Margaret Maria: Transcript
Margaret Maria:
And then the music just kept coming out, and now that's all I do. It's almost like a reversal, a complete reversal. Before I was more practicing and excelling, trying to get the music, trying to perfect and interpret music. And then I think that moment in my life, it was extremely difficult for me. It just was the exchange. It just changed it over. Now you don't have to play music. You have to create your music, which I think is kind of unusual. I didn't hear any music before that. There was no music in me before that, and now there's only music and there's too much music and I can't get it out in time. So it just feels like something happened there.
Leah Roseman:
Hi, you're listening to Conversations with Musicians with Leah Roseman, which is available wherever you get your podcasts as a video on YouTube, and the transcript and show notes are all linked in the description to my website, LeahRoseman.com. Margaret Maria is a wonderful cellist who's a unique composer. Her compositions are all written by layering cello lines in some gorgeous and emotive aural tapestries. Her personal story is interesting and moving. She started the cello as a teenager and was admitted to the University of Toronto at age 16 without graduating from high school and was then admitted to the prestigious Curtis Institute. She went on to have a successful career as a member of the Vancouver Symphony and then Canada's National Art Center Orchestra, which is how I came to know her. She gave up her job with the N A C after a few years and embarked on a new life as a composer, meanwhile, continuing to teach. Some of her work as an educator has been with the Orkidstra program, which she has been involved with since its inception in 2007. It's a social development program that serves over 650 youth from over 62 linguistic and cultural backgrounds by building community through free music programs. Finally, before we get into this conversation, I am an independent podcaster, and in order to keep the series going, I need my listeners' help. So please look for the link to my Ko-fi page in the description. Hi Margaret, thanks so much for joining me here today.
Margaret Maria:
Thank you for having me. This is very exciting.
Leah Roseman:
I was trying to think of where to start. And of course, before we start this part of the interview, people will have heard an intro and know who you are and where you're coming from, but I was thinking as a cellist and composer and educator, maybe your experience in Breno, Italy, it kind of tied all those things together that you did the summer. Did you want to start talking about that project?
Margaret Maria:
Yes. So I started my very first creativity and improv retreat with a focus on composition just a few weeks ago in Breno, Italy. And this has been something I've been dreaming of. Megan McPhee, she's an Ottawa soprano singer, and she's had this program for, I think this was our 10th year or ninth year for her. And she had invited me to come and do a program, and initially it was supposed to be cello, and then I thought, well, what would really be something that is dear to my heart? And it is to combine everything together. This year I had a cellist, actually, two of the students were actually cellists, but they were more creative beings, and we did creativity, spontaneous music making, which is what I've now come into because when I play my music, I improvise into the creations that I create. It's highly spontaneous and I love creating spontaneous music.
And I have a duo called Marbyllia, which is a piano and cello duo, and we spontaneously create. And so I think my whole journey has led me to a moment where I can actually share in how I create the creative process, where my music comes from, and to help other students figure out where their creative process is and how they find their music. Each person is very individual in that creative process. So I was there for two weeks and spontaneous music making is very transformational. It's very freeing. So when we did it in a group and we did in a larger ensemble with some singers and flute players and my students, it ended up being ecstatic music making, the music just filled the church. People were just very free. Artists who typically are not very free when they get a taste of this freedom, this musical freedom. And I feel like I can kind of embody that and I can share that. And so it becomes part of how I teach, but also how I live my life. So it was an amazing two weeks and hopefully every year I'm going to be doing that.
Leah Roseman:
Wonderful. I heard a couple of clips that you posted on Instagram, a really beautiful group.
Margaret Maria:
Yeah, thank you.
Leah Roseman:
I didn't know about your duo. Who's the pianist in that?
Margaret Maria:
So I met a pianist here in Toronto, actually in Toronto right now, Bill Gilliam. And he has jazz sensibilities, but he's been an improviser for many years and living in the atonal world. And we just got together to just randomly play. And the very first time we played, it was a few years back, but just recently right after Covid, we went into the studio and we just played music. We put the microphones on and we play, and we did two sessions like that. And lo and behold, we have a CD coming out in October. The stuff just sounds like this kind of very futuristic cello sonata type stuff with prepared piano. I use different sound effects. I use a milk frother, so you get these kind of cool weird sounds coming out, and we just found that the music is, it's going to go through the atmosphere, so it kind of goes up into space, and we've been just actually mixing over the last two days.
So that kind of music, I just found that being able to be that again, that free in the moment. And a few months ago I saw Bill had, well, actually it was last year, Bill had played a concert with Christine Duncan, and she's a vocal free goddess who sings and does a choir here in Toronto, which is all improvised. And I sat there and go, if I can do that, then I've achieved something. I really felt like I could, the courage it takes. So I did it. We did a live stream, YouTube live stream concert, and it was incredible.
Leah Roseman:
This is a short clip from Gravitational March with the improvisational duo Marbyllia with pianist Bill Gilliam. (music)Well, let's contrast that back when your musical education started. Actually, I think it's interesting. You started in school with the cello, right?
Margaret Maria:
Yes, yes. It was a music school program in Toronto. I grew up in Etobikoke and the Bloorlea Middle School, which is actually not far from where I am right now, had a grade 6, 7, 8 strings program, actually full orchestra. We actually played in a full orchestra in those years. So I saw the cello from across the room when I went in and they played a concert and I said, that's what I want to play. I'd never really heard the cello on its own, but I saw the girl playing it and I said, that has to be me. And literally from that moment it was the cello chose me in return.
Leah Roseman:
And for someone with your very advanced, I don't know how you want to put this. I would say for most people who attain a professional level of playing, they start younger in general.
