The Hand of Fate, Part I

I'm lucky. In a single instant I knew what I would do with the rest of my life.

The Time: the mid-1980s
The Place: somewhere in the midwest

The Setup:

As long as I can remember music has been an important part of my life. I spent a lot of time in the hospital when I was very young. I was read to and listened to the radio often. Later on I would discover that I was a HUGE fan of the music from Superman (and the movie, too). This was really my first exposure to orchestral music. I remember going to an educational concert given by the Kansas City Symphony when I was in grade school. They played the theme from Superman then, too. I was blown away! I thought to myself that this must be something really special for these guys to take the time to learn how to play it (yes, I realize I was only 8 or so at the time; things do change a little over time. To this day the music for Superman still holds a special place with me). I had an old VHS copy of the movie that my grandfather (ever the techno-geek, right up until his death 11 years ago) taped off television and edited the commericals out (this was in the mid-80s mind you; a big-time deal!). I wore out the first 6 minutes of that tape listening to (and watching) the main title sequence over and over and over (one of the best title sequences EVER). I was also able to watch Ben-Hur from beginning to end by the time I was 8 years old. Probably in no small part due to Miklos Rozsa's amazing score, though I didn't know it at the time (and the chariot race, I suppose; one of the greatest action scenes ever filmed and no music - a brilliant and artistically correct choice).

I always loved singing in elementary school. Like so many others I joined the school band in the 6th grade. I got my first trumpet from the pastor of my church at the time (the trumpet is, of course, a manly instrument, as opposed to the oboe! - KIDDING!). Most of my teachers were uninspiring throughout the course of my public school music education. I don't even remember the name of my first band director. My junior high band directors were enthusiastic but ultimately I was in band for the social aspect of belonging to something (I think most of us know how that feels). Then came high school. My first high school band director only taught to the best of his students and the rest of us fell by the wayside (further, he was not a very good director, as I would come to discover later. He was a horrid conductor and a mediocre rehearsal technician). My second HS director was more enthusiastic and expected a lot more of us as we were a smaller school (by this time my family had moved to the next town, very small) that had a reputation for excellence. He had a great impact on me as a musician. But not as great the impact as the choir director at this small-town school. He was the reason I became a musician and became so open- and high-minded about what music can be. Not in an arrogant sense, mind you, but about the expressive capabilities of any kind of good music. By this time I was already becoming steeped in the possibilities of film music but also knew that there was more to be had...

The Moment:

The Time: Finals week. January, 1994 (10th grade).
The Place: Mrs. Farrabee's Western Civilization class.

We had already taken our final and Mrs. F. said that she didn't care what we did so long as we didn't play cards (apparantly, somebody lost money years before). Anyway, my friend Patrick Pyzska slips me a CD of John Williams and the Boston Pops Orchestra playing film themes of Maestro Williams. It was upon hearing the first notes of the Olympic Fanfare and Theme, and ultimately the rest of the disc, that I knew that music of drama was going to be my professional life.

So when Pat loaned me that CD (eventually my first CD purchase) it changed my life completely. I made a tape of it (didn't have a CD player at this time - poor, you know) and just about wore out the tape due to incessant listening. Eventually I began picking out the themes on the piano (I had some lessons late in elementary school but the whole experience kind of turned me off to the piano, but that's another posting. On the whole I was - and still am - pretty awful at playing the piano).

It wasn't too long before I got my first job which means that I had a lot of disposal income (comparatively speaking). I started going to movies and purchasing film scores at an unbelieveable rate. By the time I graduated high school my CD collection had ballooned from 0 to about 150. I had also made it a point to see as many movies as I could in the theatre and started catching up on old movies in order to make a more conscious attempt at understanding how music works in film.

At first I thought I might enjoy being a studio player and began gearing myself in that direction. How awesome would it be to just get to play this stuff? Then I discovered how ridiculously competitive the studio musician world was and just how wretched a trumpet player I really was (it wasn't until my second year of college that I discovered it was actually equipment - no crap). Then I began to conduct (learning by paying attention to the drum major in marching band, ugh, and then conducting to the recordings). I thought it would be fun to be a studio conductor. I mean, forget playing, how great would it be to get to conduct this stuff to a 75-piece orchestra!?!

Then came the writing. At first I was playing the themes by ear and then I started improvising my own "embellishments" and then my own extensions where I would no longer use the original theme but my own embellishments. Naturally everything I wrote was horrific, but it was a start...