The Muse that Sings: Composers Speak about the Creative Process

I used this book in my 20th century music class. The composers share very interesting information on their composing processes. It's a great book.

We used this book in my composition course. I found it to be an excellent means of motivation. This book presents interviews with composers that have helped shape the modern composition process(Adams, Corigiliano,Reich to name a few). It is a book that is very useful to a young composer. At the end of of each interview there is a list of representative works from that particular composer. Although now a bit out-dated, the list helped me to discover pieces I never would have found on my own.

Ann McCutchan's book entitled The Muse That Sings fascinated me with most enlightening and wonderful insights into the music of the twentieth century. I appreciated her choice of composers, her methodology of interviewing and the systematic process of unfolding their creative process. Even though it is impossible to really say what happens, her attempts to reveal the innermost thoughts of fine creative artists is a landmark for the study of music of this century. This is a must for all budding and would be composers and teachers of composition, which these selected pedagogues and successful composers reveal is a difficult subject to teach. A welcome addition to the world of creativity.

This series of interviews offers a fascinating opportunity to eavesdrop as composers think aloud about their process. It is surprisingly accessible for non-musicians because the subjects strike universal chords. As a novelist, I found it liberating to read about creative process in terms quite different from most writers'. Joan Tower describes the poignancy of virtually connecting with the soul of a guitarist who performed her work. Sebastian Currier speaks of how making music helps him create harmony between thought and feeling. This book is a window on the mystique of musical composition, and I enjoyed it enormously.