Twinkle Toes in Switzerland: John Berners at the Music09 Festival in Blonay.

Richard Ratliff interviews UIndy’s Composition Professor John Berners about his premiere at a new music festival in Switzerland this past summer, June 21-July 3, 2009.

RR: You recently appeared at a new music festival in Switzerland.

JB: Yes, a festival called Music09, held at the Hindemith Foundation in a beautiful (and wealthy) Swiss village called Blonay, overlooking Lake Geneva. There were about 22 composers invited from the US and abroad, plus Master Composers Chen Yi, Frederick Rzewski and Joel Hoffman. There were also about 20 performer participants, who were there to play new music and be coached by the resident ensemble, Eighth Blackbird.

RR: What do composers do at a festival, compose?

JB: No, I don’t think any of us composed anything for two weeks! We listened to each other’s music, talked, ate chocolate, and looked at mountains. Actually, when we were selected, each composer got an assignment to write a new piece to be premiered at the festival, so all the writing was done beforehand. The first week we attended rehearsals on our pieces, and showed our other music at presentations and master classes. The second week we had concerts every evening—all the new pieces were played, and Frederick Rzewski and Eighth Blackbird played recitals of their own.

RR: Did you write for Eighth Blackbird?

RR: Well, for one of them! By the way, this is an electrifying ensemble. They are one of the top chamber ensembles (not just new music ensembles) in the world. They have won some of the top international prizes and even a Grammy. Anyway, the ensemble I wrote for had one EBB member, and three participant performers. It worked this way for all the composers. Tim Munro, EBB flutist, was in my group and he also served as coach. He was brilliant—they all are, and he led the rehearsals.

RR: What was your piece like?

JB: The title is “Twinkle Toes,” and it is inspired by soft shoe dancing--the kind of thing Fred Astaire and Jimmy Cagney used to do in the movies. I actually did research by watching their routines on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOoNOs8Ql28

It’s for flute, violin, cello and percussion, but it became known at the festival as “the shoe piece” because in it, the percussionist has to put shoes on his hands and do dance steps on a little table. There’s an element of theater or puppetry to it—it’s a piece you have to see visually as well as hear.

RR: How did it come off?

JB: Very well—the percussionist was Benjamin Fraley from Cincinnati, OH. I corresponded with him by email before the festival so he knew what he was getting into! He put a lot of work into not only executing the shoe rhythms, but doing visually interesting steps, just like a real dancer would.

RR: How does one write for shoes?

JB: Well, it’s not a normal instrument, so I had to invent some techniques and notations. I worked out steps with my Florsheim wingtips on my hands on my writing desk. I wrote the part on two staves, with different pitch notation for the toe and heel of each shoe, and lots of directions about shuffling, sliding, going on tippy-toe, etc. I actually sent Ben little videos of my experiments. When we got together in Blonay, Ben added some different moves that worked for him and made it more interesting. If you want to see it, there is a video of the performance on Youtube which is pretty good quality, but unfortunately somebody’s head is in front of the shoes the whole time, so you can’t see what is going on!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e7u9nMhzpU

RR: What were the other composers and music like?

JB: They were great—they were from all over and there was a nice variety of music. We shared rooms in the Hindemith Music Center, and my roommate was an American composer living in Beijing, named Jeff Roberts. He moved to Beijing on a Fulbright to study Chinese folk music and has just stayed there. His previous background is in American jazz improv and his music blends elements from both of those cultures into something very sparse and intricate. He’s a fine scholar and teacher, and I have a plan to invite him to UIndy for a residency in fall of 2010. We had a great time staying up all hours discussing Haydn and Richard Strauss (required when you’re that near the Swiss Alps!)

RR: How near to the Alps were you?

JB: Very near. Lake Geneva is in the far south, and France is visible across the lake. In the second week of the festival, there was a day with nothing scheduled so I took off and went to the Matterhorn! Nobody else from the festival wanted to go, so I made the 4 hour train ride each way myself. It was spectacular, overwhelming how vast it was—I have wanted to see those mountains all my life and will never forget it. At one point I hiked alone on a trail down Gornergrat for about 45 minutes, with snowy Alpine peaks all around me.

RR: How did the festival end?

JB: The final concert was the Eighth Blackbird program. We finally got to hear the ensemble together and they were stunning. They played pieces by each of our festival faculty, Chen Yi, Rzewski, and Hoffman, and other pieces from their normal repertoire of 20th and 21st century works. They play mostly from memory, which allows them to move around the stage while playing, and do choreography they have worked out to the music. It actually enhances the music, because their movements reflect what is happening in the score. For example, if three instruments are playing together for a while, they might actually move and huddle together onstage.

RR: What are you bringing back to UIndy from this?

JB: Well, I was inspired and challenged artistically by all my colleagues. The master classes by the faculty gave me teaching ideas—it’s always great to see master teachers in action. I can borrow some of their ideas and pithy sayings to use with my own students. In particular, I presented my music at one class by Dr. Joel Hoffman, who was the Festival Director and is Professor of Composition at Cincinnati Conservatory. I liked his music and found him pedagogically quite brilliant. He had some comments on my music, and on composition in general, that surprised me, but on brief reflection were dead-on. I liked his thinking and he certainly knows how to run a great festival!