All the New News and Pittsburgh Symphony Reading!

There's been so much new news that has come to be in November, it's almost hard to remember it all. But luckily it's all been good news, and all exciting adventures.
The biggest news is that I finished my orchestra piece, Lake Myvatn. It's about 8 minutes and 20 seconds long (one movement) and 144 measures. A gross of measures, if you will. Not very many, compared to most orchestral pieces, but it does more more slowly. I'm excited to hear all the celeste and crotale sounds, and the intense brass and string sections. The Carnegie-Mellon Philharmonic will be playing it in the Spring.
But in reality, that's not really the biggest news. I thought it was, but then I heard something two days ago. The biggest biggest news is that John Corigliano, the Composer of the Year for the Pittsburgh Symphony's Composer, chose my piece (and 3 other local grad students from surrounding colleges) to be read by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. The PSO is top-notch. And I am so delighted. There won't be a formal concert, but the Symphony will rehearse my piece and ask me questions, and I'll be able to ask them questions, and get feedback about what worked, and what I can do more effectively. I am bummed that my friend Matt didn't get picked- I think he has great ideas and I would have been happy to see him get a reading as well...but it's still good to win. The reading will happen sometime in March. I was expecting the decision sometime around Spring as well, so this came so suddenly. Hooray!

Other news in brief: Pre-Halloween festivities caused Sally and me to dress up and Sally wore My Little Ponies in her hair. I wore teeny tiny shorts and a clip-on tie from 5th grade. I can't believe I hadn't posted this picture yet.It's also an explosion of yellow outside my treehouse door, and more colors of strange neon translucence await me on my walk every day.






Such a shame that the photos don't even do the colors justice, as the remainder of the bright leaves here are quite electrifying, practically enveloping one in a bath of color.

I'm also designing things! The School of Music let me design an invitation for a fancypants piano concert they're giving for the CMU elite, and I also designed three different (and fabulous) graphic posters for the Student Composer's Concert tomorrow night.
I'm taking a Communication Design Fundamentals course next semester, and I'm really excited about learning about design for realz, and not just faking it. Then again, some good ideas come from working with what you've got...
Like taking a spool of wire and some beads from a Claire's bracelet that you found on the ground and combining it with some gaudy chandelier drops and you can have a really fantastic sculptural necklace. I also reclaimed a wool sweater by spray-painting on fleur-de-lis stencils and adding a vintage patch to cover a hole. It sadly did not get accepted into the craft book I entered it into, but I did get it back so I can wear it around. And sew up the holes that I missed the first time. Which makes me wonder why Goodwill missed this one (or a memo to Goodwill: there is a mouse in your building.)

And last but certainly not to be the least, is that I now have a real website!

Check out nathan-hall.net and listen to some music samples, check out a couple collages, read about me (just not too carefully, the texts still need some editing), and then commission me to write you some music, of course. I do it all! And by all, I just mean some of the artsy fartsy stuff, and no sports at all, and certainly nothing having to do with any real business skills, which hasn't made me any money yet but it does get me all the ladies. And by all the ladies I mean the friends I already had, and we talk about graphic design, the periodic table of elements, and why no one wants to wear my sculptural necklace made of chandelier pendants out in public. In fact, though I've been exceedingly happy about all my design endeavors, I've been steadily losing money. But soon enough, my friends.
Soon enough.