For those of you who missed out, there are also plans afoot to re-master, and re-release Flat Earth, an album we recorded at the turn of the millenium, featuring Mark Atkins on Didjeridu, Philip South on percussion, with improvisations, as well as full-on, multi layered compositions by myself. (Check out some of the tracks by clicking here) 

Rolling on, ……the wheels keep turning!

Romano Crivici, 14th May, 2012

What more can I say? What more can I do (other than going back and, in completing one more work, (Icon) completing the cycle)? Creative processes, always different, changing…. unpredictable and varied; for me, anyway…………..and you?

 Romano Crivici 7th May, 2012

What is the current reality?  Older, more experienced players have (for various reasons) moved on, leaving behind some very talented, but less experienced and developed players.  The other competitors will come from some very wealthy and very well resourced schools, (hey, I know one of them!) with much larger ensembles (that always help cover all sorts of weaknesses and limitations).

What do we have going in our favour: Our repertoire is unique, (On the Edge) -very few works written for strings and percussion; the music camp coming up later this month (21st -23rd May -are you all going!?) will give us a serious boost, and we will get to perform there, as well as an assembly at the school (I hope)……. but hey, is this enough?   What do you think ….what else can/should we be doing?  I look forward to hearing from you with your thoughts and ideas!

PS:  Next week we get our first real dose of reality when we combine the strings and percussion for the first time, and find out how it sounds, and whether we are getting close to being able to hold it all together.  Once again, what do you think; can we do it? (although the question we all have really ask is “can I………..or rather, do I choose to be able to do it”!!!

Your Musical Director

Romano  30th April, 2012

Going back through my psychic history, I found various works, some complete, some just fragments and ideas, reworked them, expanding and developing the ideas in ways I couldn’t have back then…but the initial feelings, intuitions they were expressions of still made sense………..in retrospect I could see that they all came from the same space, and as this became clearer, so then too did the title of the collection/cycle of works that have come together make sense, being, as they were -”Reflections of Life, Death and Transience”.

The range of feelings expressed/experienced as I worked were, are broad; but it was when the ‘chorale’ appeared in the final piece, from unspoken depths, softly singing with a simple, but deep heart of gratitude, and surrender, to all the love, pain, joy and struggle, and release the human form, (or is it ‘being’) realises itself through, that I realised a completion in, and of my life has occured.  Where to from here, my conscious mind, or personality, which even though growing increasingly transparent, does not know; it does not really matter anymore.

Romano Crivici  27th April, 2012

 Stylistically, these works are ambient groove, subtly jazz-oriented compositions, with gentle contrapuntal lines, contrasted with improvisation and  outbursts of Stravinsky-like writing for winds and percussion;  -overall the closest description I can think of would be ‘an ECM Label sort of sound/space’…. well, sort-of, if you know what I mean………. 

 Romano    -27th Jan, 2012

I know, I know, it’s starting to sound a bit ‘mystical’ (we are not supposed to talk like that) -and, yes it is, as well as simply being the truth of our nature as human social beings.

 Well, enough of that… the kids did amazing things; they organised themselves, produced an e-flyer, practised their instruments, focused and stretched their minds during a long performance night in ways they don’t often have to do, and had the amazing experience of playing with one of Australia’s top creative jazz saxophonists, Craig Walters.  They also created and presented some wonderful speeches, performed amazing solos, and, in the end, made a difference in the world in many ways, not least in raising over $700 in funds for Medecin Sans Frontieres.

And so, dear friends, ends another year for us all; -time, life,  it all rolls on… unfolding, as it always is -all hanging in, arising as that “Still Point” (always ever this) ……. which, by the way, just so happens to be the title of the last piece  we performed on the night, which featured Craig on the  saxophone…  Did we capture it?…who knows, but we are that much closer to it, and maybe richer for trying. I certainly am.

Love, Merry Christmas and many thanks to you all!

Romano -19th Dec, 2011

And ‘it’ came out (or was it ‘me’ going in?) -very simple, very still, an idea/feeling I had been hearing in my minds ear; -spacey, still, meditative …. and as I kept writing, it developed, taking on a form and energy of its own.  Scored for sax, piano, bass, strings and percussion, I  structured it in a way that balances written material with improvisation, and though it has its peaks, as well as long primitive  ‘chant’ sections with heavy bass percussion, it keeps returning to that ‘still point’  -ten days later, and it is now complete;  Still Point, (always ever this).

Creative flow; hmm, one can never predict when it will come, or in what circumstances it will arise, or where it will take one …. best, I suspect, to be open, -to simply ‘go with the flow’.

Romano 13th, Nov, 2011

[Performance: 17th December, 2011 -details: look it up in the site]

 A funny journey this, this life thing….big paths/arcs as the generations roll on; unfolding, arcing/peaking and then not so much subsiding, but rather being absorbed into/by the next wave (if one is so lucky) as the great cycle continues to endlessly roll on……….roll on, as the ‘younger’ part absorbs, devours, digests and internalises some of the energy, and hopefully wisdom/experience of that other, older part of the coil….rolling on….rolling on………

Romano 31st July, 2011

The first work in this set (of this millenium) was “A Playground Groove”, and it is somehow appropriate that I have completed the process with this one….and there you go, it is now done.  Having now completed the process of editing and revising all the works, one of course has a vague urge to get them out there, to be played, and shared…..how, why…who knows…any ideas?

Romano -6th July, 2011

… stage layout, sound-checks, ABC Radio Classic FM recording set-up, etc,  and finally a few precious (but seriously pressured) hours rehearsing… yet, it starts to gel/come-together…yes, it finally starts to make sense  (and it only took 10 years or so to get there).  Last minute discussions,  (who will cue whom, who will conduct what, and where) last minute practise (see the photos! I have proof !) and then the word from the stage manager… “front of house doors are being opened”…. time to move backstage.

Jess, (the guy with the beard-y thing -see photo!) offers to get me a meal while I continue to deal with last minute things…. things,  details, procedures….the team reappear backstage, sounds of tuning, litte bits of practise ….and the stage manager appears again, “is everyone ready”  ….”shit, yes, I mean, um,  yes”,   this is it…”good luck, lets have fun” we all say to each other excitedly as the scene unrolls, (simultaneously in slow-motion/fast-forward….)  hey, shit, we’re on the stage, applause greets us, and things … things settle down, -its like we’ve arrived, and we all start to tune in to the space, and each other…the way ahead seems clear, (whether written down or improvised  -or things in between!) still, quiet and a moments peace, and the music begins ….

another world, a new found space, what once was not, unfolds, and born,  …a moments grace.  Who ever said creating and performing is not where it’s at!!

Romano  -14th May, 2011