Forthcoming Book: Catch

The baby has a name!

My book of abstract work seems a little more real since I finally landed on a name for the project. I wanted something that spoke of the cyclical nature of destruction and rebirth, so the book is christened “Catch: 28 Abstracts Sung in a Round“.  Everyone knows that a round is a type of musical construction where the melody is sung repeatedly my several voices coming in at different times. A catch is a specific type of round constructed so that a separate message is heard in different voices that is distinct from the original meaning of the song- something like a musical acrostic (and traditionally, the message is a lewd or bawdy joke). Take from that what you will. The naming of things, not just cats, is a difficult matter. I always feel like it’s too pretentious, too cute, too obscure, too obvious, or I just say it in my head so many times that it loses it’s original shape and magic.

So it inches closer. The introduction is in it’s third draft, the epilogue is mostly harmless. Best of all, the titling for the pieces, which are snippets from poems and songs, either fall under public domain or fair use rules, which means I won’t have to go grovelling to publishers or agents to make this work. There are still a few hurdles to jump, but it’s on the way. I’m still of a mind that putting the book together may be more difficult than creating the work in the first place.