Literally everything.

Now that I finally have the time to sit down and write, I've accumulated a number of things that I've been wanting to express during these few weeks. There are a few, so I'm just going to write a stream-of-consciousness style entry and see what happens...

First, coming into the course I didn't know what to expect. I knew that it was a mandatory course for those of us doing the new composition program. That is all I knew. I did not know who else was allowed to take the course, who else would be taking it. I thought there would have been just me and the other composition major (that I know of, I'm not entirely certain what majors everyone in my year are taking). I did not know how Dr. Ross would be structuring the course. I did not know if there would be private lessons or not. What I found out was that there was a mixture of people doing different majors in the class, and then remembered that some of us would be doing a minor in composition. I learned that we would be presenting fairly frequently and receiving feedback for our work from the full class. Is this relevant?

We would be starting off our first compositions right away, in the form of an "atonal chord progression" comprised of 12 to 16 chords. None of these chords were allowed to be easily labeled as a tonal chord. The progression was supposed to increase in tension to a point 61.8% of the way through and then decrease toward the end. At first I was reluctant to see the benefit here. After all, it was foolish to have the first composition of the year be something so unfamiliar to me. Couldn't we start off showing everyone something in our own style? Atonal music is too hard. Restricting ourselves to atonality is not going to get us anywhere. There are too many guidelines for this piece. They will all be the same. I do not want to do this.

I did it anyway, of course. Despite all my reservations, I thought that it might be good to step away from my comfort zone for a while. I would take it as it comes, spend a few hours at the piano coming up with some interesting chords so that I could say that at least I gave it a shot. What I found was that I had spent some of the most focused and productive hours of my undergrad producing something that I was very happy with. I felt motivated to start writing already but first I needed to present these chords in class.

Let's talk about my chords. I've posted a .pdf of them in a previous entry. In general, I use a higher range of the keyboard, and to circumnavigate the problem of accidentally inventing tonal chords, I wrote a lot of polychords which were one major triad juxtaposed with one in another key. You'll find Eb Major on top of E7, F# major, on top of C major, C major on top of E major, F# major on top of G major. Also there is a stack of fifths and fourths and just some chords that I just liked.

One problem was that the class unanimously decided that my chords were a disjunctive assortment of tension levels. My first few chords were all not very tense, then my climax was three unprecedented supertense chords, and then it was suddenly not tense again. Unwilling to part with my chords, I decided that these would be the premise of my three movements a collection of character pieces. I would not use the full progression in any of these movements, but instead I would use fragments of it. My assumption is that I am allowed to use other chords in the midst and that is what I have been doing, so I absolutely will.

I want to talk about the masterclass style environment of the course as well. Going into my third year of my Bachelor of Music, I am no stranger to masterclasses. I've attended a weekly one for two years where the other flutists of the school congregate and do flutey things. However, it is of my nature to come into any sort of situation where I can compare myself to others with the mindset that I am the underdog, always. In flute masterclasses, I find myself unable to come up with any feedback about a performance because I invariably fear that I will give "wrong" feedback or something unhelpful. Coming into a composition masterclass was initially no different however I quickly learned that it is exactly the environment that I will benefit from. I came to the realization that I could very well have been a "senior composer" here. My impression is that there exists a demographic of people who barely compose anything before coming into this class. I've been writing for almost as long as I've been playing. Of course, I realize that this does not at all mean that I am any better than anyone else. What it does mean, however, is that I feel much more confident in my ability to make relevant feedback an in general not feel like an idiot. This is a new experience for me. I am also extremely excited to get feedback about my music. After I perform and a group of flutists are giving my advice, I tend to find myself saying, "Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay." After I show a group of composers something I've written I find myself being exciting to hear what new ideas I might receive.I find myself genuinely willing to let someone know what I really think works in their music as well.

One final thing that I can think of: I am finished the rough draft of my first character piece. I have no more reservations about writing atonal music. This piece, though it's very short, about 90 seconds, has some very nice moments which I don't think I would ever have reached if I was writing tonally. I also have no more fears that my music will not be "atonal enough". It's a foolish thing to fear, but it's the kind of thing that happens when you leave your comfort zone, I think. What I find is that though I've never written with this type of harmonic language before, it is still very much "my style". I have come so far that I have developed my own style and I was most reluctant to abandon it. I am excited to bring this to class on Tuesday. I would talk more about it now, but everyone is going to hear it and see it very soon anyway, so I will hold back until then.

That is it. Those are all the things I needed to say. Or all of the things that I remembered to say. Who knows?
I hope the length of this entry is not a deal-breaker.

I might start the next movement now...

That didn't work. Have a file.

Okay box.net you aren't doing the job anymore.

https://www.box.com/s/xgif0075n7ukpn15feru

Post No. 1

Hello. I am Mitchell. I compose.

This is my blog where you will be reading about what happens in my brain when music is happening out of me.

Let's try and post a file.

Okay you can't post Bitmap files.

Or PDF files.

Okay let me try this complicated bit of nonsense.

<embed src="https://www.box.com/embed/hg5ydrpfthfc9k8.swf" width="466" height="400" wmode="opaque" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowFullScreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always">