Daring to Dream Big – Pros and Cons (1)

Today's post was inspired by a family trip to Walt Disney World last summer, a place where the word "dreams" is a kind of idée fixe. Here are some examples associated with Disney:

• The Disney Dreamers Academy ("We help unlock the potential in young people and enable them to imagine their futures anew through inspirational leaders who show how to set goals, make plans and dream big.");
• A Dreams Come True parade, which in a previous iteration was called…
• Walt Disney's Parade of Dreams, whose eight floats included Getaway to Dreams, Dream of Enchantment, Dream of Laughter, Dream of Another World, Dream of Imagination, Dream of Adventure, and Dreams Come True;
• The Dream Along With Mickey show;
• One Man's Dream (a pavilion celebrating the life of Walt Disney);
• Many promotions, such as the Year of a Million Dreams (Oct 2006 to end of 2008; an unusually-long year!), which included Disney Dreams Giveaways (my boys and I were randomly given Mickey skullcaps with plastic ears one day);
• Many commercials that use the word "dream;" and
• The Disney Dream (cruise ship).

Disney marketers and imagineers clearly believe that many of us are attracted by the idea of following our dreams, but what are the risks and rewards of doing so, and, in particular, of daring to dream "big" dreams?

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There is much encouragement to fearlessly follow our dreams in songs, movies, biographies, interviews, etc. — wildly successful people are often said to have done so — but what about people whose life experiences have been more like those of Wile E. Coyote (see below; a lifetime of frustration, aided largely by his unshakable-but-consistently-misplaced faith in faulty products from the Acme Co. catalog, followed by the cancellation of his show) or Charlie Brown (who, according to Wikipedia's rather harsh description, "fails in almost everything he does"), than those of Walt Disney or Bill Gates? Don't big dreams lead to big disappointments?

An ill-conceived plan; this will not end well. 

For Wile E. Coyote, they never do.

For Charlie Brown, life can sometimes feel like an endless series of disappointments.

Well, for me the answer is obvious: Big dreams can lead to big disappointments, but that doesn't mean we should not have them.

To be clear, by “dreams,” I mean aspirations or goals, as opposed to the reveries we all have during REM state while sleeping, most of which we are unlikely to remember. And by "big" dreams, I mean lofty aspirations, such as wanting to become ridiculously rich, wanting to be the King of Iceland (bad news: Iceland's monarchy ended in 1944, but who knows, maybe they'll bring it back for you!), or wanting to become a ridiculously-rich great composer AND the King of Iceland, and be recognized as such by your subjects, the good people of Iceland.

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Walt Disney supposedly said, all our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them, and if you can dream it, you can do it.

(These quotes are frequently attributed to Disney on the Internet, as well as in How to Be Like Walt; Capturing the Magic Every Day of Your Life (2004) by Pat Williams. However, I have yet to find when, where, and in what context these statements were made, making me wonder if he actually said them, or if an awful lot of Disneyphiles wish he had said them.)

As mentioned above, daring to follow your dreams is promoted as a core belief at Disney theme parks and in many Disney movies. This advice is summed up nicely in the following song, by Leigh Harline and Ned Washington, from Walt Disney's 1940 adaptation of Pinocchio.

When you wish upon a star
Makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires
Will come to you

If your heart is in your dream
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a star
As dreamers do

Fate is kind
She brings to those who love
The sweet fulfillment of
Their secret longing

Like a bolt out of the blue
Fate steps in and sees you through
When you wish upon a star
Your dreams come true

Of course, it's not just the Walt Disney Corporation that promotes this belief/marketing strategy; many others have expressed similar sentiments:

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.
• Eleanor Roosevelt

Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.
• Harriet Tubman 

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavours to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
• Henry David Thoreau

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But before we all quit our day-jobs and head off to Hollywood (or Iceland), it may be prudent to ask ourselves whether it is wise to dream big. Here are some quotes that may give you pause:

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.
• Oscar Wilde 

A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams.
•John Barrymore

He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot.
• Douglas Adams

Dreams will get you nowhere, a good kick in the pants will take you a long way.
• Baltasar Gracian

Take everything easy and quit dreaming and brooding and you will be well guarded from a thousand evils.
• Amy Lowell

When younger writers and poets, musicians and painters are weakened by a stemming of funds, they come to me saddened, not as full of dreams and excitement and ideas. I am then weakened and diminished, and made less rich.
• Maya Angelou

It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.
• J. K. Rowling

The last four quotes above (highlighted) are particularly sobering; they articulate the dilemma with which we all must wrestle:

While it is probably true that many or even most great things could not have been achieved without big dreams, it is also true that most dreams do not come to fruition, and indeed, the loftier the dream, the lower the likelihood of its coming to pass, and the greater the potential disappointment.

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There have been at least ten different songs — as well as a television series, a film, a painting, and a book — with the title, "Boulevard of Broken Dreams."

