November 23, 2004
2 a.m.
Began filling in my sketch of Mt. III today. I am about half way through, & new themes & motives & counter subjects are running around in my head & on the ms pages. Sometimes composing is more like a jigsaw puzzle than architecture ...
I faced big gaps on the ms paper, the sketch had only main themes & motives - & often a third of the page or more was entirely empty, a few note stems here & there, scattered around like headless chickens or andirons, only rhythms pencilled in. (Andirons because I looked up to think of an image & there they were by the coal stove.)
I had to choose between keeping up the intensity & volume of Mt. II - or shocking the audience with a sudden, quiet start to Mt. III. After a weekend to think, I decided on the quiet beginning. This was brave (& perhaps foolhardy) considering there was a yellow post-it note on the score which said: “keep up the intensity, do not let up” with a rhythm scribbled on it.
I also had to abandon my initial conception for the third movement in another way because my feelings of profound grief have inserted themselves into my writing in spite of my intentions. As a result, the sections I had completed before the tragedy are lighter & more whimsical - & the newer sections are more intense. The dance (Mt. III) was meant to intensify to the end in any case, but now there are antiphonal moods throughout the beginning pages that were not in my original plan. This actually adds more tension and interest and, as always, I trust the timing & events of Life in these matters. As I thought about this unexpected contrast in moods, the first image that came to mind was the image of earth vs Heaven, human suffering vs the joy & beauty of the higher realms - in any case the listeners, on a deep level of their beings, will each respond & understand in their own way. Music, being thankfully wordless, can reach the deepest recesses of our beings, like light shining through a prism. Each listener will bring their own soul to it, & the various & changing sounds & combinations of melodies & motives & structures & form will permeate & light each soul in its own unique way. When we listen to music, we are surrounded by something larger, more infinite than our personalities, and it somehow reminds us that we are more than just the sum of our personal history here on earth. I had that feeling when I first saw the Alps, on that small train platform in Grindelwald, the mountains towering above & around me. The same laws that arrange the atoms & geometries of the Alps also arrange the geometries & patterns that are Music.
When I was in college, I cried when my orchestration professor drew the spacings, the spacial arrangement of chords & inversions that Mozart most frequently used, on the blackboard. It would be difficult to put my reaction into words, but the simplicity & clarity & humility of those fragile chalk lines seemed to express a mystery of the universe, a truth we cannot ordinarily see. Perhaps it was a glimpse into Mozart’s soul.
Now, in the midst of writing music, I am again struck by the differences between being an interpreter, a pianist - & a composer. As a pianist, whatever mood I am experiencing when I sit down at the piano soon dissolves into the music I am practicing or performing. And the moods of a piece of music change quickly, sometimes every few measures or even every few notes. So one is brought out of the personal very quickly & immersed in the composer’s thoughts & life & vision.
As a composer, this is not the case. Even if a piece is brought to us composers by the angels themselves, we are the filter, the vehicle. And therefore our soul & our struggles are somehow indelibly imprinted on the score. As an interpreter, every facet of our being & thought & life is brought to our playing - but we still must work within the framework given to us, that we must not change. The notes are fixed on the score, & they trace the journey as clearly & intricately as the most detailed map in my atlas sitting nearby, on the upright piano. As a composer, the map is being drawn as we proceed, inwardly & outwardly, onto the page.
Saturday, November 27
1 a.m. Went to the ballet studio with Sarah today, to watch (her sister) Cindy rehearse the Sugar Plum & Cavalier. I will try to do more composing tonight. The many gaps in my sketch are slowly being filled in as ideas surface - so many ideas, eventually I must choose. What I am working on now is basically the inner & bass voices. Sometimes I cannot inwardly hear them, I more feel them. Sometimes I hear a rhythm, but no pitches really. More often, I hear too many voices, too many lines, & for this piece I only have five voices to work with - unless I score in many double stops. This would not be a good idea, the musicians are not familiar with these new instruments ... So now it is a task of paring down what I am inwardly hearing. More than once I have regretted not writing this piece for Bob’s new octet of instruments, as he requested ...
Still - there is something so very beautiful about a string quintet. Now to find that beauty & express it through the score ...
Bob e-mailed me again today. He has found five players finally, & he wrote that now he can sleep again at night. These new instruments are a different size and range than the usual stringed instruments. What we would ordinarily call the viola is held like a cello. The strings are pitched differently as well, & some are in a different clef, so all the fingerings change - basically the players are transposing. When I rehearsed Elegy with Bob’s last group of players, the soprano violinist said that she was “playing by number”, she had written all the fingerings in to all the scores. They played Elegie very beautifully, I was very pleased.
