The Fredösphere

Software engineers know the feeling you get at a certain point in a project.  You're getting to the end of the to-do list, you have another seemingly short list of things that are "done" but need to be tweaked or fixed -- you're ninety percent done!  At this point, in the biz we say you have completed the first ninety percent.  The second ninety percent is yet to come.

I was feeling that way with my big composition project.  I slacked off on the work these last two weeks as I neared the end.  It was pretty much in the bag.  Yesterday my quartet brought out one of the choruses, performing it at a church service.  It was dreadful.  Listening to the recording was a painful experience -- the work is deeply flawed.  It simply does not work well for voices:  too many jumps, too many lords and ladies a-leapin'.  The chords fly past without time to coagulate.  Each singer would need the precision of a keyboard instrument to get it right.  I'm appalled to find myself making such a mistake.

To be sure, I did get some sincere complements, but I detected in them a bit of the "wow, that sounded complicated" response, which itself has more than a bit of Johnson's infamous preaching woman in it.  I impressed them, but I'm done with impressing people.  They have no idea what a simple thing it is to make it complicated.  I have a message to communicate, and it is not "Fred can write complicated music."

With my confidence wilting, I took a look at the rest of the score.  I now see a need for revision in several other places.  The second ninety percent has begun with a vengeance -- with a wrath, with an apocalyptic implacability -- and who shall abide its coming, when its terrible swift sword divides the true composers from the weenie wanna-bes?

More disturbingly, some people speak of a third ninety percent:

We were making great progress, but we couldn't get it done alone. Creating sophisticated software requires a team effort. One person can use smoke and mirrors to make a demo that dazzles an audience. But shipping that to a million customers will expose its flaws and leave everyone looking bad. It is a cliche in our business that the first 90 percent of the work is easy, the second 90 percent wears you down, and the last 90 percent - the attention to detail - makes a good product.

You people didn't warn me.  You never told me this would be hard.