Broken dreams — dashed hopes — is cleary a concept that resonates for many people, just as the more hopeful Disney quotations above also resonate for many, presumably because we all have had aspirations of varying magnitudes during the course of our lives, but we have all experienced deep disappointments along the way as well; we have all felt both optimism and dismay at different times.

We must all learn to navigate between chasing lofty dreams and pragmatism, but my advice for all composers is to go ahead and dream as big as you wish, because you are unlikely to find much success without first dreaming of it.

However, greatness in composition does not result from luck, like winning a lottery; it is the product of years of hard work (a relentless work ethic), critical thinking, welcoming brutally-honest feedback from others,  thinking outside and inside boxes, belief in yourself, a positive attitude in the face of rejections, a measure of pragmatism, constant striving to improve, self promotion, the ability to cultivate good interpersonal relationships, and many other factors, some of which I have discussed in previous posts. Luck can certainly play a part as well, especially in terms of one's success as a composer — composers are sometimes "championed" by music directors and conductors, for example — but even in cases like these, you have to be good to be lucky, as the sports saying goes.

So, go ahead and dream big, but be prepared to put in a lot of hard work along the way. Be pragmatic at least some of the time, because we cannot survive, let alone entertain lofty aspirations, without the provision of our basic needs, such as food, shelter, clothing, and Belgian dark chocolate, but be aware that too much pragmatism can be a dream-killer; a highly-pragmatic person might decide to abandon their dreams in favour of more "realistic"or achievable goals, and, while there is nothing inherently wrong with that, I wonder how many people would ever achieve their dreams if we all felt this way.

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It may be comforting to know that many people who did not achieve their "Plan A" dream were successful in achieving their Plan B (or C, or D, or …) dream; failure in one area can lead to success in a different one. Or, to put it another way, most people who achieved success in one area were unsuccessful in others along the way.

If Plan A did not work out, you are one plan closer to the one that will work out, provided that you keep setting goals and working towards reaching them.

When I was a boy, I wanted to be a writer. That was Plan A. While I didn't exactly fail at that – I am writing these very words right now (! and these!!!), and I have written many other things as well, some of which have been published – at some point, I decided I would rather become a guitarist and songwriter in a wildly successful rock band, kind of like George Harrison in The Beatles. This became Plan B, and it seemed like a pretty good gig, with excellent salary and benefits.

After spending most of my teen years playing guitar for 6+ hours every day (no exaggeration; I played from the moment I woke up to the point I had to go to school, then after school 'till bedtime, with occasional interruptions to eat, do homework, and sports), it began to dawn on me that Plan B was unlikely to come to fruition, for several reasons , one of which being that I was not Paul McCartney's friend (George and Paul became friends as teenagers). Nor did I know any Paul McCartney-types, meaning fantastic musicians who could play anything, were seemingly indefatigable and constantly in good spirits, workaholics, and on a path towards becoming, arguably, the most successful song-writer in the history of popular music. Paul made things happen. I knew no one like that.

Other roadblocks in achieving Plan B were that I was also not as good a guitarist as George, and I lacked the alpha personality to form a band, ruthlessly fire people who did not work out, get gigs for the band, or go through all of the other stressful experiences involved in the formation of a successful rock band.

So, what to do instead? Well, I didn't really have a Plan C, so I went to university and got a BA degree in Humanities. I finished a few weeks after my 20th birthday, and promptly got a job as a telephone information operator at Grey Coach Bus Lines, in Toronto.

Not bad at all, eh? Living the dream!

Indeed. But despite the giddiness that came from having a regular salary, I decided that I REALLY wanted to make some kind of music dream happen, but maybe I should learn a little more about music first; I thought it might be useful to learn how harmony worked.

A friend suggested I take a class in music rudiments at the Royal Conservatory of Music (RCM) in Toronto, So I did – every Saturday morning, along with a bunch of kids who seemed to be around 12-16. Thus, at the age of 20, I began learning about key signatures, how to subdivide different meters, and how to spell different chords. What the heck am I doing, and why am I doing it, I wondered, frequently. This is not helping further my dream of becoming a rock musician.

I was learning nothing about how harmony works, or song-writing for that matter, so, when I finished the rudiments course, I decided to take a harmony course. And then I decided to take more history and theory courses after that.

This is an example of "falling down the rabbit hole," because, what with one thing leading to another, in no time at all (well, 15 years, but that's not long, geologically speaking) I ended up with a doctorate in classical music composition.

However, since I like to feel that I am not, strictly speaking, a geological formation, 15 years actually felt like a very long time indeed.

Quick digression: On the question of whether we are or are, or are not, geological formations, John Donne wrote a famous poem called, No Man is an Island (Meditation XVII – Devotions upon Emergent Occasions). Paul Simon wrote a song in which the protagonist unsuccessfully argues the opposing viewpoint: I am a Rock, I am an Island.

Getting a doctorate was not Plan C, however; at least not initially.

