TCC 40. Who Is Music For? - Professor Roshanne Etezady

[Aaron] Welcome to the Theorist Composer Collaboration, a podcast interview series highlighting modern composers and music theorists. My name is Aaron D’Zurilla. I'm the host of this podcast and also a music theorist myself. Today I'll be talking with the composer Dr. Roshanne Etezady, who is currently an assistant professor of composition at the University of Michigan. That leads me to welcome Professor Etezady herself to the podcast. How are you doing?

[Professor Etezady] I'm doing so well. Thanks for having me.

[Aaron] Of course, it's a pleasure to have you on. And how about you go ahead and introduce yourself to the audience personally, professionally, academically, whatever you choose.

[Professor Etezady] Yeah, sure. So, hi, everybody. My name is Roshanne Etezady. I, as Aaron said, I teach at the University of Michigan, where I have been since academic year 2014. Before that, I did a graduate degree at the University of Michigan, but I finished that in the early 2000s. I got my piece of paper in 2005. from the university of Michigan and between 2005 and 2014 was kind of hopping around being an academic nomad, at you know at institutions ranging from actually I taught in a charter school like wee ones little ones, through like large state schools and community colleges and small liberal arts schools and you know private schools, public schools I taught in a whole bunch of places for not very much money. Yeah, I have academic degrees from some other places besides Michigan. I did an undergrad at Northwestern. I did a master's at Yale. And if we hop even further into the Wayback Machine, because it turns out this introduction is reverse chronological. If we hop further back into the Wayback Machine, I am from the suburbs of Philadelphia. My family's still there. And yeah, and that's where I grew up taking music lessons. thinking when I was a teenager that I was going to be a flute player. I started out when I was like a pre-teenager thinking that maybe I could be a pianist, but I think I'm just not cut out. for it. And I just never had the technique to really be a pianist. So, I thought I was going to be a flute player for a while. And then my flute teacher said, you know, if you're serious about studying this in school, you should learn some things about music theory. And so, I started studying music theory and counterpoint. and stuff like that and then one thing led to another and I started writing music and then I went to a summer camp for teenagers. And ended up I kind of oh, I submitted applications for flute and also for composition figuring they got to take somebody. So I got in for composition and not for flute and that was kind of the beginning of the end of my performing career. Yeah I started writing music and stopped practicing music, although for a long time I would say playing but not performing. And even still to a lesser extent playing but not performing is really important to me. Although I don't do it in front of people anymore it's still a really important thing. But yeah so that was kind of the beginning of the end of the practicing and kind of the beginning of the making stuff up era.

[Aaron] Making stuff up era. Sure. And, you know, that perfectly answers my second question was reading your bios online. You have quite the career or experience within music. And I was going to ask, why composition? You submitted two applications, one stuck.

[Professor Etezady] Exactly. It's kind of crazy when you think about it. It's a real Sliding Doors moment. I don't know if people still know that movie, but, you know, Gwyneth Paltrow gets on the train and then she's a blonde and then she's a brunette. The timeline splits. So, yeah, it was a real Sliding Doors moment. Who knows? Because I don't know that I have the constitution. I mean, to be an actual performer is, I mean, it's like being a professional athlete in a lot of ways. It's like being a professional athlete who is also an artist, and I just don't think I have the constitution to do that. So if I had gone into you know if I had spent the early part of my education thinking I was going to be a flute player I don't know that I would have stuck with it. So maybe I would have gone to law school or something I don't know who knows where we'd be right now.

[Aaron] Certainly. Being a professional performer is something that I don't know. I mean, I'm not saying that music theory is easy, but it's just like the mental stress constant and physical to having to be perfect, basically, to really make it as a performer is something that's pretty crazy. Yeah. So another feature of your background, as you were just going through, is your extensive teaching career. And especially with the number of places that you've taught at. And so it sounds like that being a professor of composition in some way was a goal. My ultimate question is, for what end? And I ask that very nicely because a lot of composition people, you know, I want to be a professor. Okay. You want to teach. Wonderful. But, and this is completely valid. A lot of composers want to be professors for the stability to create their own art. And although, you know, intrinsic passion is great, the reality of the world necessitates the other one. So when I ask which one is it, I'm not saying that one is better than the other, but how, what was your approach to, you know, getting into the world of teaching and so on?

[Professor Etezady] Yeah let's see, I will say that I always, I feel incredibly lucky to have the job that I do currently. I always hoped for it and never expected it, if that makes any sense. Folks who are in the academic job market know that it is a crucible it's, you don't just walk into an academic job anymore. I think a generation or two ago, you probably could just walk into a job, but I don't think you can just walk into a job anymore. So I feel incredibly lucky. When I finished my degree, I didn't. It's funny to think about it now. I wasn't even super young when I finished my degree. I think when I finished my degree, I was in my 30s. I didn't want to be, there was no danger, there was no danger of this ever happening. I didn't want to be I didn't want to be 28 years old and on the tenure track or like looking for a tenure track job. And I was not. Actually, when I was 28 years old, I was in the I was in probably just starting my doctorate. Maybe I had a couple of years out so that so there was no danger of ever, you know, kind of jumping on the tenure track too early. And it just didn't seem like something that was, academia was something that I was always, you know, the ship was always going in that direction, hopefully. But it never felt like there was a hurry. I sort of always felt like it was going to be there. And my thought was I could freelance for a while, teach part-time. Part of that, as you say, is like you got to eat. Money can be exchanged for goods and services. And so part of it was that because there's just not a lot of money in adjuncting. But part of it was that I wanted to have the flexibility to still do freelancing. And also, I had just gotten married when I, the same year that I got my doctorate from the University of Michigan. And I did not want, I know there are a lot of dual career couples where, you know, one lives in Los Angeles and one lives in New York and they make it work great and everyone is happy. And I didn't want to start out that way. If it ended up that way, then okay. But I didn't want to start things out that way. So I wanted to have enough flexibility to have a personal life. As it turns out, though, I mean, I don't want to give the impression that I was just adjuncting for the money, because if you're adjuncting for money, as we alluded to several times, like, oh, honey, you're not adjuncting for money. I really, I really enjoy teaching. It's, it's really, really fun. And when you ask about you know, why academia? I'm being a little bit glib when I say that I don't honestly know that I have any other skills. I mean, I'm resourceful and, you know, I'm resourceful and privileged and I have a safety net and I would be fine. But I don't know anything that I could do that I would enjoy as much. I love being in front of a classroom. I love working with students one-on-one. You know, I love my colleagues. I love the collaborative atmosphere. It's such a sweet gig. And I hope that everybody has the opportunity to find their way into a job that they are just really at home with. You observed correctly that I'm assistant professor which means I don't have tenure yet so hopefully I continue to have this job. I hope this doesn't turn into like an irony listen you know three years from now and

