Album Notes: Chanteuse

JACQUELINE HUMBERT

Chanteuse

songs of a different sort

*Mosquitolove*	Sam Ashley
*Attunement*	David Rosenboom
*Via Dolorita, street of sorrows, street of sighs*	Joan La Barbara
*Don’t Get Your Hopes Up*	Robert Ashley
*Short Subject*	George Manupelli
*Profile*	Jacqueline Humbert
*Listen…!*	James Tenney
*A Pregnant Pause*	Larry Polansky
*Lullaby*	Alvin Lucier
*Peace Piece*	Gustavo Matamoros
*Empty Words*	Robert Ashley
*Grace*	Katrina Krimsky
*Adieu*	Jacqueline Humbert & David Rosenboom
*Oasis in the Air*	Jacqueline Humbert & David Rosenboom

Chanteuse is a collection of new or previously unreleased songs, many of which were written for me by a broad range of contemporary American composers. My performance style resides somewhere between musical speech and melodic interpretation in a lyrical, poetic approach to the articulation of words, capitalizing on their inherent sound shapes, vernacular and colloquial origins, and intricate vocal rhythms. (Really!) I am fortunate to have such a wonderful variety of works to present in this collection, all of which extend, reinterpret, and re-conceive what we think of as belonging to the musical genre, song. (JH)

Mosquitolove by Sam Ashley (5:46)

I..........met a well-to-do woman who owned a horse
another was unknown
the horse and I were old friends

I..........see, it was only dynamic tension
early onset rigor mortis
torn between heaven and earth

I..........was eaten by a bear
and spit back out again whole
relax, the wheat and I are one

I..........was in paradise with cannibals
camping with friends forever
the breeze, the palms

I..........look out airplane windows now
I’ve seen a full circle rainbow
the plane’s shadow dancing over the clouds

I..........think it’s mosquito love

Attunement by David Rosenboom (4:25)

Socializing with the rocks
As beings in their own right
Expansion of personhood means
Living along with the world in continuous birth
Attunement
Children model the whole world on themselves
Children do not distinguish between their own minds and the world
Attunement
Even scientists find it difficult to believe that
Non-human animals, natural phenomena, and theoretical entities
Do not operate on the basis of intentions and beliefs
Attunement
When in doubt about whether something is alive,
Assume that it is
Attunement
Let’s anthropomorphize
Revealing a sense of self through what becomes
We anthropomorphize
Attunement
No physical barrier separates mind from the world
Migrating, shape shifting
Dreaming is roaming through space and time
Making active forays into the world
Hmm
Attunement

Via Dolorita, street of sorrows, street of sighs by Joan La Barbara (4:06)
for voice with a sonic fabric of multiple layers of voices

The title, “Via Dolorita, street of sorrows, street of sighs”, is a play on the word “dolor”, meaning great sorrow or sadness. In composing the song, I first asked Jacqueline to record a series of sighs, reflecting on the words: regret, sorrow, wishful thinking, need, longing, desire, and loss. My original concept was that these sighs would be used to create a sonic fabric, placed in the stereo horizon like clouds in a Magritte sky, over which the song itself would be laid. I then composed a series of phrases, which Jacqueline recorded. I worked with these in Pro Tools®, layering the phrases and interweaving a selection of sighs as rhythmic punctuation and as mood indicators. Jacqueline then sang an introduction and several key phrases I composed, along with an improvised component. (JLB)

Don’t Get Your Hopes Up by Robert Ashley (6:32)
This song was composed for Ms. Humbert’s project, and subsequently included it in his opera, Dust. (JH)

Recently I’ve been getting roses at the door.
The one’s I’ve got are hardly faded before I get some more.
The note attached, addressed to me, is always the same.
It just says, “I love you, and thanks for everything.”

(chorus)

Don’t get your hopes up.
Don’t get your hopes up.

I keep one petal from each bunch in my dresser drawer.
I count the petals every day, thinking what they’re for.
It might have been a one-time thing, the chance will never come again,
But then there’s “maybe” and “perhaps” and “possibly” and “when...”

