Visiting my friend of 40 years, Kazimir Machala (”Kaz”) who is now Professor of horn at the University of Illionois. I run an improvisation workshop with brass and wind players. The American students are very courteous and polite but also very forthright - open. They respond very well to the Lifemusic methods and some of them cluster round me after the session wanting to arrange another one. So that feels gratifying.The departments are called “divisions” and this is exactly what they are - the composers, musicologists, performers, jazz musicians and ethnomusicologists seem totally separated from each other, protecting their own spaces.
I meet one of my heroes, the grand old man of ethnomusicology, Bruno Nettl. Turns out he was born in Prague and we exchange a few Czech greetings. He is running a symposium - “The Canon Symposium” at the weekend. What luck!