Symphony No. 1 – Page 2 – An Echo That's Reversing

Symphony No. 1 – The cautious walk to the end

I began the final section, the first movement, on 17 Dec 2020.

Symphony No. 1 – From finish to start

Finishing up the last movement in the next day or so and knowing that the first movement is the final music that will be written is… confusing. Songs for the rock operas were always dramatically out-of-order, and endings could come before beginnings, but having done it before doesn’t diminish the creative uncertainty. The order of music-to-paper dictates which themes will become themes and so the first melodies written will seed the subsequent sections. My compositions are always dramatically structured–and built off of a general blueprint of sonic techniques–but the musically thematic ground gets laid when the first notes get written.

And yet writing the first movement last means that I can hint at what I know is to come. It can’t be a camp, musical overture type of collage, rather a reverse echo of the future.

Symphony No. 1 – Finished the interlude, started the 4th movement

I’m worried I have strayed from the tonality of last year’s studies (which is what I’ve wanted to do) but have made it all process and not art (which is what I didn’t). The 2nd movement was very deep into process much like what I’d read of Ferneyhough’s technique in Lemma (or any serialists really) and I’ve continued a bit with that approach with the 4th. Is it too much? I am very happy with the mood so far though.

The two pages of the 4th movement’s sketched score, three weeks in

Symphony No. 1 – Before everything changes

The 2nd movement (I am now), interlude (“Everything was forever until it was no more”), and 3rd movement (an occupying army) are done.

I have this fear that when everything changes on Tuesday I’ll no longer be able to look at this work, the work that’s left, in the same light. No matter the outcome.

I finished the interlude and it feels very good that there’s a stopping point. I don’t know what our state of mind will be on Wednesday. Being in mid-music would be at the very least fragmenting.

I can’t say that the oncoming anguish helps or hurts or strips any possibility of creative expression because of a fight-or-flight panic.

Musical observations feel less-than-important right now. Here they are from the last few days:

Symphony No. 1 – Reassessments and confessions

I was cleaning up the 2nd movement and, more and more, it started feeling alien to me. It was another me, another person, that wrote it and I no longer had any ownership or control. With distance you leave the work and become the listener. In some phrases I knew, for example, a trombone would add to the depth or rolled cymbals would provide that “radio static” sound, but I was really only giving editorial notes after-the-fact. Even if it wasn’t perfect or complete, I had to leave it.

Side observation: From the start of these notes I had been afraid that documentation would soil the creative process (the social media affect: you become the performative you instead of the intentional you). So far, I don’t feel that’s the case. The fear of exhibitionism would come from posting each movement as it’s complete but not from documenting the battlefield of creating each.