No, Plan C was becoming a jazz guitarist, because, while working at Grey Coach, I had begun to stay out 'till all hours of the night listening to jazz musicians, and I decided that playing such music in poorly-attended clubs on a nightly basis was the life for me.

So I studied jazz guitar for a while, while continuing to work at various jobs and study at the Conservatory, but – and I don't exactly remember how this happened – somewhere along the way, I started to become inordinately excited about renaissance counterpoint, contemporary music composition, and all manner of musical studies.

This – becoming a skilled composer – became Plan D.

Initially, my lofty aspiration within Plan D was to finish all the RCM harmony, counterpoint, and history exams. This was Plan D, part 1. It took about 2.5 years, but when I accomplished this, I decided to pursue studies leading to an ARCT in Composition (Plan D, part 2). This involved writing 12 three-hour exams in a variety of musical styles, such as renaissance counterpoint, baroque harmony and counterpoint, 19th-century harmony, contemporary techniques, history (all periods), and analysis. It took me 4.5 years to complete all exams. So, that's a total of 7 years of music studies so far, for those keeping score.

My next lofty aspiration (plan D, part 3) was to do a master's degree in composition at U of T. This was seemingly impossible, since I did not have a BMus degree, and U of T was famous for telling prospective applicants to go away and perish if there was anything irregular about their background.

After an interview that was perhaps the most humiliating experience of my life, U of T very grudgingly allowed me to take a year of 4th-year courses with no degree standing. The understanding was that if I did well enough, my 4th-year music results, plus my ARCT in composition and my BA degree, might make me admissible to their master's degree.

I apparently did well enough in my one year as a 4th-year Faculty of Music student – some of the courses, such as renaissance counterpoint, were easier than the level of exams I had taken at the RCM, but that was fine by me – because I was admitted into their master's programme in composition the next year. I finished it within 9 months.

I had, at that point, completed 9 years of music studies, which of course only began after I had already graduated from university.

Plan D, part 3, was about as lofty as my dreams got at that point in my life. I never gave much thought to what I would do if and when I ever got a master's degree in composition. I thought perhaps I could become a private music teacher, and make a living that way, while continuing to compose music, and hopefully win a prize or two some day.

But then the Faculty of Music's graduate secretary called me one day and asked if I was planning to apply to the doctoral programme, and I thought, okay, why not? And so I did, and that – getting a doctorate in music composition – became Plan D, part 4.

Plan D – all 4 parts – took 15 years to complete from my first rudiments class to the completion of my doctorate degree. During this time, I worked as a sales clerk at The Bay, a department store in Toronto, most of the time. I also sold stereo equipment briefly. And, around the time I turned 30, I was hired by the RCM to teach composition, theory and history, so, while I wasn't making much money, I was able to get by. I also got married, and we had a lovely daughter along the way, who became the greatest and most meaningful joy of my life.

The trouble with Plan D, aside from the length of time it took to complete it, was that it was almost impossible to make a living as a composer of contemporary classical music in Canada, no matter how skilled you might become. People who make a living from composition usually work in other fields, such as television, cinema, advertising, and video games, not in contemporary classical music. The only exception I was aware of at the time was R. Murray Schafer.

While there are many 'art-music' composers in Canada, almost all of them do not make their living from their compositions. Most do other work, such as teaching, among many other options, or they are supported by a partner or their family.

When I realized this, I decided to pursue a new plan – Plan E – which was to become a composition and theory professor. I did not appreciate what an absurdly-improbable aspiration this was at the time; there may have been only about 6-7 full-time, tenure-track university jobs in composition that became available over the past 26 years in Canada.

And somehow, through a lot of work, perseverance, many ups and downs, and an inordinate quantity of luck, Plan E worked out, for which I thank my lucky stars every day. The collateral damage was that my wife and I separated, and then divorced along the way, and I only got to see my daughter for a few weeks every year, although we spoke on the phone for many hours every week. All of this was extremely painful, as you might expect.

Eventually (about 7 years after I started working as a professor in Newfoundland), fortune smiled upon me again, because I became friends with, and eventually married, another professor, and we have been blessed to have two more children, plus many cats, and a hound. My daughter and I have remained close through her entire life (she is almost 28), but I never stopped missing her.

So, it took a ridiculous amount of time and many revisions of plans, but it all worked out in the end, at least so far.

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I would guess that variations of this story – many plans, over many years, with many ups and downs along the way – are pretty common for many people in different walks of life.

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Here's a chart that I had fun with (when I wasn't getting frustrated over the challenges of formatting it in HTML); the statements on the "pro" side (left column) are arguments in favour of pursuing one's dream, with counter-arguments represented on the right column. To be clear, neither side necessarily represents views that I hold; this is just a thought experiment, looking at the pros and cons of following one's dreams.

Which statements do you agree with?

