Today is Pi Day, so I thought I could post this old piece of mine from back in 2015. I'd posted it in the old forum, but since that's gone I thought I'd take the liberty to post it again here.
There have been many clever rhymes and other mnemonics for the first N digits of pi, but here's my contribution: a somewhat memorable melody of less than 1 minute from which you could recite the first 52 digits of pi. Can it really be that simple? How is that even possible? Well, take a gander at the score and find out! ;-)
Score: [pdf]
Computer rendering: [mp3]
Also, being a stubborn, unrepentant neoclassicist (or maybe narcissist? :-P), I wrote melody in the most harmonious way possible, unlike many other pieces based on pi which tend to be 12-tone, irregular, or otherwise difficult to approach. This one is simple enough a child could learn it by heart and thereby memorize 52 digits of pi almost effortlessly. ;-)
Replies
Okay, I give up. You have proven that you are the real amateur here.
Guys, you are scaring me with the attitude that learning the nuts and bolts seems to detract or deter you from the act of composing. The nuts and bolts supply the techniques and foundations that hold it all together. They are music's Red Bull.
I don't have a problem with learning the nuts and bolts. As you say, they are the foundations to build on, the toolbox to draw from.
My problem is with the way music is often taught these days by certain ones who have an agenda to push their particular method of composition to the exclusion of everything else. Or who believe the fallacy that the old is bad because it's old, and the new is better because it's new. And who therefore stifle the individual voices of students in favor of pushing their own agenda.
I can't really say how much of a problem all of that still is Teoh although I can appreciate the concern. Assuming mature university age groups and an already assimilated basic know-how, if there is enough about any talent, I don't think agendas will harm it, nor stifle it in the long run. Besides, I believe that after a certain point in composition training - specifically after a good and thorough grounding in technique - there isn't much that can be taught anyway and so an autodidactic and self-reliant approach to finding a personal way becomes essential.
At my alma mater there was a tendency towards modernism, but not exclusively - in fact the attitude was quite liberal - and because me and my peers had gone way past the basics prior to study there, the focus was (quite rightly imo), more on finding individual paths by encouraging technical and musical exploration and being exposed to new ways in the spirit of adventure and not having it forced upon us. In fact, I even had the freedom to formulate and do my own study of traditional techniques, ones I wanted to learn that were not part of any curriculum, especially early vocal polyphony, further fugue studies, Jazz and expanded (yet still tonal - just) harmonic practices, all with my personal tutors blessing and encouragement.
You got lucky, I guess.
Now since I've never actually gone through any music program myself, this is all hearsay and second-hand information that may be completely inaccurate, but I've heard horror stories about music majors being belittled because they wanted to explore traditional methods of composition, or someone being told straight to the face that "the notes don't matter" (as in, all pitch relationships are completely irrelevant). Or people failing their composition assignments because they didn't write something "modern enough". Or people getting so burned out that they renounced composition altogether.
Now maybe this is all wrong information or exaggerated claims, I don't know. But given how things worked out, I wouldn't have been able to manage a music degree in addition to pursuing a career in software anyway, the latter of which has been a great boon in allowing me to have a stable income so that I can support my family and have enough freedom to compose in my own time, not beholden to any sponsor or producer breathing down my neck about how I should write my music. So in that sense I'm glad I ended up taking the path I did. Who knows what might have happened had I taken a different route?
My experience was somewhat similar to Mike's. I attended a 2-year university program before deciding, like you, not to pursue a 4-year degree but to focus on an Engineering degree for job security. During that program, I never encountered anyone going through that experience or went through it myself.
During my studies at the University, we had private composition lessons. I recall one professor remarking after I presented a piece, 'Well... it's just a bit... diatonic!' Looking back, I realize what he may have been suggesting that there was potential for broader harmony exploration, though at the time as a naive 19 year old I assumed he might be suggesting I explore an atonal style, since I knew that was his main medium. But since then, I've engaged in private study and recently resumed it. None of those professors have pushed an agenda. However, with private study, you can be more selective of your professors, and if you sense any agenda, there's an easy remedy.
I agree that my professors at the university had tendencies and personal preferences towards modern music. However, by the time I left the program, it didn't cover all the theory concepts necessary for formal writing in such styles. So, even if they pushed personal preferences, they would be pushing students into a branch of theory and concepts the program hadn't even covered yet, which would be quite silly.
Perhaps if I had completed the full 4 years, that agenda could have become more prevalent as those topics were covered - but I doubt it. There seemed to be more of an agenda to encourage originality, albeit stemming from the core concepts learned in the program. A sense of providing you with years and years of ideas, systems and concepts that have been proven success recipes - but then suggesting you to do what you will with those ideas.
I too have heard of the kinds of situations you mention Teoh. So to play devil's advocate for a while....
I have no issues with compositional talent that chooses to ignore the last 100 or so years of musical development. That said, there is a good argument for not wanting students who are serious about becoming concert hall composers relevant to their own time, to be stuck with writing anachronistic sounding music which will surely stymie any potential individuality. Also there's an even better argument to my mind in that by exploring beyond the comfortable with open ears, a students own personal aesthetic will be greatly expanded giving them a better chance of finding a more personal - unique even - way of writing music. Even if the exploring leads them back to tonality, the journey will have been worth it imo. A sense of adventure and an ability to push beyond or at least try to open up musical imagination is something I think all composers - certainly those with concert hall aspiration - owe to themselves.
A higher education in music composition implies the prospect or hope of a professional career, but that wont happen unless the composition graduate is prepared for the musical times they live in. On that basis alone, exposure to, and some experience working with 20th and 21stC technique and practice is necessary. I can personally vouch for this. In my first month of working in media, I won a film score contract that was exclusively avant garde vocal techniques for a small choir. Those techniques where not part of my personal aesthetic, but I knew how to write with them and understood the language and consequently finished the score successfully.
So although I can see the objections to being subjected to musical dogma, the benefits could easily outweigh any misgivings if the student has the right attitude and wants to work as a composer. Potential students should always enquire before auditioning for a course to see if their musical preferences and aims might be an issue.
Yes..good post David. Providing road maps to explore is the only way to teach composition. The composer has to supply the wits, the sense of adventure, the invention and the imagination.
that may be true but there are many ways of learning the nuts and bolts as you put it. Mine is simply listening to and trying to assimilate works which for me show these nuts and bolts in their most effective practice. We all have very different ideas of what such works are and out own respective musical models are pretty different from each other! I did in fact study music at university (indeed it was my best subject) but it was not part of a music degree which at that time anyway required proficiency at an instrument to gain entry, but rather as a subsidiary part of an Arts degree.
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