A leaf

Cryptonomicon

I seldom read novels, really. Well, I seldom read them to the end, and I am often disappointed when I do, feeling that I have wasted a lot of time for very little long-term gain.

Neal Stephenson's novel Cryptonomicon is 1,152 pages long, in the crappy paperback volume that I am going to throw away the minute I finish it, probably late tonight.

It takes a lot of clever writing and plotting to keep me going on a novel of this size. A few laughs also help, and I find this book one of the most amusing things that I have read in 20 years of so, since I read Enderby, by Anthony Burgess. It is also the kind of book that whips your head around a few times, so that afterwards, you think a little differently.

I read a book on the history of codes and ciphers when I was in high school, and it interested me a lot, though it got only as far as the Vigenere scheme. Neal's book goes a great deal further, because cryptography has gone much further.

But really it is the humor and entertaining similes that will force me to buy a better copy someday and reread it.

New shakuhachi pieces

I have added several new pieces to the shakuhachi scores page.

There is a new solo piece in western notation, called 'No Answers', and a second solo piece written in Kinko-ryu notation. This is handwritten and scanned in as a JPG file.

I have added three violin-shakuhachi duets that I wrote to play with a friend at work who is also a student. 'Water Mirror has the hardest violin part, and 'Pear Tree Branch' the most difficult shakuhachi part, I think.

Last is a piece which I wrote and performed in church recently - I sang the voice part and played the shakuhachi part, accompanied by a keyboard koto sound. This is written in the pseudo-Japanese style of my chamber opera 'Komachi'.

Mistake corrected

I have updated my last posted composition because of an error in the second piece in the set. My transliteration/annotation of the Chinese text had the wrong 'tone' or 'intonation' for one of the words - this had to be changed to make the text comprehensible.

I doubt this has caused anyone any inconvenience, but if so, my apologies.

Three Tang Poems

I have placed some new scores and Midi files onto the 'Choral' page of my web site. These three pieces for SATB choir with piano are intended to be performed as a set. The poems together contain the faint outline of a story - a Chinese monk prepares for the visit of a brother from Japan, and in the third poem, the Japanese monk sails home in his little boat.

The texts are in the original Mandarin - much thanks to Jerry Huang of the Chinese Chorus of Cambridge for his detailed help and critiques of the text setting. Thanks also to Heather Chu, director of the chorus, for suggesting that I might write something for them.

Note about 'Going to Sleep'

Eh, I forgot to mention that I have an MP3 of a music-boxish accompaniment for the song, so if you would like to have that, just email me at charlesturner9(at-sign)yahoo.com.

Pattern Recognition

Just finished a novel by cyber-punker William Gibson, called Pattern Recognition. It's a sort of mystery/thriller set in the present - no fancy sci-fi trappings here, though there is a lot of techie talk.

The protagonist is a sort of fashion scout consultant who has great street sense for fashion and a number of phobias towards certain advertising labels. The mystery involves pieces of film footage that are left around on the Net: who is leaving them, and is there hidden spy-type info encrypted in them?

There's a nice balance of physical action, detailed observation (often of clothing) and inner world in this novel, and it's extremely well plotted and paced. I really cared about the characters, especially Cayse Pollard, with her neuroses and courage. She reminded me a bit of my favorite hard-boiled woman warrior, Smilla in Smilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Hoeg.

Well done, William Gibson!

Another new art song

I just added a new song, Going to Sleep, to my web site. It's repetitive and strophic, but the accompaniment is rhythmically ambiguous in a way that keeps it interesting, I think. The singing range is not wide, and it should be easy to sing, if you can count.

The song is all about looking at your newborn baby and realizing what an immense undertaking a life is, and how delicate.

As I say in the score, the accompaniment should be rather mechanical, but the voice should be expressive.

New piece for student cellists

I have put a new piece for four cellos on the Chamber Music page of my web site (www.hand2ear.org). It is supposed to be relatively easy to play - it may be that only the cello 1 part goes out of first position, but I didn't check carefully. It's not a very long piece, and the rhythms are pretty simple, but the journey is worthwhile, I think. I wrote this for Mollie Glazer, a cello player, teacher and composer who lives on Nantucket.

Happy playing...

Another essential book

Don't Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate--The Essential Guide for Progressives
by George Lakoff

Conservatives ought to read this book, too, because it is such a good analysis of conservative as well as progressive values. Revelatory!

An essential book

Impro: Improvisation and the Theatre
by Keith Johnstone

This book ought to be read by EVERYBODY, not just people interested in theater. It discusses the ways that education harms us and ways to make life full and colorful. It examines the ways that we become blocked emotionally and imaginatively, and gives exercises to free us. The chapters on Mask and trance are amazing.

I can't imagine a person reading this book and not being changed for the better.