As part of my continuing project to get my music onto platforms where you can hear it, here are my Li Bai Songs, settings in Mandarin of Tang dynasty poetry.
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As part of my continuing project to get my music onto platforms where you can hear it, here are my Li Bai Songs, settings in Mandarin of Tang dynasty poetry.
Patrick Mason, baritone; Curtis Macomber, violin; William Anderson, guitar.
Premiere performance, Washington Square Chamber Music Society, November 9, 1999, Merkin Hall, NYChttps://mirlo.space/david-mcmullin/release/li-bai-songs
Score, lyrics etc. here:
david-mcmullin.com/music/li-bai-songs#MyMusic #baritone #violin #guitar #ContemporaryMusic #李白 #中文 #ChinesePoetry
@mcmullin @composers I've just listened to Song 1. A moving, mesmerising experience. It makes a very 'human' connection, for want of a better way to articulate it. Wonderful music, wonderful performance, thanks for sharing this. And for sharing the story behind it - it is very moving and 'human' too.
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If this reveals a specifically un-Chinese way of hearing and reacting to this poetry, that doesn’t necessarily bother me—I’m not Chinese, after all, so it’s not surprising if my perspective is different. This is a foreigner’s respectful appreciation. Perhaps respectful in a weird way, but in a sincere and personal way at least.
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@mcmullin @composers
It can be fraught. I remember being at a new music session where a composer from one country gave the singers expressions that they thought was what the people from another country would say. I could hear mutterings beside me from a person from that place "cultural appropriation " and more. -
@mcmullin @composers I've just listened to Song 1. A moving, mesmerising experience. It makes a very 'human' connection, for want of a better way to articulate it. Wonderful music, wonderful performance, thanks for sharing this. And for sharing the story behind it - it is very moving and 'human' too.
@CiaraNi
Thank you so much, and thanks for telling me too. -
@mcmullin @composers
It can be fraught. I remember being at a new music session where a composer from one country gave the singers expressions that they thought was what the people from another country would say. I could hear mutterings beside me from a person from that place "cultural appropriation " and more.@PatrickOBeirne
Yes, I’ve heard plenty of examples of cultural appropriation in new music, some detestable. And I can understand how someone might accuse me of that regarding a couple of my compositions, but I do my best to approach other cultures, when I do, with humility and respect. In this case, there were special circumstances too; I wasn’t really even going outside my family.
@composers -
@PatrickOBeirne
Yes, I’ve heard plenty of examples of cultural appropriation in new music, some detestable. And I can understand how someone might accuse me of that regarding a couple of my compositions, but I do my best to approach other cultures, when I do, with humility and respect. In this case, there were special circumstances too; I wasn’t really even going outside my family.
@composers@PatrickOBeirne
I touched on that topic a bit in this old thread too. -
@PatrickOBeirne
I touched on that topic a bit in this old thread too.And more succinctly, here:
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P Pauliina Lievonen shared this topic
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@mcmullin @composers
It can be fraught. I remember being at a new music session where a composer from one country gave the singers expressions that they thought was what the people from another country would say. I could hear mutterings beside me from a person from that place "cultural appropriation " and more.@PatrickOBeirne
I should perhaps clarify also that none of the Chinese listeners I mentioned above suggested that it was wrong or offensive for me to do this, just that some choices I made about how to do it struck them as odd.I’m curious to know what native speakers of Mandarin out there on the fediverse think.
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