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I
have big news. In fact, I have had it for some time, but I have been keeping it
under my hat until I knew it was official. That's the reason I haven't been
blogging -- I'm not very good at keeping secrets, and this has been one of the
hardest secrets I've ever had to keep. But now I can speak freely:
My
first book, Decomposition: A Philosophy of Music, will be published in late
2014 by Knopf
Doubleday, under their Pantheon
imprint. My editor will be the brilliant Erroll McDonald, who has worked on many
amazing books, by many amazing writers.
I
owe an enormous debt to Barbara Clark, my agent, who not only discovered an
early version of Decomposition on this very blog several years ago, but went above
and beyond the call of duty at every step of the process of finding it a home.
There are plenty of other people to thank as well, of course, and that will all
come in time (the book will need a hefty acknowledgments section) -- but I
wanted to take special note of Barbara's role in advance.
In
the meantime, I'm not looking back. I guess 44 is not the usual age to embark
on a brand new career, but here goes nothing. I mentioned in my last post that
I was working on a new book project, but in fact (and here's another secret I
have been keeping) I am working on two: another work of nonfiction, and my
first attempt at a novel. (If all this seems like an odd shift, keep in mind
that my life thus far has been marked by odd shift after odd shift. I
don't claim to understand it, I just do what the voices in my head tell me to.)
Also, to be clear: I won't be abandoning music, just because I've been bitten by
the literary bug. For one thing, I have two unreleased albums nearly finished
(an IJG recording that I have been obsessing over since 2009, and the debut
album by Proto-Human, my Portland sextet). I can't seem to stop writing new
music for either group. I ask your patience as I figure out how to bring these
sounds to new audiences in 2014.
Finally,
I will do my best to keep this blog going -- though it may take a little while
to get into a regular posting schedule again.
Thank
you for reading.
(The
above photo, by the way, was taken at the Random House building in New York,
which is where Knopf Doubleday is based. That's a big beautiful shelf in the lobby, full of
notable first editions.)
2 comments:
Great, well done. Could you maybe tell us what the book is about? I see the title "Decomposition: A Philosophy of Music", but no explanation.
Thanks in advance - Joe
Thanks for asking, Joe, and sorry for the slow response.
I guess the elevator pitch is that the book is a critique of popular misconceptions about music -- particularly about musical authorship and musical authenticity.
I'm pretty skeptical of the value of either of those terms. I argue that all music--even the stuff attributed to people we call geniuses (Beethoven is the best example)--is produced collaboratively, and that our perception of it is mediated in complicated ways we don't typically think about, even (or perhaps especially) if we're involved in making music ourselves. So for me, the idea that there is ever "a piece" of music is nonsensical.
I realize that may be a little vague. . . apologies. I'm working on a website for the book -- perhaps that will do a better job of giving you a preview.
Again, thanks for asking.
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