Composer Disclosure: S1E3 Randall Standridge

and so there just came this moment where i just kind of asked myself i was like is this the type of life you want to live and the answer was a resounding no and so you know when you decide that you have to start making some decisions that to other people might sound selfish but you know ultimately the only person you can really take care of is you like period and if you're not taking care of yourself you're no use to anybody else you can't really live your life for somebody else you have to live it for yourself in the best way you can and that's that's what i decided [Music] have you ever wondered what's behind the music of your favorite composer where does their inspiration come from what do they stand for what are they most passionate about what's behind the name at the top of the page my name is jeff herwig i'm a composer and educator and each week i'm going to bring you the answers to those questions and more welcome to composer disclosure hello friends and welcome back to composer disclosure today it's my absolute pleasure to be able to speak with composer arranger drill designer educator artist writer a man who can truly do it all randall standridge [Music] randall i truly cannot express how grateful i am uh that you're willing to give some of your incredibly valuable time to the podcast um thank you so much for being here you know as someone who's performed and conducted and been inspired by so much of your music it's an incredible honor to have you as a guest well thank you very much all right so let's get started with with the first portion of the show and jump right in this is where i ask you a few general questions that i present to each of our guests before we sort of take a deeper dive um so my first question what was your earliest inspiration to compose and not necessarily you know write music for other people to perform but like your earliest memory that you have of wanting to create your own music okay well that's um i when talking about that i think sometimes it's important to define like what type of person i am now when i say this it's going to make me sound really um you know braggartly and like i'm and i'm not but this is because i mean i would describe a lot of people like this not just myself but i'm just a creative person and now when i say creative person i don't mean that i think that everything that i create is great or that everything you know that like i'm a genius is none of that none of that but what i mean when i say creative is that there is some impulse in me that drives me to create and it always has um you know some of my favorite toys when i was little were legos because you could build things and create um you know i love drawing and painting i always have even when i was little and so once i you know got into music and started learning to play music and things like that it was a pretty natural progression to not only want to do it but to create it because that's just my personality type and that hardly makes me unique i mean there's there's you know tons of people across the world that love to create things and it manifests in different ways and for me it manifested that way um so my earliest really memory of getting started was um i taught myself to play piano because my brother who is a really great guitarist received a an electronic keyboard for christmas one year and he was just not interested because i you know the thought was oh you know he loves music he's gonna love this but he wanted nothing to do with it like it was basically oh that's nice but i've got my guitar so it was just kind of lying around and i started picking it out and uh you know picking out tunes that i knew or things that i'd heard on tv or on movies and you know i didn't know it at the time i was learning to play by ear and dictate and do all the stuff but i was just like oh i'm just picking out this song you know and so of course it eventually just became you know you know it's kind of like how somebody goes through an evolution with drawing or painting generally speaking when people draw or paint at first they're drawing things they see or things they you know something that's already done like you might you know somebody teaches you how to draw something or hey i'm going to draw this picture but there comes that point where you cross over to well i've got my own ideas and i want to actualize those and so music became the same thing where i started you know writing you know little fragments little melodies little rhythm things and it just grew from there so those were my ears that was probably when i was oh nine or ten years old was there a separate moment for you later on after that after your first inclination to create music was there a second time later on that you were like this is something that i'd like to do for a career to create things for a living uh not really i always like to tell people that like i became a composer by accident um and i'm being serious because to me it was never a career goal like it was it was literally just something fun to do and i mean i'm not being disingenuous like it was um so just to give you kind of an idea about how this happened you know we just talked about the start all through high school and junior high i would keep writing like i'd write some drum line cadences for you know when i was in uh in high school band um i even wrote a couple of percussion ensembles um and wrote a couple of band pieces that were really bad but um but you know there was still that to me it was just fun it was kind of like finger painting like it was like you know this is just fun to do um and i didn't take it too seriously which i think has played to my favor like even in my later career um so when i got in college or when i attended university um you know i went for music education i mean i was studying to be a music educator and um like i didn't even know that studying composition was a thing like i didn't even know you could do that so i got there and um you know we met all the faculty you know they introduced the faculty to all the freshmen and they introduced a couple of the professors as oh well these are our composition professors and you know i had i was like that's a thing like i didn't even know you could do that and um so i went and talked and i was like well i was like i'm a music education major but i would really like to study on the side just because i it's fun i think it's interesting and so did that and studied with dr tom o'connor and it just kind of kept developing and he thought i had a lot of promise and he was a great teacher um and so then i get to my first band directing gig which was my only band directing gig that i held for 12 years at harrisburg high school in harrisburg arkansas and i composed for my band again just because it was fun and all this time like it never occurred to me once oh somebody else might enjoy playing this stuff you know so uh but um yeah i i am married i have a husband and one day he was just like you know you really have to think about trying to get these published and i was like well i was like do you think so he's like yeah yeah i think it's really good is that i think you're better than you think you are and uh so he i mean he's always my number one fan my biggest go-to and so i started submitting things and got it published and the rest was history so i mean there really wasn't a moment of like oh you know i want to do this it just kind of i just kind of stumbled into it um the only moment where it really became a decision was at the end of my teaching career um it basically just became you know i mean for all your listeners out there who i'm sure quite a few are music educators i don't have to tell you music education is a full-time job and it is literally a full-time job i mean you know you have the work day the sectionals the lessons the games and all the stuff and then all of the worry and planning that goes on behind the scenes now when you do that and you mix in with it a budding um composition career that has its own demands you know with traveling social media doing the actual writing and everything else correspondence which takes its own block of time um i mean it just became where all i was doing was working and i am definitely the type of person who wants to enjoy my life i don't i don't want to just work it away and so um there just came that point where it was like i'm too busy like i either need to teach or i need to write and so that was the only moment where it was like okay i am deciding to be a composer you know that's great and actually that you answered one of my future questions that i had down the line here so that's awesome that you alluded to that um kind of tying back into that you mentioned uh dr o'connor was one of your your influences in in your early writing are there any composers that you would say um influence you so much that they're sort of like part of your writing dna