Inspiration Without Perspiration
M. Zachary Johnson
January 18, 2008
Record stores began selling *Fantasies and Delusions*, an album of romantic-style piano music composed by rock star Billy Joel with the assistance of several arrangers. Since its release the record has remained at the top of the classical charts, proving that there is interest in and demand for new romantic music.
Unfortunately the album demonstrates the consequences of composing by "inspiration" with little serious or sustained intellectual work. This is an issue of the compositional process, but it explains a great deal about the resulting music.
In a 1978 interview published in *Rolling Stone* magazine, Billy Joel described his creative process:
"I don´t analyze it, I don´t intellectualize it, I just do it…. I think if I thought about it, and tried to figure it out, that I´d get analytical and clinical and cold and start to formulize. That´s the danger."
In a 1992 interview in the same magazine, he reiterates the view that if an artist uses a conscious process, he is blocking his ideas. There is a bit of truth in this view; at certain points an artist does need to allow the subconscious to dictate material. But Joel´s statements regard methodical effort *per se* as harmful -– including planning and editing.
There is some indication that Joel has recently begun to adopt a more serious, intellectual method: a 1997 New York Times article reported that he had just begun studying the rudiments of orchestration and the capabilities of symphonic instruments. However, *Fantasies and Delusions* bears marks of an anti-conceptual approach.
A "Reverie," according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is "an instrumental composition suggestive of a dreamy or musing state." The term implies absorption in thought, contemplation, pondering. Yet in the middle of Billy Joel´s *Reverie*, we find... a tango. This section, considered in isolation, is interesting and well done. There are even relatively effective transitions into and out of it. But it is totally out of place, and a disciplined composer would have cut it.
About six minutes into the *Waltz #1*, we reach a climax with the loudest, most virtuosic passages of the piece and the music comes to a complete resolution with three loud, accented chords. Then there is a long pause. As far as any listener could know, this is the end of the piece, and in a concert one would certainly applaud –- only to be embarrassed because the piece is not over yet. The music resumes, continuing for another twenty seconds before it ends – again – with the same three loud accented chords.
If a composer wants to notice such flaws and make improvements, it is imperative that he "get analytical." Joel might have rewritten the moment just before the pause, to make the harmonic resolution incomplete. That way during the silence the listener would be anticipating the resolution, and the final twenty seconds would be brought into connection with what came before them.
Another work, the *Invention*, contains instances of plagiarism, though they are probably unintentional. Its opening theme is a fragment of the melody from the last movement of Beethoven´s Eighth Piano Sonata, the *Pathétique*: exactly the same series of eleven notes, in the same rhythm and tempo, in the same key —- even the opening ornament matches. Another strikingly unique melodic segment that occurs in a couple of places in the Beethoven movement contains a descending scale followed by an upward leap followed by another descending scale. We find a very similar segment later in Joel´s Invention. Between those two instances we find a snippet of J.S. Bach´s Prelude in D minor (from Book 1 of *The Well-Tempered Clavier*). It has the same notes with a few discrepancies that nevertheless keep Bach´s harmonic pattern, in the same rhythm. Moreover, as one Amazon.com reviewer astutely points out, a long section in the middle of *Soliloquy* is clearly a rewrite of Chopin´s E major Etude.
Billy Joel´s childhood musical training consisted of classical piano lessons, and Beethoven´s Sonata, Bach´s Prelude, and Chopin´s Etude are all famous works, staples of the standard piano teaching repertoire. It seems likely that Joel thought he was composing his "fantasies and delusions" when he was in part just remembering and splicing together fragments of works he had played while growing up. This would account for both the essential sameness of these particular melodies and the minor discrepancies, a natural consequence of a faded, fragmented recollection. The way to prevent such slips is by gaining explicit knowledge of the repertoire with which one deals and by introspectively observing one´s own creative processes, not by "just doing it."
The compositions on *Fantasies & Delusions* do not exhibit a unified or individual style. The *Reverie*, for instance, contains passages in the style of Chopin, passages of Brad Mehldau-style jazz, and the tango. Other works contain not-so-faint echoes of Schumann, Brahms, Rachmaninoff, and Debussy. The album confirms Ayn Rand's observation that "Bad art is, predominantly, the product of imitation, of secondhand copying, not of creative expression."
As far as can be ascertained from his public comments, Joel is not deliberately plagiarizing, and he emulates the great composers out of admiration and respect, not out of a quest for legitimacy or prestige. He is aware of the mimicry, but is sincere in writing this music.
This brings us to the somewhat sad fact that certain moments of the music are quite moving and reflect a genuine ability. (It is sad because of the unrealized potential.) For instance, there is a wonderful passage a little under four minutes into the *Waltz #1*. There is a long melody containing 38 instances of the same brief rhythm, but there is no hint of monotony because each instance has fresh notes, and because the notes are arranged in waves so that each climactic point is higher than the last. The accompaniment here repeats its own rhythm, which is longer than the rhythm repeated in the melody, producing an offsetting and contrast of elements. The overall emotional effect is a certain lighthearted playfulness. *This* is the stuff of which great music is made.
Billy Joel is not going back to pop songwriting after this album –- at least not right away. He continues to compose instrumental music in a romantic style. It is possible, but not likely, that he, now in his fifties, will acquire the knowledge and discipline necessary to write more coherent and original "serious" music. If he does, we may hear good things from him.
In the meantime *Fantasies and Delusions* is a good cultural indicator. Even with its faults it contains some of the most pleasant sounding "serious" music written in decades, and it demonstrates that "serious" is not a synonym for "unintelligible." The public´s response to such open defiance of the destructive trends of the twentieth century has been overwhelmingly positive, and the album is commercially successful. This suggests that there is hope that Romanticism could be a thing not only of the past, but also of the future.
