Iowa: Lines, Borders, Boundaries
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David McClelland MAP Summer 2001 8/12/01 Iowa: Lines, Borders, Boundaries Part I: Process This morning after our meeting, I discussed with Natalie the problem of meshing personal and academic goals in composition. How does one create music that is personally and artistically satisfying, but also academically and historically meaningful? -Journal: May 30, 2001 I began my summer mentor-assisted project in composition with every intention of creating a good solid piece of academic work. I checked out and began to read a number of fascinating books on 20th century composition, Iowa’s “vernacular landscape”, and the history of the world soundscape. I conceptualized about the connections between lines in sound and space, between physical lines and contrived borders, and between perceptual borders and social boundaries. I diligently began to record and catalog the sounds of the vernacular Iowa landscape. I planned interviews with Iowans and a website to present the music in full contextual glory. I had the strong beginnings of a composition full of fertile academic and historical meaning. Promptly, I lost my motivation to compose music. Something was missing. Unfortunately, it took most of the rest of the summer and a physical injury for me to figure out what it was. Nothing in this project has come very easily. It’s all been frustratingly slow work... I don’t feel like there was any point where I just felt like I had a burst of inspiration and something just came 1 out. It’s all been slow methodical work, not always of the most exciting sort. -Journal: July 20, 2001 For over a month, I struggled. I had a hard time motivating myself to work, I found plenty of distractions, and the work I completed lacked motivation in itself. I spent several weeks trying to change a collection of sounds from the Iowa soundscape into something meaningful, but my work, the first mix of "Lines" lacked cohesion. Somehow my theoretical ideas weren’t translating into anything artistically interesting. So I found more distractions. I escaped from my composing by writing music--music that had as little to do with the project as possible. In particular, I composed a song entitled "Unfinish," with my midi synthesizer and a reconstructed drum sample. The track featured a contrapuntal harmony and a skittering syncopated rhythm. Its meanings were entirely personal, and I had no interest in integrating it into the academic realm of my project. I didn’t feel like it was appropriate for the standard of "historically meaningful" music I had set for myself. On the other hand, unlike my project, I was actually happy with it. I’m really frustrated at this point. I’m having a lot of trouble with wrist pain... At this point, I’m questioning whether I’ll be able to finish this project at all... -Journal: July 11, 2001 In the last week of June, I strained the tendons in my arm with too much continuous computer work. At first, just a nuisance, several weeks later it brought my work to a complete stand still. I was almost ready to give up and change 2 directions to a more researched based project. After all, the research elements of the project had so far been more successful than the creative elements. However, as much as I never wanted to use a computer again, I couldn’t face the disappointment in just giving up. With some advice from the doctor and support from my advisor Jon Chenette, I began working again, taking frequent breaks to stretch and rest my arm. Still, my work on the second section, “Borders,” was methodical but uninspired, and I had little direction for my final section. However, something had changed. With the frustration of my arm pain, came an emotional investment in the work. Finally, I really cared about finishing it. Starting yesterday afternoon, throughout today, I’ve spent a lot of time going back to “Lines.” It had been bothering me that it hasn’t been finished. -Journal: July 24, 2001 In the end, I had to change my expectations to finish Lines, Borders, Boundaries. I had to put aside my overly academic conceptual concerns and let myself become emotionally involved in the music. I had to compromise my unrealistic ideals of both academic and emotional music, in order to achieve something ultimately more satisfying. In returning to "Lines" I added a synthesizer and rhythmic track, purely because I found it aesthetically pleasing. The synthesizer part was influenced by (and, in one section directly quotes from) my work, "Unfinish." All of a sudden, the piece gained both motivation and meaning, because I had risked something personal in its composition. In finishing "Lines," I felt a burden lift and "Borders" came almost easily. In giving myself 3 permission to do what I really wanted--instead of what I felt I ought to do--I