ONE PERSONS informal and in progress INTRODUCTION AND DIGRESSIONS TO THE WORK OF ERV WILSON (A GOAT HERDER OF MEXICO)


BACKGROUND (SKIP IF YOU WANT TO GET DIRECTLY TO THE TUNINGS).

    I think it important to start with the limited history as I saw it. Afterwards I will talk a bit of his relationship to the archives and the archives itself.
    I first started studying with Erv when he lived in West Hollywood, this being about 1975. Erv at this point was quite focused on the possibilities of 31 equal, as there had been some contact with Fokker and the activities at Webster College in St. Louis. A whole movement appeared to be under foot. Stuff was still happening with Emil Richards as the microtonal blues band while Erv and his roommate, Scott Hackleman, were just began work on a 19 tone clavichord design.

     My formal lessons didn’t really start until his move to Normandie St, next door to a whole slew of Cal Arts percussionists including David Rosenthal (he himself built quite a few Partch influenced instruments tuned to a diamond taken out to the 13th limit). Now Erv’s  roommates at the time were the strangest group of people one could imagine. One a talented percussionist Todd Manley, who one morning ran out of coffee filters and so served us Bustelo Coffee ( the ‘official’ microtonal coffee at the time) filtered through a black sock. His other roommates included Hervé Villechaize (before he was the midget on the TV show Fantasy Island) and a  Danny Elfman who was organizing ‘The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo’ in which Todd was the drummer. Todd also wrote some pieces for one of Erv’s Helix song (2” aluminum tubing) as well as performing at this time a composition by Lydia Ayers for this instrument. Lydia e-mailed saying; the name of the piece is "Ombres de la Lune" and it was written and performed in 1977. Erv's focus at this time besides the helixsongs was on structures called the Hexany and the Eikosany (and other what are called combination product sets). Although he had discovered these almost 10 years earlier, having the “diamond crowd” next door might have caused him to focus quite a bit since they have a compensatory relationship to each other.

    The move to Ave 65 (since I have fallen into some geographical trap) found myself in the guesthouse with my wife at the time. Glen Pryor both a skilled percussionist and was  a bagpiper, moved there after we left. Glenn worked quite a bit with Ivor Darreg under the moniker, Mustache Blue. (responsible for my own fist public performance). Scott Hackleman set up shop there (and at the time of this writing is back there once again building away).  Since then, saw myself there again for a brief time before it housed, Jim French, some time (which he now refers to as “finishing school’), and for probably the longest, Rod Poole and quite a few others. Backtracking I should mentioned that early on Cris Forster Presented his work on Walt Whitman. The e-mail from Cris says: 1978:  "Song of Myself:  Intoned Poems of Walt Whitman," for Chrysalis, Harmonic/Melodic Canon, and Voice.

 Erv now has the big house by himself, much of the floor space is covered with open paper bags labeled in a short hand code informing, mainly himself of the properties of the seeds of corn (now replacing the previous same number of such Chenopodium seeds which I imagine have migrated upstairs). Besides corn and these aforementioned quinoa relatives, he has also worked with tripsicum, some amaranth, and quite a few mints of the Monarda family, other Mexican herbs and single plants of interest. It appears that his activity with plants might be more of a priority for him, seeing the need for good food crop as being higher on his agenda, but his musical ideas  seem to continue to intrude themselves into being. I have noticed that often when he takes off in a new direction he will sit on what he knows until he feels he has investigated the territory enough to have a good feel of the terrain. Like he plants he looks after his seedlings till they are developed to where they can hold there own.

 Most of these papers were to accompany verbal lessons or explanations, as he desired his work to be carried on mainly as an oral tradition. Others were originally exchanges between many of the active tuning people at the time, and they all had some cross knowledge of each others work, so quite a bit of the elementary stuff was assumed or understood.  Never concerned with wide publication and perhaps he feels like there is enough out there to play with that too many still don’t get. Without a few guides to his shorthand it all can look rather complex. He states though hee is using primarily only addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. What he does with it is quite novel.

    Maybe a few more comments might be in order.
He once told me that the reason he took the musical path he did was what he needed to do musically when he young wasn’t available, so he stated he could do more good by providing the tools necessary. He felt in the long run this actually, would have more of an influence on music than ‘compositions’ anyway. (his idea of composition would include ‘spontaneous composition too.) This is also how some of his ideas or scales developed out of conversations with others.
 He wished to help others by his work and for this he has always been a great model of what a teacher should be. I remember once someone offered him x amount of money if he sent all his Xeroxes to them. He answered it wouldn’t be fair to those who can’t afford it.
 It is for this reason, despite his initial reluctance of this stuff up on the web; I think he enjoys the idea of his work out there in the world for basically free.
   His greatest desire in life has been to have a generalized keyboard in which to try out different tunings.
  Much like Stravinsky, he identifies with the ‘conservative’ side, and like him accomplishes a monumental lot with just a few simple conservative steps. The result is anything but conservative even though his means were.
He hears and plays this entire material, and if I came up with a scale, he might modulate it around and be whistling the notes as he is graphing out the possibilities.
. As opposed to giving lists of the ‘infinite possibilities’, much which he considers obvious, Erv likes to drop in ones lap that which caught his ear in a particular way as being specifically viable in artistic merit. He presents his own choices of the best of what he thinks this material has to offer. 

  Along with both my own desire to provide a greater accessibility for others who I felt might benefit from this material and Erv’s own desire for his work to be given the opportunity to ‘speak for itself’ was the Wilson Archives initiated with his already published documents (mainly in Xenharmonikon). The possibilities of the medium quickly became apparent and expanded to unpublished older documents as well as an extended section of “Main Library’, the work of others that bear a direct relationship to work in the archives.What I include from others including myself is done to possibly help in others journey, yet it should be understood that these are from other perspectives than himself.

     In its existence on-line, it has been reorganized in quite a few different ways. The present arrangement is based on what I consider the more accessible papers to the more difficult. This differs from the previous chronological or some variations on this, which had too many shortcomings due to how and who they where written for.
The problem is that many early works were directed to specific individuals or group of individuals who were already well versed in each other’s language to some degree. John Chalmers being the most prominent and little was spent in rehashing what hey already knew. They were moving forward and this was not the time to worry about what others did or did not understand.

 Erv saw his teaching of music being taught in an oral tradition. These papers represent documents used to accompany a verbal presentation or lesson, being’shorthand’ of the points covered.
        
Feedback is quite welcome in regard to the order or others suggestions can be sent to me directly at kraiggrady@anaphoria.com