d o l f k ä m p e r . o r g

Yesterday Interests Us Overnight (2001)

This piece was a study of process in composition and performance. My first step was to study American folk music, specifically blues and bluegrass music. I listened to a few examples over and over until certain gestures burned into my subconscious. After some meditation on these gestures themselves I wrote out my distillation in the form of short melodic and harmonic fragments. These cells of distillation were not literal transcriptions of any melodic or harmonic lines in the original recordings, rather my interpretation of an overarching gesture.

These cells were then presented to the performers Marcia McHugh and Jason Taylor who were directed to practice these lines much the same way they would any other material. They played it slowly, quickly, with different articulations, and different rhythms. The performers' entire practice session on these cells were recorded.

While the performers were crystallizing the material I was doing the equivalent with the computer. I took those recordings of their practice sessions as well as the original recordings and manipulated them with the computer.

The final mix includes the composer's distillation and working sketches, the performers' crystallization of the sketches, as well as a live performance of a finished product built using the first cells.

click here for a sample (.mp3) (performed Peabody Conservatory: Marcia McHugh, Jason Taylor)

"Rooftop" Fanfare for four Trumpets (1996)

first performance at Berea ArtsFest, on the roof of a downtown building.

Recording by Joseph Drew

Baltasar and Blimunda III (July 2004)

(for Marcia Kämper)

for piano and viola

The following was appropriated from Jose Saramago's Baltasar and Blimunda:

“Baltasar and Blimunda began work on the flying machine.”

Sometimes Blimunda rises early, and before eating her bread she examines the work that has already been completed to see if there are any flaws in the cane work or construction of the machine. Impressed, the scientist Padre Bartolomeu exclaimed to Baltasar that he was Sete-Sois because he saw the work in the light of day, and Blimunda was Sete-Luas because she saw the work in the dead of night.

That night the suns and moons slept together in each others’ embraces while the stars circled slowly in the heavens.

Scarlatti Asked Padre Bartolomeu what was the secret which would make his machine fly. He asked if it was animal mineral, or vegetable. “It is neither Vegetable, mineral, or animal. Not everything is one of these things… take music for example.”

Scarlatti looked incredulous.

“I myself am transported into the air when I hear your music played.”

Thanks to Thomas Kluge and his wife Michelle Kluge-Favero for performing the world premier. This piece was first performed at ARTSaha! (2004)

"Eel-Foot" exhibition for 6 trumpets

Excerpted from "Talismans in Northeastern Ohio Dadaism" -- E. Fields. Rothschild's Guide to Contemporary Music in the American Midwest, p. 395

Eel-Foot is a joke, of course, an episodic ribbing of the worst parts of modern music. The real merit of the piece lies in its instrumentation. Trumpet ensemble pieces are an ungodly lot. Anything beyond the double concerti of Vivaldi and Franceschini begins to tread in a most dangerous territory. To be certain, there are intriguing fanfares by Biber and Stockhausen for massed trumpets, but attempts at concert music for such ensembles are truly wretched.

Eel-Foot's strength lies in its conviviality. Brevity is the soul of this piece's dry wit. The rhythmic puns of the Baroque tropes are abandoned to make way for an atonal choral (the most intriguing material), which loses itself in an unashamed reveling in the full sonic potential of the assembled forces. Eel-Foot possesses all the magical powers of other Dadaist Talismans. Even the joke at the conclusion is a forgivable device. Eel-Foot is certainly one of a very few effective pieces for massed trumpets. It also is one of the more significant compositions to emerge from the late 1990's in northeastern Ohio

click here for a sample (.mp3).

recorded performance at Peabody Conservatory: Peabody Camerata 2001, other performances include trumpet ensembles in Frankfurter Hochschule fuer Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Connecticut University, Baldwin-Wallace College (premier)

Transmissions from Deep Space (2008)

A four-channel electronic work, originally performed in a domed planetarium with stars and astronomer.

---The Jerusem Broadcasts

The superuniverse and Paradise-Havona broadcasts are recieved on Jerusem in liaison with Salvinton and by a technique involving the polar crystal, the sea of glass. In addition to provisions for the reception of these extra-Nebadon communications, there are three distinct groups of recieving stations. These separate but tricircular groups of stations are adjusted to the reception of broadcasts from the local worlds, from the constellation headquarters, and from the capital of the local universe. All of these broadcasts are automatically displayed so as to be discernible by all types of beings present in the central broadcast amphitheater; of all preoccupations of an ascendant moral on Jerusem, none is more engaging and engrossing than that of listening in on the never-ending stream of universe space reports.

This Jerusem broadcast-receiving station is encircled by an enormous amphitheater, constructed of scintillating materials largely unknown on Urantia and seating over five billion beings-material and morontia-besides accommodating innumerable spirit personalities. It is the favorite diversion for all jerusem to spend their leisure at the broadcast station, there to learn of the welfare and state of the universe. And this is the only planetary activity which is not slowed down during the recession of light.

