Understanding why I compose requires some sense of what influences others and drives them to put pen to paper, or the corresponding digital equivalent. That awareness and understanding from outside of myself provides confirmation, consideration and context for my reflection on my work. It also means I need to consider the influences that my compositions may have on others. In order to explore these relationships and influences, in the following section I briefly outline significant literature in relation to the wind orchestra, its composers, conductors and theorists.
In the introduction to his first of four volumes of Composers on Composing for Band, author and composer Mark Camphouse states that
while valuable for students in the areas of composition, music education, and applied music performance, this book is intended primarily for wind band conductors at all levels, who are interested in gaining fresh insights and perspectives from the ultimate source of musical creativity – the composer. (2002, p. xi) Camphouse's description of his book's intent describes what I seek to accomplish in this exegesis; my desire is also to illuminate matters of composition for the conductor, teacher and student. My aim is to bring to the forefront open discussion of emotion and meaning alongside intellectual understanding of works and their construction.
Camphouse posits that he is seeking to "… [promote] greater understanding and a more meaningful and mutually beneficial partnership between the composer and the conductor" (2002, p. xi). He goes on to report that there are "…many fine conducting texts available…most are quite traditional in terms of their content and approach, with a major emphasis given to the physical aspects of conducting" but he asserts that he and his
fellow composer colleagues…share the view of there being a need – an important need – for a different kind of book…a book that allows all wind band conductors (middle school through college/university) a rare, unique, and fascinating glimpse into the creative process from the composer's perspective. (2002, p. xiii)
As Camphouse notes, there are few books or research articles in the wind band domain that focus on the personal and composer-located reflectivity that his series does. In each book, composers present their views cosseted within the comfort of their own temperaments and personalities, their own writing styles, and present a window into their works by opening the window onto themselves. There is much in the series which is extremely valuable to the conductor and informative to the general reader but, given that not all 'tell' as fully as they might, in a subjective, first person manner, there is a sense in which the work is limited by how much of the composer's most intimate feelings and experiences are exposed.
On one hand it may be that such depth of openness is not required. Enquiry as to why the work was written or the influences on the composer may not preclude a competent and satisfying performance. On the other hand, it is reasonable to assert that such exposition can only inform the conductor and make their decision making, in relation to the score and interpretation, more true to the composer's intentions. Despite what may be viewed by some as a lost opportunity to bring to conductors the full and open story of the composer, the Camphouse series remains an excellent resource for conductors and music researchers.
Much of the scholarly writing about band repertoire and conducting is positioned within that somewhat traditional mode, which focuses on the physical aspects of conducting and the theoretical analyses of scores, as reflected on by Camphouse. The Journal of Band Research has many fine contributions on composition from an analytical perspective but little on why a composer writes as they do or what compels them to put pen to paper (see for example Fiese, 1987; Good, 1993; Keating, 1980; Mitchell, 1981; Morris, 1992; Olson, 1982). Similarly, the WASBE Journal (World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles) has many excellent articles on works and biographical contributions on composers from across the globe (Berz, 2008; Byo, 1994; Darling, 2008; Garrido, 2006; Johnston-Turner, 2004; Kinder, 2005) but little that serves the need of those wanting more about why the composer composes.
In Conducting With Feeling, Fredrick Harris Jr. (2001) explores these more intimate moments of the score, but from an 'after the fact' perspective. He is quite thorough in his investigation of how conductors endeavour to transmit the 'feeling' and 'emotion' communicated in the score though he is not explicit about direct connection to the composer's intent; there is no explicit referral to or reflection on matters composers may have presented with respect to their works. Notwithstanding no major intersection with composer's views on their works Harris' exposition of how the conductors he interviewed approach a composition displays an intimacy and openness not often found in the more didactic texts Camphouse has suggested are most often found in tertiary training.
Harris (2001) cites Meier and his wish to be the "servant of the composer"; he presents Kirchhoff's assertion of the need for an "evangelistic passion" and his desire to "expand the students' emotional reaction to the music" (p. 40). Harris then presents Rowell's assertion that communicating musical feeling is a "…soul-to-soul communication" (p. 41) and it is that which ‘drives' him. He contends that
ultimately, the only things that survive are the soul and the spirit…(you may have to) replace your shoes and your shirt, your teeth and your hair will fall out. But the spirit and soul live forever…and that is why Beethoven lives on, why Bach lives on, why Mahler, Copland, and all of these great composers live on. (2001, p. 41) Harris comes closest to what might be described as an awareness of the composer's wholeness in creation when he cites what Massey wants the ensemble and the audience to hear in a work.
