I wrote this on December 22. Of last year. It’s been sitting around for 7 months because I thought it was kind of annoying, but the thought’s been nagging at me that maybe I should fix it so that it’s not so annoying, so that I can post it here. Instead of fixing it I’m just posting it. I played it in again a little faster, which made it marginally less annoying than before. But I dunno. I don’t know what it was ever supposed to be. I think I was humming the tune in the shower and then turned it into this.
It’s called Pastorale in honor of the fact that just before I finished it and set it aside, it became clear to me that my subconscious had been working out a desire to hum this very lovely little tune by Stravinsky. That probably accounts for the other Stravinsky-ish stuff I ended up putting in there. It also explains why this was originally slower. Maybe I should have left it that way.
Oh well, here it is.
And here’s a tiny excerpt from the Stravinsky Pastorale, too, so you can maybe hear what I’m getting at. Pretty, isn’t it.
Okay, about the Stravinsky: the score behind that link is actually a transposed version of the original song for voice and piano. As far as I know the transposition is unauthorized, though that sort of thing happens all the time. The original is higher. The audio clip, on the other hand, is from a much later arrangement for chamber ensemble, with no voice. And I think he made yet another arrangement of this song, for violin and piano or something. I guess he liked it too.
I believe I have photocopies of the fairly rare, true original 1907 edition of the score somewhere, from a past life where I had access to such things. I’ll make a pdf for the world at large and post it here sooner or later.
Again I marvel H.
Why does faster make it less annoying? To be honest, I think much of your music is too fast. Is that because you’re insecure about it and think that speeding it up will hide its flaws?
Sorry if that sounded overly critically — of course I only give criticism because it sounds like you want some. Generally, I think your music is fantastic, of course!
Don’t worry, I’m not offended. In fact I pretty much agree with you. For me, it’s a lesser-of-two-evils situation. Much of my music is too fast for the same reason that this one is too fast – because of the lifeless synthetic sounds of which it’s composed. My synth could be a lot worse, but I still hate listening to extended tones on it. To my ear, the attacks are okay and then the sustains are irritatingly fake, so, consciously and subconsciously, I end up trying to limit the amount of sustained tone I have to hear from my synthesizer. This means emphasis more on percussive than lyrical instruments, and a tendency to speed things up until they’re all attack, no sustain. That can be seriously detrimental to the music, I know, but it’s just so hard for me to stomach the way the music actually sounds. I’m not really sure what the solution is. Real recordings of real instruments, I guess, but right now that’s not a possibility, especially not for anything more than a solo piano.
In live performance situations, I do tend to speed up out of insecurity – I imagine that I don’t have my audience’s full attention and can’t afford to linger on things they never cared about, and everything ends up sounding desperate, which it is – which is why I don’t like to perform! – but when it comes to recording things like this I want to believe I’m not succumbing to that kind of process. Of course, in the process of writing and then recording one of these things, I start to get bored of it and that might have a bad effect too. It gets very difficult for me to keep a sense of how to present something when I’m past presenting it to myself and I can’t really conjure up the idea of an audience member who cares about every little detail.
In the collected edition of Medtner’s piano works, there’s a footnote from the composer at one point saying something to the effect of “There’s really supposed to be a repeat sign here, but I removed it prior to publication in a fit of cowardice.” My italics. My whole thing, in fact, because I’m just going from memory. Anyway, it takes guts to make demands on the time of imaginary people. I think if I thought I had pretty sounds to offer, I’d make those demands. But if anyone were to say, “I can’t listen to this tinny stuff,” I’d have to sympathize. So I end up paring it down to just the notes. Sort of like with reading aloud: if some great actor with a beautiful voice is reading, better to take the time to savor each sentence. For a bad reader with an ugly voice, better to go fast; the reader is just a means of transmission and once we’ve received the words from him, we should use our imaginations to create a better, savor-able reading. The same goes for these pieces I post. “This is how they go – please apply your own production values because I can’t.”
I know that’s not a good attitude but as you can tell, for the time being I feel like I’m stuck with it. Do you think I should approach this all differently?
I’m so sorry I didn’t see this response to my comment earlier — it was only the latest Broomlet entry that brought my attention to it. I’m also sorry (for myself) I don’t have better Internet access (stupid former-USSR!) — I can’t fully give my proper opinion right now, though I want to! But, briefly, I would just say, don’t worry about the crappy electronic sound of the recordings. It’s not the same as, as you suggest, a book reading. I can get the book myself, and put whatever voice I want on it. Your music, which I’m hearing for the first (and possibly only) time, is in its sole presentation. I’m Internet savvy enough (and I think most people who read “blogs” are as well) to replace the tinny, electronic sounds with a beautiful orchestra in my head. But it isn’t obvious to me that I should change the tempo that I’m hearing. I just assume that it’s what I’m supposed to hear, since you do have total control over tempo in this e-simulated world.
As for live performances, I’m saddened to hear that you even feel a need to speed up even then. That’s something that really bothers me, as a classical music fan and frequent listener to modern music. And, of course, even accomplished conductors do it. I’m about ready to throw my current copy of Mozart’s Requiem in the trash, ’cause it’s so darn fast! For people who really appreciate the music, it makes it feel like the conductor doesn’t, and that he just wants to “get through” what he’s doing. And that’s no fun for me as a listener. I want to actually listen, and think that the performers also think it’s worth listening to. And yeah, we stupid listeners need some time to absorb what we’re hearing. When it’s something we like, we revel in that. The slow pace actually makes us feel like our appreciation is justified, because someone else acknowledges that it’s worth listening to, rather than just “getting through it.”