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thanks to whoever sent this out to me-- i think it was either Andy or Sue. please listen at high volume for maximum damage...

Thanks to my friend Robert for forwarding me a link to a site pointing out the false claims of the upcoming Ben Stein movie "Expelled". For those of you who might not know, this is a movie that seeks to expose the supposed conspiracy of contemporary scientists to bury the fact that they've all come to realize that the theory of evolution was a mistake. As it seems, in order to keep their liberal plutocracy in power in our primary schools, colleges and universities, they've created a secret cabal to ban any discussion of intelligent design or creationism from the classroom.

I just made a totally amazing Fried Rice. Here's how you can do it:

4 cups of cooked Jasmine rice
1 large Yellow Onion
1/2 head of cabbage
1 package of frozen peas
2 small carrots
1/2 Red Bell pepper
1/4 cup unsalted peanuts (optional)
1 1/2 lb of meat or firm tofu
2 large eggs
1 tsp Turmeric
1 tsp Galanga powder
1/2 tsp Lemon Grass powder
2 tsp Sambal Oelek (If you don't have any Sambal Oelek, go buy some at your Oriental store now. OK, hot pepper sauce will do)
1/4 cup Sweet Soy Sauce (ABC Brand Kecap Manis)

A concert of new music at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA). Features a new computer-controlled performance environment I've been working on over the past year or so. The performance will feature Philip Pan playing his Viper six-string electric violin. Philip is the concertmaster of the Jacksonville Symphony and an adventurous improviser. Also on the concert is music by Piotr Szewcyk, violinist with the Jacksonville Symphony, as well as Stephen Paulus' "Dramatic Suite" on which I am playing piano. The concert will take place on Sunday, February 24 at 2:00.

I am not an ethnomusicologist. I am not even a musicologist. But when I find some really beautiful music, I feel I should share it with people who may not have had a chance to hear it yet. There was a time in my life where I had an unshakeable belief in the superiority of Western art music, which I still perform and love. Here are two musical streams that have helped remove that attachment:

I was sad to hear of the passing of Sri Chinmoy, who died at the age of 76. In case anyone reading this is not aware of his life and work, Sri Chinmoy dedicated his entire life to spreading peace and harmony through music, art, poetry, meditation and athletics. A nice article can be found here.

Here is his foundation's website.

Since I've been filling in the gaps in my CD collection, I've made some interesting discoveries. I recently bought a batch of CDs that included some Beatles (Sargeant Pepper's and the White Album), some Black Sabbath (just in time for 06-06-06!) and some other stuff. They included David Byrne and Brian Eno's 'My life in a bush of ghosts' and AC/DC's 'Dirty deeds done dirt cheap'. I bought the AC/DC more as a novelty and to just catch up on music from the seventies that I missed out on due to the fact that I attended a Baptist junior high school when it was released (another post). But 'My life in a bush of ghosts' was what I really wanted to relive-- the many times I sat on the floor in my friends' rooms, in various states of consciousness (I had stopped attending the Baptist school by now), listening to Byrne and Eno's hip and edgy tracks.

A few weeks ago, I heard a concert by the local orchestra-- a very good group in many respects. They played the premiere of a piece by a composer who had won a competition sponsored by the orchestra. The piece was extremely well-crafted-- the kiss of death for a modern composer. But honestly, this guy really knew his stuff. But something struck me about the piece that I would have not have picked up on even a few years ago. And I didn't even catch it until after it was over. Basically, the piece had absolutely no influence outside of the western symphonic tradition whatsoever. Nada. Not that it didn't have it's "modern" moments, and it certainly wasn't just a 19th-century throwback, though it did have echoes of Strauss. But the thing that surprised me is that it sounded so strange to my ears. I just couldn't imagine why someone, especially a young(er than me) American composer, would want to do that. It seemed like it would have to be deliberate. In my younger years, I certainly wasn't known for my ground-breaking eclectic style, but I had among my composer friends several jazz pianists and musicians from other genres, all who turned me on to music I had never heard before. In addition, my school had a really strong ethnomusicology bend, so you really had to be living in a bubble to avoid the influence of world music. As time wore on, I came to feel I was more protecting a hallowed tradition than I was actually doing something creative or new. Now, I couldn't even imagine writing a piece that wasn't affected by, or even based on, music outside of the European tradition.

am I breaking my "mean-spirited" rule? you could argue for or against, but some things are too funny...