Margaret Maria:
Yes, yes, but not necessarily all the time. I think I played piano when I was younger, so definitely I had a musical background. I wasn't very good at the piano, and I found it really hard to read that many notes at one time. I think it stopped my music making. And then when I found the cello, it was one single line and I was like, yay, I could do this. And it just spoke to my heart and my soul, and it was kind of, once I found it, it was just literally that vertical curve. I had my first private lessons when I was 13, and then I entered into the Etobikoke School of the Arts the following year. I did three years there. I officially did not graduate high school. I didn't have enough credits, but I got into university when I was 16, U of T Performance, so I did my four years there, and it was just fully immersed, fully into playing orchestral music, chamber music, excelling on the instrument, just getting better a lot of the time because I did start late, I felt like I never really owned my talents.
It almost felt like, oh my gosh, I can do this. And I didn't know how I was doing it really. It felt just almost like a little bit surreal. I think when you start younger, you do have a bit of a confidence that might be embedded into the way you see yourself and your instrument. And for me, it was always like, oh my gosh, I really had to warm up. I really had to spend a good solid hour of Feuillard exercises to feel like I was in control of my instrument. Now, that's not unusual, but it almost felt like I needed that even psychologically to feel like I was able to actually play. And then sometimes I would play, and it took many, many years before I could really feel like I could own my capability and capacity. It was just stuff that just kind of I did, and I wasn't able to be confident about how I produced it.
So I think that that speaks a lot. And I did always think back then, oh, I wish I'd started younger because then I'd be so comfortable. All those other cellists and I was always uncomfortable. I mean, it didn't look like it, but it was always not fully comfortable. It wasn't fully mine in a way. And that came way later my thirties when I was teaching and teaching more, and I think maybe it came where I really owned that I could do it was when I had my children and I could not warm up anymore and I couldn't do that hour of practice. And I was like, you know what? You're warmed up now. You have to do it now. And you forced your body to be there for you. You forced your hands to say, I can do this. I'm relaxed. I'm warmed up. I've done this so many times, I can do this.
So that took a long time for me as a cellist and as person. I think that there were people that were kind of in my, supporting me. My cello teacher, Daniel Domb was amazing, but I still never felt like - And then funny enough, then after I quit my job in the N A C and I started composing, I put myself back down to the bottom of this learning curve again, and that's okay. And I feel like I'm somewhere now just kind of again, the learning curve and getting better as a composer, a producer, understanding how to use the tools. It's like, again, starting from zero, but that climb again and again, it took me quite a long time to own that process. And even now, it's a little still as a creator, any moment this may suck when you start opening your program and there's nothing there.
So that's how we start. That's how you start. You just have to have faith that the process is going to be there for you. Blessing of Awakening is a piece of music. Well, I wrote an album, Music for Healing, and this was just a few years ago during Covid, when my sister actually almost died from Covid. She was in the hospital and she went on a ventilator just a few days after going in, and we thought we would lose her. It was one of the severest cases they had seen. And I write music from my life and I write music that happens to me when I kind of assimilate and accumulate all kinds of energy from all over the place. And I get that from people, from things that are happening in the world. It could be news and it can be something extremely personal, which are the people that affect me the closest and are closest to me.
And I think the one piece Blessing of Awakening was written about four or five days before they actually brought her out of the coma. And for me that was people were saying, oh, thoughts to pray, and all of that. For me, music is a form of prayer, is a form of asking for what I really, truly want as the outcome, and then I put it into my music, and then I give it to the world. So the world then feels what I want it to feel. And I think Blessing of Awakening, it is so brilliant. It's so bright in that moment. It was probably the darkest moment. So I think I really needed to feel that energy. I needed to feel that positive, that hope, and really to kind of channel that she will be and everything. And I kind of sent that out into the world. So five days later, she did come out of the coma, took her a long time to get back. She had to relearn to walk everything she was under for two weeks, and it really did damage to her system. So she's okay now, but still she has the effects. It's been hard on her.
Leah Roseman:
Okay. Yeah, Blessing of Awakening. I remember when I first heard it when you were posting on social media about your sister, and it was so heart wrenching. And then I've listened to it many times since then. It's absolutely gorgeous piece of music. So, as we're about to play this, people who don't know your music should realize it's just you playing the cello, many different layers.
Margaret Maria:
Yeah. Yes. Yeah. So basically I just go in and my music's either created from a melody or from a chord structure. I don't write that much down, and pretty much the magic is done in the production of it. So as I'm playing, I create the performances of it. So you're always trying to capture that performance. So every line that you play is the performance. And then slowly I layer it out until I can get the whole composition going. And then if I'm thinking about textures, how much texture, how much build do I want, how much emotion is going to sweep over in the moments that I want? And I get, it's like my own playing field. I get to do what I want. And it's very, very empowering to be in that seat, in that creative seat, in that moment. And it's all cellos. I use Cubase as my program, so I am able to manipulate some of the instruments. So in some of my more crazy stuff, I may put some effects on the actual cello lines. And then I am known to use percussion instruments, what I have. So sometimes it's more the kitchen percussion. I do chopsticks on my cello, so I've got that. I get a milk frother kind of effect. Anything that I can use, you just try to create as many things from the palette that I have. So yes, but mostly you look, everything you hear is all done by one person by me, and I can create be the orchestra.
Leah Roseman:
Here is Blessing of Awakening. (music)
Margaret Maria:
That's kind of like the story of how my music is created. And when I first quit the orchestra and I started writing music, one of my relationships had ended and I decided, I asked my mom, can I come to Toronto? This is where I'm from. And I was in Ottawa, and I drove back and forth for about five years weekly. And every week I would write something new and it would take me three or four days to write, and then I would come back to Ottawa and I would teach my students, and then I would drive back, create something new. On the way back, I would listen and listen because something, when it's newly formed, it kind of takes over your whole system. And you can't believe that nothing was there yesterday. And today, all of a sudden there's this music. And a lot of the time, the music is stuff that it's the environment that I need to live in.