(refrain)
Don’t get you hopes up I say when I’m alone.
Don’t get your hopes up. It is writ in stone.
In winter it gets colder, the kids are gone all day.
Then, there’s piano lessons and the P.T.A.
In summer it gets warmer, we have picnics on the beach,
But there’s a little part of my heart now that always will be out of reach.
(chorus)

Thank you, they always get here when he’s not around.
I hide the paper and pretend I got them in town.
He says it must cost a fortune for what I spend on them.
I say I’ve got to have them for the mood I’m in.
(chorus)
He pretends he doesn’t know. Maybe he doesn’t care.
He just knows that in the mood I’m in, there are roses everywhere.
I know that it will stop one day and that will break my heart.
I just have to remind myself that we are worlds apart.
(refrain)
(chorus)

I’m not sorry at all. I don’t think that it was bad.
It was an accident of friendship, which is all we ever had.
It was like a stormy night, but, strangely, all the stars were out.
And when we finally touched, I thought this is what friendship’s all about.
(chorus)
Now it’s a secret locked inside me, in a place so deep and far.
Sometimes I’d like to tell it, but you know how people are.
I guess there’s not much more to say, except you’re still my friend.
I’m looking at the roses, hoping one day the chance will come again.
(refrain)
(chorus...repeat...)

Short Subject by George Manupelli (2:28)

Picked up the mail this morning,
Hoping for a word from you.
Between the gas and electric bill,
Was a perfumed letter from you.
These were the words that it said.
I love you, I miss you, I need you.
I can’t get you out of my head.
I love you, I miss you, I need you,
Written from another (wo)man’s bed.
I love you, I miss you, I need you.
I can write these words too.

I love you, I miss you, I need you.
I’m returning your junk mail to you.
I’m returning your junk mail to you.

Profile by Jacqueline Humbert (6:55)
a song of questions and answers about things of a personal sort

How are you, really?
Are you satisfied with your life?
Are you interested in things, generally speaking?
Do you have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep?
Are you having difficulties with concentration?
Do you exercise?
Are you having difficulties with your work?
Are you fearful?
Do you often feel weak or ineffective?
Are you overly concerned about family issues?
How is your sexual life? Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know.
Do you feel irritated often?
Do you feel something bad is about to happen?
Do tasks often seem insurmountable?
Is alcohol a problem for you?
Are you anxious frequently throughout the day?
When was the last time you laughed out loud?
How do you feel now?
Are you, what is often called, "blue”?
Do joyous people cause you to become cross and impatient?
Do disturbing thoughts enter your mind that are difficult to rid yourself of?
Are you presently at risk for harming yourself or any other person?
What are the options you see here?
Do you blame yourself for things?
Do you feel worthless?
Did you always feel this way?
Do you find yourself in frequent arguments?
Do you feel excessively nervous?
How often do you look at the clock?
How often do you check your e-mail?
Is laughter from afar a problem for you?
Does the sound of a doorbell frighten you?
Do you peer out the window for extended periods of time?
Have you received an invitation anytime in the recent past?
When did you last leave the house?
Distance overwhelms you, does it not?
Are your family members ever in touch?
When was your last visitor received?
How often does your best friend call?
How many friends do you have...do you even trust?
Are you often this lonely?
What do you do with all this time on your hands?
Are you hopeless about the future?
Do you experience fear when the phone rings…or when it does not?
Do you bathe often and for extended periods of time?
Do you mind your manners when dining alone?
Do the days seem long, the nights interminable?
Does the dawn loom as a formidable certainty?
Do you entertain thoughts of ending your life from time to time?
What do you see as viable alternatives for you at this time?
What are the options you see here?
Do you feel something is wrong with your mind?

Listen...! by James Tenney (4:29)
in memorium John Lennon (and Wilhelm Reich)

(we-you-wa-ma-na-ta tell oo-woo-woo-wa)
Listen, little man, time is running out.
The earth is growing weary of you and me.
The eagle and the dolphin, the Hopi and coyote
won’t be here to mourn for you and me.
A man is just a man, a woman just a woman,
another chance to understand you and me.
The answer lies inside us,
we’re free to choose for good or evil.
No one else can make that choice for you and me.

No more heroes, no more gods, no more leaders, idols, saints,
because it’s you and I that have to do it now.
No more Jesus, no more Buddha, no more Marx, Mohammed, Mao,
‘cause it’s you and I that have to do it now.

