September. I dreaded September for years and years --- starting when I was six. When I was five I had no idea what school was, but I did when I was six. That's when the dreams would start just as school was approaching. Not nightmares really, but anxious dreams where I rehearsed everything about school for several weeks before "the big day". Those dreams generally lasted for the first weeks of school --- at least into October -- then I'd relax and the dreams would be gone --- until the next year. The dreams, by the way, lasted until I stopped teaching --- hmmm --- in my thirties.
Now I have those dreams whenever I prepare for a performance. They've already started for "Obsession." But in performance dreams, the music swirls again and again. My worst show dreams were when I directed "George M" because it was all Cohen music and NONE of it was slow! You can't sleep with "You're a Grand Old Flag" going on relentlessly in your brain.
At least some of the music I wrote for "Obsession" is "ballady" enough to still sleep with. And the good news is as the music swirls, I hear variations that help with the writing --- you know when you're writing show music you have several basic themes that need to recreate themselves, depending on the scene. At least that's how I look at the music.
So I've gotten some great stuff written from the dreams --- in the original Frankenstein symphony piece that we wrote, there was a song that Victor, the scientist, sings in the third movement questioning all of his choices. Because of the swirling, I realized that this song should be put into the first act, in the very beginning. We're now using it for the student scene when Victor first goes to the university and starts his quest to find the secret of life. Michael and I are very pleased with how this whole scene has turned out. I hope the scene is as good on stage as we feel it is on paper.
Oops --- shouldn't have said that --- tonight that will be part of my dream!