that there's a little bit of their work in yours well i would say quite a few and i i could because i don't think it's possible and especially when you're a composer i don't think it's possible to hear music the same way people that aren't composers do because to me there's this constant analysis going on and there's this constant kind of breaking it down to its parts and and basically kind of gauging like how am i reacting to this and so um i would say quite a few um i mean just just among you know among them all this is certainly not all of them um i remember the first i mean i i think for a lot of the kids that grew up in the 80s like i did um you know the first big one is always john williams just because it's it's you know when you think about star wars e.t indiana jones it's the music is so great and so powerful and just iconic that um i think it's it's a lot of people's and you know movies in general are a lot of people's introduction now into the world of composition because you know they i didn't yo i'm just gonna be blunt a lot more of our young people today are going to know star wars theme then they're going to know beethoven's absolutely yeah which is unfortunate but it's the truth you know and um so you know john williams was a huge influence just because it was like music music is great this type of symphonic sound is great um i also just love love love danny elfman um you know hardcore but that's also because i'm a big like horror um literature and horror cinema you know nut i love that stuff and so i love his his music with tim burton um and then another it's funny like a lot of my academic composer composer and musician friends really kind of laugh when i tell them this but um two other really big influences on me um growing up one was yani you know the the new age composer yani because his music to me sounded exactly like what i wanted to create which is pop meets symphonic um you know it's really fashionable for a lot of academia to really rag his music but his music is incredible and it's just it mixes every culture of the world into one sound um it's just it's magnificent and uh and he's just a cool guy so that was another you know composer growing up that i was like wow this is neat um and then another one is um earth wind and fire um you know the group from the 70s because their their music is just on a whole other level than other bands from i mean don't be wrong 70s was a great time for you know rock and roll jazz funk horn bands in particular you know like you've got bill chase blood sweat and tears all these things like that but for me um earth wind and fire the way they mixed a world music sound with funk with jazz and all of this just texture and harmony um it was very effecting for me because i was also like you know to me too i was like oh that's what i want my music to sound like you know and uh so but then beyond that it's just everything like i am constantly inspired by other writers and composers going along with that is there anybody that you're currently listening to right now maybe not one of those early influences but somebody that you can't listen to enough of their music right now that's kind of influencing your current writing um not really and i tend to get more attracted to individual pieces um as opposed to like composers in general um we'll say right now i mean really i listen to everything um right now i find myself listening to a lot of heavy metal um i i grew up being a little bit of a metal head and i've kind of reconnected with my love of that recently and uh so i've been listening to a lot of that i mean i always listen to a lot of symphonic things i'm constantly culling um you know things for new symphonic bandworks orchestral works coral works um and just listening to what's new in fact my favorite feature right now yeah i use apple music and my favorite feature on it is they have this feature called for you and it will kind of like archive and select music based on your tastes you know there are things that you may not have heard and i'll listen to that every week it comes out with a new list every week and i'll listen to it and you know just see what it is and of course you have some of the things i like some of the things i don't um but that really uh i don't know i'm just i'm constantly looking for new music but it's but but my tastes tend to be all over the place um so i've been listening to a lot of that you know a lot of heavy metal i've also been listening to a lot of like folk and blue grass lately um in particular uh just to give a shout out to two um two musicians that i really like um i'm not sure if you're familiar with this particular musician but trixie mattel i'm not um trixie mattel is a drag queen that does country western okay and i mean it's not just a gimmick like the thing is like he or you know she and her persona is just in um i mean just a great musician great music very and very great lyricist and his lyrics in particular are just spectacular um and then and it just flew out of my head i'm pulling up my itunes side and give you the right name uh will stratton okay will stratton he's kind of an indie um fault music bluegrass artist plays guitar is just incredible and has this very melancholy uh sensibility to his lyrics and his overall style and it's it's very arresting it's just really cool and then uh last is a group called airlands i think um they're kind of new i found them on soundcloud and it's just a cool sound so those are the people i'm listening to right now but that's going to change next week right i'm i'm i am worse than a magpie just picking up you know something shiny and running with it that's good though and i'll make sure to link to all three of those artists so that people can maybe discover them for the first time and enjoy that too oh yeah yeah they're great great music yeah and your your eclectic taste and music really um shines through in your album which we'll talk about in a little bit because there's a little bit of of something throughout the entire thing which is awesome oh yeah yeah but um moving along to the next question here um i know that you've written for uh like a myriad of different ensembles in terms of like size ability level um even like from marching band to concert band orchestra chamber ensemble whatever it may be do you have a favorite medium or a favorite type of ensemble to write for no absolutely not um i am happy to write whatever um and i think you know sometimes when you find success in a particular genre you know like i have in concert band um i think people tend to identify you with that so strongly that they forget that you know you're a composer like i mean i don't consider myself to be a band composer i am a composer who happens to write a lot for band but i've also written string orchestra i've written full orchestra i've written choral works i've written um some movie score stuff you know i've written some just experimental stuff like i just like writing um and if you're going to be a working composer um you take the gigs that come to you which for me right now is concert band you know and but um if you know i was suddenly discovered in the choral community you better believe i'd be writing a lot of choral music um or a lot more because you know you write where the gigs take you right um i think sometimes people have this romanticized idea of composers where it's like oh you know they got inspired by this so they wrote that and it's very nice for people who can do that that have like a college job i am a full-time composer i take the gigs i get i mean now don't get me wrong i get inspired sometimes and i you know there are passion projects i have that i work on but i also take jobs that will just pay the bills you know right one of my actually one of my favorite things i wrote this last year it was a real fast job um you know one of the things that's going on uh right now is there's a lot of new schools being built in texas and i got contacted by middle school hey we would like for you to write us a new fight song like if i you know fight song for their football games because they wanted something original and something that would you know not be like anybody else's but still fall into that style and so yeah i mean it was it was a you know not a long gig it didn't take me very long to write but it was fun and so you know there's a lot of academic composers that might sneer something like that or be like well that's beneath me if you can write music then do it you know um because sometimes yeah i i tend to like throw the gauntlet down a little bit i'm like just once some of you i would like to hear you write a melody just once you know because my thing is if you can write a christmas medley you can write anything [Music] my next question has to do with the current uh pandemic that's going on so if you're listening in the future this is recorded in september of 2020 something i've struggled with since march when