By Mark Alburger – IAWM Journal (2002)
Nancy Bloomer Deussen is a leader in tonally-oriented contemporary music, and her works have been performed throughout the United States and Canada. In March her Woodwind Quintet no. 2 was the winner of the second Marmor Foundation Chamber Music Composition Competition sponsored by Stanford University. The award stimulated the interview, which took place at the offices of 21st-Century Music on April 29, 2002.
Mark Alburger: You have been able to have your compositions performed in a large number of venues. How have you managed to accomplish that?
Nancy Bloomer Deussen: I’m a rather good promoter!
MA: Is that simply due to your own hard work?
NBD: Most of it is. I love promotion; I love business. That’s probably not very common among composers.
MA: I find that if I have a choice between promoting a piece or writing a new one, I (arguably) “waste” my time writing a new piece.
NBD: In my case, I have a schedule. I write in the morning, and in the afternoon I work on promotion.
MA: Would you say it is 50/50?
NBD: When I’m working on a piece seriously, I would say it is 50/50, but when I finish a piece, promotion takes over for a while. Right now I have four commissions back to back.
MA: For your commissions, do you actively contact people, or does the work come to you?
NBD: The last four commissions came from individuals who contacted me. Believe me, it has taken a long time! I had stopped composing for about 20 years, and when I started writing again in 1985, no one knew who I was.
MA: During the years that you didn’t compose, were you pining away for composition?
NBD: No. It was a combination of being married to two former husbands—they were not only not supportive of my music, they were even punishing about it—and of being divorced, raising children alone and having to cope with everything. Plus I was on a prescription drug— Valium. I never wrote a note and didn’t care.
MA: Never take Valium unless you want to postpone a compositional career for 20 years!
NBD: I knew a painter in a similar situation who didn’t paint a stroke for 17 years. There’s an amnesia that goes along with it.
MA: You were taking Valium because...
NBD: I was married to a man who was building a flying saucer in his garage!
MA: Most people worry about flying saucers coming from the sky. No wonder the doctor said, “Take this Valium, and they will go away!” But clearly, before that, there was this creative person....
NBD: Before 1965, when I started on Valium, I had been an active composer, even though it was a very difficult field for women. When I graduated from Manhattan School of Music in 1953, there wasn’t a single orchestra that would play anything I had written. Many of the scores I sent to publishers would be returned unopened, I assume because I never used a man’s name. Even so, between 1953 and 1965 I was starting to get performances.
MA: How did you become interested in music? Was there music in your home when you were young?
NBD: My father was a musician, and he raised me. My mother, whom I rarely saw after the age of five, played the piano. I began playing the piano by ear when I was four and writing music when I was six. I am a natural musician, but I have found that the more education I have, the more difficult composing becomes! I need to remain natural.
MA: Aside from the Manhatten School, where else did you study music?
NBD: I spent two years at Juilliard, but I did not like it for several reasons. At first the composition faculty turned me down because I was not writing in the style they preferred: atonality and Bartók-type string quartets. So I went home and wrote a string quartet based upon a 12-tone row—my only atonal work. After I was accepted, I went back to writing what I wanted. I seemed to have a philosophy of composition different from that of most of my peers and teachers. Aside from being the only woman composition student, and all the problems relating to that, I was definitely on a different path. I have always heard my music in my head before notating it. I have not been very concerned about adhering to a particular aesthetic style, such as 12 tone, atonal, minimalism, neo-romantic or neo-classical. It was and is, purely and simply, my natural voice that comes from my heart and soul, similar to my signature, and I could not possibly compose any other way just to please people or “fit into” some stylistic fad.
Of course, I needed rigorous study to learn all the various disciplines that I needed to fully create my music, but I was never willing to change my basic voice. Thus, I had a tonal, melodic voice but was surrounded by students and teachers who created very dissonant, often fragmented music with no discernible melody. I was often ridiculed and criticized because of this and had it not been for a special, understanding composition teacher, Vittorio Giannini, I might have forsaken composition. He was a wonderful teacher who did not try to change my approach. He encouraged me to do the very best that I could from where I was. That’s how I try to teach my own composition students now. I have one who writes atonal music, and I’m trying to help him write the best that he can.
Another reason I was unhappy at Juilliard was that everyone was driven and practiced five hours a day. There was very little social life, and I felt out of place. Finally, my teacher, who also taught at the Manhattan School of Music, suggested that I study there, and I did for the next two years.
MA: How did you happen to move to the West Coast?
NBD: My first husband, who was not a musician, was offered a new position, and we moved to Los Angeles. I immediately set about finding musical friends. I went to UCLA, where I met Lucas Foss. After examining some of my music, he invited me to attend his composition class, even though I was not registered at the university. My husband was furious and expected me to stay at home. The marriage lasted a total of five years.
MA: What did you do next?
NBD: I needed to earn a living and thought I would enjoy teaching music. I went to the University of Southern California for two years and became certified. I tried teaching everything from K through 12. I passed the required probationary two-year period and was told that I could have a permanent position, but I said, “No, thank you.” The situation was not right for me, even though the students liked me and wanted me to stay. I found that teaching in a public school is deadly for anyone who is creative. You really have to have a calling.
MA: Then what did you do?
NBD: Ever since I was a teenager, I could play the piano well enough to entertain, and when I was a student at Juilliard and Manhattan, I used to play in clubs in New Jersey and New York. Meanwhile, I met Husband No. 2. I was introduced to him by a mutual friend—who later apologized! He was a brilliant aerospace engineer and obtained a good position at Lockheed. Unfortunately, he had strange ideas and quit his job to design and build the flying saucer that I mentioned earlier. He provided no means of support, and my son and I would have to go out looking for discarded soda bottles in the street so we could get money for food. It was during that time that I fell apart and went to the doctor who said, “I have the perfect drug for you.”
