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Lou Harrison in Conversation with John Luther Adams (4/99)
3. Balancing Two Worlds
JLA: You know, almost as much as your music, your life itself is an inspiration. You've been a mentor and a role model for many younger composers -- myself included. You've done so many different things over the years to support your art, without ever compromising its integrity. I wonder if you have any advice to young composers about that very difficult balance between economic and artistic survival?
LH: Well, I was raised in the era of...let us say, Charles Ives. And that kind of balance when I was growing up was very common. There were practically no foundations in those days. There was no public support. But what you did was to get some sort of job which would support you so that you could do your music. That was the whole point of working! I think that model may survive a little longer than sitting down to write a grant - versus writing a piece. But I do think a certain independence along those lines is a very good thing, and I have no objections to the idea that man is willing to pay for his pleasures. Music is a pleasure, and so is composing and playing it. And anyone ought to have the feeling that they can support that activity rather than insisting that it support them.
JLA: In your Music Primer, you gave a bit of advice which I've often come back to over the years, as a sort of touchstone in my own life. The idea was; "Don't allow yourself to become indebted to the silliness of society. Decide what you can afford to do with your art, and do only that."
LH: Yes, I think that's a very sensible notion, even today (and I'm still doing it, by the way). I have many requests, a lot of them are commissions, but I have an increasing need to find new tunings. I would like to build a new gamelan, and I'm having my harps repaired so I can play them more. I don't necessary have a drive towards doing another symphony, but there are still things I want to do musically and non-musically. I've always drawn, painted, and written poetry. I have another book I want to put out, perhaps several of them, and I have some musicological studies that I never finished, which I want very much to do.
And so there're a lot of things. I don't feel bound to sit at a desk writing notes all the time (besides, it's easier to write numbers), so I stick with gamelan for the most part. But I'll tell you, my hand is getting sufficiently shaky, so I have to use two hands sometimes, to be sure I'm getting it on A instead of G.
JLA: Wow. Are you using larger staff paper?
LH: Yes I am, as a matter of fact. Not quite like Carl Ruggles, who used to have to put it on butcher paper across the room, but I'm getting there.
JLA: Because of the change in your hands, have you changed the computer fonts of your calligraphy?
LH: Yes, because I can't really do calligraphy anymore. My hand won't obey me. I do like my letters to look well, so I've designed fonts. I just finished another one with Carter Schultz, who is my helper and friend along with these things. We just finished a Roman Rustica which is almost the last of the Roman forms that we hadn't done. And it looks surprisingly readable. It's supposed to be the least readable of all Roman fonts, but it isn't, as it turns out. That was fun to do. I still have a little teasing idea that I want to do another font, and that'll be my sixth or seventh with Carter. He made a beautiful font out of the letters I used to use when I would address an envelope. A beautiful font called "Lou Casual" out of just those letters. It has the most beautiful letter "U" that I have ever seen; it's exquisite.
JLA: Well, this is very exciting to those of us who have admired the elegance of your hand over the years to know that it will endure, and that some of us may be able to write in "Lou casual". How does one get hold of those?
LH: You can get the whole set through Frog Peak, and it's available for both Mac and IBM.
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