Daring to Create

This was an undertaking for my journalism class--I am fascinated with the idea of composing music and have tried (and a pretty feeble attempt at that) to compose my own stuff. I loved this assignment and hearing from different composers my own age who are learning how to make it come alive.

Samuel G. Freedman, in his book Letters to a Young Journalist, writes: “There is something daring, then, in believing, as I believe, that journalism must do more than pander to prejudices. There is something daring in letting your own attitudes and orthodoxies rub up against inconvenient realities. There is something daring in taking on a burden of expertise, proving by your own example that being a journalist means more than putting up a Web site and saying you are.” While Freedman was talking about the written language and the act of investigative journalism, his message can be applied to any art form that is losing its place in concrete places. Creativity that once belonged on the stage, in the museum, and the in concert halls are being transferred to youtube, ebay, and iTunes, and Freedman asks his readers to dare to be different. Dare to not buy in to what is simply efficient. Dare to still seek quality with the digital age, and perhaps even despite it. He is asking us to create.

The first vinyl record my father ever owned was the Beatle’s Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club. It was ranked number one in the Rolling Stone’s feature “the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time,” sold over eight million copies worldwide over several years, and was quoted as being “an unsurpassed work of concept, sound, and songwriting.” The album, released in 1967, had to be bought with dollars and cents at an actual record store. This meant that people actually had to get dressed, leave their homes, and pay the original listed price to get a portable playlist of their favorite tunes. Once purchased, getting the album home was another ordeal. Too bulky to carry in one’s pockets or bag, the record would have to be carried in both hands to a playing device either the size of a microwave or a small refrigerator before it could be enjoyed. If it were scratched, broken, or dirtied, the songs simply stopped playing.

The modern mind reels.

Forty two years later, I too purchased from my first big hit album. It was Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face,” which amassed an incredible ten million copies in less than one year, at least half of which were downloaded online. In the comfort of my pajamas, I logged into iTunes, dragged the digital track to my digital shopping cart, and headed to check out. There were no lines. No pushing or shoving at the counter. No risk of scratching or dirtying the cover. And within seconds the song was transferred literally into my pocket to be sung along with as I got ready for school. In less than two minutes I was able to own a song of relatively larger popularity for cheaper and enjoy it sooner than my father could have at the same age.

But perhaps “own” is the wrong word. John Lennon himself was quoted as saying: “Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it.” This is precisely the mindset of music consumers today. Songs are streamed, pirated, uploaded, downloaded, traded, created, enhanced, and produced on a far wider and faster scale than in any other time in history. There are literally thousands of opportunities to swindle, share, discover, change, and enjoy the complex international language of music, and all that is needed is a little monitor and an Internet connection.

From this viewpoint, with the tools of music globally accessible to the public at large, it is hard to make room for old technology like vinyls, eight tracks, tape players, and CDs. Just as typewriters and pen and ink made way for digital processing and newspapers are making way to Internet news feeds and blogs, music, as another form of language, is now taking its turn to digitalization. The art of creating a new song is as simple as entering a few notes into a software program, synchronizing them together with digital beats and instrumentation, and printing off the finished product. This is how it’s done for hundreds of commercial jingles, vlog channels, video games, and even concert music for band students.

All of these advancements beg the question: does anyone make real music anymore? Is the future of music cutting and copying pre-made beats and spending more time with keyboard and mouse then piano keys, instruments, creativity, and pen and paper? Will inspiration dwindle and be replaced by online commercial supply and demand?

I know at least five people who refuse to let that become the future. They are individuals who still find inspiration in themselves, their friends, the world around them, and even in God. They are the few who for their own personal reasons and in their own way bring music to life and compose their message into new songs with depth and ingenuity. They are the few who dare to create.

Ian Troester-Solbrig is a student at ISU in Pocatello and one of the lead songwriters for a band he formed called “Walther’s Wallpaper,” specializing in ska and alternative music. He records and distributes much of his music on the Internet, and his band has its own page on Facebook with videos of their latest performances for fans to view. While this seems a complete embrace of the technological age of efficiency, consider this: when Ian composes a song, he treats it like an investigative journalist treats a breaking story. In lieu of a laptop or blackberry, he uses a notebook and a recorder to capture his ideas. He tape records musical phrases, chords, and bits of tunes that he is working on and then listens to them over again with paper and pencil in hand. In this way he is able to write and rewrite lyrics that fit the emotions he is trying to convey, and more often than not the initial rough copy of a song is a jumble of words and chords on paper. Only after this process has been tempered with to satisfaction is it put into a computer music program and saved for printing.

