College Record 2014

I know people who like to work to a recipe, and I know people who like to make
it up as they go along. Some folk get to enjoy cooking so much that it permeates
their day, their thoughts, conversations and shopping habits. Not because they live
to stuff their faces, but because they derive great pleasure and satisfaction from the
planning, the sourcing of ingredients, the reading of recipes, the sensual pleasures
of preparing the food, the sights, smells and sounds of cooking, choosing the wine,
laying the table and sharing the fruits of their labour with friends and family. In the
same way, when I am writing a new piece it fills my thoughts and dreams. Ideas pop
up unbidden, sometimes at very inconvenient moments. I imagine the sounds, the
performance, the reaction of the audience.
Lately I’ve been doing more preparation and research and, most importantly, I’ve
developed a writing routine that involves habitually getting up early and composing
30 seconds’ worth of music each day. This is a great practice in itself, and it means
that I get much more done in less time. It led to the unprecedented event of me
finishing several works well before the deadline date.
In case you haven’t spotted it yet, I think writing music is a little like cooking. And
stretching the analogy just a tiny bit further (and hoping that it doesn’t snap like
a violin string, or like the waistband on my trousers), a composer is someone who
prepares a list of ingredients, and then writes a set of instructions (a score) on how
to put those ingredients together. Usually there is some wiggle room for a little
interpretative nuancing and the whole project only comes alive in performance in
front of an audience, like a meal on the table. So, if you are a composer or a chef
working on a major piece, you need collaborators – performers, kitchen staff – to
realise your creation and bring it to the table or concert hall. Everyone needs to
work together; timing is critical. The pasta needs to be cooked and drained exactly
30 seconds before the sauce is ready so that the plate can be in front of the diner
exactly 30 seconds later. In the same way, the violin has to come in on beat 3 of bar
5 and the bassoon two beats later or the whole carefully laid plan will fall apart. Of
course this would be all for nothing if there was no one to eat our food or listen to
our music.
In short, cooking and composing are both about flair, panache and neatly pressed
uniforms, but they are mostly about hard graft, training, study and practice. And
let’s not forget the performers. Or the audience.
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