I'm burning the midnight oil working on program notes for the next RSO concert, and I came across this quote from Ravel while researching his Piano Concerto in G.
"The G-major Concerto took two years of work, you know. The opening theme came to me on a train between Oxford and London. But the initial idea is nothing. The work of chiseling then began. We’ve gone past the days when the composer was thought of as being struck by inspiration, feverishly scribbling down his thoughts on a scrap of paper. Writing music is seventy-five percent an intellectual activity."
As the kids say these days, "true that".
This is definitely a reassuring quote. And it's applicable to all other art forms, too. A spark of inspiration is one way to start a work - but not always the way to end it!
ReplyDelete