June 9, 2012

Another rainy day, but I walk over to the Saturday Choro school anyway, though there will certainly be no Bandao performance outdoors today, to see friends, and chat with Marcia, Bia, Marcilio. It’s been a long while since I’ve visited this side of my Rio life– there was no time in November, and in January the school isn’t in session as it’s summer. I listen to the students play in a teaching roda, soaking in the sounds, inputting the rhythms into my creative brain that’s figuring out what I will write even as I listen. Marcilio’s new 2-book set of Jacob do Bandolim’s music is out and I can buy the first one at the little store on campus, and place an order for the 2nd. I wander home, stopping for lunch, and set to work on the composition that is calling me, one based on George Gershwin’s “Summertime,’ and the melody slowly begins to take shape. It’s exciting to be within this process– writing, changing, playing, changing again. I need to create a whole new section to go with my inspiration material, as there is not enough melody to break in two. By evening I’ve got the piece roughed out– hooray! It feels good to be working on my project. Outside it simply pours– will I ever see the sun again? Will the Sao Salvador outdoor roda happen tomorrow? We shall see…

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Written by mairmusic

June 10, 2012 at 2:23 pm

Posted in June, Rio

8 Responses

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Sounds like a most productive day…it must feel great to create such a musical composition…congrats!

slpmartin

June 10, 2012 at 3:25 pm

Reply
- It’s exciting but takes alot of energy and alot of belief that what you are writing is the right choice– kindof like being a poet (:
  
  mairmusic
  
  June 11, 2012 at 11:21 am
  
  Reply
that shot of the night street is fabulous marilynn. did you checked the post i have posted on tagore’s books in english? i hope you will find one of them suitable for you.

Sharmishtha Basu

June 11, 2012 at 4:06 am

Reply
- Thanks, I did check out your post. The street is where I live in Urca, a neighborhood in Rio.
  
  mairmusic
  
  June 11, 2012 at 11:20 am
  
  Reply
  - first check out the site charles gave, i think that will be a better choice :)
    
    Sharmishtha
    
    June 12, 2012 at 2:23 am
  - I will– thanks!
    
    mairmusic
    
    June 13, 2012 at 10:34 am
I love this stage of a creative effort … when it looks like it’s coming together, but there’s a lot of refinement still to do …. Enjoy!

Jamie Dedes

June 13, 2012 at 9:47 am

Reply
- Yes, me too. And I am pushing to get these 3 tunes to the stage where my friend Marcilio can help me refine the harmony o reflect a Brazilian, not classical, style.
  
  mairmusic
  
  June 13, 2012 at 10:32 am
  
  Reply

Who am I?

A mandolinist, a bandolimist, a writer, a photographer, a wannabe Brasileira. Check my webpage for information on my music and my sometimes life in Rio.

What is this?

I have made a plan for this year, beginning on my birthday- October 16, 2008 - to keep creativity in focus in my daily life, spontaneously, reflectively, and with intention, by setting in motion several series of small events. Every day I will take a photo and record a thought. Every week I will write a sonnet and photograph myself in the context of my life. And I will post it all here. Maybe not every day, but I will maintain the schedule of each series and post as often as I can. I think this will be fun, may be interesting, and will result in a considered year of small moments stolen from a busy life and strung together to make... who knows? At this point it's just a plan. Wish me luck~ here goes!

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“Year 2″ begins– so what’s changing?

I have completed a year of this blog-- amazing! And I've decided to continue on, because this document has become a treasured reflective spot in my life. There will be some changes for "Year 2," beginning on my birthday, October 16, 2009. I'll expand the options for my weekly poem beyond sonnet to add some other forms-- rondeau or triolet, possibly villanelle. I just added the decima in late January. And in August I am adding the pantoum. Definitions will appear below as the forms enter this page. I'll continue to post a photo daily, but I may post several pictures taken on one day over the course of a week if I have an interesting series. I may even post an old photo if I'm writing about something I'm thinking back to. I'll continue to have fun with this project & I hope you will too. Thanks for reading!

“Year 3″

For Year 3 I tried some changes, including other people in the self-portraits that accompany my poems, adding "Musical Sundays" to post mp3s of my music, but these petered out in a few months. This is simply a place for my daily thoughts & photos, and weekly poems in the forms I love. Onward...!

The material on these pages belongs to me

Everything published here was created especially for this project and is owned and copyright by me. When the project is complete I may do something concrete with some of it. So enjoy, but please, if you want to share more than a quote or two send people here, don't displace my work from its context or authorship.

What’s a sonnet?

A sonnet is a 14-line iambic pentameter poem with a unique and characteristic rhyme scheme. They have been written in Europe and England for centuries, and usually combine viewpoint and reflection in a personal yet universal way. I call mine blank-verse sonnets and try for a simple casual scan that observes yet obscures the form. Inspirations are the American sonnets of e. e. cummings and Edna "Vince" Millay.

What’s a villanelle?

A villanelle is an early French form with 19 lines using only 2 rhymes, traditionally broken into 6 verses. It's kind of obsessive, with lines 1 & 3 repeating alternately, the 4th time as lines 18 & 19. The lines can be any length, but don't seem to vary within a poem, and subjects include love, loss and challenge. Dylan Thomas, Elizabeth Bishop and Sylvia Plath all wrote them, and from the minute I typed villanelle in "Year 2 begins" I was itching to try it out because I've never written one. My first appear in Weeks 53 & 56. I've run some verses together, as many modern writers have done, for continuity and a cleaner line.

What’s a rondeau?

A rondeau is a form of medieval poetry that pre-dates the villanelle and also uses only 2 rhymes. The earliest come from an 8-line song form with 2 lines of music that repeat-- line 1 as 4 & 7, and line 2 as 8, rhyming the rest in a characteristic pattern. The result is a sturdy little poem that makes its point thoughtfully, and less obsessively than the villanelle, perhaps because the generating couplet is unrhymed, and the lines don't need to be the same length, just able to be sung or spoken in the same amount of time. The first ones appear in weeks 55 & 57. Sometimes the poetic form, sans music, is called a triolet.

What’s a decima?

A decima is an early 10-line Spanish poetic form, with a distinct break after the first 4. It uses an 8-syllable line and has an unusual but characteristic rhyme scheme. It's also a 19th-century form of improvised Cuban song so I thought it would work well in this blog format. My first appear in weeks 66 & 69.

What’s a pantoum?

A Malaysian form from the 15th century-- how exotic! It's a series of quatrains, w/ lines 2 & 4 repeating as lines 1 & 3 in the next. The last quatrain also uses lines 1 & 3 from the first quatrain, with the first line ending the poem. So every line is used twice. My first one is week 95.

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