The turntable went to the shop, a place peopled by lunatics, and when finally I retrieved it I was told there had been nothing wrong with it. By some amazing chance though it came back sounding absolutely splendid, whereas it had gone in sounding awful, so whatever wasn’t wrong with it benefited by not being fixed. Or something. (The lunacy, I have to say, is incidental to the turntable and its problems, real or imagined.) The import of my having the turntable back in the house in any case is that I can now play my copies of John Sangster’s albums The Trip, Ahead of Hair, and The joker is wild.

I’m booked to write a paper on these albums for an upcoming issue of a top journal, and so it’s back to research! for at least a part of this year. I’ve also, probably unwisely, booked myself a berth in the conference of the Musicological Society of Australia at the end of the year, so I’ve that to deal with too. It seems I go to this conference when it’s in Melbourne; the last time I went was in 2008. Since I have to pay my own way it’s absolutely impossible to go interstate for the meeting, and for the larger part of the time my links with musicology are mostly either historical or merely sentimental anyway. But perhaps I have something to say. Perhaps someone will come along.

I mean: my academic career, you know. What a farce. Not long ago one of Australia’s Top Universities, number something-or-other in the international rankings and, well, part of our local Virginia-creeper League of increasingly impoverished tertiary institutions, advertised a lectureship for which I fancied myself eminently suited. How many research PhDs are there in Australian improvised music, held by people who compose and perform, and teach? And I’ve publications, and a bit of administrative experience too, having co-run the Honours year and fully run the Postgraduate Diploma one, when such things were as they were, at the VCA. Anyway, I applied, and I waited. I lined up my best and most flattering referees, and worded them up that they might be required to find something acceptable to say about me in the course of events. They are probably still waiting for the phone to ring. Because do you think I was invited for an interview? I was not.

Now this is not the first time this has happened. It is as though the PhD became a disqualification or something, because other institutions have done exactly the same thing, advertising positions that turn out to be not quite as open as one might have thought, and awarding them to people who – well, to other people.

Then again, prior to the most recent advertisement, I had been invited by the institution in question to examine a PhD thesis that was so miserable, so poorly conceived and executed, as to make me despair at what was apparently going on at the graduate level. My report reflected my feelings, as I believe any honest report I write must, and I endeavoured to make clear that I should have the work resubmitted somewhere down the line, following further research and wholesale revision.

I found out however that the thesis had been accepted, when I discovered it was in the university library. This perplexed me no end, but carried a diminished measure of surprise since despite having asked to be kept informed of developments I had been told absolutely nothing further subsequent to my submitting my report.

Things aren’t getting any better for education in Australia, most likely since to educate your polity invites the risk of having it exercise its increased wisdom in the interests of improving matters, and in the process coming to understand what you’ve been up to – and getting rid of you. And besides, if the government offers money to schools for the completion of degrees, who wouldn’t want to hurry candidates through to completion? Elsewhere I’ve hinted at some of the unfortunate consequences of corner- (read cost-) cutting strategies in jazz education, and, well, I guess I shall have to lie down in the grave I’ve dug and accept that I don’t fit with the decision-makers and the program-developers, and as such it’s very unlikely they’ll come knocking on my door. But to my last hour I shall declare that I don’t see how pretending we’re all Americans and going along with whatever is broadcast most resonantly from the States about The Jazz Tradition (and by implication our obligation thereunto) is going to assist us in articulating our own place in the scheme of things, the nature and consequence of our experience, the particular variations to acquaintance and accommodation that have occurred throughout the briefer history of Australian jazz, or any concepts we might have about the future.

In the shorter term, I’m composing the music for another Salon concert, this one in October with a double trio: piano, bass, drums, violin, viola and cello. Things are progressing, fitfully; when they seem to be going smoothly I’m happy enough but I couldn’t say I’m overburdened with confidence about anything I ever produce so there is that residual feeling of being at the mercy of something I can neither control nor even name.

Usually I link to these things on Facebook and/or the abominable Twitter, but I’m not doing that this time. It’d be interesting to know if anyone found it despite my not making a noise. Leave a comment if you like, and break up the spam. Since I’m only really whining and this is in no way honorable it’s probably not worth making any sound at all. But this is how it stands. Çe soir.

24/vi/2014

Two things surprised me: I was nervous, but nowhere near as nervous as I’d expected I’d be, and today I’m not in a slough of depression such as frequently follows a big performance. All this seems very good.

When planning this concert I wanted to include specific pieces that I remember from long ago, and that have in one way or another influenced me, but I thought I’d be trying to play around them if not actually playing them in their entirety. Then as things went on I decided I would include a few written pieces, but I didn’t want to print their titles on the program in case it meant that people listened out for them and missed what was happening in the meantime. (I’m such a control freak.)

