01: Introduction - M - Lectures

Le Corbusier modulor - Fibonacci series of the human body

This is the first in a series of lectures on composition, this one focusing on Modular as a resource for composition (not yet the techniques employed). If time allows, I can open up the presentation to consider related ideas and concepts, which inform my point of view, such as: the profound effect that part-living in Sicily (over 30 years) has had on my perception and understanding of who we are and what we have done over time - the how and the why.

Zigzag: The ancient Chinese believed that time is not only a ladder, which one ascends into the future but also a ladder that descends into the past. Zigzag is a prehistoric symbol, which has come to signal water on the one hand and energy/danger on the other – and the letters Z W M N V even X. What I saw in Sicily was zigzag everywhere. If I just say Monreale, in Palermo and Durham Cathedral, for now. Let’s call this an idea expressed as an image. Then:
A Mechanism
A poetic idea, or ideas
A sound (-world)
In movement and stillness
Physicality in music: actions. Expression through activity
Sound beyond pitch: the spoken voice and as instruments: metal – multiple triangles, sports whistles, cymbals, gongs and tam tams; wood – ebony claves, wood blocks, temple blocks, log-drums; skin – bongos, tom toms, snare drums, tenor drums, bass drums; and stone – pebbles (from Whitby, in WULF).

I’ll perform, and explain, as many of these 13 piano pieces for Joan Dixon.

I’ll play brief excerpts from Qibti, Token, Hey Presto! and discuss aspects of WULF.