![]() ![]() Let’s say the first note is the most important note, but it’s random. Without a first note, you would never write a second note. Well, maybe the most important thing, to get even more boring, is that the first note you hit can be everything. That’s maybe the most important thing of all. It has to have a rhythm feel or it’s useless. That would be something like placing those things in traffic that make you go from one lane to another. I would just sit at the piano, like a lot of young composers, and play the perfect chord, and then go to the next chord and get that perfect. ![]() If the piece doesn’t have a rhythm feel to it that stands out as being extraordinary, I can’t continue working. That’s such a serious question it’s hardly interesting. I’m a very fast person who writes very slowly. During that thinking, maybe one note gets written down on the page, but my mind is actually working fast. I could end that section just by playing that note and adding it to the theme that happens.” That’s my thinking. I’ve got to go beyond that note now, because that gives me an idea for earlier in the piece where I couldn’t figure out how to end that section. Maybe ten times a day I say, “Oh, fantastic. I hardly ever say anything that I can say, after I have said it, “Boy, I said something really wonderful.” When I’m writing music, that happens maybe ten times a day, let’s say, not even a page. That doesn’t happen in real time even when you’re talking. When I’m writing a piece, the moments of pleasure are far more frequent. It’s as though playing is like… Well, Dorothy Parker once said, “I love having written and I love having played.” That about sums it up. I don’t believe I’ve ever played for pleasure in my whole life. When you’re at home and you’re writing, is this paper writing or is it writing at the piano? Are you playing for pleasure at home, kind of as a sketch pad? It’s not as pleasurable for me to play concerts as it is for me to write the concerts. I really, at the end, feel like a failure usually, because I haven’t lived up to the standards I would be following if I was writing the music down all alone in my room. It comes time for my solo, I very rarely please myself. When I play in a solo situation, all of a sudden there’s a tune with a great opening introduction, a fantastic melody, a rhythm section that’s just churning away in a marvelous fashion. The difference between playing a live concert and sitting at home trying to come up with a great melody is about as opposite as you can go. Can you talk about that kind of editing process, or the idea of making it right? I heard a quote of yours: you write it ’til you get it right. I write music and I think musically quite slowly. I’m sort of a type A person, the one that dies of a heart attack rather than a slow disease. I get a lot done every day, and if I don’t I’m unhappy. I walk fast, and I hurry through everything except dinner. How do you see yourself fit in within that spectrum of the pace of life? How do you feel at the pace that you live? Then you can belong to one of those collection societies and fill out after the concert that you wrote this tune, that tune and the other tune and get money for it. I think now everyone wants to write his or her own music, because you make more money if you do. That was something that seemed like a service occupation to me. None of them wanted to sit at a desk and carve out an arrangement or do a orchestration of a big band. They were too busy improvising and they were used to getting immediate pleasure from what they did. ![]() I used to think that I wrote for musicians who improvised. The work of writing music, do you imagine it’s as utilitarian as being a dentist? I wish I was a dentist or something, but it didn’t work out that way. I always have been, and it’s embarrassing. How do people react if you mention musician? Is it a warmer kind of connection?Ī musician puts people at ease, and a composer makes you sound like you’re a little bit full of yourself.īeyond the world of meeting people on the street and having an anxiety of telling them you’re a composer, what do you feel most at ease doing? I just say I write music, or I say I’m a musician, because that often will let me pass as a vocalist or something. said, “What do you do for a living?” We said, “We’re composers.” The guy just burst into laughter, so I’m a little nervous about that word, particularly given what I look like. I was with my husband at the time, who is also a composer. I was trying to go over a border between Switzerland and France. The word “composer” always got laughter afterwards. I always say I’m a writer, which is confusing to people. ![]() If you were to meet somebody in the elevator, how would you introduce yourself? ![]()
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