Getting the Priorities Straight

Getting the Priorities Straight

By Dan Visconti

In my own composing efforts as well I’ve found it useful to consider my musical priorities which, if lacking, would cause the whole effort to cease being worthwhile.

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DanVisconti

One of my most respected mentors in matters of music pedagogy once initiated our weekly gathering by asking all of her students to make a list of their top three priorities in life. While most responded with answers such as “my family”, “my religious beliefs”, or “my work”, our mentor quickly pointed out that while these concerns are undoubtedly important, they weren’t really priorities in the crucial sense; and then (with no small amount of wry enjoyment) she reminded the class that the list of a human being’s literal priorities might be more accurately topped with things like food, shelter, and breathing.

This little joke was intended to make us think about our priorities when working with students, but in my own composing efforts as well I’ve found it useful to consider my musical priorities—defined as that which, if lacking, would cause the whole effort to cease being worthwhile. Some of these priorities reflect basic goals I have in most of my music, while others only played a part in certain pieces; but taken as a whole, here are the top priorities that have shaped my composing:

To challenge the known (and knowable): I feel very little motivation to compose unless I’m trying something that I don’t already feel confident doing. For me, composing is a means for exploring my own curiosity—curiosity about sound, and also about myself and my own limits. This has been perhaps the most constant priority in my music, and those few works in which it hasn’t been serve to remind me why!

To be personal, even idiosyncratic: Although I’m not terribly concerned with my music “expressing” something of my personality or emotions, I am concerned with my music expressing its own personality. I want my music to be rich in character and homemade rather than a canned generic, so anything that comes out feeling even a bit “blah” or emotionally vague always prompts a rewrite.

To make the performers sound good: While I haven’t ever been concerned with writing “the kind of music that performers might want to play” as an end unto itself, I’ve found that striving to write passages that make the players sound good leads to my composing passages that frequently are good as well. When I’m not thinking about how my music will actually take shape at a performance, anything else that I did accomplish in that piece can risk being lost in a poorly-balanced cloud of sound.

I’d be interested in hearing from any composers out there: what kinds of musical goals drive your composition, and which present themselves to you as absolute priorities?