(no subject)
Olivier Messiaen ROcks my WOrld!!!
(and so do YOU)
so i've been wanting to compose lately, which is a new thing. or at least, new for lately, in that i haven't actually had a strong desire to compose in over 5 months. it's usually a terrifically frustrating process, since i still have a hard time latching on to my floaty ideas and music snippets, which seem so brilliant in my head, and actually getting them out on paper or a computer screen and not subsequently saying "well, that's not really exactly what i meant" and feeling like i KIlled it. not that i have a hard time taking dictation or understanding theory or notation, but i'm such a fucking PERFECTionist sometimes that the actual process of composing starts to closely resemble the process of drawing blood. it's like i have secret access to this beautiful pure creative energy, which is divine and ethereal and unfettered, and i want to share it, but when i try to pluck these fruity little ideas and bring them down to the physical plane, something happens in the process which makes them mortal, gives these ideas a certain death. only through transmitting them to others in some pure expressive way redeems or relieves them from their mortality. ok, maybe i'm being too deep, but that's how it feels.
but anyway. listening to messiaen inspires me; i love his orchestration and his timbral and motivic ideas. i want to steal that style and then mold it to a higher form and more modern conception, developing the motives more and giving the overall shape momentum. maybe no one knows what i'm talking about here, but oh well. something cool. go listen to some 20th century french opera.
i had the same physical and emotional reaction listening to joel's piece as listening to some of messiaen's vocal music, except more so because it was a live performance, and also perhaps because i was personally invested in it. i had witnessed its conception and development and was finally hearing it somewhere other than in my head or on midi; it was also particularly exciting because it was being recognized, respected, and performed by professional musicians, not to mention the winning of the thingy. w00t! i liked Alex's astute observation that the award money was fuel to keep composing. fuel meaning burritos.
so i'm feeling tangental and a little wired, but i'm going to stop rambling about music and go listen to some before sleepy. in other news, i think i've conducted Tosca in a past life.
that is all.
(and so do YOU)
so i've been wanting to compose lately, which is a new thing. or at least, new for lately, in that i haven't actually had a strong desire to compose in over 5 months. it's usually a terrifically frustrating process, since i still have a hard time latching on to my floaty ideas and music snippets, which seem so brilliant in my head, and actually getting them out on paper or a computer screen and not subsequently saying "well, that's not really exactly what i meant" and feeling like i KIlled it. not that i have a hard time taking dictation or understanding theory or notation, but i'm such a fucking PERFECTionist sometimes that the actual process of composing starts to closely resemble the process of drawing blood. it's like i have secret access to this beautiful pure creative energy, which is divine and ethereal and unfettered, and i want to share it, but when i try to pluck these fruity little ideas and bring them down to the physical plane, something happens in the process which makes them mortal, gives these ideas a certain death. only through transmitting them to others in some pure expressive way redeems or relieves them from their mortality. ok, maybe i'm being too deep, but that's how it feels.
but anyway. listening to messiaen inspires me; i love his orchestration and his timbral and motivic ideas. i want to steal that style and then mold it to a higher form and more modern conception, developing the motives more and giving the overall shape momentum. maybe no one knows what i'm talking about here, but oh well. something cool. go listen to some 20th century french opera.
i had the same physical and emotional reaction listening to joel's piece as listening to some of messiaen's vocal music, except more so because it was a live performance, and also perhaps because i was personally invested in it. i had witnessed its conception and development and was finally hearing it somewhere other than in my head or on midi; it was also particularly exciting because it was being recognized, respected, and performed by professional musicians, not to mention the winning of the thingy. w00t! i liked Alex's astute observation that the award money was fuel to keep composing. fuel meaning burritos.
so i'm feeling tangental and a little wired, but i'm going to stop rambling about music and go listen to some before sleepy. in other news, i think i've conducted Tosca in a past life.
that is all.