Julian Damashek organized a “composium,” a short singing featuring new compositions right after today’s session of the All-California Convention. He received 14 compositions from 11 different composers. A good strong class of about 50 people stayed to sing, and we sang through all 14 compositions. All the compositions but one were led by the composer; and all of them sounded very good. Of the tunes that I hadn’t sung before, three stood out for me: “Mechanicville” by D. M. Montogomery with its lovely matching of tune and text; “Wiley” by R. L. Vaughan with its exciting rhythms (led by Karen Willard), and “Ruth” by Shelley Phillips with its repeating 2-bar motifs in the middle of the fuguing section (mm. 14-19). (Ruth gets extra point in my book for using one of my favorite books of the Bible.)
I presented two new tunes, both completed a week ago. The first was “San Carlos,” a tune I’ve been working on for some time that finally came together just in time for the composium. The class gave it an excellent reading, though I think I could have led it a little bit faster.
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