“There is no right or wrong in music composition,” Ian explains, “you’ve got to experiment beyond the confines of what you’ve already heard. I like to think that my songs reflect who I am and provide an artistic framework for me to explore my emotions, my philosophies, and my possible reactions to alternate realities.” In other words, Ian doesn’t have to cater to online popularity or use the techniques that are the most efficient to make music. He uses his own timetable and his own resources to create songs that are personal, interesting, and inspired.

Anna Chapman and Ricardo Osuna share similar views. Both music composition majors at College of Idaho, the two compose through their emotions to produce music developed for their own ideas and inspiration rather than to any specific audience. “When I start out writing a song or a piece I’m never sure if it’ll work out,” Ricardo admits, “I always start with a feeling or emotion in mind, then try to write a melody that I feel captures that feeling or emotion.” For Ricardo this means a lot of starting new projects before finishing original ones; constantly shifting directions until the music finally fits into place. The hardest part about this kind of composing is that there is no employer or online review to provide instant feedback on the songs, so Ricardo must become his own critic, and this often makes it harder to find confidence in personal music style.

But this doesn’t stop him from continuing to grow and develop as a composer, and as he does so he turns to the computer more and more often. That isn’t to say that he lets the program do the work for him. On the contrary, it takes a great deal of knowledge in improvisation and music theory to be able to layer the parts of a song and make it professional and complex. The process of making a jingle or a simple tune takes only the knowledge of clicking certain buttons in a certain order. But the results have no depth to them, and cannot convey the kind of emotions and inspiration that composers like Ricardo strive for. For educated musicians a composing program acts as an organizer and simpler means of saving projects in a more logical way then paper, so each time Ricardo needs to go back to a past idea and make major changes to it, he can.

Anna also struggles with “composer’s block” and leaving pieces unfinished, but unlike commercial musicians who labor to make their pieces more complex and interesting to listeners, Anna fights to make her pieces less complicated so that her audience can still hear the message underneath. She relies on a composing program called Finale 2009 for most of her music writing, which is considered the standard program for music writing and allows the musician to plug in an electronic keyboard to the computer and play the notes directly into the software. Like Ricardo and Ian, she begins her pieces on paper and then saves them to the software using what she has learned in music theory and research to connect it all together. Because she isn’t writing for a specific agenda or product, she has more creative freedom with her pieces and actually has to put in the effort to harness that creativity.

Think about it. If commercialized song-writers had complete creative liberty there would be no limits to length, content, complexity, instrumentation, or tone. A thirty second jingle for a toilet bowl cleaner might grow into a thirty minute symphony. Radio stations would lose their advertisement investments as the airtime for music grew from a few minutes between commercials to a few hours. There’s a reason that these songs have restrictions. Attention spans are short, particularly on the Internet. So what gives composers like Anna and Ricardo and Ian the advantage over those who write for companies?

The audience difference is obviously a big part of it, but music theory is also one thing that divides those who compose for efficiency from those who compose for themselves. Anna explains it this way: “I’ve heard [music theory] termed ‘informed intuition.,’ and it’s entirely true. A composer knows the theory in the notes and harmonies and is ‘informed,’ yet they must also allow the ear and creativity to guide the composition, which is the ‘intuition.’” Digital technology cannot invent intuition or creativity, nor can it teach the user the music theory skills needed to really operate it.

Anthony Parry is another C of I composition major who combines “informed intuition” and the digitalization of music together without losing the elements of either. “I compose for myself. When I sit down and compose, I get lost for hours. Time doesn’t exist to me anymore, and I completely envelop myself into whatever I’m writing. Music is an escape for me.” Based on this statement, Anthony’s passion for the language of music is clear, and so I was surprised to hear that his hopes for publishing were centered widely on the Internet. There are public domain access programs which allow companies to sample bits of music for use in commercials and production, and Anthony plans to be a part of this media sharing and begin publishing his work for others.

“My love of contemporary popular music has led me to believe that three minute songs will make people happy,” he remarked, and it is this compression and limitation of inspiration in the corporate world that has caused creative minds like Anthony and Rob Walker, a musical instructor at College of Idaho, to seek out employment in the entertainment and advertising agencies. Initially I was dismayed to hear a college student already limiting himself to employment in the mainstream, but listening to the rest of Anthony’s beliefs about composing and the things that inspire him I realized that there was a difference between blindly accepting the shift in what is marketable and remaining true to oneself.