america basically shut down overnight was remaining creative when my entire schedule sort of flipped upside down and i know every time i'm i'm on facebook i see that you're constantly writing um constantly putting out new things was there a secret to you remaining creative through through the whole shutdown up until now well um i i mean i i think it's probably a variety of things i don't think it's any one thing um on the one hand um i think the biggest thing is that my schedule was not really interrupted um because you have to keep in mind that i work at home so you know for some people who might have other gigs or might have other things you know and their entire life was upended because like they're suddenly not going to university they're suddenly not doing this other thing and they were having to make a lot of adjustments um my adjustment was oh i don't need to go to you know restaurants right and so yeah i mean so you know there really wasn't a big adjustment for me other than just i mean it was scary you know it was stressful but but my day-to-day life really didn't change that much um the second thing is i just um i don't get writer's block i mean i just don't like i and i know that that again that's not to make me sound like great it's just it's a fact i don't get writer's block uh my i have the whatever the opposite of writer's block is that's what i have because i have i am never short of ideas i've got a uh i've got a list of projects that i want to write like my you know my idea notebook and one of the most depressing things about it is i will never live to write all this music like i just won't and so uh so i've yeah i mean i've got a plethora of ideas and i'm also very good about managing my time so you know it's i don't know it just it i just basically pushed through and worked through it um and just tried to find escape in the work you know so uh you know it's i don't know i've been busy i've been writing like crazy i think since the pandemic started i've got oh gosh i've written about 12 new pieces um and then and also and you know i've gotten all my stuff ready for next year's uh grand mesa marching catalog um so you know it's it's been a lot well then anne had to rewrite stuff for flex since that's what's going on right now so um it's been it's been pretty busy you know yeah so if anybody out there knows what the opposite of writer's block is please let us know um yeah the the nicest term i had for it was writer's diarrhea but i don't really think that's probably the best you know i was gonna say something similar but i didn't want to offend you since we just met oh that's okay all right uh last question of this general portion of the show that i ask everybody because i'm taking sort of a general pull um what is your music notation software of choice well for me it's a finale um mainly because i've used it since 1995 and i'm i mean i'm very familiar with it so like you know one of i've got a bit of a reputation in the marching arts community and in the composition community not only for you know writing good music but for writing very quickly um because like it's nothing for me to sit down and just rip out a piece of music you know like like that and which again that's part of the gig you know sometimes you need to do that um but um i think part of the reason that i'm so fast is just because i know this program inside and out like finale to me i ca i can almost write at the speed of thought with finale because i'm so familiar with it um if you put me on sibelius um not that there's anything wrong with sebelius bellis is fine i mean a lot of a lot of composers use it um but just the unfamiliarity that not knowing how to make things work i mean it would probably slow me to a crawl right you know and so i you know i'm i use finale but i'm not like a fanboy you know i i mean i'm just to me it's like having a favorite hammer if this hammer works for you great if you'd rather use this hammer that's fine as long as the work gets done i really don't care yeah that that seems to be the general consensus i use x because that's just what i was taught to use first um i personally bought dorico about a year ago tried to use it got too far behind on certain projects and i don't even write nearly as many things within a year as you do and that was too stressful so i just went back yeah i've yeah i i have not tried a doric o3 out yet i've been considering it um but at the same time like i mean i'm so busy that it's almost not worth my time at this point you know um so and not that and again not that there's anything wrong with that program it really just you know i mean because i've seen people use musescore and write great stuff and it's like you know it's really just whatever you need to use [Music] so [Music] something you you mentioned earlier was that prior to being a full-time composer and marching arts designer you worked as a band director in harrisburg arkansas did that experience of working daily with students influence your writing at all at the time definitely especially um i would say in terms of orchestration um so the the position i held at harrisburg was somewhat not really unique because i mean i know that there's a lot of music educators in this situation but you know looking back like it was the best thing that could have ever happened to me because harrisburg is a very small community and the school is very small and so i mean i wasn't just the high school band director i was the band director and so like i taught um the fifth grade music education so you know i taught fifth grade recorder band a sixth grade beginning band seventh and eighth grade middle school band uh nine through twelve high school band music theory class um after school jazz band you know all this stuff like that and it was all me um so you know on the one i didn't know it at the time but you know i mean i was learning acutely the way students need to develop and you know what their needs are from level to level and that has definitely impacted my writing um because number one i mean on a sheer practical level i understand a lot of the um idiomatic natures of the instruments um and can write for them accordingly um especially you know for those particular age groups and then um you know i also it makes me uh well what i like to tell people is like when i write a piece the first time i write like the first draft i write it as a composer and on the second draft i edit it as an educator and uh because like i mean things i'll look for you know it's like okay is one instrument group getting the melody all the time is another instrument group never getting the melody um you know is everything you know logical and making sense um in terms of instruments and finger positions and slide positions um so yeah i take that step and so if you if you look at a lot of my young band music you'll notice i tend to try i'm not going to say i'm always successful but i try to spread melodic lines around including parts for the low voices parts for the mid voice not just the soprano voices getting the melody all the time because you know the kids need to develop that and also i don't know any kid who joins band to play harmony i mean like seriously yeah i think we forget that sometimes as educators you know what attracts kids to band melody now that's not all they're going to play and that's not all they need to play but that is the carrot that is what they joined band for you know and so i think it's very important in repertoire to engage students to make sure that they have parts even if it's not the main melody um you know one thing i tend to favor i really love polyphonic writing i love melodies and counter melodies and you know i'll try to sneak in some type of counter melody even if that issue group never got the melody so they have something that is more engaging um and so all of that has definitely impacted my writing and sort of as a follow-up to that and you kind of alluded to this earlier about why you made the decision to move um fully to composing full-time what was the decision like to leave teaching in terms of like relationships that you build with students over the course of 12 years what was that sort of like making that decision to walk away from that the most rewarding part of that job well i mean of course it was hard um now i will say it was probably a little easier than i thought it was going to be um afterwards but um the making the decision was hard for lots of reasons um you know and you know one thing i tell people i'm a very practical person um i'm a very middle person like a very middle of the road um so like i'm not one of those people that says don't chase your dreams but i'm also not one of those people that says don't don't try anything you know i'm like i'm like my thing is like chase your dreams with caution you know that's kind of my thing and so you know the first thing i mean just on a practical level the first thing i did was make