Erika Oba - Part 4

For Good Measure, by Ensemble for These Times (E4TT)
Episode 50: Erika Oba (part 4)

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In this week’s episode, we talk to Erika Oba about writing for the Del Sol String Quartet via the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music and the future she envisions for Bay Area musicians. If you enjoyed today’s conversation and want to know more about Erika Oba, check her out here: erikaoba.com. Parts of this episode originally premiered on May 2022, found on Youtube, click here.

This podcast is made possible in part by a grant from the California Arts Council and generous donors, like you. Want to support For Good Measure and E4TT? Make a tax-deductible donation or sign up for our newsletter, and subscribe to the podcast!

Intro music: “Trifolium” by Gabriela Ortiz, performed by E4TT (Ilana Blumberg, violin; Abigail Monroe, cello; Margaret Halbig, piano),  as part of “Below the Surface: Music by Women Composers,” January 29, 2022
Outro music: “Lake Turkana” by Marcus Norris, performed by E4TT (Margaret Halbig, piano), as part of “Alchemy,” October 15, 2021

Transcription courtesy of Otter.ai.

Producer, Host, and E4TT co-founder: Nanette McGuinness
Audio Engineer: Stephanie M. Neumann
Podcast Cover Art: Brennan Stokes
Interns: Roziht Edwards and Merve Tokar

Don't miss Ensemble for These Times' upcoming concert 'Mujeres Ahora' on May 9 at the Community Music Center, presented as part of the San Francisco International Arts Festival. For more information, go to www.E4TT.org.

Chapters

• 0:45 What was your experience like composing and working with the Del Sol String Quartet during your time at GLFCAM (Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music) in 2018? What were some pearls of wisdom you gained?
• 3:28 As a Bay Area artist, how has the musical landscape changed from when you grew up here? Is there anything you would like to see more or less of?
• 6:31 What does the future of music look like to you, either for yourself or in general?
• 8:25 When you weren’t with people who supported you, how did you get the courage to break free and move on?

Transcript

Nanette McGuinness: 0:16

[INTRO MUSIC] Welcome to For Good Measure, an interview series celebrating diverse composers and other creative artists sponsored by grant from the California Arts Council. I'm Nanette McGuinness, artistic executive director of Ensemble For These Times. In this week's episode, we continue our conversation with Erika Oba, who we spoke to in May 2022 [INTRO MUSIC ENDS]. What was your experience like composing and working with the Del Sol String Quartet during your time at GLFCAM, the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music in 2018. What were some pearls of wisdom you gained?

Erika Oba: 1:00

I feel like I learned so much from getting to work with Del Sol. So my, my residency with GLFCAM back in 2018 was the first time I'd ever really properly written for strings. And certainly my first time trying to write a string quartet. So that was very, very new territory, territory for me. And that was a, I think that was about maybe around the turning point when I was starting to write works for ensembles that I was not in. So that that alone was like a pretty big like adjustment for me. And then just physically writing for strings was such an unfamiliar territory. So I feel like Del Sol was very patient with me, I you know, there was a lot that I was trying to figure out just like, well, what, what physically is possible, what can you do? Like, what are these instruments sounds like, together. So we had, like, a reading session before the, you know, final deadlines. And then throughout the process, they gave me feedback that was just so generous and kind and also very helpful. So I felt, you know, significantly more competent about string writing by the end of that piece. And then they actually commissioned me to write a second piece for them in 2020. for their joy project, and this was an initiative that they started up pretty much right after the pandemic hit like pretty early on before, a lot of other people were like, you know, full steam ahead doing new things. And they did it. They what they did was they commissioned a bunch of short new string quartets from a huge array of composers so that they could perform these concerts out outdoors. And the idea was that, you know, was 2020, it was a very difficult time. So they decided to call it the joy project and commissioned new work centered on joy. And so that second string quartet, I felt just generally more confident going into having, you know, had one string quartet under my belt. So I feel like I had a much easier time writing that piece. And I've been super, super happy with how they've played it. I've gotten to see them perform it live a number of times, and yeah, I'm super grateful that Del Sol Quartet for Yeah, they're really wonderful, amazing musicians, and also really wonderful, amazing people.

Nanette McGuinness: 3:29

As a Bay Area artist, how has the musical landscape changed from when you grew up here? Is there anything you'd like to see more or less of?