was able to complete "Boundaries" in only a fraction of the time spent on the other two sections. Part II: Product While it took an emotional investment in the work to finally complete Lines, Borders, Boundaries, the research and conceptualization did not go to waste. To some extent, I had to set aside the academic research in the actual process of composition, but in the end, whether consciously or not, this preliminary research infused the music. There are two contrasting themes holding together the distinctive sections of this work: orientation and tension. Each section explores how we define ourselves as Iowans, but also how we struggle with these definitions. Lines I want to start by examining natural/environmental lines and boundaries in the Iowa landscape/soundscape. Part of this will be utilizing the correlation between straight line and repetitive sounds in human conceptualized landscapes and organic line and unpredictable sounds in the natural landscape. -Journal: June 7, 2001 The first section of this piece, "Lines," is about spatial orientation and the tension of a created natural landscape. Growing up in rural Iowa, I have come to expect the hills to roll away to the horizon and the cicadas to sing into late 4 summer. I expect roads to follow cardinal directions and the rumble of passing airplanes to be muted by distance. While I may take these expectations for granted, leaving Iowa and returning always brings them into focus. As a child coming home from long family trips, when we crossed back over the Mississippi, I was suddenly eased. The hills rolled by us in proper fashion, and when we stepped out of the car, the continual evening hum of late August insects greeted us home. My conceptualization of “Lines" drew heavily on two sources: The Tuning of the World: Toward a Theory of Soundscape Design by R. Murray Schafer, and Take This Exit: Rediscovering the Iowa Landscape, edited by Robert F. Sayre. Schafer introduces the concept of hi-fi (rural) and lo-fi (urban) soundscapes (43), and writes, “The definition of space by acoustic means is much more ancient then the establishment of property lines and fences” (33). "Lines" explores this space-defining power of sound while playing with the tensions between the hi-fi and lo-fi sounds of the human and natural landscapes. As Sayre writes in Take this Exit, “...Iowa is not a natural landscape. It is almost entirely a human-made one: measured and cultivated, planted and built...” (11). Indeed, even Iowa's prairie land, such as the Neal Smith National Wildlife Refuge, has been mostly recreated. Likewise, as I experienced at Neal Smith, standing in the hi-fi soundscape of an insect- and bird-filled prairie one still hears the highway in the distance and plane engines overhead. "Lines" builds on this experience. The main harmonic content is created from the dropping pitch of a plane passing 5 above the prairie, analyzed and resynthesized in Metasynth. The melodic material is composed to fit this harmonic progression. Near the beginning of "Lines," an annoying fly buzzing merges into a lo-fi rumble of passing cars. Near the end, this plane harmonizes with synthesizer and birdsong. Both natural and human sounds can be ugly or beautiful. In Iowa, both are part of our sonic orientation. In the middle of this work is a more introspective contrasting section, reflecting on the transformative powers of both water and technology. The muffled voice in the background is from a recorded narration at Lock and Damn No. 10 in Guttenberg, Iowa, explaining how locks maintain a set channel depth along the Mississippi. Borders The debate was quite fascinating ... and the material seemed very fertile. Lots of differing opinions on what was most important in dividing up the state: regional identity, compact districts, bringing diverse people together, political convenience, etc. Still, I’m not sure how to approach this material in a “musical” fashion. -Journal: June 19, 2001 The second section of this composition, "Borders," is the most literal treatment of orientation and tension, exploring the geo-political lines dividing up the state and ideological divisions within the Iowa Senate. On June 19, 2001, the Iowa Legislature convened for a special session to debate the adoption of a second plan to reapportion Iowa’s state and federal congressional districts. An original plan, developed by a non-partisan committee, had been rejected in the regular 6 legislative session on the grounds that the population deviation among the five House districts was too large. The second plan developed by the committee remedied this problem at the expense of the physical compactness of the districts. While most senators were satisfied with the compromised improvements of the second plan, a vocal minority raised objections, making for fascinating debate on the senate floor.