What Makes Us Not Like a Piece?

What I remember when I first encountered the music of Brown, Cage, and Wolff, among others. Something about that experience triggered something inside of me that made me feel extremely uneasy about the music of these composers. Perhaps, I had spent so much of my life writing music with a certain attention, a type of music that had a different intention startled me. Since then, I've tried to think about music differently. Rather than liking or disliking a piece, I started trying to listen to music in a manner that answered the question, "What can I take from this piece?"

I had my focus group with our Composer-In-Residence today. There were four of us composers in there with a wide variety of backgrounds and experiences. All of these pieces had things to appreciate. Also, all of these pieces had needed improvements. Some of us may choose to incorporate those criticisms into revisions. I usually don't revise past editions of my compositions. That being said, there were some criticisms that I heard today that echo previous criticisms of other pieces. Those things, I will change.

One of the things that moderately amused me was how our work in lessons plays out over the long term. I used to be too square in my compositions. I started tying across the bar line a LOT in order to be less square. Needless to say, bar lines are good because they are things to arrive at and depart from.

The question used to entitle this blog is a valid one. I don't think I have the answers. Do we have to like a piece? I don't think so. Sometimes, however, I think that we aim our dislike of a piece at the person who composed it, sometimes unintentionally. Everyone has the right to try composition. Not everyone is going to be good at it. Sometimes, it is okay to tell someone that composition might not be their thing. I think it is important to understand that everyone comes into something at their own time and place. That is part of the human experience. I think that when we deny another person their first small steps we forget our own. I mean, isn't that what learning is all about?

I think that we musicians often forget that, well, we are all human beings. Over the course of the week, some composers might not get to have a piece performed on one of the concerts. There's a certain amount of frustration that is totally normal. It's important to realize that there are only a few hours on each concert and only ten days of the festival. A few of us have shared scores at this festival, and well, let's just say this...I haven't seen a horrendous score.

As a composer, when something doesn't win a contest or doesn't get programmed on a concert, well, that's life. That should be a great opportunity to say, "Let's revise." Or even more so, if you feel the piece is good, tell yourself, "There is this contest coming up that I think that this piece might be a good fit for."

Maybe, the act of composing, and ultimately the act of music making, is one of revision. Something can always change in order to make a better composition or performance. We can ultimately draw parallels to what we're working on and adopt a livelihood for revision, learning from something that we might not ultimately like or consider.