[Aaron] Like oh I I'm sure, I mean I don't know but I'm sure I'm sure you'll be fine. I mean

[Professor Etezady] What can you do, right? You can't live in fear of these things, I guess. But I just really enjoy it so much. I think it speaks to enough. I mean, I don't know the Myers -Briggs personality categories well enough to be able to speak to it in an informed way. But I think composers as a people tend to be pretty introverted. And those of us that, I mean I say this all the time I feel like I can kind of cosplay as an extrovert you know, I have little bursts of extroversion but like for the most part I and especially as I get older for the most part my happy place is like at home with my family and my cat. But teaching scratches just enough of the extrovert cosplay itch where I can, you know, go in short, very intense bursts and ideally have fun with nice people talking about music. I mean, who's luckier? I think about that all the time. But it's so anyway, it's kind of like micro dosing. There we go. Micro dosing extroversion. That's the title of this episode.

[Aaron] That's a really good title, honestly. But so wonderful. Before we move on, I have a couple of observations. One about not wanting to plant yourself in when you go for tenure track, you don't know where you're going to end up. It would be a lie to say if you do. I'm very fortunate that my fiancé is an accountant. So the name of job security. So she will be able to go wherever I can go. And one thing that I find interesting that is a little bit of a break between music theory and composition in terms of rationale is you said something about not wanting to get into tenure track too soon. And this is something that I always find interesting. And I want to know if you agree or disagree with this because I'm 23 and I have a lot of friends who are in composition, colleagues, and obviously a lot of friends that are in music theory. And I have observed that music theory might be a little bit more job stability once you get it. There's more avenues for success. There's more avenues to do the work in composition. Like you were saying, freelancing. There's not really freelancing in music theory. There really isn't.

[Professor Etezady] Imagine if there were, can you imagine? Oh my gosh. What a world that would be.

[Aaron] What a world. I don't even, I mean, I guess a lot of books. I'm not sure, but online tutoring? I don't know, but I'm not saying that composition is easier, but it's like the mental freedom of, you know, you said you were 28. You're like, I don't want to pin myself down. In my side of the field, you got to pin yourself down or there's literally nothing.

[Professor Etezady] Right. Yeah, no, it's really different. It's kind of a whole different. And I think about colleagues in different areas of academia, you know, non-musical areas of academia where you're researching and publishing and like you're in your PhD at 24 and, you know, working in your lab. And it's a whole. It's a whole different animal. Composition is weird. And if it sounds like I just realized that, I mean, I guess I realize it for the first time all the time. It's a weird gig, right? I mean, I think specifically composition in an academic context is kind of a weird animal. If you're lucky, then it's a place full of freedom to experiment and collaboration, a place where innovation and just try stuff out, see what sticks. If you're not lucky, then it's not that. And it can be entirely the opposite of that. And I know that that's out there as well. I do sometimes think about the fact that it's weird. You know, I think about, you know, my colleagues in performance and obviously in performance, there's all kinds of different philosophies and different playing styles. And there's the French style of whatever, and the German embouchure and the, you know, the British. Something. Yeah, the British something. And yet, if your intonation is bad, like that's an objective negative. If your rhythm is bad, if you can't. you know, subdivide evenly. All of those things are objective characteristics that are measurable and you can work on. And in composition, I mean, I can be hard pressed to think of the, if there are any objective, like what are the objective characteristics in composition that make something good or not good? And I mean, if I could think of them, I'm not going to put them down on record. And also in full disclosure, I can't really think of any objectives across the board.

[Aaron] I'm going to throw one out. But even then, it's really vague. How about artistic cohesion? Like that you're able to put out a cohesive idea? I don't know.

[Professor Etezady] I mean, maybe. So first of all, the first question that comes to mind is what does it mean for something to be cohesive? Is it motivically cohesive? If it stays a string quartet, the entire piece, that's a type of cohesion. If you know, it's, it's cohesive. If I say it's cohesive, I'm, I like that. Okay. You know, I mean, but like, what do you think is cohesiveness? And this is, it's all questions all the time, which is great. I, when I teach, in the fall I’m teaching some classes that I haven't taught in a couple of semesters. But I’m I teach a class in music composition for non-music majors and on the first day and its so much fun it's always full, I don't know who the students are going to be in the fall. But historically you know there's engineers and poli-sci majors and student athletes and students from all across campus most of whom have had some kind of musical experience, sometimes quite a bit of musical experience. They just happened to go into engineering or poetry instead of clarinet, but they could have gone into clarinet. So on the first day, I have learned that I need to say, if you are somebody who needs a correct answer, if you are somebody who will be frustrated by each idea bringing up more questions and fewer answers, then this might be a tough semester for you because the more and more I think I feel like the process is about questions. So I always have a lot of questions and cohesion, like maybe, unless my intent as a composer is to create something that's deliberately jarring and deliberately non-sequitur and deliberately non-cohesive. And that can potentially be extremely interesting. So not even that, I don't know.

