Pinnacle

I just received my confirmation yesterday -- I'm going to Pinnacle in Nashville, July 18-21.  I'm more than a little excited, since this will be my first national handbell event, and more than a little anxious for the same reason.  I've had several of my publishers wanting to know if I'm going because they want to meet me, and while I know the handbell community is a close-knit group, that doesn't make it any less daunting to be meeting these people you've only seen before as names on the top right of the first page of pieces of music.  Still, should be a great party, though!

In other news, I'm happy to say that I was name the winner of the Area II Young Ringers' Festival composition contest.  My piece Fanfare and Reflection will be played at the Young Ringers' Festival in Kutztown, PA on July 5-7.  That was quite exciting, as it was really the first handbell composition contest I'd entered (I've entered other non-handbell contests before, but it's been back in the Dark Mists of Time), and the first time I'd won (obviously).  Attached to the contest was some prize money, which my wife (my staunchest supporter and most vocal fan) suggested (almost commanded) we use to help defray some of the costs of going to Pinnacle.  So, to Pinnacle we go! 

In other news, summer has started, which means intense composing.  The past two years, I've done something I've called InMuWriJu (Indiana Music Writing June, a direct homage to NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month) where I've tried to get as many rough drafts done in one month as I can.  That's always worked well and led to several publications, but this year I decided I'd try something different, and instead of going just for rough drafts (because I've still got rough drafts from June 2009 sitting around here that I have no desire or compunction to do anything with), I'd go for finished pieces.  The first one, a 3-5 octave arrangement of Shenandoah, I sent off to Lorenz, and then on to Alfred.  I'm nearly done with an SATB arrangement of Eternal Father, Strong to Save, and I'm maybe a third of the way through a hymn medley I'm simply calling Grace.  My goal is to get twenty four pieces finished by the time I go back to school on August 10 (which coincidentally just happens to be my birthday).  I also want a good healthy mix of handbell and choral, with some other pieces (maybe some string pieces, piano, other instrumental, not sure ...) thrown in.

For part of those twenty four pieces, I'm also looking at going back to pieces I've written a while back (I think most composers will tell you we all have these pieces -- things we wrote when we were younger and more naive, things that have decent promise but poor execution) and working them into submittable shape.  I have several holiday tunes and a couple originals that fit that bill (including the Jingle Bells I wrote for the Raleigh Ringers), and those, hopefully, shouldn't take too much time to work around.

Now that summer is here, I hope to provide a more regular update on how the composing activities are going.  I realize a blog is supposed to have something to offer the reader, so this summer I'm hoping to offer an insight into the life and work of a composer -- the day-to-day trials and effort, the joys, the woes, and everything in between -- since most of your reading this are likely not composers.  I can still remember when I was in elementary school (and this opinion is still shared by the kids at the school where I teach) that I always assumed composers were people long-dead, or else really really old, and I think on a subconscious level, there are a lot of people who still feel that.  The cool thing is, most composers that I've ever known or talked to or know anything about aren't the "tortured genius" sort like Beethoven -- walking around muttering to themselves whilst ripping out their hair and beating the walls -- but are just regular guys and gals with regular jobs, regular hobbies, regular lives.

Anyway, that's the plan.  If nothing else, writing on a more regular basis should help "keep me honest" with how things are going here, and should help keep me motivated to actually get done what I want to get done.  So, until next time, dear reader, thank you for showing up, and I hope to see you again soon.