Calligraphy, Changes, Autonomy

CALLIGRAPHY, CHANGES, AUTONOMY ROBERT MORRIS OMPOSERS IN MY GENERATION don’t often publicly reflect on how much the American composer’s world has changed over the last fifty years.1 Most of the ones I know simply cope and adjust, taking things as they come, rather than stopping to think about how different their daily work was back in the 1960s. Nonetheless, the difference between then and now is stark.2 To explain this difference in detail would take a century of pages, so I’ll follow just one thread that has affected music composition in ways rarely acknowledged by composers in their writings or informal public statements: copying music. This mundane activity, and changes in its practice over the past fifty years, resonates and interconnects with many other presumably more important developments through which I and other composers have lived. When I entered the Eastman School of Music in 1960 as a fledging composition major, I began to learn what it meant to be a “professional ” composer at that time. The curriculum included a special C Calligraphy, Changes, Autonomy 285 course for composers called “Music Calligraphy,” taught by a local music copyist named Litchfield Toland, using the textbook Preparing Music Manuscript by Anthony Donato. The course was designed to introduce composers to music copying using the most current method of the time: a stub pen dipped in jet-black India ink (no other type of ink could be used) on semi-transparent music paper. Using a ruler, we learned to write clefs, notes, rests, bar lines, and words. This was not easy, since the ink could smear (a special problem for a lefthander like me), and the angle of the pen had to be precisely managed to produce different thicknesses of lines; learning to copy even a simple treble clef was a vexing experience.3 Another aspect of the course involved the “correct” ways to lay out score pages and the use of engraver rules to order the position of accidentals, chords, dynamics, and other signs. The paper, which had to be vellum or onionskin (the terms were used interchangeably), was printed on one side with staves; one copied on the other side. If the paper was not uniformly smooth or greasy, one applied fuller’s earth powder to the page. Guidelines for layout could be written in blue pencil, which was transparent in the reproductive process. Corrections could be made with an ink eraser (preferably electric), or by cutting out an offending sign or measure from a page and replacing it with a patch using transparent tape. Example 1 shows two measures from my composition Out and Out (1989) for clarinet and piano, as originally copied in ink on vellum. Once a score had been prepared, the individual pages were then subjected to a blueprint process (which imparted a faint smell of ammonia to the pages) and the copies bound with plastic combs. There were no other methods, since other means of reproduction such as “dittomasters” were too crude, slow, and involved noxious chemicals ; and xerography was still in its infancy.4 No one liked this way of copying music, and several attempts were made to invent music typewriters, one of which was used by some music publishers. Printed scores were only available from publishers who employed professional music engravers to produce the plates for printing. From before 1950 to about 1975, there were many music publishers that printed and distributed contemporary music. They engaged music copyeditors, who would proof scores for errors and infelicities. The publishing houses advertised their products in magazines and via regular mailings to performing groups. They also looked for performance and commission opportunities for their composers, set up live and radio interviews, and arranged for newspaper previews and reviews. Some even published journals promoting classical and modern music. An engraved score was therefore a mark of prestige: having a publisher made you a professional.5 286 Perspectives of New Music EXAMPLE 1: MEASURE 50–51 FROM MORRIS , OUT AND OUT (1989) FOR CLARINET AND PIANO , AS ORIGINALLY COPIED IN INK ON VELLUM Calligraphy, Changes, Autonomy 287 In any event, the copying process took some time to learn and it was never...