FRINGE FESTIVAL : THE TWO FACES OF A COMPOSER

Like many members of his musical generation, Crispin Barrymore works simultaneously in two fields. The 25-year-old California composer--whose training includes formal studies at CalArts and Golden West College as well as practical experience in jazz--describes these fields as “acoustic and electronic music” and “music of the new pop age--which makes me a New Age Rocker.”

However, the price one pays for straddling what some consider to be mutually exclusive areas, the young music-maker acknowledges, is high.

“I’m thinking of using a different name when I work in the pop-rock field,” he says. “But it’s frustrating. I find that people always want to put composers into a category. I’d like to avoid that. I’d like to keep doing what I’m doing.”

It may be too late. Sunday night, in one of the final gasps of the multifaceted Fringe Festival, Barrymore will present a showcase program in Venice, a one-composer program displaying both facets of his creativity.

Scheduled at 7 p.m. in the New Salon Gallery, 1225-B W. Washington Blvd., this presentation will be divided into what Barrymore calls, “two 45-minute sets, a total of 12 or 13 pieces, all of them from the past year.”

Barrymore, assisted by two string-players and a percussionist, will perform, as singer, keyboard player or flutist, in every piece. The entire program utilizes electronics, “but never by itself, always with a live player,” says the composer

Chafing at the limitations of trying to describe the music, Barrymore says “The first set is more or less serious new music,” while the second part “is music more in the film sound-track style, using elements of jazz and fusion and rock.”

Those second-half items are mostly songs, with words written by Barrymore himself, he says. The blond musician says he has been singing almost as long as he has been composing--”since about the age of 12. My first composition was a movement for string quartet, very Mozartean.” At CalArts, where Rand Steiger was his principal composition teacher, Barrymore also studied voice and French horn. As a singer, he once performed briefly as a member of the Los Angeles Master Chorale.

All these experiences, the composer says, may come together in a productive way in the near-future. “Right now, I’m exploring a collaboration to write a pop-rock opera.”