The Composer

A phrase occurs to him--walking, sleeping, in the bath--and he chases it down on the page.  The sequence of notes, their repetition, suggests other notes, intentional dissonance or obvious resolution.  What is possible is contained within the composer's vocabulary.  It is not enough (at this point) to find the hook on which to hang a contagious tune.  The effort required--to sit at the piano, conduct a choir, scratch these notes between the narrow bars of this new prison--necessitates that something survive and thrive below the surface.  This piece must be evocative; as it comes--from voice, or band , or instrument--this assemblage cannot afford the passive satisfaction of being merely pretty, or of pretending to be deep.  There is not enough pretense in the world with which to overcome the artifice of pretense.  There is no authentic feeling that will not trump the fabrication of emotion that the cheap composer relies on.
Goddamn it.....he knows better.