Some Pros and Cons of Dreaming Big Dreams
• Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm (Ralph Waldo Emerson) • Nothing great was ever achieved without first dreaming of it (me, paraphrasing Emerson) • Dare to live the life you have dreamed for yourself. Go forward and make your dreams come true (Emerson)	• The greater our enthusiasm, the greater the pain we feel when something does not work out • The greater the dream, the less likely it is to come true. Dream of small  achievements, like finding a good parking spot, and you won't be too disappointed when they don't work out. • You are unlikely to make your dreams come true unless you dream of small things, like finding a good parking spot, or beating the boss level in a video game.
• When you have a dream, and follow that dream, you will gain from the experience, no matter the outcome (me) • Pain, disappointment, and frustration are all experiences from which we can learn (me) • That which does not kill us makes us stronger (Neitzsche)	• Yeah, you'll gain pain, that's the only guaranteed outcome of following a dream! • Sure, you can learn from these things; it doesn't mean you have to go looking for them, however. Why not choose a safer path that is more likely to produce a positive result? • Neitzsche alienated many during his life, and became become "effectively unemployable… Subsequent feelings of revenge and resentment embittered him," (Wikipedia: Nietzsche) and he eventually went mad. This would seem to call into question his statement in the left column.
• All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them (Disney)	• This is self-evidently ridiculous, but in case you feel otherwise, here is why: Even if your dreams have no imagination whatsoever, like aspiring to find a good parking spot when you go shopping, there will be times when your dreams do not come true. You may have to park a long way from your favourite mall entrance during the Christmas rush. The store may be sold out of the item you really want. Your favourite restaurant may take your favourite dish off the menu. And if your dreams are loftier than this, there is a greater probability that at least some (and probably most) will not come true. • Did Disney even say this, or is this something that the Disney Corporation wants you to believe while visiting their theme parks, presumably so that you will spend lots of money making sure your kids' dreams are not dashed?
• We are all resilient, to varying degrees. Yes, following a dream can lead to profound disappointment, and even leave us feeling crushed; however, we have it in us to bounce back and try again, possibly a little wiser from experiencing the setback • Not only are we resilient, we are adaptable; if, after working at it for some time, we conclude that our dream is unattainable, we can re-think our dream and come up with another one. Frequently "dream B" (or dream "C," "D," "E," etc.) succeeds in a way that exceeds our wildest hopes for "dream A"	• Some people are more resilient than others. We all have a pain limit… If chasing a dream fails repeatedly, and the pain of it all becomes too much to bear, perhaps we should stop chasing that dream • Well, if you conclude that "dream A" will not work out, or if you conclude that to continue pursuing it is resulting in more pain and frustration than you can bear, do you really want to open yourself up to more of the same by chasing "dream B," "C," and "D?"
• There is no path in life that is devoid of pain, frustration, and disappointment. Yes, following your dream can (and likely will) lead to negative experiences, but to think you can avoid them completely by following another path is foolish. So, if these are a given in life, why not experience them pursuing your dream, instead of following a "safer" path that you don't really want to be on?	• Some paths have a significantly-lower probability of success than others. If my dream is to become a huge Broadway star — the next Idina Menzel — and I find myself reduced to doing poorly-paying sporadic dinner-theatre shows to bored audiences in suburbia twenty years from now, I don't think I would be very happy. There is a time to admit when your plans are not likely to lead to a positive outcome, and come up with more realistic plans
The decision of when to follow your dream, versus when to modify your expectations and pursue something else, comes down to "risk tolerance;" how much are you willing to risk, and for how long, in order to achieve your dream? It's a dilemma with which most people wrestle, and there's no, "one size fits all" solution for everyone. I've known people who kept chasing their dreams until they turned 35 or even 40, at which point they experienced a mid-life crisis because they were poor, and didn't have a back-up plan; how do you train for a different profession AND subsequently get hired when you're 40? (Ans.: It's possible; I've known people who did this, but it's not easy).  How do you start a family if you are poor throughout your twenties and thirties? (Ans.: This too is possible – I know people who did this – but, once again, it is not easy, because raising children well can be a fairly-expensive proposition (clothes, baby paraphernalia (car seats, strollers, toys), food, an instrument if they want to do music, music or dance lessons, band trips, etc.)).  My concluding thought is that, while I think it   something with which most people struggle, and it is a decision we must all work out for ourselves.
• I actually agree with many of the points on either side of the above, "pros and cons" chart. I think it's good to have a dream, and to overcome any fears that may be preventing you from pursuing your dream.  • I also think it's wise to check-in with reality periodically (acknowledging that different people have different realities), and to consider other options if option A is not working.     • I have met successful business people who told me that they too had dreamt of becoming musicians, but they ultimately decided to go to business school when it became apparent that their dream was not likely to pan out. The people I met didn't seem to regret their decision at all, presumably because they found tremendous success in another area of life, and I think this is fairly common.         But part of my motivation in holding onto my dream of becoming a composer was the worry that, if I didn't go after my dream, I would regret it later in life. I don't know if I actually would have regretted it or not, of course — in retrospect, I think I might have been content in other pursuits as well — but I didn't want to become a bitter old man, regretting things he didn't do in life, so I stuck with my goal, despite frequent doubts as to the wisdom/practicality of this goal, and some significant, soul-crushing setbacks along the way. Luckily, things worked out, at least so far…

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When your reach exceeds your grasp

Have you ever heard it said that someone's reach exceeded their grasp?  It is a metaphor referring to a desire for something that is, currently at least, unattainable.  You reach for something, but are unable to grasp it.