[Aaron] That was a great questioning of my question that I love that sort of stuff. That's why we do what we do. And you know, that, that makes me really wonder what your opinion is of like the zeitgeist of how music theory is used in contrast to that. because it's this interesting thing where music theory is a field at the ground level. And what I mean by that, I mean like a freshman classroom or something like that. It's notoriously and jokingly full of right and wrong answers. But if you get to the higher level of music theory, you go to SMT, you read the journal articles, quite the opposite. Obviously, it's a theoretical field, so there's less right and wrong answers. I got to experience that quite a bit when I was teaching, at Florida State this previous year, a songwriting class for undergraduate students, and it was a non-major class. So I had the engineering, a lot of business people, it's Florida State, a lot of business frat people, but a lot of people, you know, you had some people who like make beats on their computer and you have some people, their last musical experience was playing recorder in fourth grade. So, you know, a wide diverse group of people. I also find it interesting, you know, the me, music theorist, not composer, teaching the songwriting class, it was interesting. Because in some ways the class was an introductory theory course, but also allowing for the creative freedom to write music, but in the popular music idiom, which in of itself is not contusive to white western European music theory. And it was an odd clash of things for me intellectually. What I study primarily is pop music, hip -hop and rap, in particular that's what I listen to and that's what I like to study. But of course you know you were saying like a requirement for to be a composer or to be a good composer you know you were saying like with a performance student it's intonation like you. To be a good, you got to play in tune. With a composer, it's not as easy. With a theorist, I feel like certain people would debate me on this, but I feel as though there is an underlying baseline of expectation for music theory. For you to be a good theorist, you can't, if you only studied canonical German music. I mean, you might get some headwinds in 10 years or so, but you're probably fine and set. And myself, if I only studied hip hop and rap, you also got to know the canonical German music. There's like a baseline. If you are good, you need to know this. Doesn't matter if you're doing something that's outside of the expectation. What are your thoughts on that?

[Professor Etezady] Oh, it's complicated. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I have my own personal thoughts. And I think there's going to be so many people who disagree with me. I think there's a certain amount of gatekeeping that happens. Like, oh, you're a college freshman and you weren't aware of the Bartok String Quartets? Check minus. My personal feeling is there's good news and bad news. The good news is the same as the bad news. Spoiler alert. The good news is that there is so much music right now that we can access, all of us, most of us, many of us, there is so much music that we can access 24 hours a day without even leaving the house, without even putting pants on. You can access centuries of music from so many places around the globe. It is impossible to know all of it. Personally, I don't think that it is a requirement that somebody should be able to sing the secondary theme from an even-numbered Beethoven symphony, but not six. I'm not even joking. These are the kinds of gatekeeping things that when I was a student, like, if you can't do that, then what are you even doing? But that doesn't seem particularly relevant. What I would like would be for, like it's so okay to not know stuff. It's more than okay to not know stuff. There is too much stuff to know. But what I think composers in particular, we should be curious about stuff in general and we should be especially curious about music and so if there's something that we don't know if I come to college and I'm not familiar with the Bartok String Quartets and my teacher is in paroxysms about how great they are, then I should go investigate that. Like, I don't have to feel dumb about it, but like, go check it out. Or if there's something that, because it's also, especially for composers, I think we come at things in, sometimes we get to our composer identities through kind of circuitous routes. We don't always. You know, I had a pretty traditional route. You know, I took piano and then I took flute and then music theory and, you know, youth orchestras and symphony bands. And now, bleep, blop, bloop, here I am. But, you know, there's plenty of people that come up in different ways, playing on GarageBand, you know, just putting sounds next to each other, taking a thing that already exists and chopping it up and mixing up the order just because it sounds like fun. Hello, that is composing. And that impulse, if you have that impulse, that's the composer impulse. You know, you might not know the Beethoven symphonies, but if you have that composer impulse, then when you learn about Beethoven's motivic development, then you're probably going to be like, that's super interesting. So, you know, I understand that there's a certain, the phrase that's coming to mind is like a certain base level of musical literacy that I think I have colleagues around the country. There are people that are furious that this kind of base level of assumed knowledge is receding in importance.

[Aaron] You're probably aware, too, that a similar sort of thing in music theory as well, or a similar push and pull when it comes to that. I err on the side of being okay with those things going away. That's where I generally feel more friendly. I grew up a violinist. I still am. I have a job teaching piano and violin in a studio locally in Tallahassee. I understand the classical idiom. I did not grow up with classical music, really, in my ears. I grew up with popular music. And so when I came into undergrad, I had those plenty of experiences of you don't know this violin sonata. And I'm like, no, I don't. There has to be on a career logistical level some baseline to judge prowess in hiring, in teaching standards, and so on, obviously. But also, this is very, I'm going to be very general because it would be nasty and I'm not prepared right now to actually get really detailed but there's there the people who vehemently argue for the strong baseline standard of musical understanding prowess whatever it's so coded a lot of times it feels.

[Professor Etezady] For sure it is yeah and super gatekeepy.

