Email from Dr. Hicks (BYU Music Prof.)

Hi Ben,



I've wanted to spend some good time listening and relistening to the
CD you sent me (Owl and Inner Atmospheres). I think I can now comment
somewhat.



First, a bravo, sincere and admiring, for the quality of the two
pieces generally. As you probably know, they are in spirit and
temperament right up my aesthetic alley. Aside from the engaging
textural rarefaction and condensation—the clarifying and fuzzying—that
take place in the larger gestures of the pieces, I very much like the
harmonies you use. The chords have the quality of mystery and
evocation that I think the present-day world needs, deserves, and
(unconsciously) demands. They float, but with heavy bell-like
sonorities.



I have one critique and one more specific word of praise. The
critique is that "Owl" as a title sometimes makes the music seem
merely pictorial. The swooping and squawking come off as more
programmatic than I personally prefer. You seem to be making a series
of ornithological works, no? That's okay. But in this case I found
it sonically too literalistic in its opening and ending, especially.
I wondered how differently I might have perceived the sounds with a
different title, one that drew my attention, maybe, to subtler and
possibly abstracter features of the piece.



The "more specific word of praise" is that, when listening to Inner
Atmospheres (three times in toto, several more times around the
juncture I will mention) I had the distinct experience of a gradual
deepening of the sincerity and expressiveness of the work, subtly from
about 8:00 forward, but strikingly from (almost exactly) 11:00 on. I
haven't been able to figure out or articulate why I found myself so
arrested by the later music of the piece, especially its last 5½
minutes. The sonorities that begin at 11:00 took me by surprise,
certainly. But there is an introspection that comes in the melodic
lines and sustained pitches thereafter. Maybe you can give me some
insight into that. In any case, this piece was not just fun and
interesting—plenty for music to do in the first place, of course—but
truly spiritual.



Nice work.



On a much crasser subject, assuming Dale didn't tell you this before
leaving for his month in South Africa, I wanted to mention that the
School of Music has in fact hired someone on a one-year temporary
basis for our area. Dale and I both were exploring the possibility of
that person being you. But someone—I won't say who yet, till
contracts are actually signed—with a completed degree and some
teaching experience got the nod. But I should add that, sometime in
the fall we will be almost certainly begin a search for at least two
continuing track faculty members in composition and theory. So keep
that in mind and watch for more details in coming months.



Hope all is going well with you and your family . . .



All best,

Michael