So sometimes it's cathartic and I have to get lots of energy out, and I need that aggressive. So I really go for it. And other times when I'm feeling really either low, I want the opposite. I want feel enlightened. I want to feel this beautiful. I want to float on these beautiful melodies or these beautiful waves. And so I create that. So I guess when you feel like it's living a creative life, you are creating the next thing that you want to see for yourself and in the world. So I think probably there's a lot of angst in me, probably a lot of, not probably, but a lot of dis-ease, and therefore I have to create from that place.
Leah Roseman:
Well, thanks so much for sharing that. Hi, just a quick break from the episode. I'm an independent podcaster, and I really do need my listeners help. Please consider buying me a coffee. The link to my Ko-fi page is in the description. Every dollar helps me cover the costs of this huge project. Thanks so much. So if we could just circle back, Margaret, I think it's interesting for people, I mean, I think you're a type of prodigy, and I've always felt with your playing that you may feel differently as yourself, but I've always thought Margaret just didn't make any of the mistakes the rest of us made. She didn't develop the tension problems or any of this. She just did it all right, but you're making eyes at me, so perhaps that's not the case.
Margaret Maria:
Yeah, I think I was called Ms Perfect at the N A C because my audition was just so perfect. And I think that I've always been a little bit paralyzed by perfection. If things were not perfect, I wouldn't want it to go forward. And I think I would would rarely advertise myself, oh, come to my concert or do this. I just felt like I didn't know if it was going to be perfect enough. So I think that that was always a big issue for me, is that kind of idea, striving for perfection. And when I quit the N A C and I was doing, I realized, well, I just transferred it into my music production. It never went away. So it's kind of that feeling. But when I was at U of T in my very first year, I actually had tendonitis in my first year, and it was just a very difficult time.
I think between the age of 12, 13, 14, 15, and I attended when I was 16, the learning curve was too fast. I think my body couldn't really adjust to that. And when I was 16, I was playing Schumann concerto and Popper etudes, and I remember exactly when I got, and in my first year, they put me Principal cello, which in this day I kind of still feel like I wish they had just left, put me at the back. It doesn't matter how good I played, I wasn't ready. I wasn't psychologically ready to be under that pressure because I just barely felt I had the capacity to do this. I was building it, but I didn't feel in charge of it. So I think that all had to do with it too, that kind of stress behind it. So yeah, having tendonitis in my first year, so I did half my year, then I had tendonitis for about a year, and I slowly did 10 minutes of practice, 15 minutes of practice, I even quit performance and went into music education.
But then when I tried to make a sound on a trumpet and I, I said, I can't do this, so there's a place, I said, I can't do this. So I decided I'll go back into performance. I'll just figure out a way. So tons of physio, tons of just trying to get myself slowly back, how to, I figured, yeah, everybody's different. So some people's bodies can't take that as much tension and the stress plus the tension. I remember it was Popper nine, which is a double stop exercise, and that's when this hand went. And then I remember an orchestra we were going, it was Tchaik five, and I literally felt the other side. So usually when you get injured, it's sympathetic. So that was my first year, and I slowly climbed back out of that. But again, it was hard. One 20 minutes a day of practice.
And then I realized as I came back into it, I couldn't practice as much, so I became way more efficient. So that was the next step is like, how do I efficiently practice when I don't have as much arms to do it with? And then in my final year, I got into Curtis and I went to Curtis, but every though I felt like I did have to do some exercise or some physio, or I literally had to sometimes take a break and then my body needed breaks. And so I think that was constant throughout my whole orchestral journey as well. So I'd find myself at home on the floor resting and trying to get my arms, which may have felt a little bit funky. So I've always been cautious with my arms since that time.
Leah Roseman:
So for a lot of listeners won't actually know what Curtis is and how important it is that you managed to get in. So it's a very prestigious institution. Do you want to speak to the institution and what that meant to be able to go there for you?
Margaret Maria:
Yes. Well, going to Curtis technically is considered one of the best music schools in the world. Everybody that goes there gets in on full scholarship. And I just went and auditioned. And I also had auditioned at Julliard, and I got in and it was, I think most of my formative cello pedagogy came from. And my plan came from Daniel Domb, who was my teacher at U of T. Curtis I did two years, and I studied with David Soyer. I wish I'd been doing more quartets, so then I would've gotten more out of his instruction. But I was kind of gearing towards, okay, I want to do auditions. And so I kind of went that route. But playing in the orchestra there was phenomenal. We had Simon Rattle come in. I mean, Yuri Temirkanov came. We had some incredible, Andre Previn came. So I got a really, really great feeling for the orchestra.
And after I graduated from Curtis, I got my first job in the Vancouver Symphony and been, I was a symphonic musician most of my life. And then the N A C came right after that. So I think I absolutely adored orchestral music. And my experience at Curtis was, yeah, I think one of the biggest things that taught me is that everybody at Curtis, they were kind of fearless. They were like, whatever music was thrown our way. It was like, okay, there was not this - And I remember at U of T ", oh, this is hard, or this is difficult or this", everybody had that kind of a little bit of attitude. And at Curtis it was like there was nothing that was too impossible. So I think that that was kind of something that you get in that atmosphere and people just played.
So I played chamber music with Hillary Hahn. We played quartets, and I had coachings with Felix Galimir, Karen Tuttle, who was amazing, who I saw again at the N A C, Gary Graffman, who was the head of Curtis. He came to the N A C, and we played together music for the Sunday afternoon concerts at the gallery. And I remember playing Korngold's piano quartet for left hand. And that was momentous for me because it's just everything coming together. It was actually one of my favorite pieces as well. And Korngold is actually one of my musical influences. So I remember those types of moments where people are connecting from my past into the future. But Curtis was pretty amazing.
