Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes. (Walt Whitman)
Well, I am not sure how large I am, nor how many multitudes I contain. But just these last few days I had my ideas about what I am writing, and now I see that things change.
Music for the people ! That's what I am striving to write, music which is technically accessible to be played by even some amateurs. But again, with themes about rain, lake and other water elements of Sapardi Djoko Damono (SDD), I canNOT write something easy for the piano ! Imagine Ravel writing easy pieces of Jeux d'eau or Ondine ... so again, millions of notes on the piano accompanying the long and winding tunes of the singer ...
But what am I doing ? I am composing a cantata, based on poems of SDD. If I don't contradict myself in a few days, it will be called Ars Amatoria (stealing from the title of a book by Ovid) . The blueprint with its structure and content is finished, and now comes the hardest part : writing the actual notes . But I have finished some poems. I am not writing the cantata from beginning to end ; I set poem by poem according to "my inspiration", since I know where I am going to put each poem in the context of the cantata.
Well, the biggest problem is (or was) selecting the poems : they are ALL so great. I have 200 poems of his now in print. And sometimes I feel like setting music to his poem which will not belong to Ars Amatoria cantata . So, I think I will make a "satelite" work out of it, just a collection of songs based on his poems. This collection of songs will have no structure ; I just add one song whenever I feel like it, taking a break from such a big undertaking in writing the cantata. And it has nothing to do with Ars Amatoria.
Nothing to do ? Am contradicting myself again. In fact, I have established some leitmotives on his themes. So, there is a "rain" (or whatever which is wet, like the river) motive, there is a "love" motive, and there is a "joke" motive. I am consistent in employing those motives in my work, both for Ars Amatoria and for the song cycle. I also foresee a "death" motive, but since I am not including his death-related poems, I'll leave it for the moment.