[Aaron] Oh yeah and something that I have enjoyed. So I study rap and hip hop, I said that. You know, I just got done with my master's degree at Florida State, and I'm in a year gap between PhD and master's. And between that time, I'm hyper, I mean, I'm working, of course, but I'm also hyper-focusing on my research and making sure that that's top of the line, that I'm staying active. And because I'm not in school right now, I have extra time. I'm reading lots of different books, things that are not just music theory. And one thing that a lot of people who may not be music theorists or in academia, they may say to me, really? Hip hop and rap? You know, is there much to talk about or something like that? And it's like. there are mounds of scholarship about it just not necessarily in music theory now there is um shout out to Nariko Manabe she was on the podcast recently. But I feel like music academia fields insulate themselves in like this survive or die trying sort of thing of the own field. I don't know where I’m going with that totally this is a very complicated subject. And, okay, let me be friendly towards these standards. One thing at Florida State that they require for all of their graduate music theory students is to pass certain piano exams of, you know, like, can you play in E-flat major, correct voice leading, put a Neapolitan on the correct metrical beat to make it make sense? Can you improvise that? Right. When I first started my masters that seemed so superfluous I’m like the last time that I heard Nas he was a Neapolitan is never I don't care. But having learned that skill having going through that trial and tribulation, it just helps my thinking a lot and it makes me feel very adept at piano and like mentally um understand the flow of harmony so much better. Yeah and I’m not going to say I use that skill every day but I would never not want it you know I mean so okay I’m not sure where I’m going with all that but I’ll give it back to you.

[Professor Etezady] Yeah, no and I mean I knowing more is preferable to me to than knowing less so I mean I would rather I mean I agree. I would rather have that ability at my fingertips than not. Although like, like right now I couldn't do it. I mean, I couldn't do it off the top of my head, but also I'm not a theorist and I haven't had to teach music theory. And I, when I have taught music theory, I have not had to do that off the top of my head, but you know, the music theory that I've taught is really like fundamentals. You know, it's not, nobody has ever asked me to do that and nobody ever will. But I think an interesting question is why we do it here too. Why do we privilege piano? Why does it have to be piano? And I understand, you know, if you're going to be, is it just because of teaching in a classroom? If you're going to be teaching in a classroom, probably there's going to be a piano in it and that's where you have to do the thing. Or is there something inherently, you know, virtuous and good and smart about piano? Yeah. A lot of students come in who say, I can't do this. I mean, we don't have a lot of, but occasionally a student will come in and say, I can't do this at the piano. I can do this at the guitar, but like too bad. So sad.

[Aaron] I think the, the focus on, I don't totally agree, but I appreciate the, you know, the standard of musical genius and prowess. I love discussing that sort of thing but to be more friendly to the idea. I think it's just that a while ago piano was standardized, by who you may ask now that's a whole other conversation, as a common language. You know like I want my songwriting students to understand the piano keyboard because when they open up Logic the piano rolls in front of them. And we can do a whole history lesson on why it was standardized in that way. Maybe in a popular music idiom guitar might be more flavorful to that. But anyways let's, I love this sort of conversation that's why I started a podcast um talk about these sort of things but I want to focus back on to you and your composing thank you for your indulgence in music. And man, almost all of my podcasts in some way resolve into like a societal power structure critique.

[Professor Etezady] Imagine that.

[Aaron] I will give thanks to Professor Rachel Lumsden at Florida State for developing that in me. But anyways. Let's focus back onto you and your composing. We've been talking about institutions. We've been talking about your teaching and your professorship. And I'm wondering, in your year, in your many years of teaching at various different institutions, and you're now at quite a big one, has your experience being in the position of professor changed your own personal craft?

[Professor Etezady] I think it's tough to separate my experience as a professor from just getting older and being around. I think being around students and working with students has definitely helped me codify things that I think are helpful and useful. And, you know, I find myself stuck or struggling with something. I can't say that I always am able to apply ideas that I give to students but very often I say to myself this is like what you were just saying to Joey or Jason and you should try that. And then sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. But it kind of gives me a greater sense of awareness also it gives me a greater sense of awareness of my options. I'm going to talk kind of superficially about things I don't know anything about. That's another really good title for this episode.

[Aaron] Yeah. I mean, I fall into that. So go on.

[Professor Etezady] Continue with confidence. Yes. A couple of years ago, there was an undergraduate student, and they are actually about to enter a master's program in Indiana. But they, as an undergraduate at Michigan, were doing a, I can't remember if they had a double major in poetry or if it was a minor in poetry. But in addition to being a composer, they also were studying poetry. And in our comp seminars, we were, you know, doing the standard common composer seminar studio class thing where students would play music and people would give feedback on it. And this student pointed me towards an article that they were presented in one of the poetry workshops that they were involved with and it is called, and it's all about the idea of workshop like workshopping creative ideas. And I think the gist of the article is that workshop is not for you, I think that might have been the title, and I forget the author but I have it I have the tab opened because I think it's so interesting. The idea of commenting on somebody else's work is not necessarily, nd maybe it's different in a lesson situation, but I think there's some connections there. But the act of making comments on someone else's work hopefully benefits them. But really, the main benefit of that is for me as the commenter, for the person who is making the comments. It helps, you know, kind of observing somebody else's process, thinking about what's important to them, what is coming across, you know, what intent is being read by the audience. That helps you think about your own creative process as well and to kind of bring this back. So double sidebar as a professor among brilliant young people I wouldn't have you know I am presented with things routinely that I would have never come across otherwise and so that's one example. But also this idea of when I work with students hopefully it benefits them. And also, it affects me as well, because in giving them feedback, in a way, I'm giving myself feedback. As I'm saying that out loud, I'm evaluating whether or not I feel it's true. And I think I kind of do. I think it is true because it's helped me to, you know, the goal is for us all to become our own teachers. To make the, not, I was going to say to make the teacher obsolete, but maybe that's not exactly it. Maybe the goal is to become your own teacher, which is its own whole thing. So I'm not sure how much of that experience for me is specific to being a professor. If I were teaching people outside of professoredom, if I would still have that type of experience.  Perspective on things changes a lot, as it turns out, as you get older, you think about things differently and so I don't know how much of how much of my own changes have to do with that as well but I think it's definitely fair to say that that I think it has made me, I think being working with students. You know, I keep saying working with students, and I don't know if, that's the best part, obviously, of being a college professor, but it is not the only part. But I'll just keep focusing on working with students, which you can also do not as a professor. And so I don't know if maybe I'm picking at the wrong thing. Like, you know, maybe I'm being excessively semantic about professorship specifically. But at the same time, so working with students, I think. has made me more insightful and reflective in a lot of ways about my own process. And also, I have students who are fearless. They're just not, you know, they, not all of them. And not even that this necessarily is itself a, this is not, you know, the goal. But, you know, I have students that can, I can see on a Tuesday and then the following Tuesday they've come back and they have six minutes of music.

