Hmm...

I had a piano lesson on Tuesday evening... Actually, it was about 5 minutes of piano lesson and 30 minutes of talking.

I really like L, my piano teacher. She's a fun-loving, free-spirited person, a talented composer, an excellent pianist, and I felt like I connected with her within a minute of meeting her. The things she tells me are so good for me to hear. I often head off to my piano lessons feeling drained, overworked and harried, and I leave feeling refreshed and inspired.

On Tuesday, I mentioned that I was interested in composition and have been since I was an 11-year old with a MIDI composer and a head full of ditties. The main reason why I haven't been more proactive about exploring composition is because I suspected I'd be too pressured to be theoretically correct, balanced, educated. I'd have to research myself to death, listen to the works of other composers, and basically work the hell out of a piece in order to feel proud of it. I worried that whatever I wrote would be contrived and overly complex. L has a deep well of knowledge from which to draw her ideas, and I have a little puddle. My music would be as shallow and simple as my puddle.

She stopped me right there and told me that some of the most talented composers she's known have never taken a composition class. Why should I care if my music reflects my limited experience, if I find joy in writing it and listening to it? Why should I care if a composition is written in A minor in 4/4 and contains three pitches, if it's what I felt like composing at the time?

As an adult, I often find myself analyzing myself on so many levels that I don't exist anymore on the lowest one, the experiential, moment-to-moment level. I search for activities that engage me like that. That kind of absorption is so rare for me that it's a kind of freedom from self-objectification.

Steven has Finale. I'm looking into Sibelius First. I wonder if it's bad form to put it on my registry...?