Saturday, February 23, 2008

Advice to young composers

if no orchestra will play your music, don't complain; start your own orchestra
if no one will review your music, don't complain; start your own journal
if no one will publish your music, don't complain; start your own publishing company
if no opera house will produce your music, don't complain; start your own opera house
if no one will fund your music, don't complain; fund your music yourself
if no one will publicize your music, don't complain; publicize your music yourself
if no one will buy your music, don't complain; buy your music yourself
if no one will listen to your music, don't complain; listen to your music yourself

3 comments:

Lynne Rutter said...

sounds like you are complaining a little bit there, maestro. besides which, you are not alone listening to your music. it's beautiful.

Erling Wold said...

Yes, i'm complaining about artists who complain about their lack of recognition, as if other people were responsible for their success or lack of it. The other related pet peeve is want-to-be artists who complain that conditions are imperfect for their artist-ness and if they just had this and this and so on they could get around to it. I remember seeing Werner Herzog talk at the UC Theater - a moment immortalized in Les Blank's film Werner Herzog eats his shoe - where he says "If you want to do a film, steal a camera, steal raw stock, sneak into a lab and do it!." Yep, that's all there is to it.

zmjezhd said...

I like listening to your music, too. V. used some of it the other day in a podcast. You are top of my maestro lists ...

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