Over 50 Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival attendees joined University of Idaho Associate Professor of Piano Roger McVey for a Music Outside the Box workshop about composers from the 20th century Thursday afternoon in the Administration Auditorium.
McVey opened with a discussion on musical composers with a focus on those who do unusual things.
“I want to share with you a couple of very important American composers that were experimental in the things they tried,” McVey said. “The 20th century was a very exciting time musically, they were trying new things with music and new things with sound, they were trying to find new kinds of what music could be.”
McVey began the workshop with the works of John Cage, an American composer in the 20th century who pioneered prepared piano, using an alteration of sound by placing objects on or between the strings of pianos. McVey said pieces of wood and rubber as well as screws were used to create interesting variations of sounds.
“At this time Cage was traveling around and getting specific ideas on what kind of sounds he wanted in his piece,” McVey said. “He played on different kinds and sizes of pianos and they sounded very different, he realized that I can’t control this, but I can control the kind of sound that I want.”
McVey also played a piece by John Adams, a minimalist composer who utilized repeating patterns within short groups of notes, such as spiraling pieces .
“The changes, the things that happened harmonically or pitch wise, might change very gradually or more frequently,” McVey said. “Sometimes you spend a long time on one and sometimes you move very quickly, it is not static, but very interesting and involved.”
At the close of the session dozens of students gathered around the Piano as McVey placed objects such as screws and bobby pins on the strings and demonstrated differences in sounds.
Ellamae Burnell can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @EllamaeBurnell