yearlongday

tonight, i lost a cut-throat game of scrabble. i paced myself, biding my time and reserving my letters for more valuable words, including “stadium” for 40 points. in the end, however, i fell short of victory.

sometimes, i find game-like ways to write music…

in 1995, the first year i really approached songwriting seriously, i read something about how brian eno collaborated with david bowie on outside by enacting music role-playing sessions with members of bowie’s studio ensemble. later, in 1996, i learned of eno’s “oblique strategies“, a deck of cards with random suggestions to overcome periods of creative-block. further on, i heard of bowie’s randomization process, by which pages of text are shredded, either literally or virtually via computer program, with the fragments then arbitrarily reassembled into new text that becomes lyrics.

over the years, i have tried some games of my own. in humans (2000), i tried to compose what I call “song morsels”, pieces of music that intentionally avoid radio airplay because they are too short (many under one minute). these songs give listeners a sample, or morsel, of what might be a longer composition, but purposely fall short of top-40 standards.

i’ve tried the role-playing game as well, by attempting to write music from a younger point of view; specifically in modern moments (2002), my aim was to produce a recording that sounded like it might have been made back in high school. as faithfully as possible, i played the instruments abailable to me when i was in high school, and even tried to sing with what i deemed a more “youthful” voice, though I don’t know how successful this attempt was.

in utopia, i worked from a concept-map of themes. at the center of the map was “utopia” and branching-out from the center were all the ideas in my mind relating to “utopia”. each idea was then linked to an image or sound, and from these, i made choices about lyrics, instruments, samples, title, track listing, even album art. soon, i hope to make paintings that illustrate the songs from utopia, thereby re-presenting the original concept in another medium and creating a self-generating body of artwork.

i tell this story because i believe that as an artist, i sometimes need to establish my own boundaries and define the terms of my own creativity. in some cases, this has meant literally building the vocabulary that explains what i’m doing. in other cases, it’s meant deliberately placing restrictions on myself to discover how far i can go with few options (as well as what new options open-up).

at times, songwriting can be like scrabble… one might have to look for remote possibilities, take some chances, and follow a strategy to make the most of whatever ‘letters’ turn up.

… jonathan t marlowe