Graphic Organizer

HERE is the first draft of the graphic organizer I began to develop today. I learned about these through other composers like Eric Whitacre and Fabia Mantwill who use these ‘mind maps’ as a compositional tool. Whitacre says he works on this extensively before he even writes a single note. Pete Meechan explained to me once that he was a ‘big planner,’ that you need to have a clear plan and a scope of the project before digging in to actually notate a score. I know I said I was going to work on more constraints today, but I felt that this mind mapping would help me to bring those constraints to the fore. Tomorrow I plan to spend more time developing this sketch (importing more points of essence, deciding which student elements will go into the piece as well as the ‘where’ and the ‘why’ of said pieces, and where and how to deal with the improvisational elements of the piece) and answering the fundamental question that Dr. Meechan taught me; that is to ask myself “What is it I am trying to achieve in writing this piece of music?” And that will be tomorrow’s blog post.