My Compositional Focus

One of my goals for 2014 was to start writing music. With that said, I have been writing music since I was 14, a long time ago. During high school I tried to write music, mainly duets for bassoon and oboe and the music I wrote was okay but I did not know what I was doing. The notes on the page haphazardly appeared and were not intentional.

In college I started studying all of the usual scores that young composers study and really tried to be methodical. During my freshman year I was going to be a double major in bassoon and composition but after my first semester juries my committee told me to choose either bassoon or composition, not both. Looking back I get it; I needed to focus on one aspect of music because in reality, I was not good enough to do both so I chose bassoon. This was the best choice I could have ever made. By learning how to play bassoon at a high level of proficiency I was able to play with different orchestras, small ensembles, and competed in competitions that exposed me to countless works of music. By being in ensembles I was able to experience how music was made and organized and I also had to practice my butt off to be able to do it (Classical music, for the most part, it the ultimate meritocracy).

During the rest of my undergrad I wrote some music but mainly focused on performance. When I started my masters I started writing again and by the time I started my doctorate something clicked. Compositionally I needed those six years from the time I was 18 until I started my doctorate to learn, understand, apply, and finally be able to confidently create.

In 1999, the first year of my doctorate, I completed the first work I feel I own compositionally, my Sextet for oboe, English horn, two clarinets, and two bassoons. For the most part I ripped off Schoenberg’s Verklarte Nacht with a style that is highly chromatic like many late-Romantic composers. During that time I started a variety of other works but never was able to finish anything with confidence. The next work I completed was my children’s opera, One Snowy Night in 2005 and then a Serenata for bassoon and string quartet in 2007. The Serenata is okay; the style I used was a modified 12-tone that works but is difficult to listen to (the last time I will ever write atonally). One Snowy Night is pure joy (I will talk more about this later).

This brings me to works inspired by my animals and the slow realization of my style, my Bella Suite (2009) and Mini Sonatine (2010). It might seem funny that it took me another decade to ‘find my musical’ style but sometimes art is slow. After I completed my doctorate in 2011 (the 12-year doctorate) a weight was lifted off my shoulders and I was able to refocus on composition.

After I completed my doctorate I wanted to sell out as fast as I could. What is the most common musical ensemble in this country that could get your music played and published? High school band of course! I wrote a band piece called Tucson Memories in 2012 which took a long time to write because it was aligned with the birth of my first son.

This brings me to the middle of 2014 when I had a minor epiphany. After a great conversation at a higher education conference with a fiercely smart and thoughtful colleague I realized my compositional focus was misaligned with who I was (and still am). Up to that point I had been writing music for various ensemble but was unable to get them recorded. When people would ask to hear my music I unfortunately would have to say no because I still need to find musicians to play my music. After talking about art, music, my blog, and life with my colleague I realized that I need to do the same thing for my music that I was doing with my blog; write music that I could play myself allowing me to actually put up the music for others to hear.

After that conversation I looked at what I had in my house; a few guitars, ukuleles, a mandolin, a glockenspiel, and an alto recorder and decided that will be my ensemble! Now since I am not that good at any of those instruments I started writing in a style more like One Snowy Night than my Bella Suite.

In my next article about writing music, I will discuss why I have decided to write more in the style of One Snowy Night, simple and melodic rather than in the style of Bella Suite, complex and chromatic.