This is an article that goes out to all you composers, whether experienced or budding, no matter what instrument or genre of music you play. The title comes from Robbie Burns’ poem called To A Mouse in which he describes the moment that he digs up the nest of a mouse with a plough. Basically, it means whatever the plan, even the best thought out ones, often don’t go as expected.
Now, what on earth has that got to do with music?, I hear you ask . Well a lot, actually. The composition process is full of Burns’ moment, the music will do this, and will go there, repeat from here to there and modulate to this key and back at precisely this moment. And then, oh, wait a minute. That mouse has appeared again over the top of my headstock, or has started walking across my manuscript paper.
What I am getting at here is the very real phenomena that manifests itself when music is in the process of being composed. Every person who writes their own music can attest to this, the fact that wherever you planned for the piece to go, you will end up in a completely different country.
For example, I set out a couple of months ago to arrange a piece by the great jazz saxophonist John Coltrane for solo acoustic guitar. After playing with tunings and keys for a week or so, I finally settled on a sus tuning, one that has no thirds or sevenths, so the sound is not only ambiguous when strummed, meaning that not only could it be in multiple keys, but also the melody would contain the only confirmation of whether it is minor or major, making such a piece of music far easier to control. Here is a link to the finished piece for you to see what I mean:
Now, once I had arranged the theme, or head, of the piece, the next step was the solo. Just play around in F minor, thought I, and keep going until I like what I hear. Then the mouse appeared. Its almost like, as soon as the assumption is made that all is going swimmingly, and the completion of the music is only a few stages away, the proverbial spanner makes its way out of the cosmic toolbox and heads in the direction of the mind that is creating out of thin air, the genuine magician, if you will.
So what did the solo lead to? A restatement of the theme and then the end? No, but rather a free form rhythmic section in the style of Michael Hedges. Where did that come from? Don’t get me wrong, I love the section and the transition both into and out of it, but that was never in my plan for the piece.
I could end by saying that we should embrace the unexpected and go where it leads, and I do think that, but I am more perplexed by the fact that the mouse does indeed exist, metaphorically of course, and even the great composers, after sketching out vast symphonies over weeks or months, end up swearing and rubbing out a lot of their predestined material.
I suppose that is why a poet like Burns is still relevant today, even though it is in archaic language and uses a hard to understand Scottish dialect. The fact is, even the plans of mere mice and men, aft gan agley, and he sure was right about that.
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