I have heard this said in a disparaging way, as if it is foolish to aspire to goals beyond one's current limitations, or, put another way, as if one should not aspire to rise above one's station in life.  According to an article in The Telegraph (U.K.; 2004), Britain's Prince Charles apparently claimed that "the modern education system went against natural selection and wrongly encouraged people to think they could rise 'above their station.'"

Maintaining the status quo is a pretty sweet deal for those who sit comfortably atop the class hierarchy, but it's not a particularly good deal for everyone else.  It also goes against democratic or meritocratic ideals that many societies (including Britain's) espouse, so, no offence to the prince, but I would suggest that aspiring to rise above one's current station in life is natural, and should be encouraged.

Another Englishman, the poet and playwright Robert Browning (1812-1889) perhaps felt similarly when he wrote, "a man's reach should exceed his grasp” (line 97, Andrea del Sarto; 1855) in a remarkably long-winded dramatic monologue about a Florentine renaissance artist whose technique was said to be flawless, but who, according to Vasari,  "lacked ambition and that divine fire of inspiration which animated the works of his more famous contemporaries, like Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael." (Wikipedia)

Self-portrait of Andrea del Sarto (1486-1530) 

His grasp apparently exceeded his reach; this may be why you have not heard of him.

David, by Michelangelo (1475-1564)

Sculptor, painter, architect, poet, and engineer; 

Michelangelo's reach and grasp were huge. Like David's hands.

So, to summarize, Andrea del Sarto was a gifted painter with flawless technique, at least according to Vasari (and to be fair, not everyone agrees with his assessment), but history has not accorded him the exalted status of his renaissance contemporaries such as Michelangelo, perhaps because del Sarto lacked the desire to grasp the unattainable, whereas Michelangelo, like all great artists, had this desire in spades, as well as the technique to make it attainable.

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Which brings us to composition.

If you have spent years learning to sing or play an instrument, you probably have a pretty good sense of what great music sounds like.  You may also have an opinion of what bad music sounds like; the ability to make these kinds of judgement calls is something we all have, and it is called discernment.  Not everyone agrees with our opinions regarding the relative merits of different artistic creations, but the point is that we make these judgements frequently.

One of the potential frustrations for university-age composition students is that, at the beginning of our composition studies, there is often a significant gap between the quality of the music we perform and study, and the quality of the music we write.  This is to be expected, of course — the music we perform and study is often written by some of the greatest composers that ever lived, whereas music students are often relative novices and just learning the craft of composition — but it can be frustrating nonetheless.

I will call this the Skill-Taste Disparity.  We have developed a sense of artistic taste that allows us to recognize great music when we encounter it, but our compositional skills are not yet sufficiently developed to allow us to create great music.

One solution would be to lower your expectations; if you don't expect to write high-quality music, then you probably won't be disappointed if your compositions are mediocre!

However, I don't suggest you do that…

Instead, I will reference Ralph Waldo Emerson — "Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm" — and suggest that you approach all your compositional work with enthusiasm and intelligence, but understand that it takes time and dedication to eliminate any disparity that may exist between your musical taste and compositional skills.

Lowering your expectations may reduce your frustration levels, but I suggest that reaching beyond your current grasp is essential in order to become an excellent composer, and I encourage any aspiring composer to do this with enthusiasm!

Sure, there is a cost to this — I have done many things in life with tremendous enthusiasm, only to be figuratively have the wind taken out of my sails (or, to use a more visceral metaphor, to be kicked in the head by a mule with remarkably-powerful hind quarters) on numerous painful and doubt-ridden occasions (before the premiere: "This is going to be GREAT!!!" After the premiere: "OUCH! That SUCKED!!! Why did I ever think I could be a competent composer?) — but I don't know how to approach it any differently.

And I truly believe that if you stick with it, you will write very good, perhaps even great, music.

Bob Ross, Empowering the Masses, and Fear of Failure

I recently watched a PBS documentary on Bob Ross (no relation), who gained fame as the creator and host of The Joy of Painting, a television program that ran for 12 years on PBS stations in the United States.  On the show, Ross would teach viewers how to create an oil painting from start to finish in just half an hour by following seemingly easy, step-by-step instructions. The blank canvas with which he started would be gradually transformed into an impressive landscape painting by the end, rather like a cooking show that starts with a few ingredients and a stove and ends with a gourmet dish or meal.