[Aaron] Oh, six, really?

[Professor Etezady] I know, sometimes more. And it's not always perfect, but sometimes it's super good. And I'm kind of mad at them about it. And I'm not really mad at them, but, you know, just the hutzpah, you know, just being like, yeah, that's a thing I can do. think that's something that a lot of it I mean I think just sort of the brashness not the brat not in a bad way but sort of the fearlessness of youth is something that's wonderful to be around. Because that's also something that becomes a memory as you get to be middle -aged. And it's great to be around because you sort of and when I say you I mean me I kind of think well this is a thing that can be done. People do it every day. It's inspiring, I guess is what I'm saying. So there's that too. So I definitely think it affects me. I think seeing people, these young people conceptualize big ideas and go from concept to product, seeing them say, I have this idea for an opera. And then two years later, It's an opera. It used to be in their head and now it's an opera. That's amazing and inspiring and is a great reminder that it's feasible because that's really easy to forget. Maybe this isn't for everybody, but I think as one gets older, perhaps it's easy to pay more attention to obstacles, I think, when you're older. Which is not to say that you don't have those obstacles when you're younger. I don't know. You maybe just don't have, have the hangups. I don't know. Now it's turning into a therapy session, but it's the thing about composition. It's so, so often can walk the thin line and turn into therapy at any moment.

[Aaron] There've been a couple episodes where, particularly when we're talking about a personal piece that is turned into the, actually one of your students, Mary Denny, an episode that got pretty personal with the piece that we were talking about. To extrapolate a little bit on what you were talking about, how you're not sure if what you're talking about is from getting older or just seeing and doing things. I feel like if I were to guess from what you're describing, it's that it's not unique to professorship, but when you're a professor, it's like heightened. You just do a ton of it. And it's like, you know, I really like you were talking about workshops. Because how I've come to think about academic conferences and music theory conferences is, of course, you're there for the people who are speaking. But you're also there for, this sounds selfish ,that you're there for yourself. It's like to see the dialogue happen. There have been plenty of times where, shoot, I will take a picture of someone's bibliography at the end because I'm like, that's a great source. I never thought of that. Or you're like, oh, my goodness, what a great way to detail data like that. Or like you were saying, asking the questions, you see a presentation, you think, man. Never thought about that. I don't even have the intellect to question what they said. And then someone else asks a really good question. And then you get to see that dialogue. And it's funny. I remember I was talking with this one of my composition friends. You were saying earlier on how composers are generally introverted. I would agree. And I would also say music theorists as well. The cruel irony of that is that you get so much benefit, like we're talking about right here, pushing yourself out of that box. Particularly in our fields, which have so many introverts, but it's so beneficial to go outside of it. So I totally agree with what you're saying, I hope one day to have the sort of accelerated personal experience that you're talking about, as many people in my position hope. But speaking about your students, something that I'm wondering. So you, in many different facets, are a very highly accomplished person. You went up the ranks of teaching, professorship, and here you are at a nice university. Tenure track, fingers crossed. But you're doing very well in a number of ways. And I'm wondering when you've seen a handful of years of students at a high-level university and throughout all your teaching, what are some aspects that a student does that you just look at them, you're like, they're going to do well. And conversely. What are some aspects that you look at a student and you're like, man, if you just shift a little bit, you're going to shoot off. So what are some aspects you've picked up over the years with students with that?

[Professor Etezady] Yeah, let's see. That's definitely, I mean, I know exactly that like ping, like this person I'm not worried about. They're going to do their thing, whatever that is. And what I love. Now, in the year of our Lord 2025 is, you know, once upon a time, like, you'll be fine, meant something very specific. It meant like, you're going to win these awards and get this grant and, you know, get these types of jobs. But now, there's so many ways to be successful. And it's so much better. And so, you know, when, when, when you're like, oh, I'm not worried about that person. It's great to see momentum with whatever the thing is that is going to be successful for them. And sometimes that's, you know, traditional old school route. And sometimes it's something totally different that I barely, you know, that I barely clock because just because of a generational thing. But you still you still know it when you see it. And I think a big part of what that is, is just. somebody who is excited and omnivorous, you know, kind of across the board generally. But, you know, if you can just tell that they're looking for opportunities to learn things, you can tell that they're looking for stuff that they don't know. they're kind of looking to connect ideas and sometimes connect people you know I think that that can be a helpful thing like connect with people they don't know. Which you know is you know for an introverted subset of us that that that can be that can be tricky sometimes. And I think the just like somebody who is excited to be around and to know more and do more I feel like that's somebody who's going to who's going to who's going to do well. Somebody whose first inclination is to say yes and rather than well. I know who I would want to work with and you know that artistically I think they're going to be better off with a “yes and”outlook. I think philosophically I think personally I think professionally I think it's just kind of better off all around I think, let's see, I think a lot of students, let's see, well, maybe not a lot. Once in a while when I see a student and I see this in myself as well, sometimes, you know, I think there are times when the biggest hindrance, the biggest obstacle getting in our way is sometimes ourselves. And so I do think I've said to in my head, not to a student, but sometimes to a student, not in so many words, but if I could just get out of my own way, then things would really, that would make so much room for things to really start rolling. You know, maybe don't., if I could stop torturing myself about these six measures that would make so much room for the rest of this piece to fall, like the block that I think I have is not really a larger block. It's just like this little thing that I've set up for myself. But if I could just not, then, you know, make some space to let the other stuff in, you know, that's kind of general. But I think that as humans, maybe just across the board as human people, getting out of our own way is such a big, it's easier said than done. But I think that's part of it. I think I have a lot, again, I think historically I've seen it happen where a student kind of gets into their own head about having a block or not wanting to. I don't know. I'm not even sure where I'm going with that. But when a student gets into their own head, then as an outsider, it's easy to say, oh, all they need to do is get out of their own way and they'll be fine. Just like, you know, when I get inside my own head and get in my own way, it's easy for somebody to say, just have you tried not doing that? And it's impossible, not impossible, but I mean, it's, I don't, so I, it's relatable and I don't mean to belittle it. But I would love to see people have the opportunity to just kind of get out of their own way and make space for the momentum. Myself included.

