Last night, I started reorchestrating a composition for Wind Ensemble that I wrote a few years ago. There are many competitions for wind ensemble pieces and since I'm not a huge fan of the ensemble (what?! I just like strings, okay?!) I have only gotten around to writing one. And boy was that a strenuous process. I got my most intense and awful case of writers block trying to finish that dang piece. I even completely restarted the piece after getting about 70% finished with the original version.
I hadn't looked at the piece in a long time. When I finally came back to it, I was able to almost instantly fix many of the problems I had struggled and toiled with for so long while writing the piece. This experience was reassuring because it felt like a tangible way to measure how I had improved as a composer and orchestrator. In this field where progress in craft is often abstract, slow, and incremental, it is nice to have these occasional reminders of how far I've come.
I often have a very loathing relationship with time (as I'm sure most do.) I feel like time is always moving so fast. Far too often I hear my self saying "I wish I had a little more time!" But this is one of the times where I am thankful for time. Significant amounts of time placed between individual events can be extremely helpful in being able to find benchmarks. These achievements are needed for motivation to continue and to give a sense of energy and drive to the work that needs to be done.
Anyways, enough rambling for today.
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