Through The Eyes Of The Mother Of The Composer

I wonder if Mama Tchaikovsky felt this way. Hearing a full orchestra of professional musicians rehearse a piece my 16 year old son wrote was amazing. I have heard this piece from the beginning. He would write a few measures then ask me to listen. “What do you think?” he would ask. What could I say. It sounded good to me but I’m his mom. Not a very objective opinion. He continued to work on it for about a month. It just seemed to blossom.

This is a picture of Timothy meeting the conductor, David Mairs.

The contest rules said it had to be between 5 and 7 minutes long. His was over 8. What to do? He started cutting a little here, reworking a little there. Before long, it was better than it was. It was very enjoyable to listen to but, again, I am his mom. Not a very objective opinion.

So we (his dad, 2 brothers and myself) sit, the only audience in the huge concert hall, to watch and listen as the Austin Symphony rehearses Timothy’s composition. Where’s Timothy? Perched on a stool on stage, right next to the first violins. I wish you could have seen it. My baby, sitting all by himself, listening intently as 40 or so musicians play the notes he had written.

Up until that moment, all he or any of us had heard was what the software program spit out in all its digital glory. A good representation but not the real thing. This night, the music came alive. The personality of the musicians brought out parts of the music in a most extraordinary manner. Watching the conductor as he prompted the musicians to perform the piece in the way he envisioned it was exhilarating.

That is what is so cool about the collaboration of musicians performing a piece. The composer has an idea and attempts to put it down on paper so that other musicians can understand what he is thinking. The conductor attempts to conduct it in such a way to convey his own message. Each of the musicians have their idea of what the piece means. By the time the composer, the conductor and the musicians have put their personalities and interpretations into it, it’s almost done. There is one more person involved — the listener. Each person in the audience brings their own thoughts and ideas to the piece. The end result can be awesome. It is a different experience for everyone in the room. In this case, on this particular evening, for this mama, the end result was more than I had ever imagined.

You might wonder what Timothy’s response to all this was. His first words after it was all done were, “Did you hear the trumpets?” He had kept saying, while writing the piece, that the software program was not portraying the trumpets like it should. He was thrilled to hear the musicians playing it just like he had imagined. His Facebook status when we got back to the hotel was, “I just heard my piece played by a professional orchestra. It was probably the most terrifying experience. :)”

While this is just a recording of what went on this particular evening, I wanted to share it with you. Let you be the 4th person, the listener, in creating this piece of music. This is An Evening Storm by Timothy Dow during a rehearsal of the Austin Symphony Orchestra conducted by David Mairs.

The opportunity to have Timothy’s piece performed came about through a composition contest the Austin Symphony sponsors. The top 2 compositions were being rehearsed to be performed at Austin area high schools later in the week. In April, it will be performed again in the concert hall along with 9 other compositions from the contest. In the foreground of the video you can see a couple of people moving around. These guys are putting together a documentary on the composition contest. They interviewed the two composers, the conductor and did quite a bit of video and still photography. The documentary should be aired late this summer or early fall.