The Fredösphere

Der Drübermensch, still shy of his seventh birthday, asked for permission to play around with Finale, the music manuscripting software I use.  Naturally I jumped at the chance to let him compose, even though I suspected his interest was on the level of "one more way to have fun manipulating stuff on the computer screen," which is his most favorite activity.

I now present to you the result of this burst of creativity, which he entitled Drew's First Piece.  As you look through the score (click on the image for the whole thing in pdf) you will no doubt realize, as I did, that we are in the presence of a once-in-a-generation musical genius.

You might think that Der Drübermensch's artistic intent is focused on creating a musical score as its own, self-contained aesthetic artifact.  The dismayingly unplayable notes would lead you to think that.  It's an artistic choice that is not exactly unprecedented, yet this example is noteworthy for the courageous rigor of its application.  The difficultly goes well beyond the decision to give a high A to the tenor's first entrance in measure four; by measure seven, he calls for three tenors to sing a cluster on 64th notes at the extreme upper end of their tessitura.  I wonder if Der Drübermensch could find three tenors in the entire state of Michigan willing to take on these parts.

It gets worse; by measure eleven, the tubas are also playing impossible leaps, occurring on 64th notes, which are brutally difficult if we assume a moderato tempo.  (It would seem the 64th note is a signature of the young genius' emerging style.)  We haven't seen such boldness in writing for this instrument since Alex Ross' ground-breaking work.

Go back to the previous example:  notice the "useless" rests in the double bass part.  Can we be so sure they have no function?  Who is to say what subtle difference the counting of those rests would have on a live performance?  Indeed, this is where I begin to suspect my son is engaged in a game far subtler than we can imagine.  So what if we are decades or centuries away from producing virtuosos capable of playing this score?  If Der Drübermensch hears an ending of great dramatic power, he's going to write an ending of great dramatic power, and the tuba players can go suck eggs if they can't play it:

(Low brass players have a reputation for wussiness anyway, so we can discount their whining.)

I am ready to conclude that this score reveals to us the most uncompromising artistic visionary in the history of the world.  I am deeply humbled to have fathered and trained this young maestro.  It is clear he has nothing more to learn from me or anyone else.  I hereby release him to the world.  No need to thank me.

Labels: Composer, fun