(we-you wa-ma-na-ta-tell oo-woo-woo-wa)
Listen, little woman, “life is very short.”
The earth is growing weary of you and me.
We’ve plundered her resources,
and fouled the nest that gave us life
and hope and time to love...you and me.
A man is just a man, a woman just a woman,
but look again at what we’ve done, you and me.
We’ve murdered our own brothers,
raped and maimed our sisters, daughters,
mothers fathers, sons and lovers, you and me.

No more heroes, no more gods, no more leaders, idols, saints
because it’s you and I that have to do it now.
No more Jesus, no more Buddha, no more Marx, Mohammed, Mao,
‘cause it’s you and I that have to do it now.
No more heroes, no more gods, no more leaders, idols, saints
because it’s you and I that have to do it now.
No more Jesus, no more Buddha, no more Marx, Mohammed, Mao
No more martyrs, no more saviors
No more gurus or disciples.
No more heroes, no more gods.
No more heroes, no more gods.
no more, no more, no more/no more, no more, no-o no more!!

Oh you and I will have to do it now.

A Pregnant Pause by Larry Polansky (2:26)
Larry wrote this piece as a sketch, and presented the score to us as a gift in anticipation of the birth of Daniel Aaron Rosenboom. (JH)

Lullaby by Alvin Lucier (4:42)
for Amanda Stokes Lucier

Gently blow white noise (whispered sound) around the child’s head at pitches and speeds and in directions and shapes that suggest the motions of wind, water, weather, birds, fish, plants, trees, stars, planets, meteors, rockets, jets, ghosts, smoke, flying cups and saucers and other real or imaginary phenomena.

Taking the middle of the forehead as a reference point, trace ovals, circles, squares, rectangles, boxes, cubes, triangles, diamonds, figure eights, ellipses, parabolas, spirals, double helixes and other geometric forms.

Inscribe in air, from right to left and backwards, letters of the alphabet, words, phrases, sentences, names of people, places, things, puns, stories, epigrams. Add, subtract, multiply, divide. Solve simple equations. Design computer programs.

Draw glyphs, runes, moons, mazes, phases, routes, ways, trails, and maps of known or uncharted lands. Sketch faces, places, inner or outer spaces, turtles, trout, eagles, beagles, birds and nests, loons, spoons, fawns, lawns, boulders, shoulders, horses, elk, skiffs and sails, beavers, ponds, willows, pillows, pots, pans, tin cans, nets, rods, reels, creels, cranes, trains, weather vanes, springs, wings, Chinese kites, hellgrammites, trilobites, skies, flies, beds, redds, arrowheads, and the figures and forms of other things that come to mind,

From time to time quietly imitate sounds such as perking pots, steaming kettles, feeding minnows, purring cats, cooing doves and, taking into account the locative properties of human ears, place these sounds in specific geographical locations around the infant’s head.

Peace Piece by Gustavo Matamoros (7:21)
This piece was constructed from a number of phrases, each containing a word or syllable with the sound of “peace” or “piece.” These phrases were recorded in a casual, straightforward reading, with the instruction to assign specific pitches to these sounds. The phrases were then arranged and electronically embellished by the composer with chords and processed saw accompaniment. (JH)

Empty Words by Robert Ashley (3:08)

I heard those little lies, they told about the country rose.
They whispered love is blind, as almost everybody knows.
They told me you’d be gone and I’d be broken hearted.
Only a fool would listen to empty words, that drive love away.

They said you’d have to lie to me about the things you do.
I thought those empty words were true so I was lying too.
I broke a vow of love and now I’m broken hearted.
Only a fool would listen to empty words, that drive love away.

Foolish empty words that lead your heart astray—
Whatever a fool believes, he has just himself to blame.

The castle you and I have built to love has fallen down.
The weeds, just like those empty words have grown up all around.
You’re gone just like they said and I am broken hearted.
Only a fool would listen-I went astray, and this fool must pay.

Grace by Katrina Krimsky (2:38)
This song is a poem inspiring flight to new horizons and release from past bonds, supported by the lilting accompaniment derived from Air Tendre by 17th century composer, Jean-Baptiste Lully. (KK)

Leave the past and that ol’ place,
Layered with years of tonal lace.
Break channel open to a timeless space,
Tender air input your grace.
Listen, listen we can hear
Notes of truth always clear.

Free the source to visions galore.
Mirrored tones make dialogue soar.
Create the sound and love will abound.
Joy and grace transcends and surrounds.
Listen, listen we can hear
Notes of truth always clear.