Leah Roseman:
And when you started composing, it's when you had your children and you started writing for them. Is that right?
Margaret Maria:
Yeah, yeah. It was just my kids were really little and they said, "mom, play Twinkle and play twinkle again". And after a while I was just like, I'm getting tired of playing just the regular Twinkle. So I kind of did an arpeggiation of Twinkle is really, really sweet. And then I realized somehow that slowly I started writing, things were coming out at that point, and they were just little pieces. But I have to say, one of the things that happened in my life at that point when my kids were really young, it was a traumatic experience really. So I had a traumatic breakup and things were really, really hard. And I was in the N A C at that time, and my kids, I kind of had to give up everything. I gave up everything to be able to just keep my music going and my career.
And yeah, I think the individual I was with was just not stable. And that created a really difficult situation. And I don't know how I managed, but I think that in that moment, that was the moment where I felt like, okay, if I've given up everything, then I need to create something out of nothing. And that went through my mind at that moment where I had these really depressions where it was really dark. And it was after that where I started trying things and things started coming out. And so the first CD is called the Cello for Chelsea, and it's actually a CD where about a girl named Chelsea who finds a cello in the school, and his name's Chester. And the story mimics my past when she finds her voice. And I told that story for I was part of MASK for a while, which is an organization that's in schools and communities. So I would tell that story.
And then the second one was about this spirits living in the music, and it's called Zara, the Magini. And so that one had more music started coming out, and I was like, oh my gosh, this is, and in the middle there's a piece called Enchantment, and that was the best music I've created so far. And that was the voice that the little girl had heard in her head. So she wanted to conduct an orchestra so that she could bring back the spirits of her loved ones. So it started creating, I'm sure it was fulfilling a need within me, these stories and things that I needed to express, but the music started coming out that way. And then it was only when I was able to, I took a year of sabbatical in 2012, and I quit the N A C the year after where I got my first DAW, so my first system, and I had Cubase on there, and I was able to take these children's stories, like pieces and make them into an album of just regular music that could be.
And I used some synthesizers on there. And so I transformed my music, and then there was just more, so it just kept going. So then the next one, so Enchanting, Enchanting Rising, and then the music just kept coming out, and now that's all I do. It's like, it's almost like a reversal, complete reversal. Before I was more always practicing and excelling, trying to get the music, trying to perfect and interpret music. And then I think that moment in my life, it was extremely difficult for me. It just was the exchange. It just changed it over. Now you don't have to play music, you have to create your music, which I think is kind of unusual. I didn't hear any music before that. There was no music in me before that, and now there's only music and there's too much music, and I can't get it out in time. So it just feels like something happened there. And that to me is still and will always be a bit of unknown, a little bit of mystical, magical, whatever you want to call it, that has happened.
Leah Roseman:
But one thing that was constant is your teaching, especially through an organization called Orkidstra.
Margaret Maria:
Yes, yes. I think that because I started in a music program in a school, and I know that nothing would be possible for me if it wasn't for that specific thing. I taught always. I always had students. And then in 2007, I had connected with Tina Fedeski and Gary McMillen, who owned the Leading Note shop in Ottawa. It was a sheet music store, but kind of like a community hub. And they had been exposed to El Sistema already, and there was a D V D called "Tocar y Luchar" which is to play and fight. And I borrowed that D V D from them, and I said, we have to do something. So for me, that was, it's a huge passion of mine is to have to be able to give this opportunity to other kids and to see that kids are thriving and that we have thriving interesting communities, which are literally an ideal community that gives back to each other where there's mentorship and where there's acceptance and music is at the heart of it, and music is the connector.
So it's a social program through music, but music is what the language we all share. And because it's an international language, it transcends all boundaries. Then we're able to do that in orchestra. So this not-for-profit, it's almost 15 years. Oh my gosh, my math is so terrible, but it's going strong. And I conduct in the concerts. I still go back, I'm in Ottawa every two weeks. So I go and I work with the kids in both hubs in Vanier and at the Bronson Center, center town. And then I conduct in the concerts and I do whatever they need me to do. So I share my passion. We do some improv within the big groups as well. So I get the kids doing improvisation, and it's been amazing. It's been a trend. A lot of the students have done extremely well, and they come back and they mentor, we call them Oldkidstra, but they come and play concerts or they come and they teach with our students, or they try to have some kind of connection to Orkidstra. So that's been unbelievable. And Tina's incredible at leading that. Me, I come in and out artistically, the Leading Notes I helped to create at the beginning, and I think a lot of my heart is always there. And when I make that music with the kids, it is really the kind of music where I feel most comfortable.
Leah Roseman:
And when you're working in a large group doing improvisation, you use certain parameters.
Margaret Maria:
Yes. So I have to add another key person in my life, which is Alice Kanack, and she is in Rochester, and she has developed something called Creativity Ability Development. And now she has a method of teaching called Playing from the Heart, which is like a beginner method, a starting method where kids are learning the basics of violin. She's done a violin, cello, I believe viola already. They're starting the basics, but they're doing extended techniques and they're playing along with tracks and being different animals, and they're actually, it's a creative approach to learning the instrument, and it's very freeing, and it takes the kids, it captivates the children in a different way. And so I was exposed to the c a D method about, it's been at least 10 years now, a little bit more than 10 years. And Dr. Sarah Smolin, who is also a cellist, but she teaches the Suzuki method in Ithaca, but she also does the C A D.
She came to Guelph, and it was a Suzuki retreat thing. It was Suzuki week, and I saw it firsthand. I participated in it, and it was so, again, so freeing. We were accompanying a movie soundtrack and the kids were all exploring, and it was all very, it's all very open. And of course, the main rule is that there's no such thing as a mistake. So imagine you're being told that even at my age, you're just like, yay, there's no such thing as a mistake. And the kids thrive on that. It is this being free. And then the music starts to have a color, and it's your own color. It's coming straight from you. And so it's that really captivates, it captivates me, but I think the children are captivated by it. So when I introduce that now into, Orkidstra, I do it with my students.
