Composing Today
5 February 2007
It’s hard to really get down a sense of what was accomplished today. I took the ending off and then proceeded to work out the second ritornello – moving, crushing, repeating, doing all sorts of things to try to recapture the spirit of the opening, I’m not sure I really got there, and not sure in fact, that it is necessary to do so, perhaps the spirit is really all there is and it can be degraded somewhat, in some ways the final ritornello is a degraded version of the opening. I worked also on that pesky viola section working and building around it so that it can provide a suitable return for the ritornello. I think it works, it involves some noodling in the piano in the very highest registers and then some material derived from that noodling in the bottom of the bass and bassoon combined with the cello chopping away in its own manner. The cello really seems to have a life of its own in this piece, being apart even when it is supposed to be part of a group, I’m sometimes like that, so no reason the cello shouldn’t be. The brass then enters in and a bunch of contrapuntal lines that ascend up to the whistles of the piccolo and the reentry of the ensemble. The overall effect is of a rather tight harmonic labyrinth that leads into the ritornello, but I don’t know how planned it was. I’m coming to trust that sometimes I should just go with my instincts, even if I’m not entirely sure of what they are trying to tell me – there is nothing that can be lost by doing so, if it sounds terrible I can always delete it and try again. I do however, need to be a bit more careful with some of the canonic utilities which can sometimes really mess with the rhythmic treatment of the piece. Usually, I accept this randomness in order that it may open my mind to something new, but sometimes it makes a mistake that isn’t so good and that I don’t catch until its too late. Nonetheless, I’m accepting all this in the process of composing. No matter how much we plan, things will happen and I have to accept them and work with them. The process of composing is a part of the composition and this dialectic of freedom and order and freedom within order and freedom straining against order is very much a part of the piece.
It’s hard to really get down a sense of what was accomplished today. I took the ending off and then proceeded to work out the second ritornello – moving, crushing, repeating, doing all sorts of things to try to recapture the spirit of the opening, I’m not sure I really got there, and not sure in fact, that it is necessary to do so, perhaps the spirit is really all there is and it can be degraded somewhat, in some ways the final ritornello is a degraded version of the opening. I worked also on that pesky viola section working and building around it so that it can provide a suitable return for the ritornello. I think it works, it involves some noodling in the piano in the very highest registers and then some material derived from that noodling in the bottom of the bass and bassoon combined with the cello chopping away in its own manner. The cello really seems to have a life of its own in this piece, being apart even when it is supposed to be part of a group, I’m sometimes like that, so no reason the cello shouldn’t be. The brass then enters in and a bunch of contrapuntal lines that ascend up to the whistles of the piccolo and the reentry of the ensemble. The overall effect is of a rather tight harmonic labyrinth that leads into the ritornello, but I don’t know how planned it was. I’m coming to trust that sometimes I should just go with my instincts, even if I’m not entirely sure of what they are trying to tell me – there is nothing that can be lost by doing so, if it sounds terrible I can always delete it and try again. I do however, need to be a bit more careful with some of the canonic utilities which can sometimes really mess with the rhythmic treatment of the piece. Usually, I accept this randomness in order that it may open my mind to something new, but sometimes it makes a mistake that isn’t so good and that I don’t catch until its too late. Nonetheless, I’m accepting all this in the process of composing. No matter how much we plan, things will happen and I have to accept them and work with them. The process of composing is a part of the composition and this dialectic of freedom and order and freedom within order and freedom straining against order is very much a part of the piece.
Labels: composing
posted by Todd Tarantino at
8:53 PM
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