I’m working on a new music project called Not Less Than the Good, based on Thoreau’s Walden. It’s going to be for New Thread Quartet (a NYC saxophone ensemble) with synthesizers and recorded audio. I’m going to collect field recordings from Walden Pond, as well as recordings of someone reading excerpts from Walden for the recorded audio that will play under the saxophones.

I had never read Walden until recently. It’s present enough in our culture that I thought I had a pretty good idea what it was about. Thoreau went to live in the woods and wrote about his experience. I thought it was a journal, and maybe an examination of solitude.

It’s more than that.

Thoreau was espousing a philosophy of life—one based in simplicity and a true understanding of oneself. Over the last couple of years I have been struggling with some of these ideas in my own life, especially my creative life. How do justify spending so much time and effort creating music that will not ultimately yield material reward? How do I focus on what’s important? What is important?

Reading Walden was a revelation. So much of what I was thinking about, and struggling to put into words, was already expressed by Thoreau. I imagine that mine is not the only experience like this. What he’s saying is remarkable, and still relevant more than 150 years later. I want to capture my experience of reading his book in Not Less Than the Good.

I’ll be spending a lot of time on this blog writing about Walden and this project. For now, I’ll just quickly explain my vision.

I’m going to create a secularized morning prayer service that uses excerpts from Walden as the canticle text. Structurally, the music will be divided into sections that roughly correspond to a Lauds service. It’s like a mass setting, though much less particular.

The choice to approach this music as a religious service is rooted in three basic ideas. First, Thoreau was a part of the Transcendentalist movement in the United States. Although it’s difficult to summarize what this group of thinkers and writers stood for, the foundation of the movement was in an effort to transform Unitarian theology. Many Transcendentalists were pastors and ministers (Ralph Waldo Emerson, the best known of the group, began as a Unitarian minister). I like the idea of referencing that foundation here. I haven’t been able to find any prescribed service structure coming from the Unitarian tradition, so I’ll need to go with the Catholic service instead. I considering the inclusion of a Unitarian hymn though.

Second, the spiritual qualities of Thoreau’s writings and ideas are suited to this kind of form. A lot of the ideas he’s pursuing offer a perspective on how to live morally, similar to what religions teach. His context is different, and it’s more focused on the individual (how do I find the way of life that’s right for me). It’s a strong enough parallel to evoke a prayer service in my mind.

Third, there’s a quasi-religious devotion to some of the ideas in Walden. In particular, there’s a growing interest in our culture to live with less, be more self-reliant, and reject the materialistic values of our society. Often those most interested in adapting to these lifestyles do it with a zeal not unlike an enthusiastic disciple. Whether explicitly connected to Thoreau or not, these modern ideas are rooted in his writings. In a way, one could think of Walden as a kind of bible. I’ll be using it to create my own musical service, so it’s being treated like a bible in that way here.

I’ll be exploring more of these ideas in future posts. I have several roughly outlined as I write this. All of this is the result of my processing Walden as I prepare to compose.

Since this is the first post about this project, I’d like to end it with the official description that I’ve crafted. This will be the foundation for the webpage and the program notes and the liner notes and the grant applications.

Not Less Than the Good is a secularized morning prayer service that uses Henry David Thoreau’s Walden as the canticle text. This music will feature New Thread Quartet (a NY based saxophone ensemble), live synthesizers, and recorded sounds that include field recordings from Walden Pond and readings of selected passages of Walden. One passage in particular, in which Thoreau describes a dualism present in people, provides both the title and foundational concept for this piece:

“I found in myself, and still find, an instinct toward a higher, or, as it is named, spiritual life, as do most men, and another toward a primitive rank and savage one, and I reverence them both. I love the wild not less than the good.”

I was recently introduced to Walden when I began reading the copy that sits on my young daughter’s book shelf, a gift from a family friend for when she is older. I expected it to be a record of Thoreau’s life in the woods; I was pleased to discover that it is also an articulation of a familiar philosophy. Thoreau was giving voice to my own barely formed thoughts about living a simpler, more focused life in the midst of our over-stimulated and materialistic culture.

New Thread Quartet is the ideal ensemble for Not Less Than the Good. Their playing can be both intensely spiritual and wildly savage, qualities that music expressing Thoreau’s dualism will demand. Throughout Walden, lengthy pastoral descriptions of the woods and the pond alternate with philosophical investigations; Thoreau calls our attention to a similar dualism in ourselves. There is our “instinct toward a higher life” and another toward a primitive one —the spiritual and the savage.  The recorded playback merges the natural soundscape of Walden Pond with readings of Thoreau’s heady philosophy. The scoring will embrace both the sweet pureness of the saxophone, as well as the bawdy wildness of its timbres. Likewise the timbre and programming of the synthesizers will embrace both the spiritual and the savage, recognizing that both coexist in all of us.

One of my primary interests in composing is combining different styles and influences in pursuit of musical expression. Thoreau’s writing shifts focus and style throughout Walden. Sometimes he’s exploring a complex question, sometimes he’s describing the woods and pond, and sometimes he’s offering practical advice for others who wish to simplify their own living. All of this is unified by his experience living in the woods. Not Less Than the Good will be a similar mosaic of styles, ideas, and sounds—all unified by the experience of reading and contemplating Walden.

I believe that Walden endures because Thoreau’s encouragement to reject the life we’re expected to live—“spending the best part of ones life earning money in order to enjoy a questionable liberty during the least valuable part”—through a pursuit of self enlightenment is profoundly appealing in our individualistic society. It touches on our desires to be free, to be self reliant, and to find happiness. Pursuing these ideals is difficult in our modern world. Not Less Than the Good is a celebration of this pursuit.

Not Less Than the Good will be presented first as a performance in New York City in 2016. Following that there will be additional performances in various cities before the music is recorded and released. The length of the music will be 50-60 minutes.