

Haiku poetry and music.

Naviar Haiku is a music project in which artists are invited to make new music inspired by a weekly assigned haiku poem. Participation is free and there are no limitations in the songs’ length or genre.

Haiku is a traditional and short form of Japanese poetry consisting of three lines: it’s about moments of objective experience which lead to deeper considerations about life and nature. The juxtaposition of two images or ideas and the consequent creation of a gap in the imagery gives the reader (or, in this case, the musician) the chance to complete the poem with his/her own interpretation.

This project is about expanding the meaning of a poem beyond its words, and the active role of the reader in haiku poetry, unique in the literary realm, is what inspired this project.

To find out more and participate, visit: http://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku/


Naviar Haiku Challenge 1 - 50

Naviar Haiku 044

Wild Piercing (Naviarhaiku044-Piping autumn wind)

The forty-forth assignment is a haiku poem by the greatest master of haiku poetry.

Participants are to create a track inspired by the assigned haiku poem and post it on Naviar’s Soundcloud group Naviar Laboratory (https://soundcloud.com/groups/naviar-laboratory)

Deadline: 12th November 2014

Haiku poem by Matsuo Bashō

Picture by Jimmy Cardosi  https://www.flickr.com/photos/silveraquarius

Pipes of piss [naviarhaiku044 - Piping autumn wind]

Welcome the forty-ninth assignment of Naviar Haiku.

Participants are to create a track inspired by the assigned haiku poem and post it on Naviar’s Soundcloud group Naviar Laboratory (https://soundcloud.com/groups/naviar-laboratory)

Deadline: 17th December 2014

Haiku poem by Sōseki Natsume

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natsume_Sōseki

Picture by Old Mister Crow

https://www.flickr.com/photos/43181051@N00/

White Tree, Black Heart [naviarhaiku049-Over the wintry]

submitted to the Haiku poem by Fukuda Chiyo-ni
"Only in the river
 Darkness flows:
 Fireflies

Being all alone is like the feeling you get when you stand at the mouth of a large river on a rainy evening and watch the water flow into the sea. Have you ever done that? Stand at the mouth of a large river and watch the water flow into the sea?
This is the fiftieth experiment of Naviar Haiku.

https://soundcloud.com/groups/naviar-laboratory

Only In The River [Naviarhaiku050 - Only In The River]

Only In The River...Naviarhaiku 050

Fireflies -Naviarhaiku 050

See http://bassling.blogspot.com/2014/12/naviarhaiku-050-only-in-river.html for track discussion.

Darkness Flows [Naviarhaiku050 - only in the river]

 
"I'm not like the avant-garde artist who is always concerned about being new and original," he said. "I have a lot of fun with cliches and archetypal musical elements, no matter where they come from, whether it's Rock-and-Roll or Jazz or a Beethoven String Quartet.
I mean, I'm not afraid to go back and use that material in a way that is somewhat unexpected and new. But my credo is not to be original in everything I do. I like dipping back and taking things we've heard before and putting them in a new set of clothes, or maybe placing them in a new room."
- Interview in the Orange County Register (1989)

Steve Moshier is a composer and performer whose work encompasses theatre, dance, the concert stage, and the internet. From its inception in 1979 until its demise in 1991 he was co-founder, performer, and composer of over 30 compositions for the chamber music ensemble Cartesian Reunion Memorial Orchestra. In 1989 he was named honorary “Artistic Associate – Composer” at the Los Angeles Theater Center under the direction of producers Bill Bushnell and Diane White. Awards for music composition include the L.A. Weekly Theater Critics’ Award, the late Drama-Logue Awards and, having been nominated six times, the Lester Horton Dance Award in 1996. Besides composing award-winning music for productions at the Los Angeles Theater Center, Berkeley Repertory Theater, and the Laguna Playhouse, he has collaborated with performance artists John Fleck, Anna Homler, Keith Antar Mason and the Hittite Empire, as well as, choreographers Karen Goodman, Rudy Perez, Hae Kyung Lee, Winifred R. Harris and, most recently, Heidi Duckler . His work has been performed in international festivals that included the Soho Arts Festival in New York, the Belluard Bollwerk International (BBI) Festival in Fribourg, Switzerland, University of Mainz, Germany, Festspielhaus Hellerau, the Tanzwoche Festival in Dresden, Germany, and the ChangMu International Dance Festival.

“It is rich, always beautiful, intelligent, “humane” , sometimes sweet, sometimes aggressive, expresses a whole lot of emotions but always in a “contained” way in one word it reflects the totality of life.”
- Composer Adam Kondor, the late ‘NetNewMusic’ discussion (2009) “The Music of Steve Moshier”

“Moshier often builds minimalist tension with a melody of about four notes, taking its variations into seductively intense territory”
– Jennifer Fisher, LA Times

“Moshier’s score veered towards melody – Bach-like inventions”
- Victoria Looseleaf, LA Times

“Bold and Intuitive”
- Lewis Segal, LA Times