I don't have children. Not because I don't want any, but, well, for a variety of reasons, it hasn't come to pass just yet.

In some circles, the creation of a piece of music is much like raising a child. In fact, the development of any kind of creative idea could be viewed in this way. In music making, this process most often begins as something small - a little melodic fragment, a cool harmonic shift, or a rhythm that gets stuck in one's head - the "birth." The process then continues into the development stage. The composer learns more about this little germ, what it can do, what it can't do, what agrees with it and what doesn't. At this point the idea and all of the attendant ideas begin to develop into an actual piece of music. This could be considered the "teenage years." Appropriately named, this is often the most difficult stage - the piece now dictates that you can only do certain things with it or to it before it rebels and sounds "bad." Eventually, after many weeks, months and, yes, in some cases, years, the piece is complete. When it's ready, and sometimes when its not, it will leave the nest. The composer must now let it live in the world. Sure he can come back and tweak it, discuss within himself and with others what may or may not make it better, but for the most part it is now a living, breathing "being," part of the world around it.

I was lucky enough to realize this entire process last year. In the fall of 2010, I made the conscious decision, with some prodding by my wife, to return to writing music. It's worth noting that I had written next to nothing that I considered of consequence in the previous several years, so this could turn out to be a daunting task. To make it even more challenging, I had decided to work mainly in the choral realm. Although I had a lot of experience singing in choirs, I had next-to-no experience actually writing for choirs. The only substantial choral piece that I wrote was in college and it had some serious problems. That one turned out to be more of a "drawer piece" (one of those things a composer writes and then sticks in the desk drawer.)

But I had located a text that moved me and, well, off I went.

       "The Holy Night"

        We sate among the stalls at Bethlehem;
        The dumb kine from their fodder turning them,
            Softened their horned faces
            To almost human gazes
            Toward the newly Born:
        The simple shepherds from the star-lit brooks
            Brought visionary looks,
        As yet in their astonied hearing rung
            The strange sweet angel-tongue:
        The magi of the East, in sandals worn,
            Knelt reverent, sweeping round,
            With long pale beards, their gifts upon the ground,
            The incense, myrrh, and gold
        These baby hands were impotent to hold:
        So let all earthlies and celestials wait
            Upon thy royal state.
            Sleep, sleep, my kingly One!

                - Elizabeth Barrett Browning


I formally began writing this piece in November of 2010. By the end of February 2011, much of the piece was completed and I began to think about how I would be able to hear what it actually sounded like. (In my opinion, playing choral music on a keyboard with no voices is much like driving around a NASCAR track in a station wagon.) I decided to contact my previous choral director, Dr. Gerald Gray, and inquire about getting (at least) a read-through. That spring, he was gracious enough to do so as part of the composition studio's College Choir Reading Sessions. AND, after some conversation following the read-through, he agreed to (officially) perform it on their concert the following fall. So here it is - performed by the Fredonia College Choir under the direction of Dr. Gerald Gray.


"The Holy Night" - Jason S. Lamb




Future projects have presented themselves as a result of this venture: a piece for one of the non-curricular vocal ensembles at SUNY Fredonia; an invitation to write for one of the local high school choruses; an ongoing relationship with a well-respected conductor in the area. In fact one of these projects is currently in that disagreeable "teenager" stage. But like a good parent should, I won't give up on it. I'll keep working with it, and eventually, like it or not, it will leave the nest.