The Development of the Young Composer's Voice
Margaret Lucy Wilkins, Department of Music, University of Huddersfield
Disciplines: Music
Status: Complete
Start date: 1/9/2002
Outcome format: Book
Outcome available: Yes
As young composers, my generation was advised to seek instruction at a university, where we would gain knowledge of the craft of composition. This was true as far as the historical periods were concerned, but it left us woefully ignorant of contemporary aesthetics and techniques. This represented the "state of the nation" as far as the education of composers had developed at that time (1960s) within the UK.
Since then, my generation of composers has been teaching in university music departments and conservatoires in numbers which were previously unknown. Nowadays, most university music departments employ at least one composer. Thus it has become the task of my generation to develop ways of teaching young composers which are entirely new to Higher Education within the UK, as well as many other European institutions.
Drawing upon 25 years of experience of teaching Free Composition to undergraduates and postgraduates, I plan to write a book which outlines some of the ideas which have contributed to the education of a generation of young musicians. Many now serve in the classroom, where their experience of Free Composition enables them to teach Music to National Curriculum standards. Others have emerged as young composers in their own right, winning international awards, broadcasts on radio and TV, as well as many performances via the SPNM (Society for the Promotion of New Music) and other organisations dedicated to new music.
The term, "Free Composition", implies creative work which is not stylistically based within historical eras. In practice, it has come to mean composing within a 20th./21st. Century Western European style, open to individual interpretation.
The aim of this Project is to produce a book (with accompanying CD of musical examples) applicable to the learning and teaching of Free Musical Composition within a Higher Education context. The ideas generated within the proposed book could be useful for the development of young composers' "voices" in any European, Australian or American Music Schools. It is intended that the book will be aimed at the student composer, as well as providing ideas for the composition tutor.
Many of the previous batch of books on the teaching/learning of Free Composition are now out of print. None of these books included musical examples by women composers. I will use up-to-date examples of music composed by both men and women.
It is essential for developing composers to know the aesthetic context in which they aspire to work.
This project is now complete. The following book has been published:
Wilkins, Margaret Lucy (2006) Creative Music Composition: The Young Composer's Voice. London & New York: Routledge. ISBN: 0-415-97467-4, 288pp