New Journeys and Paths

In terms of countdown, we now have two and one-half months until everything needs to be completed for The Veil of Forgetfulness premiere.  That sounds like a lot of time, but throw in the several main holidays, family obligations, obligations to friends, housework, my thirty plus hour day job, entering competitions, posting here, posting on several other forums, overseeing a fundraiser, making sure the orchestral parts are edited and printed in a timely matter, running rehearsals, finishing other compositions, editing that blasted web page, rehearsals, and the purely mundane: eating, sleeping, exercise and the occasional shower, there is not a lot of time left.

One emotion I hardly ever feel is lonely. Overwhelmed, however, is my middle name. This leads to the question of how serial killers are related to the artistic process. It may seem a stretch unless one is a writer of true crime, however there is a definite connection for me. My favorite way to handle being overwhelmed is to watch (in one sitting) a whole season of "Wire in the Blood," a Brit TV series similar to "Dexter," but without the laughs. You see it is the exact opposite of what I usually spend my time at, so it produces balance.  I am sure that it is not good for me, but I don't care and I have some very good excuses.

If I were not producing musical works of a mystical, spiritual nature, I would be an aberrant psychologist or profiler. For instance, on Saturday, I finished my song cycle, "Walking on Earth", which is about the human relationship to the divine and the enlightenment found in nature. Sunday, I am watching man's destruction of man for a good long time, interspersed with a minimum of boring housework.  I think this dichotomy or duality in pursuits stems from my childhood (just like all my other neuroses).  When I was about four or five the the woman next door was murdered, and I got caught watching them wash away the blood. I have been watching ever since. Probably because I was not supposed to -- I have a very contrary nature! A closely related second influence in this regard was probably the In Cold Blood scenario which truly transpired about 50 miles from my hometown when I was about 10 or 11.  That was the only time our doors were locked while growing up. 

Watching all this violence somehow makes me feel calm. Perhaps it puts my trials in perspective. Perhaps it releases the pent up anger that lies beneath the surface caused by all those childhood induced neuroses.  But does it work?  I go to sleep peacefully, confident of my profiling abilities as evidenced by guessing "who did it", and that all is put in order in this chaotic world.  However, this does not stop me from waking up in the middle of the night worrying about all the things I should have done instead of catching up on my Netflix addiction. I will say on my behalf, that I do study the character development, what makes me like or hate the character, what makes the excitement build, or what is just plain over the top and too much. Although I much prefer the implied rather than the graphic, unfortunately American television has imported its blood splatters, brains, and other nasty body parts zoomed in at a three hundred percent ratio across the pond for their disgust, as well as ours. 

I have always been interested in how the human mind works.  What makes it go from good to evil or vice versa, hence, my interest in the story. I can justify long hours of reading or TV watching under the guise of "research." Stories are what I write, whether it be in poetry, prose, or music.  Now in truth, I don't really have to wander much further than my own backyard for a story, but still you never know when something may spark one that is not in ones own home garden.

While watching the said serial killers, I usually do some sort of needlework. This is also satisfying because I have something to show for my endeavors that does not have a two or three year completion time. I have been compared to Madame Defarge of Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities" several times, but I don't think it was in a complimentary manner.  My only absolution is that my victims are totally fictional. The crime is always committed by someone else, and I wake up the next day ready to tangle with producing opera.  I am the heroine rather than the victim and the day is saved.

Posted by Susan Stoderl at 11:31 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

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Or How to Make a Buck an Hour and Be Glad to Get It 

I have just spent the last several weeks writing grants for the opera company that is sponsoring my next two operas, and then a couple for me. Not only have I been working on it, but my friend has been editing for me, three different people have been producing work samples and my husband has mailed or delivered the voluminous packages in the nick of time. This is a process by which you get to summarize the plot of a two hour opera in seventy-five words or less, and at the same time make it absolutely thrilling, while telling why it is socially relevant. "Well, I thought it was an interesting story" does not cut it.

Writing the grant and getting it in is not good enough either. Now that the grantor knows what a fabulous writer/composer/artist you are, and you have convinced them that this new work should earn a minimum of a Pulitzer, be seen by thousands of people, and change world thought, you have to update your web page. They may actually go look at it. But that is not enough either. There is your LinkedIn page, Facebook, and the blog you have not written because you were writing grants.  This is to show that you can market and network.  You don't have time work at your craft, but you're a whiz getting around the internet.

Then there is the work sample.

You remember the score you thought you finished long ago—it's not really done. You find all the mistakes, and have to correct those too. Then you have to print it; sometimes hundreds of pages. It also has to be accompanied by a CD.  Now that can be a problem if you have live recordings of a large number of people. What happens is that there is always one section that really shows what you can do as a composer, but that is precisely where the performers got lost, or are just a teensy bit behind or ahead. Hey! It's live. You don't get a second chance. If you had the money for professional recordings which involve many retakes and much splicing, you wouldn't need the grant. Anyone at the performance probably would not notice the error, but when it is there to be heard the numerous times it takes to edit a sample, it becomes GLARING. Then you spend hours questioning whether this sample ... or that sample ... would be the best. The more perfectly performed ... or the "statement" sample? Then there is the request for a sample of four minutes. Is three minutes, fifty seconds close enough, or should you go with the one that is four minutes ten seconds, or simply fade out at four minutes even, regardless of whether the singers were mid-syllable?

This is just a partial description of what Grant Land entails. Did I mention that while working on the one due October 5, Outlook pops up with the reminder of the one due October 1. Oops!  Working on the wrong one. Quickly, I switch over to the correct one and get it in, then return to the one due the 5th. Did I mention that the grants are for two different works so there is no cut and paste from one to the other? And that while you are working on one, you are wondering if you actually hit the "submit" button on the other? Speaking of which, I need to check that! A hint about the submit button:  if the grant is due at 5:00 PM and you try to hit that button at 4:59 PM, it is most likely not going to go through because there are several hundred (literally) other people trying to do the same thing at the same time. The server is probably overloaded.

Then there is the budget for the project—talk about hypothetical mathematics. This, again, is a matter of experience. You know you have done "X" with five thousand dollars, so it can be done, but to do a good job, you need twenty thousand.  So you ask for the twenty and hope you get a minimum of five. If you are lucky and planned correctly, you can maybe split the difference. However, say you come in at ten thousand, trust me, there will be something no one counted on to cut that amount down, like torrential rains, the subways are flooded, etc.  Audiences do not show up in six feet of snow and sleet, or torrential downpours. This is why God invented credit cards, and friends who will perform for free.

The grant is for three thousand dollars. It probably takes a minimum of one to two hundred man-hours to produce all that is needed for one grant, more if the work samples are not already completed and ready to go, plus some cash outlay for samples, postage and copying. You do the math. Overtime at the day job starts to look really good. But then, overtime has no caché.

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