We eventually divorced, but life was still rough. First, I had a little teaching studio at home, and then I went back to playing cocktail music in restaurants and managed to play five times a week—even on Valium. I also sang and encouraged others to join in; I used to call it, “Mumble along with Nancy!” Liza Minelli came in one night, and I invited her to sing; I played everything she wanted. Finally, she said, “You are the best accompanist I’ve heard in years. Would you like to go on tour with me? I’m leaving for Hawaii in a couple of days?” I replied, “No, I have two young children.” After that lost opportunity, I continued with the cocktail playing, but it was difficult because the smoking laws were not then what they are now.
MA: Is that when you started tuning pianos?
NBD: Yes, I started the Bloomer Piano Service in 1975. At first, I didn’t know how to tune, but I was convinced I could do it, since I have perfect pitch. I asked my musical friends if I could practice tuning their pianos, and afterward they would get angry and say, “This is awful!” Piano turners have told me, “You have to tune about 100 pianos before you are good at tuning.”
MA: It’s not just an ear skill, it’s a mechanical-technical skill as well.
NBD: Yes, but at the time, I was a trailblazer—the only woman piano tuner in the area. Several years later, in 1983, I met my present husband, Gary, and soon after, I stopped taking the pills, with medical help, of course. Within two years I became interested in composition again, even though by the 1980s I was completely out of the classical-music loop; I didn’t even know who Pavarotti was.
I was doing some mundane task at home when suddenly I heard a melody in my head, and eventually that evolved into a full-scale composition, Capriccio for Flute and Piano. I have a very spiritual, mystical view of my return to composition. I really don’t care what anyone thinks of the music I am composing because I am on a path. But the paradox is that many people hear my music; they really seem to like it and are very moved.
MA: I remember being impressed by your music the first time I heard it, at the Marin Symphony, when they played your Reflections on the Hudson. That was an early work, so you have been on the same path the entire time. I recall writing about its Barber-like atmosphere. The piece worked then and it works now.
NBD: I wrote it in 1953, and it has been played by at least 30 orchestras. Altogether, I have written about 50 pieces.
MA: What percentage since your “reawakening”?
NBD: About 90 percent. When I returned to composition, after my long silence, I still found quite a hostile environment to tonally-oriented, melodic works, but during the past 10 years the pendulum has begun to swing in the opposite direction, and lately, my kind of music is being performed much more frequently. I find myself in not only a personal renaissance but an artistic one as well, as more composers are turning to more accessible styles This includes even some composers who formerly composed only serial works. In the past 10 years several works of mine have become quite popular and are performed frequently. I also have been fortunate to get quite a bit of radio play with several CDs of my works.
MA: What are your most frequently performed works?
NBD: These are my most popular orchestra works, in addition to Reflections on the Hudson (Arizona University Recordings #3108):
Ascent to Victory for chamber orchestra, dedicated to The Special Olympics (with Dreams on BM Recordings #70608)
Carmel by-the-Sea for chamber orchestra
Regalos, a Mexican-inspired movement from a larger work entitled A Silver, Shining Strand. This movement is developing a life of its own with frequent performances.
Concerto for Clarinet and Small Orchestra, which has been performed by several clarinetists with different orchestras across the country.
Of my chamber works, these are most frequently performed:
Trio for Violin, Clarinet and Piano
Trio for Violin, Cello and Piano (“Two x Three: Music by Women Composers,” North/ South Recordings #1015)
Woodwind Quintet
Woodwind Quintet no 2, which has not yet been performed but recently won the Marmor composition competition
The Pegasus Suite for flute and piano (Keynote Designs #103) [The CD is reviewed in this issue of the Journal.]
Two Pieces for Violin and Piano; the first piece, Julia’s Song, won an audience popularity radio award at station WORM, Cape Cod, MA (North/South Recordings #1015)
San Andreas Suite for flute, violin, viola and cello (with One of Nature’s Majesties and Postcards on North/South Recordings #1012)
I have also written many piano pieces, songs, choral and band works, all of which are being performed frequently.
MA: I note that a number of your works feature woodwinds.
NBD: I have an affinity for woodwind music and especially love the flute and clarinet, which explains my compositions written for them.
MA: Another manifestation of your practical side was the founding of the local chapter of the National Association of Composers U.S.A.
NBD: I received a phone call from a man who was trying to found a local NACUSA chapter and asked for my help. The basic idea appealed to me, so we planned two concerts: one in Berkeley and one in Palo Alto, California, in our backyards, so to speak, but they could have been in our literal backyards, they were so sparsely attended! The first concert had seven people and the second had a few more. After that, he moved away, but I was still interested and contacted the national office. They encouraged me to continue on my own. For nine years I served as president, vice-president and secretary. I’lana Cotton came in as treasurer and soon after, Molly Axtmann Schrag. She and I’lana are excellent composers. I am still very excited about NACUSA. I attend festivals all over the world, and I believe that what we have esteblished here is extraordinary.
MA: NACUSA, like several other organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area, has to survive by its appeal to audiences. Such groups are not funded by universities or major grants. The programs rise or fall on whether people think our music is enlightening and entertaining.
NBD: Entertaining! Mozart needed to entertain, Beethoven needed to entertain. Why do some contemporary composers think they don’t need to entertain?
MA: It’s not a dirty word.
NBD: It’s not a dirty word at all!
Dr. Mark Alburger, composer, conductor and editor, is music director of Goat Hall Productions in San Francisco (a cabaret-style theater that performs new operas and vocal works) and Associate Professor of Music at Diablo Valley College. He is editor of 21st Century Music and will be including the interview with Nancy Bloomer Deussen in a forthcoming issue.