In the film, there’s a very funny scene in which Navin Johnson, played by Martin, ecstatically proclaims “I’m somebody! Look! My name in print!” even though the “print” in question is the local phone directory.

I had that experience the other day when I discovered my name in the iTunes store, where the H2 Quartet‘s new album Times and Spaces is now available. Yes, I know. Just about anybody can put music in the iTunes store if they’re willing to jump through the right hoops. But I’m really proud of this piece and the recording, even though I had very little to do with the recording. In fact, maybe that’s what makes me so happy about it. It’s one of the few times in my brief career that I haven’t had to beg for performers or herd metaphorical cats in rehearsal. Yet there it is, my name in print.

Incidentally, the CD is also available as a digital download from Amazon, but they don’t list composers over there. Check it out from your preferred download dealer.

iTunes – Amazon

If you don’t know what a masterclass is, or if you’ve only been to performance masterclasses, composer John Adams just wrote a humorous and thoughtful essay on composition masterclasses that you should read. As a summary, I will tell you that he calls the student composer “the victim” and the process “ritual disembowelment.”

I find masterclasses to be a bit nerve-wracking in the best of situations, but this will be something else altogether. This will be a masterclass given by one of the most prominent American composers of his generation, and I imagine it will be attended by several members of the faculty from outside the composition area. Thankfully, I will be presenting a rather short (6½ min.) piece, Falling up the down escalator. Also, I happen to have a stellar, recently-released recording by the H2 Quartet.

I’m hoping to come out of the experience smarter but not in too much pain.

It is right that the historian should indicate the summits of achievement in art (the poetry, architecture, and sculpture of ancient Greece, sixteenth- and eighteenth-century music, Renaissance painting, etc.); but in a sense this is of little use to us. The claims of life are stronger than the sublimest art; and even were we to agree that we had achieved the best and most beautiful it is possible to achieve, we should be impelled in the end, thirsting as we do more for life and experience than for perfection, to cry out: ‘Give us something else; give us something new; for Heaven’s sake give us something bad, so long as we feel we are alive and active and not just passive admirers of tradition!’

-Carl Nielsen

It’s a tough question, and it’s one that I know a lot of composers deal with, though not one we often talk about. I’m a one-thing-at-a-time kind of person. That’s bad, because it means if I get side-tracked by one of these “next projects,” I put off my main project and it loses momentum. There are some people that can successfully work on two pieces at once, but I’m not among them, and I think most of the composers I know would say the same thing. This can cause some problems. One of the most frustrating is that working on large-scale projects means that you can’t take on any new projects for a long time. Right now, I’m working on my dissertation. By the time I finish it, I’ll have been working on it for at least a year and a half. The worst part is when somebody says, “Hey, we should work on a piece. I want you to write something for me.” This doesn’t happen very often, and when it does and I can’t act, it’s pretty maddening. I have to tell them to come back in a year and ask me again.

The good thing about the one-piece-at-a-time policy is the moment I get the new idea. Nothing gets me more excited about finishing the piece I’m working on than the allure of diving into a new one. (Admittedly, the diving in can be painful, but in a hurts-so-good kind of way.) I know some composers that keep a written queue of pieces they want to write. I keep a mental list. Sometimes I bump things up and down the queue. I’ve been meaning to work on a one-act chamber opera for the better part of 5 years. But when things start to stagnate, it always helps me to start thinking of that next big thing.