sure i was going to be financially okay um which you know because i mean it's scary like you're going from a a steady job with a retirement plan and you know a you know bi-weekly paycheck or whatever the term is bi-monthly twice a month whatever that is and um you know to just basically surviving on commissions and royalties and it's it's scary you know that so that was honestly the biggest thing now as far as working with the kids um i mean i really enjoyed working with the kids um you know especially at that small school and you know i would have students that were seniors in my band that i had taught for you know between seven to eight years and um so it was very difficult but at the same time and if this makes me sound selfish that i'm selfish i you know as i as my life became busier um and i started to basically i had my life out of balance because i mean i was just working and if you don't mind me being very real because i mean i don't mind being very world sure there were things going on i mean number one my mental health was suffering i'm just gonna be very blunt about that um i was stressed out from you know basically working two full-time jobs with no personal time and i was on the the brink of having a complete like mental breakdown and then um on top of that like you know as i've mentioned earlier you know i'm married and you just celebrated 23 years last friday you know very very proud of that congratulations well well thank you but you know during during the last year of that time while i was teaching uh me and my husband uh started really drifting apart and it wasn't because like we weren't fighting we weren't angry with each other it wasn't anything like they showed in the movies or anything like that but we just weren't interacting and you know because there was no time like it was i was either working or i was composing and it was kind of like my personal life was pushed off to the side and so there just came this moment where i just kind of asked myself i was like is this the type of life you want to live and the answer was a resounding note and so you know when you decide that you have to start making some decisions that to other people might sound selfish but you know ultimately the only person you can really take care of is you like period and if you're not taking care of yourself you're no use to anybody else so you know i just had to make the decision that i wanted to be happy and healthy and um you know if that was selfish it makes me selfish that i i can live with that you know um but that was the hardest part was getting over the feeling of obligation like it's oh i have to do this because don't get me wrong i love the band kids i've got fond memories of them they were amazing but if i would have stayed at that job in two years you know my juniors and seniors have been gone and yeah i had new kids but you know you can't really live your life for somebody else you have to live it for yourself and in in the best way you can and that's that's what i decided i think many many band directors myself included can empathize with that because i'm also married um i have two small children oh congratulations oh thank you but it's very difficult to balance work itself and then all the extra stuff on top of that after school you know missing significant parts of my my children's life that's tough to to balance yeah and and it it it takes effort right and i think that's the one thing that a lot of music educators well and just people in general not just music educators but people in general don't get it is that a balanced life takes effort and kind of stewardship you know it's uh i mean you have to be your own guardian you know and uh you just have to be willing to say no occasionally and and i know something else that you do is take care of yourself physically i guess there's no one answer to this as well but do you have any tips for balancing work and family and your own personal health physically and mentally um well i mean i think the biggest thing is to um set expectations and uh and then just based on those expectations kind of build in a schedule um i mean just to give you an example i mean i ride a lot i'm a full-time composer but here's basically my schedule i get up in the morning i do my morning chores like you know feed my dogs and get everything ready do some correspondence and then i write from basically eight o'clock a.m until roughly five o'clock p.m and then after that i'm done i don't care if i'm in mid phrase once it is five o'clock i'm done because after that it's family time it's me and steve time it's video game time it's dog time you know it's it's time for me to have a life outside this and um i don't work on the weekends i mean last night i will say occasionally i do only if like you know sometimes i get hit with that music and i'll go into my office and i will sketch down an idea i will get enough information to know where to pick up on monday but i don't just sit there and obsess over it um you know and it's it's very easy for people who have this romanticized idea of composers and artists to to kind of look at me and be disappointed when i tell them that but i'm like i'm taking care of myself and because of because of the fact that i'm taking care of myself i'm going to have longevity in this career that's all great advice and something that i personally still struggle with six or seven years into my career yeah well i mean and again it takes effort like and i think because i think some people are always just saying you like some days some day this will happen or someday so bounce no it has to start today and it has to start with you deciding to do it [Music] shifting gears just a little bit um you are published by a multitude of of different publishing companies i think like six or seven based on what i saw in your bio um but but recently within the past year or so you started up uh randall standard music llc yes um for which you know you're your own editor and your own publisher what what led you to the decision to begin self-publishing your work um well it was a few things um the biggest thing is that um i think sometimes people think like oh if you just write good music people will publish it and that is not true in the banned world there are certain avenues that are open to people and certain avenues that are not and based on your career certain avenues can be opened in certain avenues can be closed um so one of the things that i discovered is you know i started most of my concert band career in young band writing so like grade one two and three music which i really enjoy writing and i think can be just as artistic as anything else but i mean i do enjoy writing grade four five and six and more advanced you know larger scope literature the problem is um if you start in academia you know and you write great you know grade 5 and 6 you make a name for yourself that way and then you d you deign to lower yourself to writing grade one and two you're you're a genius you know but if you start in the grade one two and three and you suddenly try to get out of your lane and write grade four five and six you're a poser you know and that's um i mean that's never said out loud but it it it sure as hell is implied pretty damn hard you know um so uh so it's just what i was saying so um what i discovered was that many of my publishers there there was certain music that i wanted to write and get out there that they were just not willing to put out there because of who i was um and i'm not faulting them for that because i mean at its root publishing is not about art and i know that may sound harsh but it's the truth um publishing is about business and i you know i am not a known quantity at that grade four five and six liters so it's it you know they're looking at do we want to invest in this and you have to keep in mind too that the grade four five and six literature the whole um industry of it is a lot smaller than young man there's just a bigger market for young bands so i mean you're dealing with a smaller clientele and very very competitive so the reason i decided to start my own number one um it just gave me more creative control and so i can try some things that you know may not have been tried elsewhere um and then also to help me get some of that more advanced literature out there and then lastly uh you know i mean i i make no bones or pre or pretense about the fact that i am a very much a social progressive um i mean i don't i'm not super political on social media mainly because i don't really believe you're going to change anybody's mind by arguing with them on there i agree that's that's just my beliefs you know everybody else you know feel free if you disagree with me please feel free to comment on your blog i'm sure you will but um you know i um but i i try to more or less do my political endeavors by example i never tell people what they should think i never tell people like you should do this i'm always