Inside the mind of a composer (pt.1) --- Title

I'm going to start a short series on my blog over break on a topic that I seem to rarely write about anymore, my music.  As you can all see I changed the name of my blog from the almost always mispronounced 'thecomposinator' (sounds like the terminator) to 'I writes a blog' due to this phenomenon.  So I'm going to start a series for all you blog readers to get a glimpse into the mind of an elusive composer, how I think about composing, the process, ideas, structure, and other junk about what I do.  So here's post number one.


In many ways the hardest part of the compositional process (and most often for me one of the last) is the arrival at a final title for a piece.  Each composer assigns a different amount of importance to what their titles mean and what they want to evoke or give away.  Composers like Russell Pinkston stick to titles that are light hearted and incorporate the name of the performer he's writing the piece for in them, ex.  Lizamander for Elizabeth McNutt, or Gerrymander for Gerry Erante.  Of course these titles are puns and have second meanings that tie into the process too.  This points to the title being a structural part of the composition (or at least incorporated into early ideas).

Some titles are meant to evoke an image to the listener that the composer desires them to know going into the listening.  Takemitsu has some very evocative titles (especially in his last phase) like Rain Spell or Rain Tree.  He also had a water motive (s-e-a) infused throughout these works so most of their titles have to do with water.

Some composers like really technical titles that have either to do with an algorithm or scientific (hard or soft) principle behind them.  They typically sound like a word you've never heard before ex. (making these up) Geometus, or Fractal Dimentions, or something equally cool sounding.

These are but a few of the ways in which composers use title for their works.  If a composer wants to be really 'original' they'll call it untitled in an attempt to negate any connotation of pre-conceived notion, or perhaps they think they are really really smart and a pioneer (which they aren't).

Titles generally fall into two categories, 1) a title that piece is built around (ie, pre-compositional), or 2) a title designated after the work (or near the end), or post-compositional.  Now it is true that the idea of the title can be pre-comp and the finalized version appears at the end (which is usually how I work).  I'm sort of a hybrid titler, I have the idea for the title and for what the piece means to me usually very early in the process and it (or the idea of it) will dictate the compositional choices I make but will usually arrive at a sleek, shiny new title near the end.

This is happening with the Mass I've been working on for almost a year now.  I knew I wanted the name Mass incorporated into it, but I didn't know the nature of how I wanted it to be incorporated.  I thought of doing a statement like, Mass for a new generation, since the Mass is generally an unused form in modern music. But then that sounds a bit pompous to me and it reminded me of the Pepsi slogan from the early 90's.

Then I got the idea to incorporate the Mass as a subtext and have a different headliner, so that people would be tricked into listening to it.  Yes, this is that path I shall take.  So I have a first draft of the title, which I really like at this point.  Int[er(re)]actions I: MassOrd.  This title may seem long and weird, but let me explain.  First off, this piece is built around guided improvisations and interactions between vocalists and instrumentalists.  It's also going to be a part of a larger series of pieces for improvisers.  So I wanted a title I could use more than once, hence the I.  It's the first of a series of these types of pieces.

The name MassOrd is a shortened version of Mass Ordinary which is the type of mass I'm setting: five of the traditional (mostly latin) mass, Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus/Benedictus, Agnus Dei.  I like the sound and look of MassOrd, as it's less clunky than the whole title.

The beef of the title is two words within in the one.  Inter-actions, inter-reactions.  I put the bracket (which I might take out) around er-re to show a symmetrical relationship between that letter ordering and symmetry is a main structural element in this piece.  I might take the brackets out because symmetry might only be an important element in this work, not more down the line.  I like it for now, and who's to say I can't take it out in later works.  So it could be Inter(re)actions or Int[er(re)]actions, I haven't decided yet.

I really like this title as of now, but who knows, as the work is not yet done and I have had no feedback on it yet.  It says everything I want it to say, that is, it has interactions, reactions, uses mass text.  Now as we get into the structure in a later post, we'll see how the structure is based all on personal and doctrinal view of God and that is very important, but I don't want to give that away in the title.  I want to title to be broad, interesting, and cool sounding.  I want to music to say what I really want to say and hopefully it will.  We'll have to see when it gets performed this semester.