Adieu by Jacqueline Humbert and David Rosenboom (3:28)

le telephone,
he rang.
the mistral blew translucent curtains fluttering through moonlight
and horror rained, then echoed in the crackle of that night.
allons
alone
mama, adieu...
white light, applause, retreat.
then blackness and a silence and a sorrow…
as I lay splayed upon a suddenly sharp, barren plane
mirrored, cold and luminous;
alone with my laurels, accolades and minions.
the warmth of an insanity cloaked me in deception and descent,
curdling my heart along the way
as I acquired the limp, insipid attitude of the abandoned.
oh, I have raged against the moon,
its wane and wax,
crushing petals underfoot
in a mad and frenzied dance,
countering the imbalance of impermanence,
trembling at the yawn of an abyss,
the loss of all stability in death’s untimely theft;
and left in wallowing, in anger
in hunger and in need
but, most of all, in the crush of just aloneness.
wearing my heart upon a shirtsleeve,
the wind can make me weep, the rain engulf me,
while the world watches from a safe and scary distance.
I broke,
crumbling into dust , dream and remembrance.
who else to rage at but the moon and stars,
the oh so uncertainty of a tomorrow?
now, I’ve grown weary from this endless waltz,
worn thin as ancient ballerina slippers,
my soul, balding,
grappling with irregular rhythms in a cycle of existence…
ah, to rage no more against the innocent dispassion of the sky,
to find serenity at last
and simply say, adieu.

Oasis in the Air by Jacqueline Humbert and David Rosenboom (6:03)

Always wandrin’ on the planet, always movin’ around…
I’d view chaos in the cities and sorrow in town
Then the lure of the desert would arouse me again
And in its vast folds I’d find me an old, faithful friend…

Oh, the sagebrush, ocotillo and Joshua tree
Are swaying in the hot breeze and beckoning me,
And the shadows in the twilight of that sweet prickly pear
Create the shape of something orchid, there’s an oasis in the air…
Create the shape of something orchid, there’s an oasis in the air…

Seeking solace in the shadows to be found at high noon
Listening to the desert creatures working out a new tune
And then soothed by the power of that time-frozen pace,
I would linger in this vast, arid, timeless, clear space…

Oh, the sage brush, ocotillo and Joshua tree
Are swaying in the hot breeze and beckoning me,
And the shadows in the twilight of that sweet prickly pear,
Create the shape of something orchid, there’s an oasis in the air…
Create the shape of something orchid, there’s an oasis in the air…
Create…air…(slow)

Composers

Robert Ashley isa distinguished figure in American contemporary music, holds an international reputation for his work in new forms of opera and multi-disciplinary projects, pioneered opera-for-television, and his recorded works are acknowledged classics of language in a musical setting. In the 1960’s, Ashley organized Ann Arbor’s legendary ONCE Festival and directed the ONCE group. During the 1970’s, he directed the Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College, toured with the Sonic Arts Union, and produced and directed Music with Roots in the Aether, a 14-hour television opera/documentary about the work and ideas of seven American composers. Ashley wrote and produced Perfect Lives, an opera for television widely considered to be the pre-cursor of “music-television.” Staged versions of Perfect Lives and Atalanta (Acts of God) and the monumental tetralogy, Now Eleanor’s Idea, have toured throughout Europe, Asia, and the United States. More recently, he has completed Balseros for Florida Grand Opera, When Famous Last Words Fail You for the American Composers Orchestra, Your Money, My Life, Goodbye for Bayerischer Rundfunk, and Dust for premier at the Kanagawa Prefectural Concert Hall (Kanagawa Arts Council) in Yokohama, Japan.Having composed new kinds of opera for forty years, Ashley offers the following perspective: (1962 ) in memoriam ... Kit Carson(opera) presented a choice among 256 plot-diagrams to be realized by any producer with any kinds of resources (minimum of sixteen, independent performers or sound sources). The most recent (2002), Celestial Excursions (for five voices, any number of solo instruments and real-time computer-realized sound layering). His work has been described by critics as “sounds easy.” Performers have described it as “exceptionally difficult.”

Sam Ashley has devoted his life to the ongoing invention of an experimental trance-mysticism; his music/art is the “worldly” result of this. He has been creating “mysticism with an audience in mind” pieces for more than 30 years. Each song or other kind of musical work by Sam is about some particular exploration conducted through trance. Authentic spirit possession is frequently central to his work, a specific version of spirit possession typically being used in the performance of a given piece. “Mosquitolove” is part of a larger work entitled Harry The Dog That Bit You, and though it’s not directly about spirit possession it is a study of closely related effects, ultimately dealing with what goes on during a “werewolf” transformation.