just like i'm doing this i think this and um so with the company one of our long-term goals is to eventually turn randall standards music into a publishing group for a more diverse range of composers now that was the plan until kovid hit but right now you know the i'm just going to be honest like right now we're not publishing anybody else because i don't feel good about taking on anybody else's music in the current climate because we don't know what sales are going to be like we don't know how easy it is to get exposure out there since we are such a small company and i i don't want to confine somebody's music to my company at this point that is going to change in the future but you know it's one of those things where we just haven't yet um so we're going to be seeking out you know more diverse range of composers to publish and and with that a more diverse range of music because i think when you invite a diverse population of composers you know to the table you're going to get music that you've never heard before and i'm really excited about that and i don't just mean people i mean like styles um you know just to give you an example uh one composer who's kind of emerged in the last few years that i've struck up a facebook friendship with and just really admire his music as omar thomas um and it's not it's not just you know it's not just that he uh comes from a different community but it's his whole aesthetic is so different and it's so exciting and that's what i love about it and i think you know when you invite people and just you know and you don't expect them to sound like everybody else that is exciting and so that's what we hope to do in the future yeah and i i was lucky enough to meet omar at midwest and couldn't be a more like humble person that has just you know accomplished so much in the last couple years oh yeah yeah it hopefully he will if he's listening hopefully he'll be a guest on the show soon but um yeah i agree with everything you said um it's not just his difference in background it's just that he's a truly unique composer that's bringing something new to the game right now yeah but but what i meant by that is that i think you know when when you look at the older and i don't mean in a bad way but like the old guard of band composers most of them had a similar life experience and a similar background so we there was a bit of a homogenized sound and uh as you know we've become more culturally aware as we are opening doors for people band music is changing and i mean even from people who are from like i mean not to toot my own horn but you know why else am i on this podcast but like you know i don't think 10 years ago the music that i'm writing and the music that people like of mine would have been published um because it's so different and it's so because i definitely my my heart is in the is in pop culture and you know my music is definitely influenced by that and you know 10 20 years ago that would have been such a no-no um you know so but now you know it's the door is opening for lots of types of people and lots of points of view right and one one more quick question about your your self-publishing um i self-publish the majority of my work and it's incredibly taxing uh you know writing everything editing everything being responsible for the marketing the printing all those extra costs how does somebody like you that works on a much much larger scale balance all of that do you do everything yourself oh no no no i have help i have okay um now i write all of my own music there are no ghostwriters here i write about music but um no we're actually we're a team of two um so i do all the creative stuff in a lot of the marketing and uh social media aspect um you know gotta get my tic toc dances up you know so people can laugh so uh but anyway um but now steve uh my husband he does the business side of things so he takes care of the you know making sure things get printed making sure things get build uh setting up with distributors um and you know kind of doing the day-to-day business um because if i had to do that i would not be producing as much as i am um and where you know i mean here's here's what's exciting to me is you know we're in the middle of a pandemic which i was i was like of course out of all the years like the year that i start my company of all the years this has to happen you mean i'm and i'm not griping too much i mean in the green scheme of things my life is great so you know i'm not gonna gripe too much because i'm healthy i'm happy and i'm doing what i love but still you know there's that little bit of of bitterness of just like like really like any other year any other year but the year that i'm starting this um and incidentally you know one of my pieces that came out this year that was kind of patient you know right out of the gate was four horsemen of the apocalypse and so um yeah i was talking to brian belmay he's a friend of mine and uh we we love talking to each other because we we're both pretty quick witted and and a little bit snarky and so we we love just you know bantering back and forth he's he's one of my favorite people in the world by the way but uh we were talking like he had this big piece come out earlier this year it was this big like social media thing i think it was like love and light or something like that yes and i just i started laughing because we were talking i was like brian i was like of course of course i was like you write of love and light and what did i release the four horsemen of the opponent i was like i was like this is like either the best timing ever or the worst um but anyway uh so regardless of that though i mean this year has actually been pretty good like our people have responded really well to our company which we've been rolling with the punches pretty well you know we've put we instantly got things together to put out for um flex arrangements and for us other things and uh made our pieces very online friendly um and actually most of our catalog should be on smart music pretty soon awesome um but um but we may like if things keep going the way they're going by next year we're probably going to have to hire another person um at least part time to fill orders um just i mean just basically their job will be to ship music like it'll just be a part-time thing but right but you know i mean the big the big goal is for me and him to be done at five o'clock every day and for me to not drive myself crazy and and or crazier and my uh and for my primary responsibility to be to write the music side note i absolutely love four horsemen of the apocalypse i i'm naturally like drawn towards darker music um that's kind of my style so i can't wait to be able to program that oh thank you well and we're uh we're actually working on modifying it right now um awesome for what i'm calling modular wind ensemble so it's not not the same thing as flex and i enjoy writing flex but you know as a composer because to me such a big part of composition is orchestration and flex totally wipes it out like it just it just does um but this modular idea is just basically it's just written for a smaller group you know it could be achieved by a small group or it can be played by a large group you know but still sound good um so i'm doing a another edition of that one and it should we're hoping to have it out in the next couple months um that will be you know more my goal is to make it where it can be played by as few as 13 players um because right now there's no way it's too massive right right that would be perfect for an ensemble like mine i teach in rural western pennsylvania and right now because of covid kids being online some kids being in school our biggest ensemble is only like 22 kids at the moment so yeah modular wind ensemble pieces would be perfect for what i'm dealing with yeah i've got one out right now it was our first one that we kind of tested the concept with um it's a grade three it's called it's an arrangement of um precious lord take my hand which was also kind of just inspired by my reflection on everything that's going on with our kind of reckoning and awakening about social justice right now um i find a lot of comfort in that song and uh yeah that was not a commission it was just something i wanted to write and uh but it but i was also like okay you know how do we make it relevant for now so it's like well we're in this coveted world so modular wind ensemble and it really turned out beautifully i agree i listened to what you posted on facebook and it's beautiful so well congratulations with that um speaking of uh four horsemen of the apocalypse that's one of the pieces included on your album that you just recently released um a new day dawns yes um and like i said earlier in the interview it's an incredibly eclectic sort of snapshot of your work as a composer i have a few general questions first if you could um explain for everybody in case they haven't listened to it yet um just