Bob is looking for a hall downtown that we can use, checking the acoustics & fees. This concert is scheduled for mid-February. I haven’t finished writing the piece, Bob hasn’t even finished printing up movement one, & the players haven’t received any of the score. If our concert deadline isn’t met I will lose my grant & won’t be able to pay the musicians.
After writing that last sentence, I think I will make myself a nice cup of decaf coffee & continue composing.
Sunday, November 28
Windgarth, 2:30 p.m. We are here at the lake. Raining when I awoke, but now the sun is out, a beautiful day. Fairly warm. Shoveled seaweed into the gardens. M. went to a performance of Nutcracker, at the northern tip of the lake, so I am here by myself. I am sitting on Larry & Cindy’s dock, Larry is away for the weekend. A few dark clouds surrounded by blue, the mountains calm in the distance. Some wind, many little ripples in the water which seems to be moving north rather hurriedly - as M. was on her way to the Nutcracker. I have felt Cindy’s presence all afternoon. Brought the quintet score with me & will do some work on it while I am here, on the old upright downstairs. If I look left from my seat at the piano I can see the lake ...
Deb hasn’t taken the canoe in yet. The roses are still blooming.
Last night, as I fell asleep, I heard many inner voices to the quintet’s final pages. I was too tired to write them down, but they are still here today.
Came inside & lit the downstairs stove. An old note from Kay on the piano: “the dishes are in the basement, on the washer-dryer.” I might as well plunge in & write some music.
Monday November 29, 2004
3 a.m. Hardly wrote a note today. Sarah & Chris are here from Asheville, staying next door for a week or so. Sarah at the front door, shining as usual, wearing her flat grey velvet hat with the crushed flowers to one side. I loaned them a can opener, which I now realize they have not returned. So much for getting the pickle jar open.
An e-mail from Bob Spear. He is almost finished typing the first movement of the quintet into his computer program. In my opinion, his job is harder than mine - although I suppose it is easier than carving violins, violas and cellos into being. Bob is now urging me to write the piece for St. Michael for his octet of new stringed instruments - his instruments are undoubtedly among the finest new instruments in the world. Rostropovitch has one of his cellos ...
Diana e-mailed from Dallas - she has not had time to lay out the new books. She says she will get to it in a few weeks. Myra wrote to remind me to find a new publisher. I dutifully scribbled it down on a small piece of torn paper I found near the computer. Must check Sergey’s orphanage webpage for translation errors.
Tuesday, November 30
Ithaca, 1 a.m. Sarah & Chris stopped by briefly today. Sarah was wearing a soft, light pink dress with sparkles - & a fluffy pink & grey winter scarf that went well with both her hat & dress. Chris said: “She’s beautiful isn’t she. She looks like an angel” & I had to agree. He smiled & observed her with pleasure & added that he has been asking that angels surround her: “I’m asking for a pink ray & a purple one - & a gold one as well. Especially the gold one, don’t you think?” & he turned to me to see if I thought that a good idea. And then with a mild flurry they left to do some errands. They leave for Asheville tomorrow & I will miss them terribly.
Except for a brief outing with JF & Adam, I spent the rest of the day composing. Now that I have both developed & learned the musical vocabulary of Movement III - & it is a vocabulary - the inner voices are falling into place quite nicely, effortlessly. It’s a bit of a shame - finally we learn a new language, & then the piece is finished & we never speak or hear it again. Except in concerts or recordings.
Of course, that isn’t entirely true. Other pieces I will write in the future will reflect the harmonies & intervals developed in this quintet - like a patois with old friends around the fireside - but I will never again explore these sounds in the same way or depth. So now my mind is finally bursting with ideas & intervals, expanding infinitely outwards from the last movement I have been writing - & I, like my dear friend Chris, will need in the future to put them through a violet or gold or pink ray, so that they hang in the air & in my mind in a different way & with different themes & bass lines & forms.
The sketch is entirely filled in now, & quite a mess to look at in some places. Tomorrow I hope to begin copying it out into score form. Bob is still way behind me in his awful task of entering all these little notes into his computer. Undoubtedly, I will have finished writing most of the new Prayer to St. Michael before he has finished printing up this quintet.
I am done with composing for the day. Maybe I will take a walk to the falls or meditate. The night is young & silent, & I do not wish to clutter my mind until this score is copied out.
A Composer’s Journal Entries November 23 - November 30, 2004
Moderator: figaro