Katrina Krimsky, pianist and composer, has developed an individual voice that has grown from her highly developed roots in European classical traditions and blended a variety of influences from world music, African-American music, and the contemporary avant garde. Born and raised in the American South, she began musical studies at a young age with her mother and eventually attended the Eastman School of Music as a student of Cecile Staub Genhart. She has taught keyboard studies at prestigious institutions, including American University and Mills College, and has performed internationally since the mid-1960’s. Her repertoire has covered a broad range of genres, including solo recitals of 20th Century piano music, chamber music with the Ars Nova Trio and others, performances with the Center for Creative and Performing Arts Ensemble in Buffalo, NY, being a member of La Monte Young’s Eternal Dream House ensemble, playing “The Pulse” in Terry Riley’s In C for Columbia Records, working with jazz greats, such as Woody Shaw and Bobby Hutchison, and developing her own ensembles with musicians like bassist, Peter Kowald, saxophonist, Trevor Watts, flautist, Lisa Hansen, sitarist, Krishna Bhatt, and her prominent former student, performer/composer, Barbara Higbie. She has been closely associated with composers like Karlheinz Stockhausen, Henri Pousseur, Luc Ferrari, David Rosenboom, Jon Hassell, David Behrman, Terry Riley, Pandit Pran Nath, Robert Ashley, and others. She has recorded works by many of these artists, along with her own compositions and exemplary interpretations of music by Samuel Barber and Heitor Villa-Lobos on ECM, 1750 Arch Records, Transonic, Spoon Records, Mills Anthology, CTE, and her own labels. In New York’s Merkin Hall, she recently premiered David Rosenboom’s twelve-movement work for piano, Bell Solaris, which was written for her. Katrina currently maintains presence in Zurich, Switzerland and San Francisco, California.

Joan La Barbara’s career as a composer/performer/sound artist explores the human voice as a multi-faceted instrument, expanding traditional boundaries in compositions for multiple voices, chamber ensemble, music theater, orchestra and interactive technology, using a unique vocabulary of experimental and extended vocal techniques - multiphonics, circular singing, ululation and glottal clicks - that have become her “signature sounds”. Among her awards are the prestigious DAAD Artist-in-Residency in Berlin, 7 NEA grants and numerous commissions including Saint Louis Symphony, Meet The Composer and European radio. She is Artistic Director of the Carnegie Hall series “When Morty met John”, has produced 11 recordings of her own works, including,ShamanSong (New World) andVoice is the Original Instrument (a 2-cd set of her seminal works from the ‘70s for Lovely Music), served as producer and performer on internationally-acclaimed recordings of music by John Cage and Morton Feldman and has premiered landmark compositions, including Morton Subotnick’s chamber opera Jacob’s Room; the title role in Robert Ashley’s opera Now Eleanor’s Idea; Philip Glass and Robert Wilson’s Einstein on the Beach at Festival d’Avignon; Morton Feldman’s “Three Voices”; and Steve Reich’s “Drumming”.73 Poems, her collaboration with text-artist Kenneth Goldsmith, was included in The American Century Part II at The Whitney Museum of American Art.

Alvin Lucier has pioneered in many areas of music composition and performance, including the notation of performers’ physical gestures, the use of brain waves in live performance, the generation of visual imagery by sound in vibrating media, and the evocation of room acoustics for musical purposes. His recent works include a series of sound installations and works for solo instruments, chamber ensembles, and orchestra in which, by means of close tunings with pure tones, sound waves are caused to spin through space. Since l970 he has taught at Wesleyan University.

George Manupelli is a pioneer in the world of experimental film, most notably for the classic Dr. Chicago series of films. He was creator of the internationally recognized Ann Arbor Film Festival, a primary member of the legendary Once Group of experimental theatre and a gifted artist, internationally represented and exhibited. With a doctorate in art education from Columbia University, he taught in the United States and Canada for many years, most notably at the University of Michigan, York University and the San Francisco Art Institute. He now enjoys retirement at his converted church residence and studio in the White Mountains of Bethlehem, New Hampshire.