some general background on on the album like how long had that sort of been in progress before you released it earlier this year i think was it after the shutdown that you actually released the album yeah it was released in uh july okay it's fairly recent yeah um but anyway the background was um i i'm i'm just one of those people that i don't take no for an answer like i just really don't um and there there is this um there's this quote i saw about four years ago that really spoke to me um and it's i mean it wasn't about music in particular but it was just something to the effect it said if the opportunity does not exist create it and so you know i think there are so many composers and voices out there who just kind of sit around and wait for things to happen you know it's like i'm going to wait for the eastman wind ensemble to decide to do an album all of my music you know or i'm going to wait to you know for the north texas groups to you know record an album just of just myself or just include one piece on you know and i just you know decided i was like well you know i could wait around for that or i can just produce my own damn album you know and just you know and kind of take the reign so i started researching you know like how difficult is it really to put together an album and to release it and what i happily discovered was that it really wasn't that difficult i mean it takes money but as far as like is it hard no it's not that hard and so um you know i started generating ideas and right around that same time i just i felt like i had this break through in my writing um because i mean there are certain pieces in certain moments in my career that i can point to and be like that's the moment where i took a step forward as a composer and so i had i've had several of those the past years i really feel like i'm finally kind of blossoming um and um so i had this collection of pieces that i was really proud of i was like you know these make a good album these are the ones that i would want people to hear if they were gonna you listen to my stuff and so i just put together uh this album and recorded it with a studio group um which was uh the lodge wind ensemble in um indianapolis and uh that i mean that's pretty much it like i mean i wish there was a bigger story but we did that i released it through this service called cd baby um that is c the letter c the letter d not cd as in like you know scandalous or anything um but uh but so cd baby and i mean it was an easy process and uh you know the uh i'm actually gonna one thing i'm working on right now is figuring out how to do some publicity for it because uh you know it all kind of came around at a weird time i mean with the covid thing and with everything else going on um you know normally you would try to build buzz about one and then release it and i think we're gonna have to do this the other way around um but anyway it yeah it got released and i'm very proud of it the goal was never to make money the goal was to uh number one get really you know top quality recordings of all this music and then second like can i create an album like can i do that and it's to me it's basically a stepping stone because i'm going to be doing this again like this is not a one and done i've already got plans for the next three albums um and uh you know all with their own kind of themes and goals and uh so this was also a learning opportunity for me um to learn how to do this and to get better at it um and that you know so hence the title a new day dawns for me it's it's kind of about me starting a new chapter as a composer and taking myself more seriously not in the sense of losing what i think is the fun of my music but just dreaming bigger you know it's um i i i don't think you need to be limited in your scope i mean like yeah i i may not ever get to the heights that i want to reach but you know sitting sitting on my ass i sure i sure am not you know right yeah you've got to get up and do something and the worst thing people can tell you is no and yeah it's it's and then you know you're literally no worse off than you were before so um so i don't know i tend to dream big and this album was part of that and uh i'm really proud of it i've actually considered like as a publicity thing doing a limited vinyl print print of it since vinyl is kind of a big thing right now that's awesome and i know one person who would be interested in that sitting here so i think it's really cool how you sort of included recorded program notes throughout each of the the four sections um could you give everybody sort of like a brief description of each of those four sections and the pieces that you chose for each yeah yeah sure um it's uh i mean the idea for program notes is just to me as we've moved more away from the physical world of music by which i mean you're like you don't get cds anymore i mean some people do you know some people still get vinyls and cities and things like that but generally speaking we've really moved into a digital space with music and so a lot of people never get programmed like you used to you'd open the the lp sleeves you'd open the cd thing and have the little booklet and you could read about that because like i remember the first several albums that i got the very first of which was um a cd of mizorski's night on bald mountain um the you know which inside it had program notes had a biography of zorsky things like that you really don't get that anymore and so to me the program notes it was the audio ones was a chance to just basically kind of you know have that moment digitally and have it in a format that i thought was conversational almost kind of sounded audiobookish you know and uh just give people a better appreciation for that because you know one of the things with instrumental music instrumental music even when it has the best story and the best intent behind it is an abstract experience and i will argue this to my dying day i know there's people who are like oh no it's a it can be no it can't it doesn't have words it doesn't paint a picture it's harmony rhythm and sounds and textures it's abstract period and you need to approach it that way if you're going to make it successful you know um so but you know because instrumental music is so abstract sometimes that little extra note can help people appreciate it more and so that was the intent um as far as the pieces um i'll i'll try to give you a brief rundown and i'll keep these as short as possible and i'll make sure to link to to the album um on spotify and wherever else it's available so folks can listen okay oh yeah it's it's available on spotify apple music itunes um it's supposed to be available eventually on pandora but i don't think it's up yet i think they're just dragging their feet but and it's also on google play and all that stuff um but anyway so the pieces i included um the album kicks off with one of my newer works for young band called earthdawn which is very world music very like this this this would feel right at home in epcot like in disney world or at the animal kingdom like it's it's very that kind of cinematic world music um celebratory thing and it's really fun um then uh probably my favorite piece on the album is the uh second actual music track uh which is stonewall 1969 which i consider to be the best thing i've ever written i mean like if i had to say you know what is my crowning jewel as a composer right now that is it because i don't think any piece i've written better exemplifies what i really believe in as a composer because it is the ultimate marriage of like pop and symphonic so much so that i actually wrote two original pop songs that are in the world of the piece that have lyrics you know we we had a singer um who was my friend derek palmer who if you for those of you that haven't heard the album yet if nothing else just listen to it for him he is such an incredible vocalist and the fact that he has not been discovered and made a star is a crime against humanity he's just amazing um but the piece it combines symphonic with um you know a vocalist and then um beat poetry to create this portrait of new york in 1969 uh during the stonewall riots which was the beginning of the gay rights movement um and it's it's a very uh evocative piece and it's it's it's fun but it's also angry and it's it's a lot of things um and so it's just really fun then uh deus ex machina um this basically sounds like concert band mixed with dubstep and techno um and it's this really kind of weird take on um an almost bolero-esque melody that just grows and grows but has this groove underneath it then there's vanishing point which what was funny was when vanishing point when we were recording the album it was really my least favorite when we were going into the recording session keeping in mind that i had never heard it live i mean it had been premiered by the premier group but the only like album thing i had really heard was like a youtube