Echolocation, Papier-Mâché and The Things We Wrote Before This
written by Tanner Porter
2019 GLFCAM Dana Lyon Fellow, Cycle 9
Every now and again, I write something and think, “CRAP. This is something Tanner circa 2009 would have written.”
Or 2011.
Or 2000–whenever.
(I date myself quite specifically, yes?).
Why does the thought of creating music that sounds like what I was writing ten years ago freak me out?
Sometimes when I look at old photographs or listen to old pieces of mine, I feel a type of emotional echolocation. I see or hear that image of who I was, and whether or not I mean to, I feel the current expectations of who I am shooting out, bouncing off the memories of who I used to be. It’s as if, in some reverse timekeeping, I’m trying to locate and define who I was based on who I’ve become. In this critical dialogue of self-comparison, I might ask some ghost of mine, “Were you good enough?” And get the response, “I don’t know. Are you any better now?”
At GLFCAM, Gabriela asks us to write a piece over the course of nearly a year. We have two definitive deadlines for the music: we are asked to submit a draft for workshopping, and then a version of the piece for performing about seven months later. I find this elongated process to be a huge luxury in terms of preparation and planning, but also a bit of a mind-game. For me, part of the challenge of working on a piece over a year or more is maintaining a respectful relationship with the person I was when I started it. In later drafts and rewrites, how completely do I honor my earliest intentions? It can be easy to fall into a state of gnawing dissatisfaction when working on projects with longer time-frames. I pick up a piece I put down months before and think, “Well, this won’t do anymore.”
As a result, I layer and superimpose new versions of compositional myself onto the older ones, like a child over-zealously papier-mâchéing their art project into a sopping, shapeless blob. (You know the scene — glue and newspaper everywhere —“You were supposed to make a birdhouse, Tanner. A BIRDHOUSE.” Ah, the first grade.) What might have started out as a lovely piece has become some sort of unhappy creature, and all because I’m attempting to keep pace with my evolving expectations.
Are the new versions even that much different, that much better, from the old? Or is it just the emotional maze of self-comparison, the mirror prison satiated with insecurities, that’s frenzying my perspective?
To go back to the question of whether or not I feel like I’m a different person than I’ve been before: to be honest, yes, of course (and thankfully). But to be honest again, no, not really. I still adore the same albums I did when I when I was 15. I still love mint-chip ice cream. The Princess Bride makes me cackle just as hard as ever.
And the music I was writing ten years ago?
I loved it at the time. I was so deeply in it, felt such a swirl of joy and pride and fulfillment when I released my first album in high school. I remember this overwhelming rush of...relief? I don’t know how else to describe it. I had the (admittedly over-the-top) thought, “Well, no matter what happens now, at least I’ve made some art I’m truly happy with. Something that can represent who I am.”
And yet, it only took about three months for me to feel the exact opposite.
I’d flipped completely on the music. The thought of that music being out there in the world, representing who I was? It flushed me with embarrassment, a slowly flowering sense of dread. This is because in the time since I’d written and recorded that first album, I had learned more about composition, more about myself. even if only a teensy bit. It had changed the way I wanted to share my voice.
This process of growth, revaluation and self-criticism is a creative hurdle I’ve been trying to learn how to navigate. Not only in my artistic experience, but also in my personal life.
Happily, I do think it’s one I am getting better at. Recently, I’ve been continuing to work on a project I first started eight years ago. Cracking open this music has been like entering a time-capsule, a nostalgia feedback loop. It has been a wonderful (if not harrowing) exercise in positive self-talk, in honoring the artist I was when I started writing it, in dissuading my current expectations from coloring the way I see the older work. To the little voice that says, “Well, this isn’t good enough anymore,” there’s another voice I’m trying to let in. This voice answers, “What are you talking about? This is amazing. You used to write like this?! Wow!”
What I’m finding in this is a compositional process more akin to oil painting than water coloring. (Admittedly, I am terrible with oils. I usually work with watercolors. They dry fast and I like them. Ah! The metaphor!) There is joy in working on a piece over a longer period of time, and joy in coalescing new versions of yourself with the old, when you reconfigure that internal narrative of self-comparison. I think what may come from this experience is art with deeper layers — not haphazardly superimposed, not an attempt to placate insecurities by throwing paint on the canvas. What may come is a piece which has been allowed to change the way we change, to grow the way we grow, to breath. To find detail — orchestrational, emotional, narrative — that only time can make visible.
It’s this mindset that I hope to adopt as I continue to work on the piece for my next session at GLFCAM, as I look through old photo albums, as I encounter old posts on Facebook, as I think about the person I was and am. Kindness towards others is one thing. Kindness towards yourself is another. Here’s to continuing to foster compassion for yourself and your art — past, present and future.
**The first album I'm referencing, along with my more recent second (with which I am also trying to keep a healthy relationship! It's a journey!), were recorded, mixed and mastered by the incredible David Peters of Oak House Recording in Altadena, CA. http://www.oakhouserecording.com/
Tanner Porter is a composer-performer (voice and cello), songwriter and visual artist from California. Learn more from Tanner’s bio page.