Lee Barry Composition (And Photo) Diary

 The Last Art of April 4/30/2002   Planetary alignment of J upiter, Saturn, Mars ,  Venus, and Mercury in the western sky at sunset. (First time in 80 years)  It's been cloudy, so no one's been able to see it.    

 Don't Lose Your Key Israel mulling a counter-attack. The Middle East has always been about "the first stone". (someone on CNN called Iran's offensive was a "telegraph" which was an interesting metaphor). There's already been one round. At some point someone has to not react. This was always my stance on 9/11. The US should have not retaliated. A few days ago I was watching an interview with Caroline Myss. I think she's interesting in that she's a "secular spiritialist".  "I'm going to go against what my reason wants me to do what my heart what my gut says. I want to destroy these people and I'm going to go against that and say I want that desire out of me."

Weather very pleasant, 60 degrees. Oldest living conjoined twins die at 62.  Two people that were never lonely.

Studio: Fire and Ice (Sandur). The music should "look" like this: 

  Instead of using a star rating system, using average threshold with plus or minus above/below horizon (A "candlestick" chart essentially) 

  A diagram from the paper diary. At the time I was interested in boundaries and invisible boundaries which can overlay other natural boundaries. You can build towns or cities across rivers and that will eventually create "the wall in the head": "You're from the other side of the river". Developments can be created ad hoc within certain areas where they might not belong as a kind of "occupation". I think that's what I was getting at.

Possible installation:

 An excerpt from the handwritten diary, The Influence Contour , an augur of the Influencer.

You can hear music anywhere if you just notice it. Like in the Spa Cafe on Monroe Street in the Loop: the freezer makes a canorous humming sound. In the background faintly is the sound of a soda machine, clicking like and insect or bird of some kind. If I were to re-create it, it would be like this. (This was the initial idea for the Music For Places series) [6/2/2024: The cicada broods of 2024 are this year's keynote].

 

Topic for boundary discussion: the boundary between free-form music and structured music. Music without limits can be boring. It's more exciting to make constraints and create resourcefully rather than to play with the net down. Free-form music can also seem arrogant as it doesn't always invite the listener in or compel them to want to connect with it. The success of free music depends on its ability to connect at the "fourth dimension" (level of the conceptual), and the surface elements (how it sounds) are not as important. (Rev. 1/2014: Marina Abramovic talks about it in this video . Using axis formulae, you can control audience response by "swinging the pendulum" from stasis to dynamism. 

Made small painting based on the Arnold Newman photograph of Stravinsky at the piano, replaced with a silhouette profile of a cowboy. I liked this particular image, as it had an interesting framed/cropped geometry. The image of a cowboy (Average Joe) is a generic symbol representing freedom, self-reliance and rebellion. In this piece I am using it ironically, as cowboys are not typically classical musicians, or if they are, they are not great fans of Russian composers, or are simply effete.  A new Songday based on it: Silhouette Cowboy by meta4s   Then I ran it through DALL-E with the prompt "Silhouette of a cowboy on A SpaceX rocket"  

Perfect day. Sunny, clear 75 degrees Went to nurses rally at Daley Center. As with all protests these days, it's a smorgasbord of grievances. 

Another gorgeous day. Jazz Showcase with T. What do young people appreciate in jazz? It's interesting to observe jazz club patrons: they hardly move their bodies, like at a symphony. Most of the young girls (apparently) on dates with their jazz-loving boyfriends have a glazed look of boredom on their faces ("Get me out of here"). Looking at the audience is sometimes more interesting than what's going on on-stage.                                         While waiting for T, a woman and her pet duck: 

 

Diagram of one of my favorite shots in Sleepwalking:  

 I was thinking about how we apply metaphors to shape our thinking, sometimes going too far by taking them too literally. I called them "Boundary Conditions" but they are really metaphors" "We are________" When we take the "We are machines" metaphor too literally we get "The Singularity". A page from my diary 2008: 

Watched obscure Hitchcock film/ documentary featuring the stories of Holocaust survivors. I liked what he did with shadows and silhouettes behind the characters. The visual implication is that it is the shadow of the character, when in fact it is a doppelganger. 

 

Downright frigid. Chicago Photo Network photo shoot at Rookery. Tight security. I drifted up to the Mezzanine and the security guard went nuclear. You're a terrorist until proven otherwise. Shot for 15 minutes—kind of boring. Then down to Dearborn Station with Moya, Garfield Park Conservatory, Dale Chihuly Exhibit.