iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Thanks to C. Neil Parsons & all his collaborators (especially outstanding lighting designer Brea Denno) for putting on such a great show this past weekend! It was a treat to get to be a part of this creative team. (& thanks also to friends who came our or tuned in to the livestream!)

Text as above, with smiling Curtis standing next to a sign for C. Neil Parsons' show "50% Nonverbal"

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

This is the album that I am digging right now and that’s helping me through a morning of (not too terrible) mental fog and weird temperature sensations after getting double-vaccine-boosted yesterday. forbesgraham.bandcamp.com/album/graham...

forbesgraham.bandcamp.com

Graham/Karlson/Wick - Right Before, by Forbes Graham

7 track album

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Was that in Chicago? This was the inaugural concert of the east coast manifestation! And in a gallery space I’d never been to. Always refreshing when something happens in Boston that breaks with what’s expected…

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Thanks to everyone involved in making it a good, consciousness-altering evening!

Concert flyer posted on the wall for a•pe•ri•od•ic east event in Brighton MA

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Gotta love how there’s three consecutive nights that I’m trying to go to concerts that are on the Green Line exactly when the Green Line is shut down. It’s a wonder that any performing arts orgs in this city are able to stay afloat at all.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Transient Canvas at THE TOP of their game last night with an all-new program... stylistically diverse but all super intense!

Amy Advocat with her bass clarinet, Matt Sharrock with their marimba, taking a bow onstage at Seully Hall in Boston

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

If we’re collectively failing to teach young men how to not be self-centered animals, then all we have left is the most harshly punitive options, which must be employed!

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

When negligent parenting and self-serving institutions fail us (and oh do they), I’m certainly grateful for student journalists at Cornell who, by publicly outing the rapists, are at least putting some fear into the countless sociopaths out there who see women as objects for their own gratification.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I also knew of very conscientious parents and teachers who did their very best (which MATTERS), and others who let it all slide. It’s a new kind of malpractice but of course it’s a problem as old as humanity. I just thought at one time that maybe we were making some incremental progress on this.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

...as I witnessed that at liberal-leaning schools there were boys whose worst tendencies were often indulged, allowed to fester unchallenged. I was aware of parents who had no idea what their boys were up to online & school policies that championed technology without putting any guardrails in place.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

But I’m willing to wager that at least some of those 7 men were raised by parents who oppose Trump. It doesn’t mean they didn’t do a crappy job of raising their boys. As a parent of a girl over the last couple of decades+ I got more and more cynical on this subject...

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

It’s surely true that the specific culture of Trump’s America is a major ingredient in this. (FFS Jonathan Ross murdered Rene Good & we haven’t even had a broad cultural conversation about what he SAID to her after he shot her. I’d guess that most Americans don’t even actually know what he said.)

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

The parents/guardians of these men, both the bystanders & perpetrators, utterly failed to meet their responsibilities. And the institutions that merely protect themselves are no better than the Catholic church at its worst.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

A lack of courage is the kindest accusation you could level at young men who knew what was happening at Cornell and did nothing. But it’s a notable ingredient. Nobody taught these men anything about courage, which means they’re little better than their peers who directly committed heinous crimes.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

There’s SOME redeeming value if a male institution has leaders who consistently espouse a model of masculinity rooted in altruism, self-discipline & courage, rather than entitlement and power. But take away the leadership, & what've you got: FRATERNITIES where courage & empathy are in short supply.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I spent long enough in all-male educational institutions that I developed an allergy-like loathing & deep distrust of such environments. Separation by gender certainly contributes to dehumanizing attitudes among men towards women (as well as reinforcing the gender binary & rigid gender tropes).

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

You can’t turn these things off, so you have to face them and deal with them. Constantly. That’s the job. And it’s often a really bad sign if your boy seems to be gravitating towards certain all-male institutions and echo chambers...

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

That’s the helicopter parenting we actually need. Too many are content to let the internet just do its thing, which will turn their boys into befuddled sociopaths, fostering their most animalistic tendencies & cultivating misogynistic attitudes that fester for lack of sustained intervention.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Of course there are exceptions: parents who are consistent & diligent & aren’t naive enough to think their boys will just learn by osmosis or that parents merely need to set a good example, & who understand that it takes relentlessness & constant monitoring of ALL influences in their boys’ lives.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

...but there’s never NOT been a need for people raising boys to be extremely vigilant. And the problem as I see it is that, on balance, they just aren’t doing their job any better than before.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

It’s clear to me now that parents & authority figures are STILL failing to teach boys to be compassionate, empathetic, or anything other than self-centered & sexually entitled. Yes, there are toxic influences online & in pop culture everywhere that parents & guardians have to work to mitigate...