[Aaron] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you, the, I mean, that, that, that's a lifelong struggle for most and probably all of us. Yeah. And so when we talk about students, you know, and in your case, your students, my age, and when I talk about my students, only a handful of years younger at this point, you know, we're talking about the future. Having this podcast for a year and a half as someone who is not a composer, I have a lot of friends who are composers. I care about the field of composition a lot, obviously talking to composers on here. But I've gotten a lot of perspective over the year and a half purposely searching out for things that are different, things that I've never seen before, constantly meeting new people, seeing new music. And it's this interesting dichotomy I found of what's in the official halls of institutions in composition across the country. You know, who's on faculty? What are they doing? And frankly, again, it feels asinine to say this is my opinion, non-professional opinion. It feels very homogeneous sometimes, whether in style and, yes, let's say it, identity of white men galore, as one myself, and especially pot calling the kettle black. I'm a music theorist, too. Let's be real here. So then you look at institutions and you say there's like a monoculture almost of composition. But that cannot be further from the truth. All the things I've seen online, people who may not be in positions of faculty, but maybe adjunct, or they're doing their own freelancing thing, a hundred different jobs, there is such a massive diversity in identity, in style, in approach, in people, in everything in composition. And There's probably some easy answers as to why, but there's probably much more harder ones about why that's, I'm seeing this dichotomy of how this beautiful diversity of all this is not reflected at the highest annals of the field. And I suppose my question to you is, do you see it that way? What is your opinion about that? Yeah.

[Professor Etezady] Yeah, I think. I mean, I know what you mean. And part of me wants to, I have a couple of different thoughts about it. I mean, I think that maybe does it all. This would be better as a conclusion. And also, I don't know. Here's a question that I don't have an answer for. I guess maybe it all comes down to the question of what is music for? What is it for? I think that it is for people. I think it's for performers and I think it's for audiences. And we have those in the university, but like that's not really, ideally in addition to in the university, you know, the greater artistic culture of society is hopefully where music is. And so I wonder, I hope that it's getting better. Once upon a time, I think academia was extremely removed from the like music in the wild. And I think, you know, it's probably regional and it's, you know, nothing about academically. I think, you know, depending on where you are and who's there and like what the vibe is at your school or department. There's probably as many different attitudes as there are places to study. But I hope that there are more and more places that are invested in the idea of the importance of music in the greater fabric of a cultural society, which I hope makes that boundary a little bit more porous. I mean maybe there's always going to be a separation you know maybe there's always maybe there's always going to be a little bit of a separation and maybe that's okay? This is another one of these things that I'm saying out loud to see how it feels when I say it out loud. But like when I think about I'm such a dilettante I don't know enough about enough things to really make, to really say but. I’d be curious I think to know whether you know I’m thinking about poetry, I’m thinking about visual art, you know those are other things that exist, at the academic institution, theater, dance, things that exist graphic design, things that exist at the academic institution that also exist in in an artistic society and I would be curious to know about the relationship between like what I'm going to, for lack of a better word, call in the real world, how those art forms in the real world relate to how they are treated in academia. I think it would be interesting to see, to compare side by side, how music fares, and contemporary music in particular. I think that in many places, there is a greater inclination for academia to either include or welcome or embrace or like at least acknowledge the idea music in the real world. And I’m not even talking about you know I’m including you know what is sometimes awkwardly called concert music, or classical music, or art music, and popular music, and or vernacular music to continue to make things awkward I think there's more I think your point is well taken. And I also hope that it's getting better and things are becoming more inclusive because otherwise what are we doing? You know we're it seems like a good way to become irrelevant quickly. Which also makes me think well what does it even mean to be relevant? And then that's a whole nether thing that I don't want to do.

[Aaron] Yes well I am so intrigued. And I think that might be the episode title. Who is music for? I think that's a very interesting question. And I think that's something that myself and my colleagues in music theory should also think about. And I'm not pointing towards criticism in some way. I think that's just a very intriguing question to ponder. You know, I might have sounded very cynical, which in some ways it is, but I do generally believe that in the overarching you know timeline of composition, and I’ll throw my field in too, I think it is getting better. I think, generally how fast and if it's on the margins that's an entirely different conversation especially considering um this 2025 political climate. But that is a different but important conversation. At least in my field, I am continuously encouraged by seeing who is able to find positions of prominence and of notoriety and the diversity of conferences and so on. I'm very encouraged by it even if there's plenty to work on. Before we close out this delightfully philosophical conversation, I really do love this. I keep bringing up my own field because it's how I can relate to your own experiences. How do you see, right now, music theory and composition interacting? How would you like to see it interacting?

