Notices by David McMullin (mcmullin@musicians.today), page 2

@inthehands
“Get there firstest with the mostest” as the old adage says, is inefficient but it works.
@venya

@inthehands @venya
I found where this came up before, remembering a conversation I had with my Dad when I was little:

https://musicians.today/@mcmullin/112105827158274108

A couple days ago, I boosted a question about PPE to avoid COVID, and someone replied that we “need to stop” with all these protective measures, and the sooner we do, the “better we will be.” I obviously disagree: I don’t “need to stop” protecting myself because some stranger says so, and I would not “be better” with a debilitating illness.

I can’t find that comment and I seem to have accidentally deleted my response. But I keep thinking about it…

1/

#COVIDisNotOver

@skinnylatte
I agree. And that’s a good example of what I meant—it’s a step below NY or LA and a couple steps below China, but it’s still high quality, especially if you know what you’re looking for. For example, I’ve had better Peking duck in China than in Boston, obviously, but not miles and miles better. And some of the Peking duck I’ve had in China was not as good as I can get here. Just to pick one thing.

@skinnylatte
As far as cuisines of the world, I don’t know what to say. Boston’s a pretty good city for food, in the sense that it’s cosmopolitan and there are many immigrant communities, so you can find a decent to excellent example here of a wide range of different cuisines. But I honestly can’t think of one where the example you’d find here is the best you could find anywhere. By that standard, we’re not such a good food city.

@rednikki
@skinnylatte
Wonderful—I’ll see you then!

@rednikki
Looks like I’ll be late, and might even have to miss it, I’m sorry to say. In case that happens,
@skinnylatte, welcome to Boston!

@skinnylatte
I’m sure you’ve got better sources than me for restaurant recommendations, because I haven’t eaten in a restaurant since before the pandemic. But in terms of what you should eat here, what it would be a shame to miss when you come to Boston, I’ll just say what I’m sure you know already: have fresh seafood. Raw oysters in particular—they taste different from each little place along the coast, so try a variety harvested from different locations…

@skinnylatte
If you’re just going NYC to Boston, then Amtrak is definitely better than flying. But don’t schedule it to arrive just in time for something; delays are common.

There are also buses, which are usually about an hour faster than the regional train (because they go inland through Hartford instead of along the coast through Providence), comparable to the Acela but much cheaper.

@skinnylatte
From what you’ve posted here, I think I know you well enough to predict you would probably want to leave by November at the latest. But definitely come back in May and stay a while!

On my never-ending work in progress, I've now finished addressing the problem described in the linked thread from a few weeks ago. In summary, it's a 20-minute piece with a big climactic cadence at around 16 minutes, but the section before that didn't really build the way I wanted...

1/

https://musicians.today/@mcmullin/114886830766121936

#composing
#composers
#wip
#orchestra
#choral
#NewMusic
#ClassicalMusic
#ContemporaryMusic
#OriginalMusic
@composers @contemporarymusic

The section that bugged me is about 2 minutes long. It starts with an attention-catching gesture and has a subsidiary peak or arrival point about halfway through. But after and between each of those, it pulls back and gets relatively peaceful again.

I didn't want to just make everything louder and thicker because I was worried about swamping the solo voices that sing very tricky things throughout the section.

2/

I did add a few nervous-energy gestures, mostly quiet ones, and I filled in some spots where it felt like there could be more happening. But what mainly worked to create a sense of building, of expectation, wasn't anything I put in the passages where the growth is supposed to happen.

3/

Instead, I made both the opening gesture and the in-between peak a little bigger, more abrupt and more urgent. Instead of feeling like "Maybe that was the destination, but now what are we doing?", now it's more like "What the heck was that about? Something else has to happen to make sense of that, so this must be going somewhere, toward something at least that big."

/4

The passage that felt flat doesn't feel flat anymore, even though I barely changed it. In fact, if anything it is flatter now in comparison to the now-bigger gesture that precedes it. But because now you have different expectations when you get there, you can now feel it growing in a way it didn't seem to before. Even though it's pretty much the same music.

Fix how one spot sounds by making changes somewhere else entirely. Little discoveries like this continue to fascinate me.

5/5

That’s my mayor there, winning my vote again.

From: @stevenrosenthal
https://mastodon.online/@stevenrosenthal/115056799681514175

Previous thread on Mayor Wu responding to federal pressure:

https://musicians.today/@mcmullin/114156183419786277

@bmacDonald94
I don’t know… I’m pretty sure dogs are good and do good. Cats are mostly agents of chaos but I love them too.

“Why are you still wearing that mask? COVID’s not going away, you know.”

“Exactly, yes.”

[?]

“I’m wearing this because I know it’s not going away.”

[Exchanging looks of mutual incomprehension…]

#CovidIsNotOver

@kristiedegaris
One can be nice without being kind, and vice versa; they are not the same thing.