10 FebETHEL’s HomeBaked: A Preview With Composer Matt Marks

This season ETHEL is thrilled to launch a new and ongoing project called HomeBaked in which we support the work of innovative, emerging composers who are based in our hometown of New York City. In 2011 we’ll commission and premiere four new works by Matt Marks, Judd Greenstein, Andy Akiho, and Anna Clyne as part of this initiative. The premieres will take place on May 23 during the Tribeca New Music Festival at Merkin Concert Hall. ETHEL’s HomeBaked commissions are funded in part by the Jerome and Greenwall Foundations.

In this interview, HomeBaker Matt Marks discusses his approach to music and his new ETHEL piece:

Dufallo: Can you describe some of your musical influences?

Marks: I suppose there are two types of musical influences on the music I write. The first would be the various kinds of music that I’ve consciously learned to emulate and the techniques of which I directly employ in my pieces, such as hip-hop, drum ‘n’ bass, and 70s power ballads. The first music I ever created was noisy hip-hop on my sampler, and the music I write for humans has gradually grown from that origin. 

The other type consists of the unconscious influences, which I try to encourage indirectly. For about a decade I was obsessed with finding and listening to as many types of music as possible. At first I consciously attempted to write music in these various specific styles–everything ranging from house music to Nepalese folk song–but I would always fail. Eventually I learned to let these influences creep into my music, almost without my knowledge, with absolutely no claim to authenticity. 

Dufallo: Your work has been described as “brilliantly simultaneously creepy and funny.” Can you tell us a little about your distinct approach to humor in music? 

Marks: I’m fascinated with the subversion of irony. Coming from the world of hip-hop and genre electronica, one of the main devices used is the remix, which often places a well-known extended sample in a completely different context. Quite often this displacement is done humorously or ironically, such as remixing the Tetris theme to a hard house beat, but sometimes the recontextualization makes for conflicting moods and emotions that can be unsettling, frightening, or unexpectedly beautiful. If you’re lucky it can be all of these things. In my more theatrical works, I often pair up (or mash up) seemingly conflicting genres such as horror and romance, or sex and Christian pop. Audiences tend to expect basic irony when faced with these juxtapositions, but I like to use this expectation against them.

Dufallo: Please tell us a little about the piece you are writing for ETHEL.

Marks: My as-yet-unnamed piece for ETHEL is an extension of a series of solo pieces I’ve been writing for a few years. I’ve been creating solo works for specific instrumentalists based on music they are ashamed of or embarrassed to admit they love. These “Shame Remixes” have been based on the music of Madonna, Sade, Taylor Swift, and various Disney songs. For ETHEL, I thought I’d continue this project, but on a larger scale. I contacted everyone from ETHEL and asked them about their own shameful choices and they gave me a treasure trove to work from. I’m creating a large piece for string quartet and electronic track that involves all four of these choices. I’m tempted to give away what the choices are, but I’ll hold off until the piece is performed. 

Dufallo: Any other exciting projects that you’d like to mention?

Marks: As I mentioned above, I’ve been writing a lot of theatrical works recently, mainly with vocals. My post-Christian nihilist pop-opera, ”The Little Death: Vol. 1,” was released on New Amsterdam Records in the last year and had a successful run in NYC this summer. I am also completing a song cycle for baritone and chamber ensemble called “The Adventures of Albert Fish,” which is a sort of pop song cycle about the notorious serial killer from the 1920s. I’m also in the planning stage of a new theatrical work for Alarm Will Sound.

Dufallo: Do you have any advice for composers who are just starting out?

Marks: I have two main points of advice for young composers. One, if you can’t find people to play your stuff, play it yourself. Two, don’t define your music by what it isn’t.