks (see below and above) twice

discussion of the trip to Downunderland
the smell of Amontillado on tape

2 years in, establishing tradition out of teacups
this is it folks
this is how Banned Rehearsal began
this is the first sound
oh no uh oh oh dear oh heck
twice as many couches
cranberry satin and pink lace
I got a bug in my amontillado
other than that
it's dead
everybody knows the chorus more or less

uh oh the bug's gone

the ukulele stays in tune for one year

June 4, 2019
Goin' Cali - Bruce Springsteen [from Tracks]

The West: toward death, the promised land
Bruce does Independent
a musician can do something like this when they's got nothing to lose by it or when they are so big no one will remember that they did it anyway

Banned Rehearsal 705 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Neal Kosály-Meyer [July 2006]



im-Vögel-ating geese and ducks
shadow play on a hot day
drums sneak in among the toots and hoots
goose keeps it real

June 5, 2019
So Cool - Choke The Pope [from Emotional Material]

even the guitar sound hangs up toward the sinusoidal
hard to belong when everyone is title of track, it is
(attack on disaffectitude by out-cooling the so cool

Sonata in B-flat Major, K. 16 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder

The science of oblique sequitur (neither non nor non-non)

June 6, 2019
Pitches Low and Inside - Stuart Dempster - Marzena Music Ensemble [from Hendrix Uncovered]

Dempster Stu
Dijeri  Du

Cistern
blothern

bone
tone

gone
too soon

Every Day I Have The Blues - Billy Stewart [from The Best of Billy Stewart]

He allows the pitchiness of the drum kit to build into a rhythmonic groove.
Who was his drummer? Was that him himself? Damn!

set back
do it again
done

Is That All? - U2 [from October]

A song is buried in there among the guitar (nice job Edge) and hook (good enough). Probably not enough song to bother much with.

I Believe - REM [from Life's Ritch Pageant]

Hey, don't stop, I was digging that finger pickin'!

phrases on stickies posted on a revolving lyricbelt squeezbox.

there is something almost Renaissance-harmony-ish about how it hangs in counterpoint space.

UCLA Experimental Workshop Ensemble - Elaine Barkin, Benjamin Boretz, Lindsay Clare, David Open Space 12]
Jones, Jay Keister, Grace M, Ben Thigpen [from Open Space 12]

the room is made small with close sounds
close sounds can be heard moving
percussion and variously excited strings
punctuated by sax and crumar(?) ((synth of choice)) (((NB we prefer Wurlitzer)))
neither passage episode nor selection
an hollow
a grove
or a thicket

In Session at the Tintinabulary

May 27, 2019
Gradus 349 - Neal Kosály-Meyer

all
all this and
all this

7th chords arose as a means of mediating between the cognitive demands of pitch class and just intonation.

Does astonishment come to the roses, or do the roses come to astonishment?
How does one come to the astonishment of roses? ↔ ↔ establish the environment within which sufficient complexity exists so that astonishment will arise as summoned. The voice-leading trick there is there but sounds like something else cognized.

June 3, 2019
Banned Rehearsal 982 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Steve Kennedy, Aaron Keyt



I was intent on scraping and clicking with wood sounds

Postscripts

longings 1 of dark night and its traits it
will be a good thing to leave sad the fruit
of and the happy traits about which it

the wanderer
in the house of fire
soon