Anyway, now it’s all done I can make these revelations in retrospect, so here they are.

Initially there was an improvisation, and it gave way eventually to the English traditional melody harmonized by Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) as ‘King’s Lynn.’ This tune makes the rounds, and as I wrote earlier it was reintroduced to me most recently in connection with some words I’d never heard before. I remember it as accompanying text by G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936), of which a verse seems worth reproducing in the current context:

‘O God of earth and altar,
Bow down and hear our cry,
Our earthly rulers falter,
Our people drift and die;
The walls of gold entomb us,
The swords of scorn divide,
Take not they thunder from us,
But take away our pride.’

This hymn is found at no. 492 in The New English Hymnal.

This was followed by another improvisation, which along the way found itself in psalm chant territory; this was merely the rhythmic scheme of chants, each improvised according to my own harmonic agenda. Bringing things back into D minor cleared space for the re-setting by Charles Wood (1866-1926) of music by Thomas Tallis (c.1505-1585): his ‘First mode melody’, or ‘Man blest no doubt who walk’th not out’, the first of the Tunes for Archbishop Parker’s Psalter (1567). Wood’s manipulation of this material became ‘My God I love thee, not because I hope for heaven thereby’, from The Passion of our Lord according to Saint Mark (Leighton Buzzard: The Faith Press, 1921). This I sang at St Paul’s Cathedral, Melbourne, way back in the day. My brother was the toast of Young and Jackson’s for his rendition of the treble solo in the last verse. In my research through the hymn books it is only in The Book of Common Praise with Australian Supplement (Melbourne: OUP) that I have found this tune and these words matched.* There, should you wish to access it, it is at no. 664.

Next up was the jazz, since Mood Indigo is a jazz season and I thought there’d better be at least a nod towards that tradition. At first this was simply ‘jam in E-flat’ with no specific or repeating chord progression, but as things moved into focus I was playing over a set of changes extracted from the hymn tune by John Ireland (1879-1962) entitled ‘Love unknown’. Whether this was kosher I can’t say for sure, but enough of Ireland’s harmonic language is familiar to me as much from contexts other than the hymn book that I thought this was a particular manner in which to demonstrate the cross-stylistic continuity. ‘Love unknown’, to the rather lovely words by Samuel Crossman (1624-1683), is at no. 86 in The New English Hymnal.

The next improvisation preceded a motet by Jacob (or Jacobus) Vaet (c.1529-1567): ‘O quam gloriosum’ – ‘O how glorious is the kingdom, where all the saints rejoice in Christ. Dressed in white robes, they follow the Lamb wherever he goes. Alleluia.’ My acquaintance with this dates also from my time at St Paul’s Cathedral, although any idea of when or why we sang it I have totally forgotten. There’s a sung version you can watch from The European Grand Prix for Choral Singing, 2012.

Another improvisation followed, and it attempted to draw from the piece that was to follow it: the ‘Magnificat’ from the evening canticles of William Mathias (1934-1992) in G, op. 53. Another for which the Cathedral is responsible. Mathias in G was probably my favourite of all the evening services, and I still find it tremendously moving. In some instances (though not on the score I own) it’s called the ‘Jesus College’ service, because that’s where it was commissioned and premiered. It’s published by OUP, and if you want to hear it being sung there is a marvellous resource over at the website of the Choir at St John’s College, Cambridge, and you can check it there. You need to make an identity and sign in, but it doesn’t cost anything and they don’t hassle you with weekly emails or any such nonsense.

After the Mathias I did some work with nothing more than plagal (or ‘amen’) cadences, before playing the ‘St Anne’ fugue of J. S. Bach (1685-1750), BWV 552b. Because this was composed for organ, I had transcribed it for piano, not writing anything down but trying to figure out ways to represent the pedals in the correct register while not losing the sense of the interior lines. I think if I ever play this piece at home again, someone is probably going to strangle me.

The encore was a song by Leslie Coward, about whom I’ve been able to find no further information. Entitled ‘Wandering the king’s highway’ it was recorded by Peter Dawson, which is why I know it since there was a Dawson tape in the family automobile back when automobiles had tape players.

If you’re reading this because you were there, my heartfelt thanks for your attendance and your warm reception. If you weren’t there, you’ve probably got an iron-clad excuse and I shan’t be expecting you to trot it out for approval. My sincere thanks also to the Melbourne Recital Centre for the opportunity to deliver this program. Developing it and performing it has meant an enormous amount to me, and I had great fun.

*‘My research’ has been limited to the hymn books on the shelves at my parents’ place. It’s very possible there are others.

17/v/2014