Since last posting about my trip to Finland to discuss my research on Julius Eastman, a lot has changed.
-I played bass in a 90’s and early 2000’s cover-band…which led to me playing bass in the musical “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown.” I AM STILL A GUITARIST, but I can bass if you need me to- apparently. The name of the band was Dunewalker. They rock Mid-Michigan. Check em out.
-I no longer live in my native land of Michigan
-A cat occupies my new home
-My new home is in Kansas
-I am a graduate teaching assistant and a doctoral student at the University of Kansas
-I am currently in the process of launching an organization called Art Music for All.
Art Music for All (AMFA) is an organization dedicated to disseminating art music and ideas about art music that promote radical notions about how music can influence politics, society, and everyday life.
The genesis for AMFA came after a long beer fueled talk with my comrade in music, John Jansen. More to come on AMFA has things begin to take off…
This talk about music’s role in society is a good segue into quick spiel about my new music. One of my most recently produced recordings is of a piece called What Democracy Looks Like. Here are the program notes:
What Democracy Looks Like utilizes a fixed media track to accompany a solo guitarist. The fixed media contains several elements: 1) Audio from a protest I participated in at an appearance of a US presidential candidate during the 2016 election cycle. One of the call and response chants at this protest was “Tell me what democracy looks like! / This is what democracy looks like!” 2) Audio of a conversation with my cousin and uncle regarding money in politics and the role of government in people’s lives. 3) Audio of several friends whose opinion I regard highly giving me their thoughts on what democracy is. I was expecting there to be a consensus; democracy is a good thing. Instead, I got rather diverse views on democracy. Because I was unaware of the outcome of asking people their thoughts on democracy, I did not know what the piece was going to be about until it was finished. For me, these diverse views provoked some stimulating contemplation about the frailty and efficacy of democracy in a free-market capitalist society.
The most recent recording of my new music is a piece called Fo’ You Get Rolled Up On. Here are the program notes:
Dedicated to my good friend John Jansen. If you ever owe John or any other friend or family member of mine some money, you better pay up fo you get rolled up on.
For a snapshot of the music that I wrote between Fall 2015 and Spring 2016, check out the following playlist:
The last order of business:
I will be adding three new tabs on the homepage of www.FrankNawrot.com to display my research on composition pedagogy, my research on Julius Eastman, and a tab dedicated to AMFA.