Frank Corcoran

Still, it´s very important to get rid of bleating, the whiningly personal, any whine. Button up all whingy bars. Keep the self out of music of distinction . No mawking. Be tough on autobiographical references, however smartly arcane or carefully hidden away they may seem ; be also strict about nifty private programmes, though I am myself not fully averse to the occasional motiv , eg. ” Doh – Re- Mi”, ” B-A-C-H” and the like. In my future work , even ” F-R-A- n – Cis-Es C-orcor-A- n and such fun may certainly appear. Does this negate what I´ve just written about “self” in well crafted works ? Not at all; here we have intra- and not extra-musical material. Do you see ? Do you hear? ).
If Orpheus had had three saxophones, he would have availed of their WHAT power ? Their melancholy and reedy, rotten fruity plangency? He would! It´s intra-musical, silly!
Music bewails more than the ” DIES IRAE” ( although, of course, that too) . Music mourns the passing of time ( its own very stuff, surely ! ) . Even without a double reed in any particular registrar, the composer´s unsettling caoine.
Well then, can we attempt “joyful” music ? Sure we can ! ( But am I sure we can define…. ? Hmmm ) . What about music of power, music of awe ? Awful music ? Certainly. And music of human weakness and of loneliness, any kind of mawkish self-pity being revealed of a cracklingly cold December night-sky? We can. More on chapter and verse anon.