He contends that
the goal is to force them to hear – to look at the statue from all sides: from below and above. And if they look at the statue from all those sides, then their depth of understanding and perception is so much greater, and the feeling attached to that awareness is so much deeper. (2001, p. 42)
This awareness which Massey describes is similar to how I wish my works to be portrayed and responded to. Yet the perspective seems not as well informed as it might be. There is no consistent reflection from these fine conductors on what they believe the composer wants. They do not display an awareness of the composer's intention other than what they perceive that intention to be through the score. More information on what a composer may have desired in a particular work must surely come from a closer relationship with the composer; a more intimate connection with them and their output.
Closest to this type of open discussion of a composer's feelings and emotional requirements to write, comes from a composer himself, Martin Ellerby. In an article for Winds, the journal of the British Association for Bands and Wind Ensembles, Ellerby (Spring 2005) speaks on a very personal level about the work of a composer and sets the scene for an analysis of a major work by presenting the composer in a frank and candid manner. Here the composer's personally revealing thoughts are reflected upon by Ellerby and his reflections given in a form, an interview, which allows the reader to glean more of the composer than a truncated biography in a published score or a perusal of the music itself might give. In this case, the composer was myself and the work in question was my Bright Sunlit Morning, my personal response the events of September the 11th 2001 in the United States.
From my years of observation, it appears that the wind band community has not come to a point where it is comfortable with such an open and intimate intersection with what the composer feels and says and how they might reflect on that in the interpretation of the music. Camphouse and Ellerby, have come close to this personal style of scholarship, and Harris, too, in his investigation of feeling in conducting; but, in my opinion, the vast majority of scholarship in this domain is still bound in the straightjacket of positivism whereby formal analytical approaches make up the mainstay of understanding what a score is and how it should be dealt with.
There is little found in the wind band field that suggests a more progressive view of scholarship and the benefits it brings. Even in the educational domain there are many examples of reviews of works, and much discussion over performance levels, but engagement with the score in the manner of Camphouse, Ellerby and Harris is the exception rather than the rule. When I have engaged in discussion with colleagues over the years about my autobiographical, and now autoethnographic research, there has been reaction that has ranged from positive and enthusiastic through to the bemused. There have also been those who consider what I do to be lacking in rigour and true analytical understanding. This last group (some represented in the journal articles reflected on above) appear to be firmly grounded in the arena of tradition which Camphouse deliberated on, and this seems to be the majority of those in this wind band village I find myself in.
Yet a look over the village wall, past the village band, allows me to find methods of investigation and means of understanding which give heart to my desire to open the conductor, the learner, and the researcher to an awareness of the composer's work which transcends that most commonly available now. It provides an insight into process and, more potently, it grants the reader a unique perspective on why a composer composes. The methods and means of interrogating why I compose; the unravelling, or as Alasuutari suggests, 'unriddling' (1995, p. 16), give me ways to tell others who then utilise my works in performance or in classes about my method and motivation for composing. Not only that, they present a unique way of knowing about a composer, about how a person feels and is affected by the vicissitudes of life, in fact, more broadly, about the human condition itself.
Coming from an autobiographical locus in previous research I approach this investigation with an awareness of needing to grow ever more open in my presentation of my work, for frankness here will encourage others to be open and fragile too. Making music is not solely about the realisation of notes on a page but an attempt to give as honest and transparent presentation as possible of the heartfelt output of one person to others.
