In approximately 12 hours I have my final composition exam for my first year. I want to have a moment to reflect on how my year has been, what did I learn, what did I leave behind and what lies ahead (at least in my mind now).
This year was a year of lots of changes and lots of new experiences. It is the first time when I have had so many performances of my pieces. It has been a very enriching experience to work with performers because I learned how to express myself more clearly, which influences the way in which I approach notation. I realized that sometimes all the expression indications are redundant and that the music can speak for itself, only needing maybe an f or p to give the reference of intensity. Before, I used very 19th century-style indications like "moderato cantabile." Now I think this kind of indications are superfluous and a simple metronome mark or concise tempo indication is enough. For the acordion pieces, I wrote short pharses that dictate more the mood of the piece, but in a very abstract way. For other pieces, I just wrote metronome markings. For other pieces, none of these were used bu I recurred to other ways of determining the tempi, such as breath length or just the performers' free choice.
In a more structural way, I started to focus on more simple material, and trying to develop it as deeply as I can or want, but always focusing on very few elements at a time. This especially happened from the second of the accordion pieces onwards. Oh tiempo tus pirámides was a greakthrough in this sense, where I focused on very simple rhythmic motives that were almost not even developed throughout the piece but were just repeated and recombined with other elements, but always very simply and almost like crystal. I also dared more to explore the world of silence, of the space between the notes. It is a fascinating phenomenon to realize how one can create so many different atmospheres just by insinuating a contour with a few notes and silences. It is also a very counter-intuitive way of performing for most classically trained musicians, who are used ot more 19th century music that is sound all the time.
I also went away from the kind of faux-romantic style that predominated my school years. I was very influenced by the mid-late romantic composers and I wanted to write music like them. I don't reject this period in my life, I learned a lot from it, but now I am more interested in simplicity, in creating musical structures that are pure and simple and elegant without being pedantic. I like this way because I think music like this creates lots of space for meditation and slef-kowledge. In an ideal or naive expectation, I would like to affect the people that listen to my music in that way, to make them feel at peace with themselves and the world, to have a moment to rest from the noise of the world.
What lies ahead? Well for now I have 3 projects in mind. The first, which I think I can finish quite soon, is to write a cadenza for the first and second movements of Haydn's Piano Concerto in D Major. My sister is studying it and I offered to write her a cadenza to play with it. I already have some ideas for it. The second is the piece I mentioned before based on the Tabula Smaragdina. The piece will be approximately half an hour long and the instrumentation is singer (sopranist), accordion, cello and two harpsichords. My idea is that using two harpsichords will give more depth and increase the possibility for multiple voices sounding at the same time. And the third piece will be a collection of short pieces for fortepiano inspired on paintings by Giger (I also mentioned this a while ago), to pay him an homage after his death. After that, I have more ideas but they are all still quite blurry (a piece for solo harpsichord, a piece for organ, another for two pianos and one for solo violin, and also I thought of one for solo singing bowl), also, I just prefer to focus on what I have clear now before I begin wandering around mroe and more different ideas. It confuses me.
I am excited and a bit nervous for my exam tomorrow. But at least for me this year has been completely worht it, I am really satisfied with what I have done, I learned a lot and I feel like coming here has been one of the best decisions I have made in my life so far. I feel really fortunate to be here and to have learned so much.
And I am feeling inspired tonight so I will end this post with a simple mantra.
ॐ शान्ति शान्ति शान्तिः