recording which is very flat and very just like somebody's camera you know somebody's uh phone you know microphone so it i mean don't get me wrong the group that premiered it sounded great but it's just you know i didn't get excited about it because it didn't sound like it really sounds so we got into the recording session and that was the very first thing we recorded was uh vanishing point and um we started playing it and i was just like and i just had that moment which and again it makes me sound like a braggart i'm not but it was just like i was just like wow i was like this sounds so much better than i thought it was going to and it's actually turned into one of my favorite pieces on the album um it's it's really exciting um it's very john adams by way of philip glass but with a cinematic sensibility you know and it's minimalistic but fun then there's the garden suite um three movements of the garden sweep um when he actually decided to cut one of the minutes it originally had all four um the garden suede is compress it's a young band suite comprised of frogs flowers and bees there's also march of the arachnids but i don't know as we listen to the album a march just seemed out of place and as much yeah it would have been nice to have the whole suite on it but at the same time i'm not so married to it that i was like uh you know i want the album to make sense and to feel organic as the listener goes through it and as i listen to it every time it got to march of the arachnids it just i don't know it felt silly and it felt like it just stopped the momentum of the album and not that i don't like the piece i love the piece but it's you know for the purposes of the album we only wanted three of the movements um and then um there's when the spring rain begins to fall which is one of my older pieces um but i would say it is one of the first ones where i really connected with what would become my compositional style which is that kind of pop c symphonic that's the very first piece i wrote that sounded like that and i remember just intensely loving it when i was writing it and so i wanted to include that uh then there's havana nights which is just my love of mambo music brought to life i actually envisioned it as a ballet and i would love to see somebody you know uh bring it to life it's just you know seven minutes so just be like a very short kind of art installation ballet so if anybody is listening to this and wants to stage that hit me up we can totally make that happen um and then there's uh the four horsemen of the apocalypse which is a suite that was uh um commissioned by colorado mesa university and uh it's it's very like it's just my love of cinematic symphonic sounds um not not anything really pops about it other than it's in that cinematic mode you know um then we have the nine which is another piece that kind of deals with social justice and it was written about the little rock central nine it's another one of those that i think is one of my favorites um just because there's not a single note of it i would i would change like it's i think it's not not everything i write is perfect but if if there was something i wrote that was perfect that's probably about as close as i've gotten and then just for fun um i i took the two pop songs out of stonewall and included them as bonus tracks along with karaoke tracks because i am a karaoke fiend i was like somebody could totally sing along with us and be it'd be fun um and i think we're gonna actually like especially since both of those you know deal with stonewall and everything i think next june when pride month rolls around we're going to do some like online social media challenges for people to like do their best karaoke and put it up you know so that'll be a lot of fun that's awesome um and folks that are listening make sure you check out the album i i've listened to it actually a few times just today um and it's a really fun lesson from beginning to end it's something different every track and every section of it it's really enjoyable so if you enjoy concert band music make sure you check it out yeah and let me give a special shout out real quick to um the musicians that are included like i mentioned derek palmer the vocalist um and the yeah there's the lodge one ensemble which is mainly comprised of band directors and um uh orchestral musicians from the indianapolis area they were great very easy to work with and then lastly um a lot of the the recordings of my older pieces um parts of the uh garden suite um the nine and uh when the spring rain begins to fall we're all recorded by uh the university of northern colorado bands um who've done a lot of the recording sessions for grand mesa music and they were always very easy to work with i always did great recording so you know just want to make sure i acknowledge them and thank them for their hard work [Music] i don't want to take up too much of your time i have one more question arguably the most important question i've asked you so far and i'm sorry guys i saved like the heaviest topic for last year but you mentioned your two pieces stonewall 1969 and and the nine that are sort of you know like socially conscious pieces something that i've personally been struggling with lately is to write or not to write about you know the current social unrest that's happening in america and you know i want to be an ally to to people who face injustices on a daily basis um and the best way that i personally know how to make my voice heard is through my art but you know i lack the perspective um you know that's needed to accurately portray what's currently happening well i see what you're getting at and there's i i have some very complex feelings of this so um for those of you that are listening um before you take me to task on social media on anything i'm about to say um please know that uh i mean it really i really consider it to be complex and i probably won't even be able to get all of my feelings about it out in just this brief conversation um i think but well i'll just use myself as an example um so like stonewall 1969 i mean i i am part of the lgbtq plus community um so my perspective on that was personal you know i have lived that i have experienced um you know discrimination because of my sexuality um and because of my life um so for that piece you know i i could write and speak to it very personally when i was writing the nine which is you know the little rock uh nine um and the whole thing that happened there it's such an experience that is particular to the african-american community um that was one of the things i felt like i had to be very careful about in and not not in writing the piece but in how i approached it and i think what you're getting at is what i was feeling there it's like how do i comment on something when i'm not part of that population and so what i think you have to do i i think a lot of it number one comes from the approach and then the second part comes from the intent because people can and this is where i disagree with a lot of people that argue on social media i do think intent matters and i think if you are divorcing a work from the composer's intent that you are usurping its value for your own so and that's a whole other conversation but um like when i wrote the nine i struggled at first because i didn't want to presume to speak for the nine or for anybody in the african-american community because i'm i'm and i'm a 43 year old white guy i could never know what that experience is like and i never will i can empathize i can become educated i can be an ally like you said and i can champion causes but that is still not the same as living it you know however what i could comment on was my reaction to everything because for me the nine it's not supposed to speak for the name and it's not supposed to speak for anybody it is my reaction to what is going on and how i feel about it because ultimately that that's what a good artist should do is say i believe this and i think this and when that is the intent and it's and you're not speaking for somebody and you're not saying well you know i'm representing this population even though i'm not part of it i think it's a different ballgame um because um and i mean i'll even give you some examples uh you know when i was writing the nine um i'm you know i created my own spiritual like i didn't use a previously written one because um you know i didn't want to write something that was a traditional because um you know then i felt like that would be taking from that community to speak for them um so i created my own because then the message is totally my own um and then yeah i also i'm not gonna lie i struggled a little bit with that with the precious lord arrangement but the difference there is precious lord was actually written by a specific composer it's not a traditional it's not just a like this you know this is from our tradition it was written by one particular composer and is in