We just sit there and we just play and we just create music. And in Orkidstra, we also, in a larger group, I found the easiest way to do that is by Follow the Leader. So if they follow a rhythm, but they can pick their own notes within a scale or within just a few notes, even open strings, then you can actually get all the different sections playing together, really listening and fitting in. But they're actually improvising rhythms. And I've done it where the students now lead each section and the student comes up with a rhythm that fits into the other rhythm, but each student in the orchestra is able to pick their own notes. So then you're picking and choosing which notes will fit in what kind of things you want. So there's a lot of choice involved in it, and I think our brains are wired a little bit differently when we're constantly choosing.
And then this really dovetails into how I actually teach, because I think we pick and choose how we phrase, how we make little phrases. Is this phrase a inner phrase? Is it an outer phrase? Where am I going with the phrase? And you're constantly picking and choosing. So the creative approach to performing is also very much intertwined with being creative in an improv fashion. So I think that that creates a little bit more of a individual take on your interpretation already from the get go. And I think I've always been one of those people kind of sitting on the fence in interpretation. When I was younger even I said, well, it could go this way or could go that way. Which way do I want to play? It was very hard for me to decide, but now when I play, I just know that in the moment, I need to decide which way I want it to go, and whether I want it to bloom and take a little more time, I can decide differently each time. And that's kind of the cool thing. And I think that that creative approach allows you to be more creative in your performing as well.
Leah Roseman:
On that note, you said we might be able to share another track. Do you want to introduce some other music that we'll be sharing as part of this episode?
Margaret Maria:
So I also have a duo that we produce music for film and tv. So I've been actually very lucky to have a few albums on a label called Hard Music Design, and it's part of the APM catalog. So some of my music has found itself on W W E Wrestling and Top Gear, and you can hear some of my music on TV and in film things. And this was done with a fellow named Craig McConnell here in Toronto as well. And we blended electronic music with my cellos, and it created this thing which we call Rage Angel. So I was able to get a lot of my aggressive kind of, it's almost, there's a little bit of techno, there's a little bit of E D M in it, there's a little bit of beats, and we actually scored one film together. So some of the music that you would find also through the licensing catalogs are film cinematic in Flavor.
It was a psychological thriller. So we've got Cut the Body and all these kind of gory things, but Creeping Dread, there's another album called Hard and Heavenly Cello. So there's some beautiful tracks on there which are available for licensing. And I do find that it's not a lot, but I do find some backend, which is my SOCAN Royalties, and I do see where my stuff is being placed, but because it's usually about six to nine months out from when it was placed, it's hard for me to go back and really listen to where it was placed. So one of the pieces was called Raging Red. The original piece was describing bombings that had happened in Turkey, so I called it Raging Red Carnations. And it's just that you just needed to get that angst out. So the actual, and then we transformed it into a rage angel track, and it just has this energy to it. I like writing really fast. I know I have some kind of musical A D H D kind of thing. Most of my music has, the pacing is very fast. It's harder for me to write slower music. I have to slow myself down, and I feel like I'm always racing through space and time, and there's always an energetic in there. So Raging Red is a combination of Craig McConnell's Artistry and Genius, and my cellos.
Leah Roseman:
This is an excerpt from Raging Red by Rage Angel with Craig McConnell. (music) Thank you. And you produced a duo album with Donna Brown?
Margaret Maria:
Yes.
Leah Roseman:
A singer.
Margaret Maria:
Yes. So I was just looking about six years ago, I got a grant from the Canada Council. That's the last time I got a Canada Council grant. I was just rejected yesterday. Again, I need to figure out why and how to write better grants. I have a rock opera that I want to finish. I have the first act, but I don't have the second act done, and I want to be able to produce that just to get it going. And my co-writer for that is in Argentina. So I have this huge idea, and we have the storyline and everything. So I'm going to try to do a better job of getting a grant to help support something like that that would take me, it take us months to do, but we're still forging ahead. And I got a initial grant to write some arias for Donna Brown to sing, and Donna's incredible.
And it started there. And then just recently I received an Ontario Arts Council grant to produce CD, and which I'm very grateful for, and I also produced it on the Canadian Music Center Center Discs label. So I became a Canadian Music Center associate composer a few years ago, which for me was huge. So I still like when I see Margaret Maria composer, I'm like, it catches me a little bit, but I'm getting there. I'm getting there. That's me. And so we did have a beautiful disc called Between Worlds where it's Donna Brown singing, and it's my cellos in the background, and it's Donna Brown wrote all the poetry and her poetry and my music. They existed together. So some of the music existed, and she wrote the poetry to the music, and I then placed her voice inside the music and some The Arias, some of the songs, not really Aria songs, I actually just wrote the music for and created the songs, and we want to make another cd. So we're really excited about that. But that was a beautiful, beautiful partnership. And then I did orchestrate that for full orchestra. So that was done in Ottawa right before Covid with the Ottawa Chamber Orchestra, Donnie Deacon conducted and Donna sang. So I did have my first premier on a stage. And then most recently I was also, oh, and there's going to be that, I have to now reorchestrate those songs for String Quartet because the Molinari String Quartet is going to be performing them in Montreal with Donna in 2025.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I'd read about your rock opera and heard a little bit. So this guy, Julian Garcia, is it Reig? How does he pronounce his name? Yeah. So you met him online.
