Musicologist Thea Derks' article about Vanessa Lann in
Keynotes Magazine, a Donemus publication. March 1998
Vanessa Lann:
'I focus on a limited amount of material' |
| (Photo credit, Vanessa Lann: Tom
Broido) |
Soft sucking and breathing sounds,
interspersed with a snapped clapper and rustling bells create an atmosphere of
suspense in Madness and the Moonwoman. Pitched instruments gradually take
over, playing long-held notes rather than melodies, with a staccato chord at the
end. As in Schoenberg's Klangfarbenmelodik the instruments grow
organically from one another and the orchestra is like one breathing organism.
About at two-thirds of the piece church-bells in a bleak landscape herald the
return of the murmuring noises of the beginning, while the pitched instruments
fade away.
The composition is typical of Lann. It shows her interest in the
physical aspect of sound and it has a clear structure in which a silent and open
beginning is followed by an intensification and succesive thinning-out of the
texture. Though the end mirrors the beginning, she doesn't conceive of this as a
proper A-B-A form:
'To me the coming out of the intensity, especially in my slower pieces
that deal with meditation, trance or dream, is as important as the going
towards it. Listeners have an experience of starting off in a world that
doesn't yet make sense, but through the use of repetitive elements, or an
increased density of the instrumentation or number of notes, they may
gradually come to an understanding of what role a seemingly meaningless
detail plays in the piece. Around where the golden section would occur, a
pizzicato that has been spaced far apart might become a quick appoggiatura
that makes you say 'oh', and realize what the original material meant.
It's this 'oh' that fascinates me in music. Therefore I'd say it's not so
much A-B-A, as it's a B and then a very often quite exact backward
repetition of A'. |
Lann labours long over her
compositions, lying awake at night if she can't find the right answers. This
goes back to her teacher RUTH SCHONTHAL, who insisted she find the best note in
the best place. 'She would say: take something good and make it even better'.
When Lann came to study with Schonthal on her thirteenth, she already had a
background of writing fugues and analysing Bach chorales at the local
conservatory. Schonthal continued training her in traditional harmony with a
strictness that would not allow easy solutions:
'Schonthal made me critical of myself in a positive way. She was very
much interested in surprise in music. So I'd come to her with something
I'd written in a 4/4 metre and she would have me look at it to see where I
could lose a beat and make it a 7/8 measure in order to give it that
slight energy. Or she would take a tonal piece and have me pick notes that
with accidentals would be a little more challenging to the ear. Schonthal
still influences the way I work. I'll basically focus on a very limited
amount of material. I write in layers, starting generally with the
structure or the conceptual idea and the bursts of energy versus the
amount of static time. Thus using the element of time and proportion I lay
the background down, and the overall feeling the work should create in the
audience. Then I add the colourations, putting gracenotes in certain
places systematically, or doing something with vertical harmony that I
hadn't considered at the beginning. In general I write linearly. Not only
the pitches are linear, but usually my instruments play certain roles, so
that a layer of activity will be going on in a particular instrument or
instrument group. This will either stay the same or develop in the course
of the piece. I regard the instruments as individuals having a dialogue
with each other. Therefore I don't combine notes vertically, but in the
sense of time passing, and what happens
proportionally'. |
Lann's pieces have a strong
ritual element, because of the ostinato-patterns, the frequent repetition of
elements and circular form.
Sometimes there's a strong emphasis on the
visual aspect. This can be lighting, as in Lullabye for a young girl
dreaming for string quartet, where Lann insists on a blue light in the hall
to create a dreamlike atmosphere for both performers and audience. While all the
silences are shared with the listeners, there's a big tension, and this forms an
intrinsic part of the composition.
In Towards the Center of Indigo for
the Syrinx Saxophone Quartet, the players chant the word indigo, whilst being
surrounded by indigo light. The chants builds and builds until they do play, but
this turns out to be a kind of whirling music that goes along with the chanting.
It develops into a frenzied shout and then drops back again.
Something
similar happens in Prayer, Torture and Ecstasy for solo cello, where the
repetitive nature of the fragments and the three basic curve forms of the
pitches correspond to the direction of the bowing. Lann:
'It's as if the cellist is leaning over a prayer object and is doing a
rite of passage and a discovery. Left and right are clearly demarcated in
the score, and when the piece is at its most busy, it should give the
impression the frenzy is taking over the entire body of the
performer'. |
In spite of these characteristics,
Lann feels no kinship with the British composer Harrison Birtwistle, who also
conceives of his works as rituals.
