| Content | Bohuslav Martinů has finished viewing the competition scores. Out of 450 compositions, he selected 10 and only two of them are good. He saw 450 lives, minds, energies. Some of the scores are yellowed and you can see that they have wandered from one competition to another in the hope of confirmation, performance and money. The audition is anonymous, but all the pieces sound like Respighi. Very few of the scores were interesting. It's as if time has stopped and the music in them sounds like it did 40 years ago when BM started. There were no competitions then, but BM sees the struggle, the search for ideas to put into the music, the fleetingness and impermanence of the thing that disappears before we can capture it. And now he, Bohuslav Martinů, sits here and judges their scores, but he cannot judge their lives. BM also once sent a piece of music to [Elisabeth] Coolidge for an audition for [THE SMITH SEXTET], and Roe Barstow knows what went on during the judging process, and if that's true, it was the most ridiculous thing in the world. Anyway, BM got the award that time and now there are 450 other people waiting. So there will be 440 big disappointments and only 10 will be happy. When memories come into play we get quite sentimental but not really. It's really about feeling sorry for ourselves and it makes us feel good, we're not hurting anyone and it makes for a nice memory. |