Margaret Maria:
Yes. So at one point, it's interesting because SoundCloud brought me a lot of connections, and that was when they were able to still do groups. I haven't mixed feelings about all of the apps that are out there and how our music is being consumed. And before in SoundCloud, I was able to share on groups in different groups. I found that I accumulated a lot of friends, but a lot of musicians also listen to my stuff. Actually, I have another album of Cinematic Steampunk, which I did with a fellow composer in la and that's also in a music library, a-list trailer music. I did that with John Sari. He heard my music and he said, we should do something together. And then we created an album together. So it was the same thing with Julian. He heard my music and he took it, and he did one of a Slice of Moon it was called.
And he took one of my tracks and he put vocals on top of it. So I think my music is very versatile in that way, because from where I am, I can create all kinds of different things. So I love the synergy of partnership partnering like that and having a collaborative kind of thing. It just creates a whole new sound out of what I can make. So I was really excited because I just started hearing this incredible voice, and he's more like a character actor. Voice is growly, but it's very passionate. And then slowly we decided, well, let's keep going with that. And so the majority of the first act is him taking my music and actually just putting vocal lines on top. And the story developed that way. And just the other day, because we're committed to continue this, I actually took, there's a finale to the first act he wrote, which is with organ and voice, and he said, oh, there should be cellos in there.
But I used that to create the beginning of the actual finale. So I took that, I added some slides, and then I added the rock part because I hear it as a bunch of strings. So maybe six or seven string instruments, a drum kit there, so it can have the rock aspect to it. And pretty much that's it. So the rock opera would have dancing in it. And finally, now I know someone who would want to be able to choreograph that, who's just absolutely incredible. So I'm trying to put all those pieces together. It almost feels like it's impossible, but anything that's impossible is possible. I've discovered you just need to keep following that path. So the rock opera will get done. And I find it's fascinating. It's again, the Lady of the Moon having inspiration and she's ethereal, and she would be on silks, and the sculptor is sculpting a sculpture that's going to rise above the city, ushering in a new era.
So all of these kind of themes that are part of me, part of my creating, I'm the sculptor, I'm the lady of the moon, and then Maria, who's the wife who actually eventually finds her voice and raises the sculptor, she's half beautiful and half disfigured, and she needs to come into her voice, finding her voice and empowerment. So I think that that I'm so excited to keep going. I just need to dig in and say it's going to get done no matter what, which is the artist's way, it's going to get done no matter what. Yeah, you never stop. You never have - faith, you always have to have faith in it. And no matter what, that's kind of where I'm at as music is the ultimate powerful thing that I could be expressing myself in. And yeah, there's low moments where you think, okay, I didn't get the grant.
Oh my gosh, what are they looking for? It's not good enough. I'm not good enough. It's always there. That's a constant. And also that struggle, because again, all of our music from all creators, all music is free on the internet. I mean, it is free. I mean, everything that you find that people can pay for is also free on YouTube. And the payout for those things, there really isn't any. There isn't any. So if it's not with the licensing or getting grants, there's no support. So I support myself by teaching. I teach cello and I love teaching, which is great, but I definitely support myself through teaching. And it's not through my art that does leave me with a beautiful situation where I can create whatever I want and I'm not beholden to anything or anyone. And I could follow my path. But at the same time, that creates another situation, which is artists are not supported. And I think I have to thank, my sister supported me a lot. She saved, she saved me many times. So sometimes you get into artistic life pickles, and there are people that save you. So music has saved me, and my sister saved me a lot, her husband that I can, there's been a lot of support for me that way.
Leah Roseman:
This is From Scars to Infinite Stars (music). Well, people can buy your albums on Bandcamp.
Margaret Maria:
Yes.
Leah Roseman:
I don't think they're all there though. Like your album with Donna's not there. I'm not sure your children's albums are there.
Margaret Maria:
No, they're not, actually. No. So I think they're a little bit hodgepodge. I think on my website, I have some things too. I have a Bandzoogle website, so Margaret mariamusic.com. So probably the best way to support any artist is to actually download their albums. But even if it's downloaded off of iTunes, I still get something as an artist. It's not the same as streaming. Streaming is literally nothing for artists, but any kind of download, it's still because it's downloaded, there is some,
Leah Roseman:
Well, I often bring this up with so many of my guests, and I think we need to use the streaming for browsing. And when you find something you love, if you can afford it, try to buy it. So I think Bandcamp is a really good platform. People are using it more and more, and you can set your price and sell your physical CDs or whatever as well. But if we could circle back to teaching, I curious if you must've changed the way you teach. I mean, you've changed so much as a musician in your approach.
Margaret Maria:
Yes, yes. I think I teach a lot through emotions. So I call it teaching through emotions, and definitely I sit down with all my students and we improvise. So that's a big, huge change, which didn't exist before at all. And now they're becoming fearless too. So if they've done it enough with me, we sometimes just sit down and I say, okay, let's do random, which means we don't pick a key, we don't do anything. We just start with sound effects, and we try to find one another here and there. And in the process, I usually close my eyes, so I give them completely just privacy because it's such a kind of personal thing. And then we just go, the music just goes, and so I'll do chord changes or crazy effects, and you're literally creating it on the spot. You're meeting halfway. So I think that that part of my approach is the students really feel that freedom.
I think there's that creative part of them that comes out. So I think to be able to hear and respect that child's creation is such a big thing for them. They're heard. They're heard, and they're listened to, and there's no such thing as mistakes. So they're not being judged. They're just sharing in something that can be very powerful. And I do find that, and I do mention it to some, if the parent is sitting there or the student is there, I say, where do you feel that liftoff in music, that liftoff comes when you're playing a huge symphony where you feel the emotion coming and you feel the power of it? Professionals feel that often because they're hearing amazing music and they feel this lift off, but students don't feel that for a long time. The music doesn't lift off. It doesn't really soar. It doesn't capture them and take them.