Reimer (2003) suggests that "…music occurs only when people choose to create and share it, and since they always have done so and no doubt always will, music clearly must have important value for people". I am challenged to become aware of the value in my music when he asserts that, "If we can explain why humans need music we may learn something profound about what it means to be human" (Opening section, para. 1). Reimer's work challenges me about my research too, as he follows the above with a question. For
we know that humans need food, clothing, shelter, language, social interaction, belief systems, and so forth, and that these needs help define the human condition. But why do they also appear to require music, which seems, on the surface, to be only remotely related to human survival rather than central to it? (Opening section, para. 2)
The value of my music has resonance with why I compose, for it surely reflects on the human condition. It tells of my survival, a survival of heart and spirit more than just flesh and blood. A particular story of survival forms the central section in this dissertation. Others have grappled with this too. Gardner posits that, "Precisely because [music] is not used for explicit communication, or for other evident survival purposes, its continuing centrality in human experience constitutes a challenging puzzle" (1993, p. 123).
These matters of survival and telling the story of that experience are best addressed in the domain of autoethnography for the frank confrontation with life and the experiences it throws up are dealt with in the open candid way I am advocating in this chapter. The work of Ellis (1993, 2000, 2004, 2006, and 2009), Bochner (2000), Behar (1996), Etherington (2004) and others have aided me in illuminating my place in this research, located within the broader context of my personal and professional relationships and endeavours.
"All research is interpretive;" say Denzin and Lincoln (2000), for "it is guided by a set of beliefs and feelings about the world and how it should be understood and studied" (p. 19). Such assertions locate my work well for I am endeavouring to tell about why, and how, I compose and to do so from a perspective informed by a multiplicity of experiences and knowledge. The desire here is to share and make explicit my beliefs and feelings about composing music for others to reflect on in relation to their musical lives.
To begin with, my first interrogation of my compositions in my Masters research was focused on the obvious of what I wrote and how I wrote it. Ellis describes the autoethnographic 'gaze' where, "Back and forth autoethnographers gaze: First they look through an ethnographic wide angle lens, focusing outward on social and cultural aspects of their personal experiences…" (2004, p. 37) It may well be that then my "social and cultural aspects" were the accepted manner of investigating compositions, the formal almost empiricist manner that Camphouse alludes to above. Then Ellis suggests autoethnographers
look inward, exposing a vulnerable self that is moved by and may move through, refract, and resist cultural interpretations. As they zoom backward and forward, inward and outward, distinctions between the personal and cultural become blurred, sometimes beyond distinct recognition (2004, p. 38).
Here she encourages me to view why I compose from a personal and vulnerable locus and not be distracted by the positivist approaches I had been used too. This personal locus allows a more complete and open examination of why rather than how I compose.
Scholars, such as Ellis and Bochner, have established that an investigation of self is allowable, for being immersed in the "the flux of lived experience," (Ellis and Bochner 2006, p. 431) is what autoethnography is about. In uncovering the complexity which is self and shared human experience I sense I am on a track which will lead to revealing my story meaningfully and purposefully. My research emanates from deeply personal experiences and it melds scholarship with my musical creativity. Burnier defines my location solidly for me in stating that,
Autoethnographic writing is both personal and scholarly, both evocative and analytical, and it is both descriptive and theoretical when it is done well. It tilts toward the solipsistic when it is not done well, and it loses its claim as interpretive scholarship if it fails to be analytical and theoretical (2006, p. 414).
I am attracted to this mode of investigation for it offers a rigorous approach yet allows me to write about what I do in a creative and evocative manner all located within the broad expanse of the life I live. Thus positioned, I move on to interrogate why I compose and do so through telling an autoethnographic story and placing its telling within this broad autoethnographic locus.
Composer Julie Giroux asserts that, "Some composers write good stories. Some composers are good story tellers. Great composers are both" (in Camphouse, 2004, p. 63). I want to be 'both'; many of my pieces are good stories, told well. But how do I 'tell' the story which is the genesis of this research, when it is the recounting of an emotional experience which has had a devastating impact on me personally and on my family as well. I wonder if I am able to tell that story as well as others I have created because, as Ellis asserts, "The 'truth' is that we can never fully capture experience. What we tell is always a story about the past" (Ellis, 2004, p. 116).
This investigation of literature displays an opportunity for me to harness the candour and rigour of autoethnography to allow for an open and frank examination of my compositional practice located, as it is, amidst the influences of my everyday life. It will address the paucity of such research evident in my community of interest at present. A number of the issues and ideas which have been raised briefly in this chapter will be explored in more detail throughout the exegesis.