William Brooks studied music and
mathematics at Wesleyan University (BA 1965), then received degrees in
musicology (MM 1971) and composition-theory (DMA 1976) from the University of
Illinois. He has been associated with John Cage as both performer and scholar;
he played in the world premiere of HPSCHD and has several times directed
productions of Cage’s Song Books. Brooks taught at the University of Illinois
(1969-73) and at the University of California (1973-7), then worked as a
freelance composer, scholar and performer before returning to the University of
Illinois (1987). In 2000 he took up his present post at the University of York,
and in October 2014 he reduced his York commitment to half-time to enable him
more extensively to pursue composition and research in the United States. William Brooks’ new work, Crazy Jane, will be performed by Everlasting Voices at the next
Late Music concert, Saturday 4th July at the Unitarian Chapel, St
Saviourgate, York.
Steve Crowther: Can you describe the work to us?
William Brooks: William Butler Yeats opens a (relatively) late
publication, Words for Music Perhaps,
with seven “Crazy Jane” poems. Crazy Jane is built in part on a real figure,
but in these poems she appears as an alternate voice for Ireland, a kind of
complement to the Irish national figure of Kathleen that had preoccupied Yeats
at the turn of the century. In her brusque forthrightness, her anti-clericism,
and her earthy sexuality she is both an intriguing and forbidding person.
Consistent with the title of the collection, most of the poems include a kind
of refrain that suggests the possibility of a musical setting. But as far as I
know I am the first to set the entire group of seven poems for forces other
than solo voice.
SC:
Do you write at the piano, do you pre-plan? Can you describe the compositional
process?
WB: Sometimes.
Usually. And no, I really can’t describe the process. There isn’t one process,
after all; there are many. I do like to know how time will be structured;
perhaps that’s a given. But, of course, when writing open-form works, even that
must be set aside.
SC: Is it important to know the performers? Do you write with a sound in mind?
SC: Is it important to know the performers? Do you write with a sound in mind?
WB: I generally don’t write music unless there is a
performance forthcoming. Hence I often know the performers, and I like that.
And most definitely I write with sound—and action—in mind. I abhor midi (though
I use it when necessary), and I try whenever possible to sing, shout, dance,
thump, conduct, or otherwise make tangible what I’m writing.
SC:
How would you describe your individual ‘sound world’?
WB: I hope I don’t have one, but I probably do. I
seem to write a lot of shapes, gestures—not enough repetition, I think. (On the
other hand, I just finished a short piece with a Gertrude Stein text that is
nothing but repetition!) I want
people to remember things, the good and the bad, so traces of the past are
often evident. I’m a historian at heart (though I have many hearts: mind your
back, Doctor).
SC:
What motivates you to compose?
WB: People. Community. Love. The opportunity to give.
SC:
Which living composers do you identify with or simply admire?
WB: All the good
ones are dead. Didn’t you go to school?
SC: Behave, there
must be someone…!
WB: Well, in truth I
ducked the question because an answer usually results in being assigned to one
camp or another. Uptown, downtown; minimal, maximal; Tonal oder Atonal ... that
kind of thing. I’m pretty lavish with admiration, actually; if you give me a
score chances are that I’ll find something that interests me. (How else could I
get excited about obscure pop songs from 1915?) As for identity, I’m as
confused as ever.
SC:
If you could have a beer and a chat with any composer from the past, who would
it be and why?
WB: We’d have to have a party—maybe, since I’m American, a
barbeque. George (not Charlie) Ives, Ockeghem, Clara Schumann, George Gershwin,
... But to tell the truth I’d rather host some performers: Maria Callas, Bert
Williams, Eva Tanguay, Ole Bull, Patsy Cline, Bix Beiderbecke ... now THAT’s a
party!
SC:
Now for some desert island discery – please name eight pieces of music you
could not be without, and then select just one.
WB: Today, the one is Charles Ives’s Second Orchestral Set. Tomorrow, it might be any or none of the
following: Josquin’s Ave Maria,
Roscoe Holcomb singing anything, Chopin’s mazurkas (especially the senza fine), Porgy and Bess, Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit,” Coltrane’s A Love Supreme, Dr. Subramaniam playing
an alap, Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes” (with the words: “Be kind to your
web-footed friends ...”). Of course, I’m choosing all these for effect; in
reality, I almost never listen to recordings, I’m astonishingly ignorant about
almost all repertoire, and I truly think I’d prefer my desert island to sound
like a desert island.
SC:
…and a book?:
WB: The Bible? Finnegans
Wake? A 5,000-page anthology of poetry? Richard Taruskin’s history of
music? (Just kidding ...)
SC:
…a film?
WB: A dead heat between Top Hat and Some Like It Hot.
But I’m in despair about giving up the Marx brothers ...
SC:
… and a luxury item?
WB: My Mac—or if
that doesn’t qualify as a luxury, my iPad. But what’s the wifi like on a desert
island?