According to the documentary, Bob Ross felt that one of his missions in life was to convince ordinary people that they could paint pictures skillfully, even if they had no background in art. He wanted to help people who considered themselves to be untalented and/or lacking in artistic skills to discover that they too could create art by following his (apparently) simple steps.

That is a powerful and beautiful message!

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Mystery, Complexity, and Drudgery

It seems to me that composers and other creative artists often make the creative process sound far more mysterious or complicated than it really is.  The reality, at least from my perspective, is that developing into an accomplished and mature artist takes years of drudgery.

People who wish to become concert pianists or violinists understand that the process involves years of practicing scales, studies, and progressively more challenging compositions, as well as constantly trying to improve their sound, listening to other artists, studying music theory, history, and ear-training, all the while receiving frequent feedback from teachers and others.  Becoming a skilled composer is no different; you do all these things, plus spend thousands of hours composing music, until you reach a point where you kind of feel like you know what you are doing, although I admit that I never totally know what I'm doing.

When you reach this point, others might tell you, gee, I wish I had that kind of talent, when what they should be saying is, gee, I wish I had spent ten thousand hours developing my skills as a composer!

[Here's a link to another blog I wrote on this topic, in case it interests you: Talent? Skill? What's the difference?]

It can seem as though composers (and other artists) sometimes play up the mysteriousness or complexity of the creative process by offering explanations that are shrouded in mystery, or  seemingly designed to obfuscate. Here are silly examples of both:

Shrouded in Mystery:  This composition came to me fully-formed in a dream, and all I did was write it down when I woke up!

Designed to Obfuscate:  The prime form of [0 2 3] is, as even the simplest child knows, [0 1 3].  This aptly illustrates that, on a Babbittion plane, "major" and "minor" (I herewith mimic dormant terminology with both prudence and shocking insight) trichords are indistinguishable from one another, at least aurally (visually, the difference is notoriously striking!). I manipulated both of these sets employing a cunning derivation of neo-Riemannian theory that I authored while researching North-Indian proto-tablational reductions of integer-centric, sub-sonic impulses in the steppes of central Asia on prestigious Fulbright, Guggenheim, and Getty Grants, employing retrogrades, inversions, graduate students, and, of course, post-modernist regression, with the following results: [0130230203010333333333327(!)7], and so on (I refrain from revealing too many of my secrets here in the interests of protecting my intellectual property; all too often in the past others have marauded my ideas and created works that generated untold millions for their music. I speak here of Michael Jackson, Madonna, and Justin Bieber, among others). It was thus that I genetically engineered my latest chef-d'œuvre, "Mary Had a Little Lamb."  It is contradistinctive from "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," Baa Baa Black Sheep," and "A B C D" in non-trivial ways that defy explanation (I refer readers capable of understanding über-high-level theoretical constructs to Edward Cone's seminal publication, "Beyond Analysis," which MUST be followed immediately by a close reading of David Lewin's "Beyond the Beyond," although it is unlikely that people who love music will be capable of understanding either article or this erudite explanation for that matter).

I made up both examples above, but if the second amused you, I highly recommend a visit to The Contemporary Classical Composer's Bullshit Generator, a clever Perl Script by composer Dominic Irving, that, as its name suggests, generates reams of random rubbish masquerading as composer's program notes.

But I digress… Bob Ross empowered ordinary people to create art by demystifying the process of artistic creation, and explaining his process in a way that made ordinary people feel that they too could paint. This was a noble and tremendous accomplishment.

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But can anyone compose music?

I believe the answer to this is yes, at least for anyone that is physically capable of doing so. GarageBand, an Apple software application for Mac OS X and iOS, allows users with no musical background to to create music or podcasts.  You don't need much musical knowledge to use music sequencing and notation software either; all you need is a computer, the knowledge of how to use these programs, and the ability to distinguish the musical bits you like from those you don't.  Naturally, as with painting, the more you do it, the more your skills improve.

This is great news for people who love music but did not have instruction in musical instruments as they grew up.  It's also great news for people who did have musical instruction in an instrument, but not in composition. A lot of classical musicians are trained with little or no instruction in composition, but, should they (or anyone else) ever wish to try their hand at composing, there are ways to do this in privacy, in a risk-free environment.

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Fear of Failure

A recurring theme of Bob Ross's television shows, according to the documentary, was don't fear failure, and this seems good advice for anything else in life as well, but particularly so for music.

Fear of failure can hold us back from achieving our goals. Some awareness of the potential pitfalls associated with any endeavour seems wise — we all know what can happen if you cross a road without looking — but what can go wrong if you compose music?

This calls for a list!

