News
- "War of Words" was performed at SFCM on 10/29/10
- Letter from Linda on YouTube
- New Piano Book Published
Music by Martin Bartlett and Alden Jenks (October 31, 1968)
Alden Jenks
Alden Jenks studied at the Aspen Institute, Yale University, and the University of California, Berkeley. Outside of these institutions he also worked with composers Karlheinz Stockhausen, David Tudor, and John Cage. He created the performing group“Deus ex Machina" in collaboration with Canadian composer Martin Bartlett, and subsequently became involved in a somewhat expensive scheme to create a huge (for its time) digital synthesizer called “The Grand Canonical Ensemble". Much of his work has emphasized electronic sound (his tape piece Nagasaki was a prize-winner at the prestigious Bourges Festival); more recently his life-long interest in poetry has led to an increasing number of vocal pieces. Along with this shift of emphasis has come a change of style, showing less concern with experiment and novelty, greater concern with expression and communication. Jenks is Director of the Recording and Electronic Music Studios at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. He is a member of the American Composers Forum and the American Music Center; and he is a member of ASCAP.
ALDEN JENKS: PRINCIPAL WORKS (chronological listing)
TWO RIMBAUD SONGS for baritone and piano
1963-64CHEZ ELLE electronic tape
1968AT IT'S electronic tape
1968LAPIS electronic tape
1968FREE
a collection of musical scores, poems, and graphic works with contributions by Martin Bartlett, Philip Glass, Patrick Gleason, Anthony Gnazzo, Steve Reich, and Alden Jenks; the collection as a whole designed and edited by Alden Jenks. Published by the Mills College Tape Music Center and given away free.
1969NAMO
electronic tape
1971VIDEOM I
for acoustic instruments, color TV/oscilloscope, and TV monitors with video modulation
1971SPACE
electronic tape. Performed alone in some circumstances, with instruments in others.
1972SEEING IN THE DARK
electronic tape: one version with a male vocalist, another with a male actor/dancer
1972MUMMERMUSIC
for mime, tape and synthesizer
1975WAVING
a film of electronically generated images with Britton Pyland and Efrem Lipkin
1975THOSE LONG CANADIAN
WINTERS
for actor/composer in bird costume by artist Peter Veres, two tapes, synthesizer, and slide projections
1976THE CONFINES OF SYMMETRY
for winds, brass, and percussion. A set of variations, based on computer-generated symmetrical rhythmic processes
1975-77MARRYING MUSIC for two pianos
1978 Rev.1983OHIO
electronic tape for dance
1980FEMME FATALE
for a choreographed drama; for string quartet, clarinet, piano, percussion.
1981AND THE WINNER IS...
electronic tape for a choreographed drama
1983NAGASAKI
electroacoustic composition on tape
1983THREE STAFFORD SONGS
(text by Wm. Stafford) for tenor, flute, clarinet, viola
1985-88SNEAK PREVIEW or HOUSES OF MUD AND ROCK
electronic sound track for video drama
1987FOUR PIANO BALLADS
for piano
1987-88ANSICHTSKARTE AN JOHANN
for two pianos
1989, rev.1994WEST MEETS EAST
commercial project --- sound track for instructional video
1989CALCULULATIONS
electronic tape
1990MENAGE
for synthesizer, piano, and percussion
1994THE CANDLE A SAINT
(text by Wallace Stevens) for reader, guitar, and tape
1994EXPLORERS
(text by Chas. Simic)
for singer, tape, synthesizer, percussion instruments, MIDI percussion controller, Macintosh computer
1994, rev. 1995LETTER FROM LINDA
song for soprano, actress, and piano; text anonymous
1998-99MARTIN PUT THAT GUN AWAY
electroacoustic composition
2000SOUR MUSIC
music for 12 instruments and electronic sound
2002OGNAGGIO AL'ANZZONIO
electroacoustic composition
2003PRELLUDE FOR ORGAN
2003GHOST SONGS Three Songs on Poems by Charles Simic for soprano and piano (Night Picnic; Ghosts; Shadow Publishing Company)
2004TIME SUITE Seven Songs on Poems by Jim Harrison for baritone and piano
2005FIVE CALIFORNIA SONGS on texts by Richard Brautigan, Leonard Nathan, Robert Hass, and Philip Whalen for tenor, cello, and piano 2006