Because Anthony spends time in music classes that help him grow creatively and allows his own talent to be tested with improvisation, and because he continues to write songs so that his own message can be heard, he is already different from the composers who pander only to the consumers. He knows that what sold in the music industry twenty years ago is different from what sells now. Getting hired here and there for advertisement is not only smart financially, it will also get him recognized by other groups who might be willing to publish his longer, inspired compositions for film soundtracks, concerts, and even internationally sold as sheet music for other orchestras and bands to perform world wide. And really, that is what music is for. Sharing the message of one creative mind to hundreds of others.

Rob Walker is no stranger to the corporate world. He has a large number of television and film credits to his name, including High School Musical III, College Road Trip, Fired Up, Friday Night Lights, The O.C., Ugly Betty, and Animal Planet; and he also recorded the music for NBC’s Triple Crown Coverage for horse derbies. Rob saw the trends in the composition business and followed them, and was more than accomplished enough as a musician to be given a deadline and an idea for a song and to write something with quality for publication in a short amount of time. But Rob still remains true to himself and his passion for music. As a jazz instructor at the college and an active musician in the community, he often improvises and composes in whatever genre inspires him most simply for the pleasure of bringing new music to life.

When asked what the hardest part of composing music was he replied: “Narrowing down the possibilities. I always use the analogy of asking an artist to create a picture. Go! An artist must make decisions such as watercolor or charcoal, canvas or paper, colorful or dark…once these parameters are set, creating the work is easy.” So although Rob has a hand in fast-paced production of media music, he also takes the time for his own music projects that use different materials and a fresh canvas for his ideas. This past spring he held his own compositional concert at the school to showcase songs he composed for choir, orchestra, band, and jazz alike, most notably of all a tribute to President Lincoln which took weeks of research and piecing together of old 19th century tunes together to create.

As Rob explained, “composers should learn all of the rules and then forget them or attempt to break them.” By selling songs for television and soundtracks, Rob follows a few guidelines and preferences for others, but on the side, he is still feeding his ingenuity with music that defies the standard, stretches limitations, and even makes parodies of media tunes and their simplistic nature.

All five of these individuals have dared to be different, and have worked hard to make their own musical vision continue to develop beyond the restrictions of downloads, deadlines, and distribution. For Ian, music is a love affair that began in his attempts to be the next Jimi Hendrix. For Ricardo, his passion is in the drive to create something that is his own and express himself. To Anna music is more than a part of her, it is a calling and a way to share her feelings for her friends and the world around her. Anthony explained composing as “opening up so many boxes to create feeling and emotion without words,” and finds inspiration in love, in life, and in nature. Rob uses music as an outlet for his ideas, whether professionally or for fun, and constantly keeps a new mental canvas ready for the next project.

While their inspirations and motives differ from one another, each of them agree on one thing: when asked what the most rewarding part of composing music was, each and every one of them replied “hearing it.” Hearing their vision come together and become real, whether in front of an audience of two or two hundred, is what composition is all about.



Sources:
1. "Beatle's Srgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart Club History". CD Universe. 20 May, 2010 .

2. Chapman, Anna. Interview by e-mail. 27 April, 2010.

3. "Finale".Wikipedia. 20 May, 2010 .

4. Freedman, Samuel G. Letters to a Young Journalist. Cambridge, MA: Basic Books, 2006.

5. "John Lennon Quotes". Great-Quotes-Powerful-Minds.com. 20 May, 2010 .

6. Osuna, Ricardo. Interview by e-mail. 27 April, 2010.

7. Parry, Anthony. Interview by e-mail. 27 April, 2010.

8. "The Fame". Wikipedia. 20 May, 2010 .

9. Troester-Solbrig, Ian. Interview by e-mail. 19 April, 2010.

10. Walker, Rob. Interview by e-mail. 16 April, 2010.

Minestrone Soup-As It Was Published

Minestrone Soup

By: Robyn Argyle

Maturity has a selective memory. Age six: the unique perspective of the waist-high. Flat marble counter tops reach high above my head, making it hard to reach the elusive Oreos. My feet remember cold linoleum floor and stiff carpets in ugly colors; dark brown, deep orange, and jungle green. Hands recall scraped palms from falling down, then the soothing wool of the cream blankets in the guest room, where my sister and I have a sleepover. Magic exists. There is glitter on the ceiling embedded in the stucco that looks like stars; a whole secret galaxy for us to name and own. Brightly colored tinker toys wait patiently in the closet for us to free, building cars and cities and make believe heroes from painted sticks and plastic wheels. My brother smashes my skyscraper, and I cry.

