Kyle Gann fascinated composers

Composer, music critic and author Kyle Gann, OC '77, returned to Oberlin last week to share his vast knowledge and insight in his many areas of expertise.

"Gann is a major force in American music," said John Luther Adams, associate professor of composition, in a recent interview with Oberlin Online. "The range of his musical knowledge and experience is nothing less than astonishing...I can think of very few individuals whose contributions to new music are as diverse and influential as Kyle Gann." Gann may very well have written the definitive resource on the subject, including American Music in the 20th Century, as well as The Music of Conlon Nancarrow. His writings include more than 1,500 articles for over 30 publications. He has studied composition with Ben Johnston, Morton Feldman and Peter Gena. His music has been performed at the New Music America, Bang on a Can and Spoleto festivals in the United States, and across Europe. He finds time, somehow, to teach music history and theory at Bard College. In his various roles of critic, author and teacher, he has worked to redefine the premises of American classical music as something quite distinct from, and not indebted to, the European tradition.

Gann's week began on Monday with a gathering of student composers and writers for his lecture on "Music Critics and Criticism." With his easy Texan delivery, he described the long history of his writing career; from reviewing concerts for larger publications through landing his job at The Village Voice, where he has worked since 1986. For composers and performers at the talk, he offered advice on how to make press releases that grab people's attention. Gann encouraged the group to hold a more positive, respectful attitude toward music criticism. He feels that it is to the profession's, as well as to music's, great disadvantage that most critics become so by default.

Gann's next donned his composer's hat at the Composition Seminar on Tuesday, where he discussed "Non-Tempered and Acoustically-Perfect Tunings,' specifically in the music of Harry Partch, LaMonte Young and his own. His lecture on Thursday entitled, "The Rhythmic Legacy of Henry Cowell," exposed the influence of Cowell's book, New Musical Resources, on the music of John Cage and Conlon Nancarrow, as well as many composers of today. Creating a sense of unity for those who attended all events, these subjects were again realized in musical form on Friday evening, at the concert of Gann's music.

The concert showcased works from the composer's recently released CD, Custer's Ghost, performed by Gann and assisted by student performers, senior pianist Robert Reich and sophomore cellist Erin Hollins. The program included So Many Dyings, Arcana XVI, How Miraculous Things Happen, as well as the highlight of the evening, his one-man opera, Custer and Sitting Bull. Gann dubs 'Custer' as an "electronic cantata" and is right in doing so. "Custer" is an emotionally charged performance piece that involves the listener and observer through the single affect of naivete.

As Gann describes in program notes for the piece, "'Custer' is a musical document of two male egos, taken as symbolic of the tragic clash of two cultures... At greatest issue is the alleged guilt of George Armstrong Custer: once a hero to many generations of American schoolboys, more recently a scapegoat for everything considered culpable about the white male.

"His real crime, a crime he shared with thousands of his contemporaries and with untold millions in this century, is that he handed over his personal responsibility to a corrupt social structure. Custer's tragedy... is that a person so daring and brilliant in carrying out his assignments had no moral compass with which to judge the humaneness of those assignments."

With a simple, half-declamatory tone, Gann sang the parts of both characters, Custer and Sitting Bull. With a straight forward, push button aesthetic, Gann was aided by the accompanied synthesizers and samples. The four movements of the piece are based on microtonal scales, where the octave is divided into 20, 22 and sometimes 30 pitches instead of 12. Gann's virtuosic accomplishment is utilizing these scales to add dramatic effect to the text.

For example, Gann said, "where Custer rationally contrasts Indian and White cultures, the music flows smoothly between the scales. Where Custer retreats into a narrow, white man's vision of life, only one of the scales is used. And where he indulges in hypocrisy and dissembling, the two scales combine, contradict and sour each other."

Despite his busy schedule, Gann still found time to spend with students and faculty and to attend concerts. He found the Wednesday new music concert at the 'Sco "refreshing in its wide-ranging variety and freedom from narrow viewpoints... I had forgotten what hard workers and proficient musicians Oberlin students are, and best of all, how dedicated the composers are to a creatively avant-garde vision."

"At a time when student composers at certain institutions are still performing stupid pitch tricks, Oberlin composers continue asking philosophical questions about the meaning of music and building bridges between esoterica and the pop vernacular. The spirit of the place is as intense as ever, and the general quality has improved considerably since the 70s," said Gann.