'He uses the term in a completely different way. When I say ritual, I
don't mean it has to have a particular story, or refer to something
spiritual or religious. I use a minimum of elements, whereas he tends to
have many different things going on at the same time, and it's a challenge
to find out where everything is being put together. My material reoccurs
at specific points and in the growing or the lessening of it, and in its
reference to what came before, one experiences new insights on that
material. It's a path one follows while listening to the music, and
hopefully it's a different one each time one listens. At a certain point
they perhaps realize that what at first seemed to be the background, may
well have been the main material. It's all got to do with my fascination
for illusion and reality'. |
All of this doesn't
mean Lann only writes heavy-handed stuff; a work like The Owl and The
Pussycat for piano and singer has a light-hearted cabaret aspect in that it
reverses the roles of singer and accompanist. The pianist basically recites the
poem by Edward Lear, while the singer intones true pitches, but on nonsense
syllables, playing an imaginary guitar. And in DD (Double D) for piano solo,
the pianist plays with hands crossed over the keyboard throughout the piece.
Lann:
'It's based on a repetitive note D, that becomes a D-flat as the music
goes along. The crossed hands are entertaining for the audience, especially
for those who know the meaning of a "double D" bra-size.
 (photo:
Vanessa Lann and Theo Loevendie
at Tanglewood Music Festival
USA)
It was Theo Loevendie, with whom I came to study in 1990
after having graduated from Harvard University, who made me aware of the
playfulness and fun of instruments. He encouraged me to place myself in
the shoes of performers. I'm frequently mathematical and tend to be
intrigued by systems I set up. Initially I wasn't excited by the
experience that the player would have in a fun way. I was aware of the
possibilities of the instruments and what would make a beautiful sound
when combined with whatever else. But Loevendie suggested I write a couple
of pieces without pitch, where I just deal with the instrumentalists
having a good time'. |
This resulted in Piece of
Pizza in which 5 percussionists rattle pots and pans, fry a piece of pizza
and eat it. Another work is American Accents for percussion duo which is
based on scat-singing. For her it was a liberating experience to concentrate not
only on structure and pitch-format but also on the 'performance aspect' of the
music. She now integrates this aspect in her music frequently.
Vanessa Lann
doesn't compose for the human voice that often and when she does, she hardly
uses it in a traditional, melodic way. What does the voice mean to her?
'I love poetry. My father, Richard Lann, is a poet and I grew up
surrounded by words. Words fascinate me; the vowels and consonants. In
Coming Home for the Maarten Altena Ensemble, set to a poem by my
father, the meaning of the words is important and the singer is acting as
an instrumentalist. She holds the 's' of 'still', the first word of the
poem. The 't' is spoken by the violin and the double bass whenever they
play a pizzicato. And the rhythm in the words dictates the rhythm of the
electric guitar's pop melody, which the singer repeatedly attempts to
'sing' on one breath. |
In Herman's Song
the piano repeats a simple melodic motif from beginning to end, while the
countertenor speaks in an agitated way, sings arioso parts on aah or oeh, or
recites in a style reminiscent of Gregorian chant. This work appears to be based
on a biographical poem by Richard Lann:
'It refers to his grandfather who immigrated from Poland to the USA at
the beginning of this century. He was a cantor in a schul and the more he
became respected in the community, the less time he spent with his wife,
Rose. The spoken voice in this situation is used for references to the man
Herman. In the beginning when he speaks so quickly that you can't
understand the words, it indicates the haste with which Herman undertakes
his voyage. The high melismatic singing refers to Grandma Rose, the
forgotten person in the poem. The chanting on 1 or 2 notes alludes to
Herman's position as a cantor, and indeed there are similarities between
Jewish religious singing and Gregorian chant. The piano with its repeated
pattern of notes is like time going by, symbolizing the "calendar of
lonely tins and jars" of Rose waiting for her husband to come
home'. |
Simplicity, repetition, trance,
illusion and reality form a central aspect of Lann's work. She demands her
listeners to reflect on the material she offers, hoping for them to pick up
different aspects each time they listen. Thus listening becomes a ritual act,
like Zen meditation, where one keeps repeating a phrase during a lifetime. Lann:
'Your reaction to this word or question changes as you go through
life, and it's somehow your response to your own response that helps you
determine who you are'. |
| (Photo: Gertrude Stein) |
Recently she has taken an interest in live electronics:
'I like the idea of picking up something so subtle that you would
otherwise have glossed over. Being able to focus on this tiny little thing
and see the beauty in something so close to something else, I find a
fascinating point of departure.' |
For more biographical information about Vanessa Lann (temporarily only in Dutch; publisher is revamping catalogue):
article from DONEMUS Composer's Brochure and
bio from DONEMUS Composer's Brochure