[Professor Etezady] I'm going to start my answer with an anecdote.

[Aaron] All right.

[Professor Etezady] From the 1900s, I was but a youth, and I was in an academic setting at a program not at any of the schools I mentioned with none of the, nobody I know currently. So I was in a room at a very well-respected and established department of music like with composers and theorists and musicologists nice people smart people thoughtful people. And the question came up a kind of a similar question came up and I am not saying I was the only composer in the room but I felt like the only composer in the room. And the question came up about um like what do I hope as a composer what do I hope that music theorists and musicologists take away from my music? And, you know, I was glib and fearless and, you know, 26 or whatever. And I think I said, hopefully, respectfully, you know, I hope you find things to take away from my music, but you guys are not my focus. And I'm writing for the performers and for audience members. And what the theorists and musicologists have to say is not my primary concern. And God, what a jerk. I didn't have to be such a jerk. But honestly, so I, two and a half to three decades later, I would refine that response a little bit. Personally, I still am the most interested in what you know, the people playing my music, how they're interacting with it and the people hearing it. And sometimes those people are musicologists and theorists and I want there to be things there for them. But I'm not, I'm not concerned about posterity and I'm not concerned about how things will be received intellectually. However, I think, okay so correct me if I’m wrong about this, it seems to me that, again something I don't know that much about but I’m going to make sweeping generalizations about. It seems to me that at its core music theory, what it's for is to kind of put into words the thing in music that makes you go oh, that you know like to try to catch some of the lightning in a bottle. So that, well because like lightning in a bottle is a cool thing to talk about and ideas are interesting and maybe if we know how to do it maybe we can do it again. And so I think, I don't like the idea so that seems, surely that can't be an accurate description of what music theory is for because that's so like responsive it's not proactive, it's reactive. And so I don't want to like paint music theory with a reactive brush, but I feel like when my world intersects with music theory, like actual music theory not like the fundamentals of grammar which are like giving people the language to discuss the actual music theory, but you know when I think about my own interaction with music theory I think the most satisfying parts are how to you know how to describe the lightning in the bottle that makes you gasp or tear up or you know that kind of thing. Is that what do you think?

[Aaron] I generally agree. I generally agree. I mean even the most traditional and I’ll put big quotes on that traditional music theorists would agree. If they're doing a harmonic analysis of an 1800s symphony, you're still most focused on what makes you go, oh, wow.

[Professor Etezady] Yeah. And why? Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

[Aaron] And I agree that's generally what music theory is. I think that anecdote that you gave was incredibly interesting because I'm sure that they were expecting a clinical answer. I mean, if I was in the room, I'd probably roll my eyes a little bit if someone said it.

[Professor Etezady] There may have been eye rolling. I don't remember well enough.

[Aaron] But I don't besmirch you for the attitude towards it because I feel like there's a lot of times for people creating new art to adhere. And adhere not only to theory, but the music that theory has been developed from, Western classical canon and so on. And I think of theory, my own work, as something closer to what you said about trying to describe that lightning in a bottle. I see composition. And this is why, I mean, I have two halves of my research. It's rap and hip -hop and then modern composition, which that can mean. It can mean anything. So I'm still working on working on what that really means. But it's, you know, two. So I have a large rap corpus study that I'm working on, but I have two other projects. One is a forthcoming publication through SMT Pod where I'm talking about vocal timbres in Ellen Reid's Prism. an opera from 2019 that won the Pulitzer Prize. A phenomenal, phenomenal work. And my other work that I just got accepted to a conference for it, at the time of this episode, I think I'll have announced it. It was, I wrote a paper based on, I wrote a paper about a piece that I had featured on this podcast because I just loved it so much. And that will be, I'll present that in mid-October at Cornell. But I love modern composition so much because when I hear music, I feel like I'm hearing the person who wrote it speak. And I think it is such a special and under-respected thing that we can listen to someone speak through their music and then talk to them because they're alive. A real living composer, not, not when they're 95, not when they're dead. And so just, you know, when, when people who are not familiar with what I do are familiar with, you know, like friends and family, they say, what, what is music theory? I always describe it as the, you know, if you were born in the U.S. in a English speaking household, you know, spoken English your entire life. When you go to college, you still need to take an English class. You are learning the common language. To understand the language that someone is speaking, a composer. Similar to, I'm getting so like, so like high-minded with this, but I see it similar, you know, analyzing that piece that I'm going to be presenting at Cornell. When I'm trying to figure out the language in which the message was spoken, I feel like it's the same way as when I'm analyzing rap lyrics. Like I'm hearing the soul of the person who is writing and speaking. And so my role as a music theorist is to help describe what is being spoken and maybe find something that's underneath. And so. There are good exceptions to this where music theory can come before composition. One of my friends did an extensive paper on quarter tonal transformations. But then at the end of his paper, he actually wrote a short quarter tonal piano piece, which was really cool. So there's exceptions to that where theory can come first. I see my work as admiring the craft and the spoken language of others. That's how I see it.

[Professor Etezady] So it is a little bit reactive, but not in a negative way, like an appreciative.

[Aaron] Yeah. I mean, it's, as you said, there is just so much amazing music and art being made every single day that we will never hear. And that's all the stuff that's been recorded and uploaded, not counting the things that haven't. There's some lightning in a bottle thing. I've told people repeatedly, no matter what your major is, if you're a performance major, music theory, whatever, go to a composition concert at a college. You do not know what you will hear. I mean.