Things that could go wrong if you write music:

1. It might not be good.
2. It might cause a riot when it is premiered.
3. The audience might boo lustily, or shout, "For SHAME!" during the premiere.
4. It might result in your becoming the biggest laughing stock in the history of the human race.
5. It might get bad reviews.
6. The musicians might tell you that the music is unplayable.  
7. The musicians might not play the right notes. Or they might play the right notes, but at the wrong times. Or they might totally disregard dynamics, articulations, and slurs.
8. The musicians, accustomed as they are to playing music by dead people, might resent having to perform music of some upstart composer with the unmitigated gall of being alive.  
9. The musicians might say, "You didn't really want that F sharp in bar 41, did you?" Or worse.
10. Your parents/friends/pets might not like it.
11. You may be branded a formalist, and be called before the Union of Soviet Composers to explain yourself.
12. You might get hit by a bus on the way to the premiere.

Yes; all of the unfortunate events in the above list could happen to composers, but some are not very likely (numbers 2, 3, 4, 5 [because concerts don't get reviewed much these days, and many reviews don't express particularly strong approval or disapproval], 11, and 12), and others are just things you deal with as they arise.

Perhaps the most likely of the above possibilities is the first: It might not be as good as you'd like it to be, at least in the early stages of your development as a composer.

But so what?  If our composition isn't as good as we would wish it to be, then we try again, and keep trying again until we can eventually write music we feel good about.  Sure, the premiere of  Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring caused a riot, but (a) music premieres generally don't, and (b) if your premiere causes a riot, count your blessings (while taking cover), because, as the old show business saying goes, there's no such thing as bad publicity.

All great composers have had bad reviews, been harshly received by members of the public and/or their family, and many have been told been told their music is unplayable; they went on to achieve greatness in spite of this. If technical issues in your music are causing problems for performers, look closely at them to see if there is a compromise that serves your goals as the composer and makes the music more "user-friendly" for the performers. It's all "stuff" that you can deal with, and, to quote a book I have never read, "Don't sweat the small stuff."

It can sting when your music does not turn out as you had hoped, but, generally, if you work at developing your craft for long enough, you will write music you can feel proud of, and that is the only factor within your control. If you believe in your music, others are likely to believe in it as well.

Compare the things in the above list that actually have some likelihood of going wrong to the things that can go wrong for air traffic controllers, surgeons, or police officers; if they make mistakes, people can die. If we make mistakes, we feel disappointed or even frustrated, but no one dies.  

"Failure" is all relative. If a composer goofs and writes notes that are out of range for a particular instrument, we fix it, and, in the great scheme of things, nothing particularly bad has happened. If a composer tries some crazy new thing that does not end up working very well, the composer may feel unhappy or even embarrassed at the premiere, but there's an good chance that someone will come up to the composer afterwards and say something like, "Dude, that was my favourite part of the whole piece! I really loved that section!"

A composer can (and, I believe must) take chances and try new things, and if they don't work out satisfactorily, we either attempt a fix (go back and keep trying things until we arrive at a solution that satisfies us), or chalk it up to experience and move on to the next piece somewhat wiser, assuming we have understood why it didn't work.

Fear of failure can be paralyzing for an artist; I believe, having experienced it, that it is the primary cause of "writer's block." Try to embrace the risks inherent in writing every new composition, with the knowledge that:

1. Risks are an essential part of the process;
2. If risks "fail" — if something you try does not succeed — the consequences are usually minimal;
3. There is a solution for every compositional problem;
4. The more you solve compositional problems, the more you learn;
5. The solutions to compositional problems can end up being among the strongest sections of a composition; and
6. There is a saying that you learn more from failure than you do from success.   I don't know how true this is — I think there is much to be learned from both, frankly, and here's a link to a Scientific American article that challenges this saying — but I do believe that challenges (a nicer word than "failures," don't you think?) provide opportunities to both (i) learn and grow as artists, and (ii) improve our compositions, so, looking at it this way, they are not to be feared, but embraced!

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And so, to summarize a ridiculously long blog post…

I am not suggesting we embrace failure, despite any appearance to the contrary in my last point above! ;)  I am suggesting that fear of failure can hold a person back from accomplishing goals, and every composition brings challenges that, if negotiated skillfully, can result in some very fine music!

To return to the point of the first section of this blog, the creative process is sometimes described in mysterious language or perplexing techno-babble/jargon, and this can serve as a kind of barrier between practitioners (e.g., composers, artists) and those interested in developing skills as composers and artists (e.g., students, amateurs).  Like the old joke about how to get to Carnegie Hall (answer: Practice), becoming a good composer is not very mysterious at all: You just practice, a lot, try to get lots of feedback along the way, and aim to make every piece as good as you can make it at that time. And yes, anyone can be an artist!

On the perception of progress

How do you measure progress when composing?  I sometimes set durational goals for myself, like thirty seconds of new music every day. The value of this approach is that it can provide an incentive to create some quantity of new music every day, even if it sometimes feels like you're "churning it out."

But wait!  Is "churning out" some quantity of new music every day a desirable goal?

