I went with Diego this afternoon to a “reading” of his and some of the others in the department’s pieces. All the pieces were for violin, cello, clarinet, and piano. I liked most of them, and it was really interesting to see the interactions between the composers and the musicians. The musicians made suggestions about how the scores might be improved, and the composers indicated where the musicians didn’t play the pieces quite like they wanted.

Unfortunately, with some pieces, I find my mind wanders partway into the piece and I would start thinking about all kinds of other things that have nothing to do with the music. I haven’t quite figured out why I do that with some pieces but not others. Overall I find the music to be hard to appreciate. I don’t mean that I think it’s bad, but simply that I don’t have the musical knowledge necessary to fully appreciate the pieces. It kind of frustrates me but I think it is somewhat symptomatic of the genre of music. Most people simply aren’t capable of appreciating it.