At this broadcast-receiving amphitheater the Salvington messages are coming in continuously. Near by, the Edentia word of the Most High Constellation Fathers is received at least once a day. Periodically the regular and special broadcasts of Uversa are relayed through Salvington, and when Paradise messages are in reception, the entire population is assembled around the sea of glass, and the Uversa friends add the reflectivity phenomena to the technique of the Paradise broadcast so that everything heard becomes visible. And it is in this manner that continual foretastes of advancing beauty and grandeur are afforded the mortal survivors as they journey inward on the eternal adventure.

The Jerusem sending station is located at the opposite pole of the sphere. All broadcasts to the individual worlds are relayed form the system capitals except the Michael messages, which sometimes go direct to their destinations over archangels' circuit.

Check these articles on my news page for more information:

Extra Transmissions

The Dogon

Special thanks to Madelline Adkins and Christian Colberg for their voice talents, as well as Marcia Kämper and Heather Frasch for their flute playing.

First performed at ARTSaha! 2008

Stereo version .

Te Recuerdo Eras (2004)

For winds and Mezzo-Soprano

first performance at Omaha Cooperative Arts Gallery: ANALOG arts ensemble and Christina Carr 2004

King's Toil (2008)

Common tools, especially those related to transportation have always been essential to men of power. Before the rise of Nationalism, or Imperialism, the ordinary person in Europe would have been born and died without ever having seen their king or capital city. Because of the technology of transportation, a farmer in the Holy Roman Empire would have no conception of the size and diverse cultures in his realm. Because the average person couldn't easily travel the breadth of his nation, in the Dark Ages he would have considered himself part of a "World State."

As technology developed with the invention of the stirrup, and carriage, etc. a national identity began to form. By Shakespeare's time Nationalism had completely emerged, yet even the most powerful men knew that the exercise and security of that power relied on some of the most simple tools.

Even today, with all of our power, every human being's Earthly ambition relies on tools that function properly. The campaigns of the most powerful men and women depend on the real-life reliability of their tools of transportation.

First performed at ARTSaha! 2008 with Colin Breen, Mallory Vallier, and Timothy Vallier performing.

score

Pulsating Stars Enable New Precise Determination of the Rotation of the Milky Way (2008)

For tuba and theremin

First performed at ARTSaha! 2008 with Mark Barnette and Dolf Kämper performing.

live recording .

Number 25 (2007)

For variable instruments and tape. Found sounds include 1912 Mercedes, 1927 Lincoln, Steam Engine, 1999 Mercedes-Benz, 1984 Mercedes-Benz (Diesel)

first performance at Galapagos in NYC: ANALOG arts ensemble "Found Sounds" program

recording with Heather Frasch, flute

"...shuddered under the gallop of the Sun, which rode bare back on its untamable black mare, convulsed with speed..." (2007)

For carillon

First performed at ARTSaha! 2008 with Dolf Kämper performing.

live recording .

gelanstrifibramacon (2007)

for stereo tape

First performed at ARTSaha! 2007

Recording

Mrs. Armour (of the Chicago Armours) was aghast at the suggestion of Madam Peterson. (2007)

for 4, 8, 12, or 16 midi-contolled pianollas or player pianos with mechanical action

Special thanks to Yamaha Disklavier and Renier's Pianos for the use of their instruments

First performed at ARTSaha! 2007

Baltasar and Blimunda IV, "In Lisbon..." (2006)

This piece is a collaboration between three artists. Originally conceived from a narrative from Jose Saramago's Baltasar and Blimunda, a painter, dramatist, and composer each present their own interpretation.

A large triptych comprises the visual aspect. Painter Julie Christensen draws on details from the narrative as well as the mood of the music to create her canvas. The dramatist Sheila Rocha likewise has the opportunity to draw upon the narrative and music as well as the reactions and atmosphere provided by the audience. The overall effect is a complete immesion in the expression of the original story.

Audience members hear the music, converse with the story, and see the art - all of which is being created before their eyes. During the performance, the audience is surrounded by the music; they are part of the telling, and they watch the painting unfold.

Rudolf Kamper's Baltasar and Blimunda are a series of pieces begun during the composer's stay in Mexico. All of the music in these pieces expanded from a few short cells of music which were sinpired by the characters and themes in Jose Saramago's novel.

I was really struck by your paintings of the reflections of the stained glass windows on the floor, and the monks. I am excited to add something like that to my music - to put more bright relexive sounds dancing on top of the dark and heavy structures which I've already got started. Some brittle flute sounds noodling around those big chords should be perfect for this. Also it creats a kind of theme of heavy stone structures (like the church) against these things which aren't really physical and which float around the (the colored light) dancing around the physical and corporeal (the world of men). As I think about it some this idea is again in the Halo on the saint's statue. A halo isn't really physical, it's just and aura, yet here it is physical enough for the mad monk to take away in punishment. Again, the difference between the heavy earth-bound and ethereal... Also mixing the tow by making a halo physcal and removable.

-email to the painter, by the composer.

click here for a slide presentation (.WMV)