Jason Treuting spoke to our class this week about some of the percussion pieces he has written. I think one of the major takeaways that many of us had was that he is a believer that “all sound is music,” the idea that anything audible could be considered musical and there is no line distinguishing noise from art. One of the pieces that he shared with us was based on the idea of sudoku puzzles which contain nine numbers horizontally and vertically in a grid pattern, similar to 12 tone rows. I was particularly interested in the idea of this piece because I am addicted to solving sudoku puzzles. I try to complete a Sudoku puzzle every day during my commute to school or back again. I expected him to go into detail about his thought process and an explanation of the guidelines he provided to the performers of the piece. However, I was a little bit disappointed that he did not explain the exact process that he went through to compose the peace, nor do I think I fully understood how performers understood what they were playing while I watched the video of the body percussion performance that he shared with us.
It was interesting to see that the music that each of the players was following was just the nine rows of numbers, but at what point was there a difference between music that Jason had written and music that the performers were just making up on the spot? Obviously, there were some parameters that they were following to end up at rhythms and patterns that sounded to be in sync with one another, but maybe the audience needs to know what those parameters are to be able to fully appreciate the piece and the concept behind it, otherwise who’s to say that the music wasn’t just made up in the moment?
I think some of these thoughts stem from my general dislike of music that must be co-written by the performer at the time of the rehearsal or performance. Although Jason did not fully disclose the guidelines given to the performers, it was clear that they are given a massive amount of responsibility by being provided with a minimal amount of music to follow and therefore must create much of the piece themselves. I understand that many people enjoy this type of collaboration, but I prefer to write and listen to music where musicians collaborate through their interpretation and do not have to worry about being a co-composer.
Hi Judith!
ReplyDeleteI also often wonder about at which point the performer becomes a "co-composer." I recently gave a presentation on the Movie "Gladiator"- Hans Zimmer is credited as writing the score, and it was nominated for best score, however he collaborated with a vocalist and several performers that contributed their own improvising (who weren't acknowledged). I definitely think that composers in this case should be clear as to what they contributed and what the performers contributed, giving them credit. It has made me rethink my own writing; I had a recording session in Dolan where I asked a drummer to improvise. I realize that I partially described to him what I wanted, but ultimately he provided the rhythms and interpretation, so I need to acknowledge him in the final product!