Erika Oba: 3:38

I mean, I think it's probably constantly changing. And yeah, like, like you said, I did grow up here. So I imagined that the musical landscapes changed quite a bit since I was a child. And I've heard from older music colleagues and mentors, how things have changed. I mean, it does sound like maybe back in the 80s, and 90s, it might have been a little bit easier to make a living as a working musician. I do think that like, even just since I've moved back here after college, it does seem to be that, like, Yeah, I think like artistic opportunities seem to be definitely more expansive than they were even when I moved back here, like in 2009. And that's been exciting to see. And I feel like I've definitely benefited from you know, just how much is going on here. That's very exciting. And I've gotten to do a couple like local residencies that were, you know, in support of like emerging artists, that really did make a huge difference in my career, just in terms of, you know, the types of work that I'm able to do and the people that I was able to network with, and also just like bolstering my skill sets. So yeah, and that way, it seems like a it seems like both a great moment. And then I think the housing crisis makes it really difficult for working musicians who are trying to sustain themselves through their, you know, performing careers and composing careers because as fertile as it is, you know, housing is insane to so I would say that's maybe the main like, I know a number of musicians that musicians I was playing with that I was in projects with who have left the Bay Area since the pandemic because it was just A completely unsustainable. So yeah, one thing I would like to see more of I think it's two sided right. I think on the one hand, I think just more more paid opportunities like good paying work for musicians, like guaranteed wages. I know there's organizations really working on this, I think inner music SF has done some fantastic work on this, um, jazz in the neighborhoods been doing some really great work on this for jazz musicians, just trying to get musicians like guaranteed wages. So you're not always playing for like a percentage of the door, which, you know, can, as we all know, can be quite unpredictable. And yeah, very hard to rely on. So I think, yeah, these organizations have been really helping, and I've benefited from them a lot, from like, you know, the gigs I've done with them tend to be the ones that, like, I'm able to, you know, pay rent. And then on the other side of that, I think we need perhaps a larger transformation outside of just the music scene, in Bay Area, and perhaps in California, addressing our housing crisis, to make it a little bit easier and affordable for people who are working to be able to live and survive.

Nanette McGuinness: 6:31

What does the future of music look like to you, either for yourself, or in general?

Erika Oba: 6:37

The future of music? I think this is such a great question. And I'm really not sure how to answer it. Because I feel like right now, month to month, I'm having a hard time predicting what the music landscape is going to look like, or what the world's gonna look like. But I guess I can see what I would like for the future of music to look like, I think I would like to see, you know, we touched on this a little bit in the last question, but just an abundance of support for lots of different artists coming from different traditions and different backgrounds like culturally, aesthetically, artistically. And for more things like you know, the inner music SF and jazz in the neighborhood, just more guaranteed support, I guess, for artists creating new work. And not just new work, but you know, for performing artists who want to perform and create the vibrant art scene that we have. And for and I think there's a great trend right now happening. We haven't talked so much about this, but just a larger diversity of voices being heard, and supported. And I think we need more of that. So not just, you know, like, diversity in any particular way. But you know, racial diversity, cultural diversity, gender diversity, like, artistic diversity. I think, on a lot of those friends, I see a lot of, like, wonderful initiatives happening. And I hope that momentum continues and that we're all able to benefit from having just like a very rich and varied artistic scene of fully supported artists who are able to create work and live their lives and thrive.

Nanette McGuinness: 8:25

When you weren't with people who supported you, how did you get the courage to break free and move on?

Erika Oba: 8:33

I think it's an ongoing process, to be honest. But I think fine. Yeah. The times that I can think of where I was really struggling, and then kind of found my way out of it was finding the people that would like listen to me and support me and like, make me feel seen and heard, and kind of trying to minimize my investment in the spaces that we're not doing that and like the mentors that were not doing that for me. And I've been very, very lucky and mentorship I feel like so lucky. There's like a, you know, like a good half dozen mentors that I've had over the course of my life who have completely changed the course of my life and like, I feel like very, very lucky to have met crucial people at crucial points in my life. One of them's Gabriela Lena Frank who runs GLFCAM, which we talked about earlier, like, I mean, I think I would have a very different life if I hadn't met her. So I'm very, very grateful to her another ones. I met Myra Melford, right after I graduated from Oberlin when I moved back to Berkeley, and she like was a huge like, just encountering her music and encountering her as a person. She was just so like generous with her time and mentorship and I feel like that also like was a little pivot for me for like the kind of music I thought I wanted to make and the direction I wanted to go.

Nanette McGuinness: 10:05

[OUTRO MUSIC] Thank you for listening to For Good Measure, and a special thank you to our guest, Dawn Norfleet for joining us today. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to our podcast by clicking on the subscribe button and support us by sharing it with your friends, posting about it on social media and leaving us a rating and a review. To learn more about E4TT Our concert season online and in the Bay Area where to make a tax deductible donation, please visit us at www.E4TT.org. This podcast is made possible in part by a grant from the California Arts Council and generous donors like you. "For Good Measure" is produced by Nanette McGuinness and Ensemble for These Times, and designed by Brennan Stokes. With special thanks to audio engineer extraordinaire Stephanie Neumann. Remember to keep supporting equity in the arts and tune in next week "for good measure." [OUTRO MUSIC ENDS]