Maybe when they're listening to a piece of music, you feel it, but when you're literally in charge of the music. So I find that when we improvise, I can get them to go literally, there's liftoff and you can feel the power of the music. So I think that that is one of the biggest differences for me, is that I try to show it in our improv how big and how passionate, powerful the effect of the music can be. And then when we actually play the music, you're trying to find those moments as well. And so it's easier to explain how are you going to make this huge crescendo, how much sound you need, and what kind of phrase you need to get there, and what kind of emotion you need to capture. So I think a lot of, there is a kind of difference in my teaching that way.
I think I've always been very responsive to where a child is at. I don't think that has changed in my approach. I think that that has always kind of been there. I always feel like, okay, where are we and what can I do to bring that out Now, just with the whole little bit of improvised aspect, it takes on a different kind of color even. Like, okay, where are they at and how can I bring that out? But when we're improvising, it's much easier to bring it out. It's easier to find it. It's easier to find the child, it's easier to find where they are. And even if I do this with an adult or whoever is in front of me, I can find where they are, and then we go together. And that little bit of togetherness is like chamber music at its most advanced, where you're really listening and you're really combining and you're respecting and you're moving together.
So it's that kind of ebb and flow, which is literally the hallmark of the best chamber music. So I find that teaching kids this way creates another level of listening, another way of listening. And it also is very, the students are very conscious about really listening to what the next person contributes. So I find that whole Creativity Ability Development method has that in it. It's embedded in it. How am I going to listen so I can respond? How can I do that at this? If we're going around in a circle and I'm next, or I'm playing in a little trio and somebody's doing a drone and they pass the melody to me, what can I give? What can I contribute? What did they just do? What am I fitting into? It's this incredible thing which we talk about in chamber music in university. It becomes, how are we communicating?
This is done for children. This is done at that level where you're listening and everybody's watching and responding and passing it. So I think that that has changed me a lot. That has changed how I teach completely, because it's a different way of respecting a child's voice or a person's human's voice. That's their music. That's their music coming out, and how am I going to interact with that music? Because it's very evident, because they're giving something of themselves. They're very different. When a child plays a phrase of music that is something that's already written down, and they now have to conform to that and try to interpret that is very different than someone giving a phrase of music that is coming directly from them and being created and rendered in the moment. So I think that that is what really keeps me, fascinates me, keeps me very interested. And literally, when you are creating and teaching this way, there's not a moment where you want to lose anything. So you're just always there. You don't want just time really flies away because you're so focused. So it's a very different approach, but I think it's wonderful to be a part of it, and it's wonderful to witness it and to be kind of enabling it and making it happen for students and in groups. So I like doing that. That's kind of part of my life's work.
Leah Roseman:
In your private lessons, do you plan to have that time as part of the lesson, or does it just come up?
Margaret Maria:
Yeah, I usually plan it. I usually say, do you want to improvise first or last? So sometimes students want to get warmed up. Sometimes if I sometimes choose, I say, okay, let's improvise first just because I want to kind of break the ice. I just want to communicate and I just want be in that world with my student for a little bit before you get down to, okay, play me a scale or anything like that. And even then, once you've improvised in, okay, play me a scale, play it like a rainbow. So you start doing visual images to kind of prolong their experience of playing very, very musically with different images and ideas? Yes. All my music now, I ask them for stories, but that's not unusual. But stories where you can really kind of build if there's what's happening in your mind. So for sure, having a visual and having some kind of story, because you can actually tell when a child has no story because the music doesn't go anywhere. And slowly they realize, oh, if I think this way, or I'm adding this in, or if I feel this emotion that they're starting to play more musically and the music starts to flow much easier. So for sure, sure. I didn't do as much of that before, but now I do it all the time.
Leah Roseman:
And were you teaching online before Covid, or did that start then?
Margaret Maria:
It just started during Covid. Yeah. Yeah, I didn't teach online before that. So now actually to make my life work, I teach one week in person in Ottawa. All my students are in Ottawa, and I do one week online. And when I'm online, I do more scales and things where I can do corrective work where it's a little bit easier or listen to whole piece and be able to see where they're at. And then when I hear them in person, I do more improvising and get to hear their sound. It is very hard to hear the sound and what the concept of the sound is over just zoom or over the internet. Yeah, sometimes it sounds like they have a huge sound, but then you hear them in person. That huge sound is not huge at all. It was just a good mic place. So it's nice to have both of the worlds together and to be able to bring that together. So yeah, I'm a hybrid cello teacher.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I found that because I was teaching exclusively online during the height of the pandemic, and when I finally heard some of these people in person, it was mostly a question of volume actually, that didn't have the depth of tone. So we worked a lot on that once we got in person.
Margaret Maria:
So this way I can ensure that the tone is where it needs to be so that I am not disillusioned just by what I'm hearing over the internet.
Leah Roseman:
So Margaret, if you could just speak to Her Heart on a Platter.
Margaret Maria:
So this one actually is going to be, it's something I wrote at the beginning of this year, 2023. My life has kind of taken me full circle to a place where I feel like my kids are grown up now I just have a new puppy, and I feel like I now want to live my life for my music where I kind of am at the center. In the past, I kind of felt like I need to fit into other places, into other people's lives. And I feel now that I kind of like the center of my life stays and I'm kind of like in the center and people can come in and out and I can just be extremely giving, be very open. I am, my personality is to be giving, be love, to really feel like I can connect with people and get the emotional kind of connection I need with people without feeling like I need to be somewhere else other than within my center.
