In the past five years or so, I've been known to work on a project or two. However, while many of my projects are put out into the world, promoted a bit, and then swept under the rug, there are many more projects that immediately are swept under the rug and remain there, incomplete, pending. Here is a selection of some of my favorite unfinished works.
BECOMING MORE AND MORE (documentary)
Many of you readers may have actually participated in this. After seeing an Italian student documentary, I thought I could do better and proceeded to map out a document of Pittsburgh's current music scene through interviews and performances with musicians, artists, photographers, radio personalities, and local music journalists. I filmed about 50 GB of footage with 14 people that I trust musically and went about editing down the footage. My initial excitement diminished as I ran into sound issues, content issues, and general aesthetic indecision, while trying to put it together with modest means - $400 in digital video cameras. Three videos were finished and posted to BurghSounds, but the rest of the interviews were generally abandoned. Every time I thought about starting it up again, I realized that many of the interviewees are in different places now and I didn't want to pin old thoughts on their current activities. Interviews with the Hugh Twyman, Josh Verbenets, Cindy Howes, Matt Wellins, the Draw Us Lines founders, and more currently lay dormant. My favorite interview with tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE made it, and is below.
RESTRAINT WRITINGS (book)
With the advent of Lulu, publishing a book (full color, even) seemed to be a much easier task. The trouble was filling the book with sufficient content. I'm definitely thinking more about the failed Restraint Writings project since Host Skull is embarking on writing a book detailing recording techniques, open source and dance, and other tidbits. Let's hope I don't have to add that to this list. But Restraint Writings would have collected a selection of interactive poetry, graphic compositions, and instruction compositions. The interactive poetry grew out of a need to create a form of poetry that avoided all the issues I currently see with poetry. Ever since my junior year in college, my patience for poetry has been limited to Susan Howe and Terrance Hayes. (Hopefully, I can add Sarah Smith's forthcoming book to that short list). Additional FYI: I received a minor in poetry from CMU. The interactive poetry was to be performed in front of an audience and the passages or words that were to be read would be based on audience actions or non-actions. Initial writings proved uneventful and I lost interest in many of the text-based graphic scores that were created for the book (The Outer Circle did perform a handful of these in various concerts in 2010). Below is one such text piece that was turned into a video.
SOLO GUITAR RECORDS - "Secure Tomorrow" | "Attempt"
Over the years, I've made a few solo guitar albums. During the Vale and Year days, there were a few limited runs (5-10 copies) of solo guitar and solo piano albums. Very small affairs. The piano albums have held up better, providing atmospheric pieces for prepared piano or Satie-like moods. The guitar albums generally sound like Derek Bailey rip-offs. More recently, two old, but new guitars provided inspriration for solo recordings. My dad' 70s Fender Stratocaster provided the impetus for a jagged collection of electric guitar improvisations and compositions - Secure Tomorrow. All pieces were developed with the theme of secret or not-so-secret military operations in mind. Only one track made it out alive. "Ill Wind" was included on a Ball Hall compilation. Free download and info: http://dbernabo.drupalgardens.com/content/ball-hall-compilation-new-david-bernabo-solo-guitar-track Ultimately, I deemed this collection too rough. The few parties that attained a copy didn't express much interest, either.
Attempt was and is a much better document. This set of pieces came from playing a classical guitar. I believe only Pj Roduta has heard this release or pieces of it, but this collection sits much better with me. As I think about the point of releasing music, this record continues to sit.
MUSIC FROM WAR (series of compositions)
I cannot remember what the event was, possibly a Wikileaks leak, but a lot of Iraq War data became available. So, a series of compositions solely derived from data seemed like a thing to do. Only one piece was created. Since at this point, I had abandoned the Secure Tomorrow guitar album, I decided to call this project Secure Tomorrow. From wikipedia, Operations Secure Tomorrow was "an operation that took place from February-July 2004 in which a multi-national force led by 3rd Battalion 8th Marines was sent by US President George W. Bush to Haiti to protect US interests there. The Central Intelligence Agency was believed to be behind a coup plot after it was revealed that the National Institute for Democracy, a US Congress-funded organization played a major role by funding opponents of the Lavalas government. The government was overthrown by rebels, led by Guy Philippe, Winter Etienne, and Louis-Jodel Chamblain in order to oust the left-wing President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. In four months the multi-national forces brought Haiti back in line. The countries that participated in the operation were Chile, a close ally of the US in Latin America, and Canada's Liberal government that wanted to show its support for US foreign policy after its opposition to the Iraq War." I mainly liked the name of the operation. The other song titles drew on more interesting operations.
So, the only piece dealt with Iraqi War Deaths from 2004 to 2009. The piece was scored for four parts. All instruments need to be in the same range with one instrument capable of a large range. Low brass instruments seemed suitable for a piece about death. The four parts mirrored data provided for coalition force deaths, Iraqi force deaths, civilian deaths, and "enemy" deaths. Since I couldn't gather an ensemble to perform or record the piece, I soon lost interest. Below is the only score.
OTHERS
- Reviewing all record purchases. This lasted through Sam Prekop's Old Punch Card. Then I generally got sick of writing album reviews, especially if I didn't like the music.
- Collaboration with Jack Wilson. The full album idea never took off. A partial track made it to DJ's mixtape: http://soundcloud.com/jackwilsonmc/its-changed-jack-wilson
- Letters to the Editor: During the automobile industry bail-outs, I wrote a letter to the editor urging a shift to cooperatively-owned automobile companies and plants. Never sent it.
- Unreleased albums: Vale and Year (On Safari/Is Truant, I Can Remember At Her), Solo (Pickpocket), Assembly (Must Have Order), Host Skull ("In Hell" 7")
