Technology - it's an amazing thing! Friday 25th July

Last night - some utter brilliance happened in 416 (Jxel and Ivan's room a.k.a party central (but shhhh! and yes - we STILL working REALLY, REALLY hard and just burn off steam of an evening - it's healthy...! tehe!))

So anyway - we only managed to hook up my recording equipment to a Mac and record straight into the computer in to one of the really funky programmes we have and Syrse made a complete, BRILLIANT multi-voice module with just her voice - amazing, truly amazing!

I love this group - this is what we can all do - and it's all coming together just naturally and organically - David was such a clever man picking all of us - genius!

Today we wrote more - and much more we did write! Jxel, Ivan, Syrse and I are working on one particular story which has many different ideas in it - so we're working together to get an overall form (for want of a better word) to it.

It's very odd composing together with people - it's fantastic, but I can't quite explain how it's working!

I think, going back to David's selection process, we are all very open and flexible people - who thankfully are the type of absorbing people who bounce off each other's ideas too...it is really hard to explain - it's almost, not 'if it ain't broke don't fix it', but 'if it ain't broke, don't try to explain it'!!

What is interesting though is how, usually, composers are solitary beasts who work alone writing their music. What this is doing is throwing extroverted introverts into one big melting pot and the more cooks the better it seems!

A huge elastic-band ball can be ravelled together after someone has just one tiny idea, and then it spirals into a naturally collaborative entity...like a shoal of fish, each one is individual, but we're all working and moving together collectively and individually rippling, but overall creating a pulsating mosaic of energy and inspiration - and yes, that is the only way I can get vaguely close to explaining what's happening here...and I think that's really the essence of the literal meaning of A Counterpoint of Tolerance...David really is a clever man!!

As for the MA project - no problems with the music collection - in fact I feel quite like some kind of musical anthropologist right now!! Bartok - eat your heart out!! (pah - wax cylinders - the future's Fostex and the future's gigabyte!!)

Interviews - well, getting there! There is so much vibrancy in this group musically and socially that it's very difficult to a)find the time to sit people down individually to speak to, b) pick the best time - as we only have two weeks and we all want to make the most of it c) find more time to really be able to concentrate on how I conduct the interviews - it's going to really test my interviewing skills with some language barriers and obviously, with the shoe on the other foot, what it must feel like for my fellow composers to be on the other end of that microphone trying their best for me.

And they are SO willing and helpful - I feel very supported with my project - a big thank you to all.

In fact, in my next blog - I'll explain a little more about the difficulties I've had already and what may lie ahead interview-wise - it's very interesting and, well really quite remarkable how music, and our fluent communication through that medium is just that, fluent, but the interviews and the MA project, with no offence intended WHATSOEVER (because the language skills are phenomenal - as I'll also be explaining) BUT the interviews are going to be interesting to tackle.

Stay tuned (harhar!)