Gustavo Matamoros was born in 1957, in Venezuela where he became interested in experimentation with short wave radios, tape recorders and listened to the progressive rock music of Egg and Gentle Giant. In the mid-1970’s he heard “In The Bag” by Joseph Celli and became a composer. He studied music in Boston, and since 1979 has lived in Miami, where he finished school, met Earle Brown, and organized and administered the Annual Sub-Tropics Festival of experimental music, the South Florida Composer’s Alliance and the Sound Arts Workshop studio. In his work, he experiments with sound, words and gates, plays the saw, and explores sound’s ability to contain and deliver information. In describing it, he writes, “For the past 18 years or so, (my) attitude toward the work has been such that the result of my experiments ultimately influences the way I live. What I’ve been trying to do as an artist who works with sound is instruct myself on how to listen better.”

Larry Polansky was born in 1954 and is a composer, theorist, performer, software and systems designer, teacher, writer, editor and publisher. His interests include live interactive intelligent computer music, computer composition, theories of form, and experimental intonation. He holds the Joseph Straus 1922 Chair of Music at Dartmouth College, teaches in the graduate program in electro-acoustic music, chairs the Music Department and is co-director of the Bregman Electro-Acoustic Music Studio. For ten years he worked at the Mills College Center for Contemporary Music and is founder and co-director of Frog Peak Music (A Composers’ Collective). He lives in Hanover, New Hampshire.

James Tenney was born in 1934 in Silver City, New Mexico, and grew up in Arizona and Colorado, where he received his early training as a pianist and composer. His teachers and mentors have included Eduard Steuermann, Carl Ruggles, Edgard Varèse, Harry Partch, and John Cage. He is a performer as well as a composer, and was a pioneer in the field of electronic and computer music. He has written works for a variety of media, both instrumental and electronic, many of them using alternative tuning systems. He is the author of several articles and books on musical acoustics, music, and musical form and perception. A teacher since 1966, most recently Distinguished Research Professor at York University (Toronto), where he taught for twenty-four years, he is currently appointed to the Roy E. Disney Family Chair in Musical Composition at the California Institute of the Arts. His music is published and distributed by Sonic Art Editions (Baltimore), Frog Peak (Lebanon, New Hampshire), and the Canadian Music Centre, and has been recorded on the Artifact, col legno, CRI, Hat[now]ART, Koch International, Mode, Musicworks, Nexus, oodiscs, Soundprints, SYR, and Toshiba EMI labels.

Humbert and Rosenboom

Jacqueline Humbert’s work as a performer, visual artist and designer of graphics, costumes and sets has been exhibited, published, recorded, broadcast and presented around the world since the early 1970’s. Originally trained as a visual artist, her performance directions began with inventing the character, J. Jasmine, documented on the record, MyNew Music (1978), followed by Daytime Viewing (1980), both created in collaboration with David Rosenboom. She continued to pursue performance and design and became particularly well known for her collaborative work with leading innovative artists, filmmakers, choreographers and composers. This is exemplified by her more than 20-year contribution to Robert Ashley’s music as both a singer and designer of sets and costumes, including the principal role in Improvement, part of a quartet of operas entitled, Now Eleanor’s Idea, and most recently, in Dust, and Celestial Excursions. She has recently collaborated on a new performance duet, entitled “Au Pair”, based on her original story set to music by Robert Ashley in the context of his larger opera, Atalanta, and a duet version of his Foreign Experiences with Sam Ashley. She has designed costumes and properties for many modern dance choreographers, like Alonzo King, Joanna Haigood, and the Oakland Ballet’s acclaimed productions of Emily Keeler’s, The Awakening and Our Town. A performance version of Chanteuse was premiered at the Subtropics Festival in Miami (2002) and later at Lotus Fine Arts in New York to critical acclaim, the EarJam festival in Los Angeles, and California Institute of the Arts. She lives in Southern California where she teaches experimental performance in the School of Theatre at CalArts.

