Rocky Riverbed -

Letchworth

Some years ago we learned that a new association of composers was being formed, and was having its first gathering at Houghton College in “upstate” New York. It was called “The Christian Fellowship of Art Music Composers” and was intended to provide support and encouragement to composers who wrote in the contemporary “classical” or “Art music” idioms, whose Christian associates were sometimes uneasy with their not-always-orthodox musical style, and whose composing associates were uneasy with their Christian beliefs and interest in writing for Christian contexts. We attended because we were interested in seeing what sort of music they might be writing for woodwind players. To that end, I wrote a set of three pieces based on hymn tunes popular in the Moravian Church, designed to give some ideas as to what our instruments, clarinet and bassoon, can do. Having been challenged by the organizer of the group not to bring “just another hymn arrangement”, I was prompted to think about what kinds of development of the basic elements of the tunes a “real” composer might employ, which resulted in a new style, method and confidence for me. (You may find it interesting to visit our companion site www.ongracestreet.com, especially www.thestoryofthreem.html, www.threemoravianhym.html, www.holylord.html, and www.joinweallwithone.html.

Letchworth State Park, with a magnificent gorge and three waterfalls, was a side trip one afternoon during the conference, but became a major attraction for us as we planned our return the following year. This image is from the second visit, when I was using a seasoned Hasselblad in a quest to be battery-free. The Hasselblad uses a square format, which makes it an ideal tripod camera, as you never need to flip it from “landscape” to “portrait” orientation. (It is interesting, I guess, to note that most of my landscapes are shot in the “portrait” orientation, while I used the “landscape” orientation for my current self-portrait). You can of course plan to crop a standard rectangle from the square, but I found that I was composing to fill the entire area, and liking the balanced look. Another thing I had always noticed about photographs made with the Hasselblad, is that the Carl Zeiss lenses seem to have a three-dimensional effect, seem to mold the forms within the picture rather than to make flat representations of them.