Unfortunately the album demonstrates the consequences of composing by "inspiration" with little serious or sustained intellectual work. This is an issue of the compositional process, but it explains a great deal about the resulting music.
In a 1978 interview published in *Rolling Stone* magazine, Billy Joel described his creative process:
"I don´t analyze it, I don´t intellectualize it, I just do it…. I think if I thought about it, and tried to figure it out, that I´d get analytical and clinical and cold and start to formulize. That´s the danger."
In a 1992 interview in the same magazine, he reiterates the view that if an artist uses a conscious process, he is blocking his ideas. There is a bit of truth in this view; at certain points an artist does need to allow the subconscious to dictate material. But Joel´s statements regard methodical effort *per se* as harmful -– including planning and editing.
There is some indication that Joel has recently begun to adopt a more serious, intellectual method: a 1997 New York Times article reported that he had just begun studying the rudiments of orchestration and the capabilities of symphonic instruments. However, *Fantasies and Delusions* bears marks of an anti-conceptual approach.
A "Reverie," according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is "an instrumental composition suggestive of a dreamy or musing state." The term implies absorption in thought, contemplation, pondering. Yet in the middle of Billy Joel´s *Reverie*, we find... a tango. This section, considered in isolation, is interesting and well done. There are even relatively effective transitions into and out of it. But it is totally out of place, and a disciplined composer would have cut it.
About six minutes into the *Waltz #1*, we reach a climax with the loudest, most virtuosic passages of the piece and the music comes to a complete resolution with three loud, accented chords. Then there is a long pause. As far as any listener could know, this is the end of the piece, and in a concert one would certainly applaud –- only to be embarrassed because the piece is not over yet. The music resumes, continuing for another twenty seconds before it ends – again – with the same three loud accented chords.
If a composer wants to notice such flaws and make improvements, it is imperative that he "get analytical." Joel might have rewritten the moment just before the pause, to make the harmonic resolution incomplete. That way during the silence the listener would be anticipating the resolution, and the final twenty seconds would be brought into connection with what came before them.
Another work, the *Invention*, contains instances of plagiarism, though they are probably unintentional. Its opening theme is a fragment of the melody from the last movement of Beethoven´s Eighth Piano Sonata, the *Pathétique*: exactly the same series of eleven notes, in the same rhythm and tempo, in the same key —- even the opening ornament matches. Another strikingly unique melodic segment that occurs in a couple of places in the Beethoven movement contains a descending scale followed by an upward leap followed by another descending scale. We find a very similar segment later in Joel´s Invention. Between those two instances we find a snippet of J.S. Bach´s Prelude in D minor (from Book 1 of *The Well-Tempered Clavier*). It has the same notes with a few discrepancies that nevertheless keep Bach´s harmonic pattern, in the same rhythm. Moreover, as one Amazon.com reviewer astutely points out, a long section in the middle of *Soliloquy* is clearly a rewrite of Chopin´s E major Etude.
Billy Joel´s childhood musical training consisted of classical piano lessons, and Beethoven´s Sonata, Bach´s Prelude, and Chopin´s Etude are all famous works, staples of the standard piano teaching repertoire. It seems likely that Joel thought he was composing his "fantasies and delusions" when he was in part just remembering and splicing together fragments of works he had played while growing up. This would account for both the essential sameness of these particular melodies and the minor discrepancies, a natural consequence of a faded, fragmented recollection. The way to prevent such slips is by gaining explicit knowledge of the repertoire with which one deals and by introspectively observing one´s own creative processes, not by "just doing it."
The compositions on *Fantasies & Delusions* do not exhibit a unified or individual style. The *Reverie*, for instance, contains passages in the style of Chopin, passages of Brad Mehldau-style jazz, and the tango. Other works contain not-so-faint echoes of Schumann, Brahms, Rachmaninoff, and Debussy. The album confirms Ayn Rand's observation that "Bad art is, predominantly, the product of imitation, of secondhand copying, not of creative expression."
As far as can be ascertained from his public comments, Joel is not deliberately plagiarizing, and he emulates the great composers out of admiration and respect, not out of a quest for legitimacy or prestige. He is aware of the mimicry, but is sincere in writing this music.
This brings us to the somewhat sad fact that certain moments of the music are quite moving and reflect a genuine ability. (It is sad because of the unrealized potential.) For instance, there is a wonderful passage a little under four minutes into the *Waltz #1*. There is a long melody containing 38 instances of the same brief rhythm, but there is no hint of monotony because each instance has fresh notes, and because the notes are arranged in waves so that each climactic point is higher than the last. The accompaniment here repeats its own rhythm, which is longer than the rhythm repeated in the melody, producing an offsetting and contrast of elements. The overall emotional effect is a certain lighthearted playfulness. *This* is the stuff of which great music is made.
Billy Joel is not going back to pop songwriting after this album –- at least not right away. He continues to compose instrumental music in a romantic style. It is possible, but not likely, that he, now in his fifties, will acquire the knowledge and discipline necessary to write more coherent and original "serious" music. If he does, we may hear good things from him.
In the meantime *Fantasies and Delusions* is a good cultural indicator. Even with its faults it contains some of the most pleasant sounding "serious" music written in decades, and it demonstrates that "serious" is not a synonym for "unintelligible." The public´s response to such open defiance of the destructive trends of the twentieth century has been overwhelmingly positive, and the album is commercially successful. This suggests that there is hope that Romanticism could be a thing not only of the past, but also of the future.
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