public domain um so you know i think when composers want to do that like for instance jeff if you if you were to want to write a piece about like stonewall or about the pulse shootings or you know about anything or or a celebration of marriage rights you know that were granted in 2015 you could do that you would just have to make sure that you were approaching it from a place of how you reacted to it as opposed to oh i'm going to speak for them and that's exactly what i was asking advice for somebody that is not part of that community but supporting them yeah now having said that please keep in mind that we are living in the social media age and even with the best intentions there will still be people that will take you to task no matter what you do absolutely yeah but you know as rupaul once said is if they if they ain't paying your bills don't pay them no mind you know right and so um you know that's one thing uh becoming a public figure and becoming somebody who is so active on social media and things i've i've had to learn to let go of a few things because i'm not gonna i mean i've gotten hate mail i've got negative comments i've gotten all kinds of stuff and if i allowed that to get to me number one i would never create art again because i'd be too afraid and number two i would just never sleep because i'd be upset all the time so you just can't make you all you know like i know when i write my pieces i know what my intent is i know what i'm trying to say and if i offend somebody i apologize but at that point that's all i can do you know and um and they'll either accept it or they won't and i can't control that you know um but you know like the nine was received very well and i think people understood its intent you know so uh so i i don't think you have to be for a population to write about issues like that i think you can be an ally and provide commentary i just think you need to make sure that it's coming from the correct place and from the correct perspective all right very well said and good advice thank you um is there anything else you want to talk about before i do the quick couple wrap-up questions um well i mean we are in the halloween season if you've got time i just want to tell you about the stupidest thing i ever did like and it's and it's halloween related okay so as i mentioned earlier i love scary movies i love you know horror novels i mean i'm a big stephen king reader you know things like that that just melts my butter i am like yo all into that now having said that i am one of those people that will talk back to the screen so like you know the the dumb the dumb teenagers wander into the obviously abandoned house you know with these you know with the body parts hanging off of it and i'm just like why would they do that i would never do that that is the donor say that is not how people would react in real life okay so one time i went to this abandoned house and i was gonna i was gonna photograph it um i have this interest in photography it's one of my hobbies and there's this kind of creepy house and i wanted to get some pictures of it and it was snowing this particular day and so it was really pretty you had like the stark white you know with the the dark you know wood of the house i was like these are gonna make great you know pictures and they did but anyway so i'm wandering around there and i was like all right you know i wonder what it looks like inside so i go inside the house and it's creepy and i i mean the reason i like scary movies is because they genuinely scare me so i mean like i mean i'm not like fearless i don't even pretend to be so i so i go in there and i'm getting myself good and freaked out and it just i mean the house is a wreck it looks like the type of place you know a murder would happen and i've got that little voice in my head telling me this and i'm getting more and more scared so i go into the the living room area and there's a mattress just laying there um and so i mean the thought occurs to me you know instantly i'm like somebody could be staying here like there could be some you know crazy person here that or you know thinks i'm invading their space i need to get out of here so i turn around and there's all these like crazy messages spray painted on the wall and i mean i'm just like i mean i feel like i just walked into you know one of my horror movies and um then from the back of the house like there's this hot there's this hallway going from the living room to the back of the house where i can't quite see the back of the house i hear a thump and here's where you know randall standridge goes stupid do i leave no i stand there and i literally do this i stand there and i go hello and i mean like inside my head i'm going what the hell are you doing you've seen every horror movie like you know that you need to leave like but and so do i leave no i inch closer to the dark hallway going off into the back of the house lean my head in a little bit and say hello and then a few things happen at once i hear another bam and i see like some shadowy movement and so i run and i go outside but it was snowing and you really can't run in the snow right i mean i i didn't trip or anything like it was not like that but like you can't also like i had i had like that fight or flight thing going on so i turned around and there's nobody there do i leave no i start inching my way around the house to see if i can see whoever this was that i thought was back there and so i get to the back of the house the win there's a window open in the back room where the sound was coming from and there was a closet door that was getting caught in the wind and climbing and so i kind of relax but then i look down at the ground and there are footprints in the snow leading off into the woods and i'm not making that up like i i'm getting chills right now talking about it and so i got in my car and i left but but to this day i don't talk back to horror movies anymore because i'm like yes that you would do it's like you don't get to say you wouldn't do that anymore so that's a good halloween story for your listeners that's great and thank you for helping end this on on a lighter note there have you have you ever written a piece uh like based on that experience not based on that experience but but i have written some pretty ghoulish things that i love and i've got a piece out called um the witching hour that i really love um it's very danny elfman very you know like that whole that um i wrote a christmas piece called a christmas tale beware the krampus that is about the scary side of christmas um which is one of the pieces i got hate mail for by the way yeah i've heard i've heard stories and then uh i've also written some marching shows um my favorite of which is this show called the presents um i don't want to say anything else about it other than it's basically a horror movie for marching band that's awesome yeah that's right yeah you should check you should check it out like it was one of those i was almost actually afraid to release i was like people are going to be so offended by the show um and uh so it's it's creepy but i like it so and and i've got some ideas for some other things that i'm writing i'm definitely allowing that part of my personality to come out more in my writing i mean i enjoy writing other stuff too but there's i definitely have a ghoulish darker side i'm exactly the same so i can understand um i know that you're super in demand in terms of uh marching band design and commissions but um if anybody wanted to reach out to you and wanted to commission you how could they do that um best way would be to um check out my website uh it has a lot of contact information on it which is uh randallstandridge.com i'm also all over social media you can find me on facebook you can find me on tech talk instagram uh twitter you know so you know feel free to reach out that way um or just uh at my email you know which is uh randallstandridge yahoo.com real creative i'll make sure to uh include all of that and links all that in the in the show description um randall thank you so much again i really appreciate it you've given me more than an hour of your time and i know how valuable that is so thank you so much sir oh no problem thank you for having me [Music] composer disclosure is produced by jeff herwig and is a product of eminem music press llc music in today's episode include freedom by jeff herwig and vanishing point by randall standridge special thank you to randall for allowing us to use a recording of his music throughout today's episode please be sure to subscribe on apple podcast spotify iheartradio or wherever you like to consume your podcasts [Music] okay you

Channel: Jeff Herwig

Views: 3,916

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Keywords: Jeff Herwig, Randall Standridge, Composer Disclosure, Podcast

Id: hf9UOVTXU80

Length: 76min 12sec (4572 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 19 2020