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

It seemed like we were having a cultural conversation that was intensely and productively focused on fostering the right kind of change. I can’t believe I was that naive.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Boys and young men, I thought, were being brought up in a culture that was slowly learning to dispense with the practices and attitudes that had produced so many predatory men who dehumanized women in their thoughts and actions..

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Bluesky is not designed for long-form posting I know. But this just isn't something I know how to be concise about: I had a weird, misplaced optimism when I was a young man that we were gradually headed into a more enlightened age...

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

I am with you in that. As eagerly as I unsubscribe from corporate spammy things, I generally don’t unsubscribe from small arts orgs or individuals just trying to get word out about creative endeavors, even if they’ve been maybe a little careless or mildly unscrupulous in assembling email lists.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

I composed the music for a little part of this show in what was has been an extremely invigorating collaboration. (And it's free to attend!) It's at 8 PM this Saturday October 3 at Boston Conservatory's Studio T401.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Do you have an inner monologue? Is it linear, or might it be better described as a "chewing gum tornado?" Is it 50% (or more!) nonverbal?? If you're near Boston, you should come to C. Neil Parsons' extraordinary solo theater/music/dance performance this Saturday!

"50% NONVERBAL" in a cartoon text bubble, from an individual playing a trombone. "Storytelling. Performance Art. Inarticulate Nonsense."
"A (mostly) solo variety show by C. Neil Parsons"

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Winsor Music in Brookline! Very fun program…

Concert program showing a variety of works by former students of Nadia Boulanger.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

My sincerest apologies that I can’t edit the text here, but I used the wrong pronoun. That should read “their newest solo album.”

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Amazing and intimate solo performance by Wendy Eisenberg at the Somerville Armory tonight. Great intricate songs from her newest solo album rendered with the most elastic sense of expressive time, guitar pulling one way & voice another, always re-converging.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Mind blowing performance by esperanza spalding w/ trio earlier tonight.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

[NB - THERE IS NO LAMNTH CONCERT ON 9/13 AS SHOWN IN THE SAMPLE IMAGE - THERE WAS A TEMPORARY ERROR ON NEC's WEBSITE.]

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

PS - Many questions people have about this Boston New Music Calendar and how it works might be answered by the following blog post: www.curtiskhughes.com/blog/new-mus...

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Pease send ANY info you have confirmed about new music concerts you're putting on to bostonnewmusic@gmail.com, even if incomplete, as the listing can be a useful PLACEHOLDER, helping all of us wonderful new music freaks plan our lives & do a better job of building & keeping audiences for what we do!

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

This here Boston New Music Calendar has been updated with tons of events for the 2026-27 season, but it's still early enough that I hope it can be ESPECIALLY helpful to people still planning concerts, so you can see when lots of stuff is going AND when it ISN'T. newmusiccalendar.com/boston.html

A sample image of upcoming Boston New Music Calendar listings

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

Need to get me a copy. The first 2 books in the trilogy have been a great pleasure to read.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

If I wasn’t already a fan of your music (which I certainly AM), reading this would make me go check it out! Add to that, as someone whose work was also once described in an alt-weekly as “torture” I’m certainly feeling solidarity, and hoping this ultimately brings you more mirth than anything else.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

Tonight at the Lilypad it was one high-intensity & velocity set (BLINK) and one super mellow, introspective & spacious set (Kit Demos quartet). Loved them both - and loved the contrast. Both stayed literally cool due to the excellent AC in the room and the cold beer.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

I made a day trip to the Northampton area on Sunday for this truly outstanding concert, including premieres by @julwerntz.bsky.social & Kate Soper & my first live experience of Grisey’s Talea.

Concert Program showing the Etchings Festival with works by David Sanford, Michael Djupstrum, Kate Soper, Stratis Minakakis, Tobias Hume, Julia Werntz, Gerard Grisey

Performers Stratis Minakakis, Jihye Chang, Jordan Harrell, Robert Bui, Aleksis Martin, Lily Xie acknowledging the audience applause from the stage

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

… and another work by Milton Avery, plus a Marsden Hartley and a portrait of Hartley by Helen Stein.

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

Some highlights from the Avery, Gottlieb & Rothko show at the Cape Ann Museum…

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Curtis @curtiscomposer.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Here’s the setup for a performance I attended a couple of nights ago… Can you tell what band is about to take the stage just from seeing the stage set-up?

Small concert stage including 2 drum sets in front, facing one-another, a vibraphone, guitars & synths and other miscellany around the circumference.

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