Let's consider some arguments for and against this approach:

Pro

1. Writing music every day (or at least most days), is, like practicing your instrument or singing daily, extremely helpful (probably essential) in becoming a skilled composer.  Giving yourself daily duration goals can help motivate you to achieve this.


2.   Working on your current project daily also keeps it fresh in your mind.  You will likely find that your piece stays in your thoughts when you are not actively engaged in composing.  One value of this is that it allows your subconscious to be involved in your creative process; you may be reading, exercising, or falling asleep, and suddenly get a good idea for your composition because your subconscious is keeping your piece on the "back burner," as it were.  Having your music fresh in your thoughts every day when you sit down to compose also makes the process more efficient; if you are too long away from a project, you may find yourself struggling to remember where you were going with particular musical ideas, or wondering why you wrote what you did. Writing a composition sporadically is possible, but not much fun.


3.   There is value in being able to compose quickly.  Surprisingly (to me, at least), it doesn't necessarily result in lower-quality writing.  I think we sometimes get too obsessive about small details in our compositions, at the expense of the big picture; this can be fixed by working at a steady (and fairly brisk!) pace. As a general rule, I think it is much more valuable to try to "churn out" music for a period, and then, perhaps when you get stuck, you can go back and work on some finer details such as links, general improvements, and score details. This isn't quite the same as saying, "don't sweat the small stuff," because details are very important in a composition.  Instead, I am suggesting that there is a time to concern yourself with details, and there is a time to concern yourself with the big picture; if you spend too much time on the former, the latter may suffer, and vice-versa.


4.   If you make a habit of challenging yourself to write music every day, you will find it easier to do so; it can help ease the existential pain that sometimes accompanies composition (see my previous blog entry for more on this topic).  You are also likely to find that you are writing music with which you are satisfied, for the reasons given above.


5.   If you go on to a career as a composer, there will almost certainly be times when you have to compose quickly in order to meet a deadline.  If you write music for film, television, or commercials, writing good music quickly is a basic requirement; an inability to deliver quality work on time will quickly close the door on future opportunities.  The only way to develop this proficiency this is to spend years challenging yourself to "churn it out" on a regular basis.

Con

1.   A daily duration goal can be useful, but it can also be counterproductive if (a) you are meeting your goals but writing music with which you are not satisfied, or (b) you are satisfied with the quality of your music, but not meeting your daily durational goal. Both can be discouraging. The most important objective is to be satisfied with the quality of your music, irrespective of how much you compose every day.


2.   A daily duration goal is not always practical; some sections of a composition require more work than others.  I often find the beginning of a work very slow-going, but once some progress has been made and I am happy with it, things often proceed somewhat more quickly, albeit with slower progress when new challenges arise (which is often).  A particularly thick or complex texture can also slow you down, as can contrapuntal textures, fast tempi, and avoidance of repetition in your music.


3.   Other aspects of the composition process are as important as writing new sections.  At the top of the list, perhaps, is revision of earlier sections.  Each new day brings fresh perspective to one's music; what seemed like a brilliant idea the night before might seem pretty weak the next day, and if this is the case, revisions are necessary.  For what it's worth, my own approach is to generally start my composition sessions by revising earlier sections, followed by working on new material.  For me, everything is subject to revision until the piece is done, which means I might still be tweaking aspects of the first few pages as I work on the final pages.  


4.   Likewise, an essential aspect of the composition process is editing your music, which includes adding dynamics, articulations, written instructions, slurs, bowings, etc., and this too takes time, if it is to be done intelligently. In general, I recommend editing your music as you go, more or less, but the way I actually do it is that I compose new music until I get stuck, or feel that a section is relatively complete, at which point I go back and edit/revise/improve earlier music.  I have discovered that sometimes the reason I feel stuck is that aspects of previously-composed music are not sitting well with me, and it can be hard to progress until I fix them.

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→ It is important to feel you are making regular progress on your compositions, and one way of doing this is to set achievable goals for yourself every day. These goals can be durational, but they can also relate to other aspects of the composition process as well, such as revisions and editing; you could aim to put in dynamics, phrasing slurs, articulations, bowings, etc., for x many pages or bars, for example.

→ Similarly, your daily or weekly goals can include other tasks that are important for a composer, such as applying for grants, copying (and editing) parts, inviting people to an upcoming concert where your music will be played (using social media and other methods, such as E-mail), making and distributing posters for that concert, and communicating with your performers to ensure that (a) they are prepared to perform your music, (b) they don't have any questions or concerns regarding what you have written thus far, and (c) they know that you welcome their input.

→ Goals are useful when they help motivate you to achieve something, but counterproductive when they make you feel you have failed if you did not achieve them.  Set modest, achievable goals, and then see how they work out. If they are easily achieved, then slightly increase the difficulty, and vice-versa if they are not. Be flexible; modify short-term goals if necessary in order to better reach a long-term goal. We are all capable of achieving wonderful things, and setting a series of smaller goals can help us get there.