Private Thoughts (made public here)

Yesterday flutist Rebecca Johnson and pianist Cara Chowning played three pieces of mine ("For Poulenc," "In light we see, in light we are seen," and "Cante Jondo") on a concert of music written by living American women.

I went to the concert alone, and sat by myself. My experience in this public setting felt very private. I marveled at the creativity of the musicians, and observed that there were "things" in the music that were new to me ("things" being more than the notes, rhythms, dynamics, and articulations). It was overwhelming to encounter the combined emotions of Rebecca and Cara through music that I thought I knew really well. And there were moments during the performance when I actually had chills. All my pieces were new to everyone in yesterday's audience (except for me, of course). Now they are pieces that "belong" in some way to everyone who was there.

Listening to this concert made me realize a little more about the enormity of music. Music is far more than what is written on the page by the composer. It is far more than any one musician's individual sound, technique, style, or sense of line. It is far more than any one person's particular emotional relationship with the materials at hand, and even more than the combined emotional relationship that the musicians enjoy through the music and share with the audience.

In this case the audience happened to be members of my own community, since this concert happened in my own small college town. People play my music all over the world, but there's something especially meaningful to me when it is played in my own neighborhood, and for my neighbors.

A few months ago Rebecca and Cara made some video recordings of these three pieces, and when the videos are all finished (the audio and the video need to be mysteriously merged), I will post them here.