Sometimes I really need to self-soothe a lot because of the state of the world where my kids are, what's happening all around me. And I feel like I can do that in my own space now, where I could not do that before. I'm searching for it outside of me. So Her Heart on a Platter is I think, realizing that I give everything and I show myself, and I show what I'm thinking, what I'm feeling. And I give a lot of love without asking for anything in return because you're not supposed to. But it's that love liberates. If you give, you just give everything and every moment you just give and you are giving and you are loving so you can live that kind of life. And I think that Her Heart on a Platter, literally just when you hear it, it's that's all of me on a platter, fully exposed. Those are my thoughts, my feelings, my heart, and I guess just to show that you can be open and be as open as I want to be in life. And that's the place where my music speaks from. So that's what you hear.
Leah Roseman:
This is Her Heart on a Platter. (music)People can buy some of your sheet music on your website.
Margaret Maria:
Yes, yes. I have a few things there. I'm supposed to put up some more scores. I have some six cello ensemble parts pieces, a five cello part exquisite night is there that can be played for cello ensemble. So yeah, I'm slowly, you can just take a look on my website, there's a store and there's the sheet music part there. So I'm slowly adding things, but those can be found on my website. Yes. And I'm hoping to have Between Worlds this orchestral score at the Canadian Music Center library soon as well, so that other orchestras can play it. And either Donna can sing it or another soprano can sing my pieces too. So that's in the works as well.
Leah Roseman:
Excellent. That's really good to hear. Yeah. I mean, we've talked a little bit about imagery and so on. You have a level of synesthesia, I believe.
Margaret Maria:
Yes. I think what happens is I take on the colors of other people very easily. I think it's kind of an empathic type of thing. I could take a moment or a poem. I tend to become other people's lives. It's very easy for me to do that kind of like a transference. And so I can create my own stories out of that. And I feel like I feel other people's emotions. So being very emotive, I mean, it's great for music because that's what we're doing. We're creating emotions. And so I kind of take emotions on, and I think that that's the hardest part of writing for me, is that I take on all sorts of stuff that it may not be me, and that's okay, but I could take that energy and then transform it into music. But that process in itself has a high energy, is a high energy type of process. You have to sit there and it has to. Yeah. So for me, I guess that that would be the hardest part and the most, it's kind of painful too sometimes. Depends on what you're trying to describe.
There's a track actually that I'm going to share too. It's called Shame on an Angel. And I wrote that when I felt really, really, really bad inside. And so many things had come together to create that. I lost touch with my artist friend, Angel Muriel, who created these incredible videos together. And he was like my divine twin. And he passed away actually in October. But he was an energy that stayed within me for a long time because we were like twins. He was this master surrealist painter. And he said, until I came along his creatures, he's got creature like these little surrealist creatures had no voice. And he goes, now he paints my music and my music is his painting. And we had this incredible bond. And then we lost touch over Covid and I couldn't find him. And then when I tried finding him, his website went down.
It was quite dramatic, but traumatic for me. It's like I lost him. I can't find him. And eventually he was found. I have a friend who was a friend, Russian art, he represents Russian artists and he's in Ireland. And we connected together. We tried to find this mystery of where did Angel go? Where is he? And we found him at restaurant and he had opened a restaurant, but I'm not sure whether from that point when I did my last video, I had not been in contact with him. So maybe something had happened to him too that he couldn't paint or something because everybody else talked on his behalf. But I knew he was still alive until October of last year. Anyways, so all of these come, it hits me. I've lost my friend. I've created another situation where I felt like I was like this cotton a chicken coop, and I had just fallen out of the sky like this.
So Shame on an Angel. You hear this creature, this mysterious, this mystical, it's like an angel with huge wings and who lands in a chicken coop. And it's based on a story, a short story. Gabrielle Garcia Marquez, could that be the name? I hope that's the name. I read the story and I felt like the reason this angel dropped down is because of shame. The something shameful happened and had to regrow its wings. And I created the sound of this angel coming crashing into the chicken coop. And then the music just goes from there. And it's kind of, my musical heroes are Prokofiev and Shostakovich. They're my comasitional grandfathers. I call them. I think they're somewhere in me and always somewhere in my vicinity, in my brain and around me. And sometimes I kind of like to say, okay, what would they think of that? And sometimes I just laugh with glee. I say, oh my gosh, I wish they could, I wonder what they would say when they heard that. So in that one, I actually had percussion in the end. I love Prokofiev's mechanical endings that have machines in it. So I added that in it, and it is just a wild ride to the end.
Leah Roseman:
This is Shame on an Angel.(music)
Margaret Maria:
I think life does its thing inside me and my answer. I answer it in music. So yeah, when it's happening, when I'm actually writing, I mean it's the most empowering, most incredible feeling. But you can also feel it going through you, through you, and you're being rung out, rung like a rag, and then you take a break and do it again. I have all the music from last year, it's coming out. It's called Goddess of Edges. And it's about living in this state in between things, living where you're not really here, but you're not really there. You're not of this world, but you're not there yet either. And you live between things and you're trying to describe the world between. And so I find myself constantly in that state of being, and that's where I find my music. So it's a kind of unstable place and it's very free. You have to be extremely free and just letting go. A lot of letting go, a lot of letting go of things so you could find new music. So I think that state of being is where I live. Not an easy place to be, but it's where the music comes from. So I just continue.
Leah Roseman:
Wow. Thanks so much for telling your story and for your beautiful music, Margaret. It's really inspiring.
Margaret Maria:
Oh, thank you so much for sharing it and having me be able to explain it and share it here. I'm very grateful for that. Thank you so much.
Leah Roseman:
I hope you enjoyed this episode. There's such a fascinating variety to life and music and this series features wonderful musicians worldwide with in-depth conversations and great music. With over a hundred episodes to explore, many episodes feature guests playing music spontaneously as part of the episode or sharing performances and albums. I hope that the inspiration and connection found in a meaningful creative life, the challenges faced and the stories from such a diversity of artists will draw you into this weekly series with many topics that will resonate with all listeners. Please share your favorite episodes with your friends and do consider supporting this independent podcast. The link is in the description. Have a great week.