Smells. Bacon and butter frying in the morning. Old lady perfume. Outside in the garden, the smell of tomatoes, cucumbers, dirt, grass, and sky. The euphoria of squishing snails and worms on the sidewalk after rainfall. The sound of the rusting swing set creaking back and forth, back and forth. Aunt Ruth’s perfect hair. The way she never seems to stop smiling. Having two Uncles in one house. One has big glasses and laughs a lot. The other uses a walker and stutters when he talks. Sometimes we watch Little House on the Prairie together. Sometimes we just sit and I read the funny papers. Dinner is a big deal. We always have to eat the weird soup. It has beans and little noodles and green things floating in it. Unnatural things. Things that don’t belong in soup. I always eat a lot of rolls so I don’t have room for the soup. Although I always have room for ice cream.

Age eight: I’m not so certain about magic anymore, but death is real. One of my Uncles, the one with the big laugh, is lying motionless in a casket. He was the husband of my Aunt Ruth,

and he is gone. He could do a perfect Daffy Duck impression, and suddenly I realize that is all I really remember about him. I cry big, round tears for the man I barely knew.

The house seems emptier after that. Aunt Ruth looks the same. She is a rock. She is strong and always smiles, at least when people are watching. And her hair is still perfect. But she is frustrated. Everyone forces her to sit down. They take the dishes away from her and chop vegetables for the soup that I won’t eat. They hold her hand, and whisper memories and sympathies that will never bring my Uncle back. For the first time I see something else in my Aunt. I see exhaustion. I wish there was a way for me to protect her from the pestering relatives. I wonder if she wants to go to the garden. It always helps me, with its promises of growing and scurrying things.

Not today, she says. She smiles, but it’s an empty smile. Not today.

Age ten: my other Uncle is Aunt Ruth’s twin, Reed. He was born with “complications.” He has trouble speaking, and hearing, and seeing, and walking. When I say hello to him, I hold his hand and speak loudly and clearly. I listen hard to understand what he says back. I can reach the oreos myself now, and frequently do. My sister and I are grown up now so I have a guest room to myself. It is almost entirely green, like the garden. There is a painting over the bed of a little girl with a black eye and a crooked smile, sitting outside the principle’s office. Her painted parents have furrowed brows, but she looks so proud of herself it’s hard to be on their side. The caption says Tomboy. At night the window is always open and I hear trains go by till dawn. They make a sad, crying sound.

In the morning I go out and pick the biggest tomatoes I can find. I help my Aunt to wash them and cut them up for the soup, which I am now too polite to refuse to try. She looks tired

again, and she smiles a little less often. My parents wash the dishes for her and in return she presses them to accept the leftovers from dinner. There is a chalkboard hanging by the door, and as we leave I write “we love you” in big letters with yellow chalk.

Age thirteen: in the garden room again. As I slip into my pajamas I pause to examine something familiar and gray on the dresser. Aunt Ruth’s perfect hair. It’s a wig! Something clicks into place, and I open one of the dresser drawers and see some of Aunt Ruth’s folded laundry. This is her room. I am sleeping on her bed. Where is she sleeping tonight? Does she sleep at all?

I see my Aunt with new eyes. I ask her about the painting in her room, and for the first time in many hours she smiles. It’s a Norman Rockwell, she explains, and the tomboy in the picture is the spitting image of herself in grade school. Aunt Ruth, getting in fights with boys? Coming home in mud and tatters? I can’t imagine. I help her cook the bacon for breakfast. Real bacon, I realize. That’s expensive. I go to the fridge and see it crammed full of fresh food from the garden and more expensive food that looks brand new. Whole milk and olives and salad dressing. I wonder how much money she spends to feed us when we’re here. I wonder, when we aren’t visiting, how empty the fridge gets.

