Yes, music - but for whom? One cowardly answer could be: for human beings. Another one: for no-one. My attitude toward the issue can be summed up as a combination of both answers. A combination that should turn out - if only a bit - less cowardly. A combination that in fact serves to render the distance between the two answers arbitrary and artificial.
I make music in a situation without any particular recipient - we have left the age of beneficiaries behind us, we work in absence of king and cleric. Now - this is where the trouble begins - I refuse, or fail, to recognize what may be called 'humanity', the sole and genuine addressee of the contemporary arts, as a consistent concept. It is certainly true that my compositions comprise sounds with frequencies within the limits of human auditory perception. But this is about as far as it goes. Sure, I want my music to resonate with the listener, but how can I possibly lay claim to any knowledge of beauty? One can only hope, because I do not believe that experience is in any way communicable - and if there be similarities between my personal experience and that of another listener, these should certainly not be the subject of my music. I must always take a cautionary step away from any prior knowledge about what comprises 'the musical'. I don't view this as a 'rupture from tradition', and I am not disavowing tradition - I would even venture to say that this socratic attitude, if you will, makes me something of a traditionalist. I don't see much use for abstractions here, not for the abstraction towards a notion of what makes up humanity, but certainly also not the violent abstraction of disregarding the emotional underpinnings of human experience. In the end, I try to wed this socratic attitude with avoiding the error of failing to appreciate that we are not timeless, coldblooded beings. Try again, fail again, fail better.
When I'm at work, I feel an urge to steer free of any preconceived ideas of 'what works' because the resulting piece of music should not 'work' - it should simply be. It should be a quiet place. A place which is accessible to anyone and contains no promises, only some possibilities.
Honestly, I couldn't say whom the work is for. For me - on an immediate level - it is simply a task, something to do. And when the task is completed, I consider the result not a message with a specific address, but rather the possibility of an occurrence that will always be embedded in a certain situation. The meaning of this occurrence can only come about within an essentially social situation. And, as Christian Wolff has it: one person making music and one person listening already makes for a social situation.
At the heart of the matter, I compose for a scene of two.
Amsterdam, xii '09
