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For This Horizon Pilot, Music is Always in the Air
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1/7/2009 9:30 a.m.
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Pianists play different notes with each hand, combining them all into a single melody. Horizon Air pilot Rody Ortega has approached his life in the same way, flying aircraft with one hand and composing music with the other (figuratively speaking, of course).
Ortega is regularly asked to compose music and serve as sound designer for musicals and other theatrical productions in Portland. In fact, his work has earned him seven Drammy Awards – the local equivalent of Broadway's Tony Awards.
Most recently, Ortega composed all of the music and lyrics for the Northwest Children's Theater's (NWCT) production of "Hansel and Gretel," which played in October.
"When I was in college studying music, I started taking private flying lessons, but it was mostly as a hobby," he says. "I saw flying as a fallback career."
After earning a bachelor's degree in music from the University of Arizona and a master's degree in music from Manhattan School of Music, Ortega toured the world as a classical concert pianist. But the urge to fly the skies never went away, and he finally gave in. In July 2000, after attaining the rest of his pilot ratings, he joined Horizon as a first officer on the F-28.
Ortega says flying and composing bring balance to his life.
"The two things are polar opposites," he says. "The flying world – at least as a commercial pilot – is very standardized and regimented. The last thing you want is somebody you're flying with to be creative and do things his own way. In the world of art, you're encouraged to express yourself and do things nobody has done before."
That said, the two careers complement each other.
"You can compose anywhere you like," Ortega says. "I do a lot of my composing while I'm on overnights."
In addition, the regimented schedule of a pilot allows Ortega to carve out time to work with theater companies, according to Melody Bridges, development director at NWCT.
"Rody is one of those rare artists with exemplary time management skills," she says. "It makes him very reliable and dependable, and it's probably what makes him a great pilot."
Ortega has worked with a number of other theater companies in Portland, including Artists Repertory Theatre (where he serves as composer in residence), Oregon Children's Theatre, Profile Theatre Company and Miracle Theatre.
He says his work in composition came about "almost accidentally" in 1996, when a friend at Miracle Theatre encouraged him to compose music for an upcoming production.
"I gave it a shot, but I warned him that the results might not be great," he says. "It turned out that the reviewers liked it, and then a couple of other theater companies asked me about composing and arranging music for their productions. This was really nothing I had ever considered until I did the first one."
Luckily, Ortega's time in New York City had helped familiarize him with musical theater.
"I initially kind of looked down at the genre, but I was always a fan of opera and Wagner, the first truly great musical theater composer," he says. "My appreciation for musical theater grew from that, and when I was in New York, I started sneaking down to Broadway to see some shows when I wasn't practicing. Some of my favorite musicals are by Leonard Bernstein, like that wonderful little one called ‘West Side Story.'"
In fact, Ortega considers Bernstein a mentor.
"Lenny conducted and had master classes at many of the schools in New York," he says. "He was a terrific teacher. He fostered many pupils until he passed away the year I graduated with my master's."
Ortega has composed music and soundscape for a number of NWCT's productions since 2004, but "Hansel and Gretel" is the first musical that Ortega has done for the theater company.
Next, Ortega is doing the sound design for NWCT's production of "The Wizard of Oz," which will be quite different from the classic 1939 movie musical. That show opened on Dec. 13.
He's also working as the sound designer for NWCT's jazz adaptation of "Alice in Wonderland," which opens this month, and Shakespeare Santa Cruz's production of "The Wind in the Willows," which is currently running in the Bay Area.
Doing a full score can be a laborious process, particularly when juggling another career. The music and lyrics for "Hansel and Gretel" took him a year to complete.
"For each character, you develop a sort of kernel – a ‘leitmotif' – of what that character is, in musical form, kind of like the shark in ‘Jaws' or Darth Vader in ‘Star Wars,'" he says. "After you've done that, you develop songs based on that character's themes. Then, you sit down and ask yourself what you want this song to do and say, and that's when the lyrics start coming in."
Ortega doesn't consider himself a lyricist, so it wasn't always easy for him to find the right words to go with his music.
"Traditionally, lyrics and music are developed separately, and they serve as checks and balances for each other," he says. "Sometimes you're forced to do it if there aren't any lyricists available."
At the same time, Ortega likes the fact that this, like other aspects of his music career, has pushed him beyond his former boundaries.
"I went into aviation because I wanted to see things that I couldn't see from the ground," he says. "But music can take you places that even an airplane can't."
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