David Rosenboom is a composer, performer, interdisciplinary artist, conductor, author and educator. Since the 1960’s, he has explored ideas about spontaneously emerging musical forms, languages for improvisation, new techniques in scoring for ensembles, cross-cultural collaborations, performance art and multi-media, the interactive music of the infosphere, compositional algorithms, extended musical interface with the human nervous system, and the evolution of human consciousness. His work is widely distributed and presented around the world and he is known as a pioneer in American experimental music. At California Institute of the Arts, he has been Dean, School of Music, and Conductor, New Century Players, since 1990 and was Co-Director, Center for Experiments in Art, Information and Technology, 1990-1998. He has worked in numerous innovative institutions, held the Darius Milhaud Chair at Mills College, was awarded the George A. Miller Professorship at the University of Illinois, and was a co-founder of the Music Department York University, Toronto. His recent projects have included Bell Solaris, twelve movements for piano on transformed myths; Seeing the Small in the Large, a cycle of six movements for orchestra on melody, idea, nature, mood, spirit, and back to melody; On Being Invisible II (Hypatia Speaks to Jefferson in a Dream), a self-organizing, multi-media opera on transmigration over history employing analysis of performers’ brain signals; Naked Curvature (Four Memories of the Daimon), a modular score inspired by mystical writings of W.B. Yeats and others for instruments, whispering voices, and interactive computer music system; performances of little known music from the David Tudor Archives at the Getty Research Institute; a new CD of Zones of Influence, a concert-length work about morphogenesis for percussionist, William Winant, and the Touché, electronic instrument; a new recording of “And Come Up Dripping” with oboist, Libby van Cleve, and computer signal processing; writings on interdisciplinary topics combining neuroscience, music, cognition, self-organizing systems, evolution, interstellar communication, and a book about his approach to compositional models, which he terms, “propositional music”. He states, “To be in a constant state of evolution and understand its processes—this seems to be a consistent thematic thread that reveals itself winding throughout a great deal of my music. I love encountering forms that are dynamically emerging and providing opportunities for audiences to become immersed in them as well. Enfolding aesthetic, philosophical, and artistic notions inside unfolding, somewhat unpredictable processes, with both visceral and intellectual results, that’s part of the goal.” Lots more information about his work can be found at his website: http://music.calarts.edu/~david

General Credits:

Produced by Jacqueline Humbert and David Rosenboom.

Vocals by Jacqueline Humbert, with harmony vocals by Sam Ashley on “Don’t Get Your Hopes Up”, “Short Subject”, “Empty Words”, and “Oasis in the Air”.

Musical and soundscape arrangements, electronic realizations, editing and final production by David Rosenboom in his studio at California Institute of the Arts, except as detailed below.

Voice and piano recordings engineered by Tom Erbe in the Dizzy Gillespie Recording Studio at California Institute of the Arts, with assistance by Miriam Kolar and Bob Bellerue, except as detailed below.

Digital editing of voice tracks on “Mosquitolove”, “Don’t Get Your Hopes Up”, “Short Subject”, “Listen….!”, “Empty Words”, “Grace”, and “Oasis in the Air” by Sam Ashley along with valuable critical feedback.

Digital transfer of voice recordings into ProTools® setups by Clay Chaplin.

Voice recording for “Profile” and “Adieu” and the sighs in “Via Dolorita, street of sorrows, street of sighs” engineered by Gustavo Matamoros with Sam Ashley during Ms. Humbert’s residency at the South Florida Composers’ Alliance, Sound Arts Workshop in Miami during the annual Sub-Tropics Festival.

Thanks to the George and MaryLou Boone Fund for Artistic Advancement for their grant in support of David Rosenboom’s creative work and his studio in which much of Chanteuse was created.

I am deeply indebted to David Rosenboom for his inspired and creative musical arrangements, electronic realizations and recording production, but most of all for his love, support and dedication to this project. (JH)

Additional Credits:

“Via Dolorita, street of sorrows, street of sighs”:
Vocal melody recording by David Rosenboom and Tom Erbe.
Digital construction of voice assemblage by Joan LaBarbara.

“Don’t Get Your Hopes Up”:
Original electronic orchestration by Robert Ashley, processed and slightly expanded by David Rosenboom.

“Profile”:
Piano accompaniment and vocal protests by Lindsay Claire Rosenboom (age 4-7).

“Listen….!”:
Piano, David Rosenboom.

“Peace Piece”:
Digital voice editing by Miriam Kolar.
Voice assemblage, electronic music and processed saw by Gustavo Matamoros.

“Adieu”:
Accompanying music is an electronic arrangement of David Rosenboom’s “Hymn of Change” from “Movement X” in his Bell Solaris, Twelve Movements for Piano, Transformations of a Theme.

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