Uncle Reed shuffles up the stairs and takes his seat at the head of the table next to Ruth. She fits a bib on him and loads his plate with hot eggs and French toast. Sometimes he misses his mouth and food rolls onto the floor. Aunt Ruth picks it up, scolds her brother, and continues on in conversation with my parents. She waits until all of Uncle Reed’s food has disappeared before she touches her own, and I wonder if it has gone cold. I watch her through the meal and notice that she eats half as much as the rest of us before she is up again, collecting dishes, clearing the

table, ignoring our protests. She reminds me of the rabbit in those commercials, the one that never stops working and banging his drum. I wonder how and if she ever recharges.

I play with the neighbor’s dog until the neighbor chases me away and the sun chases the light from the sky. The garden room has changed in the hour or two since I’ve been outside. My clothes are in a neat pile in the corner instead of strewn around the room. The bed is made. When did she have the time to do this? I could have sworn that my Aunt never left the living room. I feel like crying.

That night when it is time for soup, I don’t complain about the green things. I even ask for seconds.

Age fifteen: Emergency Trip. We announce our arrival at the house with as much warning as a firing squad, and making about as much noise. Aunt Ruth has had maybe an hour’s notice before we show up at her door, and yet there is the steam of soup cooking on the stove, the smell of laundry detergent in the air. Aunt Ruth fills up bowls of dinner for us, empties out the bathroom so we can take turns showering, and somehow still finds the time to ask us about our lives. She remains calm, talks cheerfully through the night, and keeps us all from falling apart. I remember getting impatient for my turn in the bathroom. I remember being too upset to eat much of the soup she had prepared. I don’t remember ever saying thank you.

There are more of us than there are beds tonight, and as I stretch out on the couch, warm, fed, and safe, I catch a glimpse of my Aunt’s insomnia work ethic. I hear her in the kitchen washing dishes, and as I listen she begins to sing; a sweet, low tenor that I have never heard before. I didn’t know what song she sang, but I recognized the emotion. It was the train whistle out my window.

I fall asleep to her humming as she dries the dishes and wake up to her cracking eggs and stirring juice. Same place in front of the sink. Same clothes. Same expression. That morning everyone is in better spirits, healed by the good care we’ve been given. My parents offer to pay for groceries which Aunt Ruth refuses with her usual shake of the head. We give her hugs and promise not to drop in on her without warning again. And we don’t, not for a long time.

Age sixteen: another funeral service. This one is for Uncle Reed. Aunt Ruth ages before our eyes. Her hair is lopsided, her mouth set in a stern line. She doesn’t smile once. She forgets what she is saying as she’s saying it. She drops things. Strangest of all, she lets people help her and doesn’t argue. We have the soup as usual, but this time I imagine it tastes bitter and salty. Like tears.

Age seventeen: our last visit. The house feels empty and cold. The garden outside is overrun with weeds. My parents sit with Aunt Ruth for hours and hold her hand, the way we did with her brother. I walk through the room with the star-studded ceiling and to the closet. It’s still full of tinker toys and pictures of grandchildren smiling, as if nothing has changed. But it has. I can feel it. I go to the green room and look at the Tomboy picture, and wonder what my Aunt was like when she was my age. I realize that for all these years of visits, I’ve never seen her weak. I’ve never seen her spirit break down. Until now.

We clean up before we leave. We wash all the dishes and make our own beds. We are no longer the ungrateful guests; we are the caretakers. It is our turn to keep her from falling apart. I write “we love you” on the chalkboard as usual before we slide out the driveway, taking one last look back to the kitchen door. I can still feel the yellow dust on my hands hours later, as the freeway takes us home.

A few weeks after that, we receive the phone call we have been dreading. Aunt Ruth is with her husband making Daffy Duck impressions. She’s with her brother helping him finish his dinner. Her funeral is enormous, full of friends and neighbors and family and acquaintances, who remember her kindness, her strength, and especially, her cooking.

Age twenty: independent living. College is a test of perseverance and discovery that I am eager to pass. But sometimes, I feel swallowed up and small on campus. Sometimes I still feel like I’m standing on my toes in my Aunt’s kitchen, stretching high above my head for the elusive, just out of sight. I lay awake at night and hear the Caldwell station trains make their sad, crying chords; and for the first time I think I can put a name to that feeling: longing. On nights like this I find comfort in a cup of minestrone soup. There are still the green things, and the unnatural things, and it tastes like the can instead of her garden, but I think of the girl with the black eye and the crooked smile, and savor every drop.

*Picture by Chelsea Larson*