March 13, 2009

I've returned from my travels, and will be spending the next few days in Chicago to relax with friends and recover from the time change before going home to resume normal work on Monday.

The UK conference was exciting and a lot of fun, with spring-like weather in Walton adding to the optimism and energy of the event. Performances were all highest caliber, and there was a particularly nice variety of music in terms of compositional style, ensemble and instrumentation. I enjoyed seeing friends and meeting new people working in the field. The conference provided a rare opportunity for spirited conversation and enthusiastic exchange of ideas for everyone involved.

My part went reasonably well, despite some technical difficulties. My macbook did not interface well with the overhead projection system, so that about 3/4 of the screen was not only out of visual scope, but was also inaccessible in terms of scrolling and mouse clicking - a bit short of ideal for a presentation focusing on software demonstration, and this weird problem also caused some programs to crash. Nonetheless my short presentation of less than 30 minutes was well received.

At the Sibelius Academy I was honored to have two hours to present, so I was able to cover quite a bit of ground, and the response from students seemed very positive. The macbook exhibited the same weird video problems, but anticipating them I was able to avoid some awkwardness. I had a couple of Tonal Plexus keyboards there to demonstrate with, belonging to Finnish composer Juhani Nuorvala, who also provided a Korg M3 synthesizer as an alternative sound source for the TPX6s. I was glad to see some of the students in attendance express a keen interest in my theories, instruments and software.

Berg's opera Lulu was playing for four nights in Helsinki, and I was able to attend a performance on Tuesday, the night before my presentation at the academy. It was an unusual but well conceived production, which was remarkably well done. The orchestra played flawlessly; every section shone with beautifully expressive coherence. In all I was quite impressed.

I had my camera with me but I really had no time for sight seeing, so I failed to take many photos; in fact, I have no pictures at all from London and only a few from Helsinki. Above is a street near the center of Helsinki, just a few minutes walk from the Sibelius Academy (taken March 9, 2009).