Jay C. Batzner is currently an Assistant Professor at the University of Central Florida where he teaches theory, composition, and technology courses as well as coordinates the composition program. He holds degrees in composition and/or theory from the University of Missouri – Kansas City, the University of Louisville, and the University of Kansas.
Jay's music is primarily focused around instrumental chamber works as well as electroacoustic composition. His music has been recorded on the Capstone, Vox Novus, and Beauport Classical labels and is published by Unsafe Bull Music.
Jay is a sci-fi geek, an amateur banjoist, a home brewer, and juggler.
Well, last weekend began the landslide of activity that will carry me to Thanksgiving. I was in Atlanta for the National College Music Society conference the past few days and had some great experiences. I like CMS in that it is a general music organization. I got to talk to composers, performers, educators, theorists, the whole range of college music types. My involvement with the conference was a poster presentation on the podcast (83 weeks and still going) as well as numerous career counseling sessions. I also participated in a Oxford focus group which was a lot more fun than I thought it would be.
So what's next? I'm off to Southeastern Louisiana University for a guest composer slot next week. Mid-October takes me to the annual Electronic Music Midwest festival at Lewis University. As their programming director, I get to see if the concerts work as well as I hoped. And also to see if anyone notices that I snuck in my animation collaboration Carnival Daring-Do. CDD gets some more play at Third Practice in November and again at the Electroacoustic Juke Joint the next weekend. Mercurial, for flute and tape, will get its premiere performance at the hands of Lisa Bost at the Juke Joint. Throw in a local electroacoustic music concert, and November will be over.
Oh yeah, and teaching four classes. And finishing a work for cello and piano. And writing grants. And sending out more scores for next semester. I'm suddenly feeling very tired...
posted by Jay C. Batzner
9/19/2008
Obsessions
Ok, I've become obsessed. The past two weeks or so I've been spinning a lot of Sibelius symphonies and post-minimalist/totalist/choose-your-term composers. These are not necessarily the "two great tastes that taste great together" but I'm enjoying the whole experience.
With both obsessions, I think it is a case of the "right music at the right time." Ten years ago, I didn't much care for Sibelius. I was very into Carter. Sibelius didn't connect with my brain then. He does now. I've also been spinning some Lang, Ashley, and Mikel Rouse (lots of him), and I don't know what I would have thought of this music 5 years ago. I'm not entirely sure what has changed, specifically, in the past few years, but I don't think I would have been hip to it. Something has become unhinged in my ears, though, and I mean that in a good way. I've had some very good influences in the recent past that have really expanded my musical world. I'm grateful.
I've talked to other composers who are recently out of their doctorates and we all seem to be doing the same thing: the opposite of whatever we were doing in grad school. My thick, dense, thorny, dissertation has been replaced by music of peace and serenity (which was emerging in my diss, but not embraced in the way that I'm doing it now). A friend who wrote the same way is now exploring spectralism. We've finally become "real" composers, realizing that we have nobody to please but ourselves. It is scary and liberating at the same time.
As a faculty member, I try to expose my students to my own obsessions. One of my students was talking about how he just heard music by Pärt and loved it. I handed him some Charlemagne Palestine. Another student is a Mahler nut, so I started her on Sibelius and William Schuman. Another student had an idea of an electroacoustic piece based on recording the sounds of the music hallways. Hildegard Westerkamp to table 4, please! Whether they like the music or not is less important than the fact that they are hearing it now. They might not encounter this stuff at any other time in their undergraduate. Who knows, they might even find something that I've never heard of and become obsessed. Worse things have happened.
Since today (9/19) is International Talk Like A Pirate Day, I suppose I should put on some Charles Arrrrrrgersinger. What are you going to listen to?
posted by Jay C. Batzner
9/15/2008
Saturday! Saturday! Saturday!!
Ok, that doesn't work as well as "Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!!"
This coming Saturday, The Cadillac Moon Ensemble will be performing the premiere of my quartet Goodnight, Nobody. If you are in/around Astoria, and I bet some of you are, go check it out! My work is programmed alongside some pretty heavy hitters. I'm honored to be with such names.
Details: The Cadillac Moon Ensemble (Roberta Michel, flutes, Jeffrey Phillips, violin/viola, Evelyn Farny, cello, Danielle Weinberg, percussion) is playing at Waltz-Astoria this Saturday at 7:00, and we'd love to have you there! We'll be playing pieces by Jay Batzner, Zack Browning, Luca Vanneschi (world premiere!), Christian Wolff, Jeffrey Harrington, Hector Villa-Lobos, David Drexler, and John Cage. And as if that weren't enticing enough, let us mention that Waltz-Astoria has amazing desserts. (Red velvet cake, anyone?) Cover is $10, and there is a 2 drink minimum.
Waltz-Astoria is on Ditmars Blvd between 23rd and 24th streets. Take either the N or W train to Ditmars Blvd and 31st st and walk six blocks west to 24th st.
posted by Jay C. Batzner
9/12/2008
Radio Ga Ga
I was interviewed for ArtBeat, a local radio show on WUCF, one of Orlando's NPR stations. It was supposed to air on Labor Day but ended up going out on Wednesday. The subject was my video collaboration with Carla Poindexter, which has quickly become my most performed work ever. We've hit a lot of film festivals, will be hitting more (including a big landing at Raindance in London), and are now starting the electronic music festival circuit (EMM, Third Practice, EA Juke Joint).
...was going to be the sound of me blowing my own horn. No, I'm not playing trumpet again. Haven't done that since the 90s and we are all much, much, happier. Ok, maybe I'm not, but it would be painful for everyone involved if I put a horn to my face right now.
I was asked to compile a list of stuff that I've done since the last half of 2007. I was going to put that list up here, but it would have been a total vanity thing. The list might pale in comparison to what many of you do but it made me feel pretty damned good about what I've been doing. My video collaboration, Carnival Daring-Do, will have been screened no fewer than 14 times in 2008. That is, if I may indulge, pretty freakin' cool.
The real issue in my life is patience. I am tremendously impatient with my own life. I've been measuring my abilities and accomplishments against composers with a 10 - 15 year head start. I'm 34. I've done a heck of a lot in that time, especially considering that I didn't seriously start composing until I was 20. Hell, I didn't even seriously start doing electroacoustic music until 2005. I have a long way to go, but you know something? I'm going on that way.
I'm not where I was 10 years ago. Ten years from now, I'm going to be someplace else. The only thing artistic goal that I have is to stay mercurial in my quest to be whoever I am at that time.
Well, this blog post took a hell of a lot longer than I anticipated. And it didn't go where I thought it was going to go. Sounds like something I'd make, all right!
posted by Jay C. Batzner
