We had our piano compositions recorded today, and our class's compositions reminded me of the compositions my music theory class recorded last year. The high school idea of modern composition and the college idea, I've realized, are two completely different matters. My own composition from last year was a musique concrète-lite piece as a tribute/criticism of Twitter. Other pieces were reading a poem over a minimal riff, composing with limited pitch material (Barktòk, anyone?), and juxtaposing jazz saxophone solos with drums (mediocre counterpoint?). But are those really modern? As discussed in forum, it's a little difficult to know WHAT exactly constitutes modern composition, especially because most people still revere techniques/styles over 40 years old. 12-tone music is post-tonal. Serialism can be post-tonal. Spectralism, closer to present day, is also post-tonal. So I guess if you consider post-tonal music a label for the music being created in classical art music, then all of those are still modern. But 12-tone started with Schönberg in the '20s. Serialism came after in the '50s. Musique concrète came in the late '40s. How old these styles are, and we're still looking back to them!!! Not saying that any of these styles are useless. But come on, can't we think of something new to teach?

I've seen some buzz at school for alternate tuning systems. JI is becoming more and more popular. As my comp teacher would have put it: Letting the instruments play how they were destined to play. Maybe he wouldn't have said it exactly like that, but it would've been something just as dramatic. Alternate tuning sounds interesting. Very mathematical...lots of physics. Maybe when I've mastered tonality (laughter), I can be bored with equal temperament and join the ranks of the high art world.

But for now, I'm still sticking to my original goal: combining pop and classical. I mostly wanted to introduce the "weird" classical techniques to pop music to add some sophistication and artistry to the production. But now that I'm at an innovative art school, I also want to introduce pop ideas to art music than can be aloof and impenetrable.

This is my manifesto! or a rant to distract me from writing a brass quartet.