[Professor Etezady] No, it's so great. It's my favorite thing. I love it. I just think of some of the recitals we had at the end of last semester. We had, you know, people do show tunes and, you know, people who focus on kind of like a folk music language. And then we have people doing kind of like Fluxus, you know, chant pieces and, you know, post -modern, you know. contemporary art music languages as well it's you'd never ever know and I love it so much.

[Aaron] I’ve seen, at oh man at University of Florida actually has a pretty inventive composition studio I was I was happy that I could study alongside a lot of those composers. One composition concert, just because the tech setup, they put this piece first. It was a completely live recorded piece with someone sitting on the ground of the recital floor with his electronic pedal board. And all of it was through a microphone, delays. filters and all that. And it like involves screaming and involved yelling. And then the next piece on the program was a three movement string quartet.

[Professor Etezady] I love that so much. I love it so much. You know, I have a, I have a 14 year old child and you know, they, my husband is also a musician. And so our child has been to some concerts and does not always love being dragged to mom and dad's concerts. But they super love coming to the student composer concerts because you just never know. It's you never know

[Aaron] And you'll find some, and I bet you out of the six or seven things on the program you will find something you like, there will be something.

[Professor Etezady] What a time to be live! It's so great it's for this reason only.

[Aaron] Yes so maybe my answer to your answer was a little high-minded. Sorry. I got lost in my own fantasies of music thought. But I feel like people who only focus on studying the music of dead people really miss out on a beautiful part of the musical language. But that's just me. Anyways, so we're coming to a close. This has been an awesome conversation.

[Professor Etezady] I'm glad to have had this opportunity. Thanks.

[Aaron] Yeah, I mean, you've been amazing. You've put up with my like, fanciful music theory talk and so on. And so coming to a close, what are some projects that are on the horizon for you?

[Professor Etezady] Well, let's see. I've got some wind projects coming up. I've been writing a lot for wind ensemble recently. And I've got actually a deadline for a piece that I actually have some time before the next deadline. And I thought between now and when I have to really start working on this piece, I have this window of time where I can sort of do whatever I want to, which is not something that happens a lot. You know, I've kind of go from project to project, like deadline to deadline a lot of times. And so to have this window of time where I can kind of hark back to you know back to another stage of life where you could just be like hey wouldn't it be fun if like what if like I know these six people what if I write a piece for them just for funsies. So I have this little window of time right now where I'm kind of entertaining some ideas that could just be for funsies. Some of them are like small and manageable and some of them are kind of large and probably excessively ambitious and cockamamie, but kind of in the nascent stage still. But I'm just excited to have the opportunity to be able to, it's a privilege when your time is, like when you're kind of deadline out for a while in the future, but when you don't have, like when you've had that for a while and you don't just have the opportunity to just say, Like what weird thing do I feel like doing? Like you do when you're in grad school that you miss that. And so I've really missed that. And so I'm excited to kind of figure out what the weird thing is that I'm going to do now. I don't know that I'm comfortable putting my finger on it publicly just yet, but I have a couple of ideas that I would describe as cockamamie that nobody ever asked for. But I am excited to kind of explore like the cockamamie ideas that nobody ever asked for.

[Aaron] All right. Yeah. All right. I mean, that's a, it sounds like a beautiful time. Thank you for giving, letting me borrow some of that precious time that you have of cockamamie exploration. But now what would be the best way for the audience to contact you with any comments or questions?

[Professor Etezady] Well, let's see. You can probably either through my website or through email would probably be the best, best ways to do that. And I'll let you put those up rather than do all the spelling.

[Aaron] Yes, certainly. They will be in the description wherever you are listening to this. And so for the final question or discussion, I always like to give a guest last little say on this. Professor Etezady, is there anything else that you want to share to the audience about anything that we've talked about today? Music, life, composition, music theory, and so on. What would that be?

[Professor Etezady] Oh, wow. I you know there was something there was a thread that I wanted to pull on a little bit earlier and I’m afraid that it'll like start a whole other thing, but earlier when you mentioned you know how excited you are about modern music and you know about hearing people speak through their music. You know I entirely agree and like Aaron you should write some music. I don't know if you've written any music but I really strongly believe that. And again, hopefully this is less, but I think historically composers have been kind of made into these mystic creatures of genius, which if you know a lot of composers is really funny because most of us are goofballs in one way or another. But I think there are a lot of people who are intimidated by the idea of composing. And if you are somebody, okay, if you're somebody who's listening to this and thinking about, you know, if you're saying, I wonder what would happen if I wrote music? Like, that is your brain telling you that you should write music. Do it. Do it. And I hereby bestow upon you the title of composer because I want to demystify it. I want people, I just want it to be a normal thing that people do so if you are hearing this and thinking that you love contemporary music because you are a contemporary human, and you would like to create music that is therefore contemporary because anything you do because you're a contemporary person so everything you do is contemporary. Don't worry about whether you're nesting your tuplets, or you know splitting your octave into 17 pitches, you know don't worry about whether you have parallel fifths, or whether your harmonic progression is retrogressive, just don't even worry about putting stuff down on paper. Just go make some stuff that you like and call yourself a composer.

[Aaron] Wonderful wonderful. Yeah that was great and well thank you again Professor Etezady for coming on to the Theorist Composer Collaboration, this has been a really fun conversation. I wonder how this is going to come out in the edit because we kind of just like flowed the whole time. But I thought it was a lot of fun.

[Professor Etezady] Okay I thought it was fun too.

[Aaron] Good, thank you very much for your time. Thank you for coming on to the podcast. And yeah it was great.

[Professor Etezady] It's been a pleasure I hope you can put something cogent together

[Aaron] Oh I certainly will. Hello, this is Aaron again, and I want to thank you for listening to this episode of the Theorist Composer Collaboration. I also want to give another big thank you to Professor Roshanne Etezady for coming on to the podcast. Professor Etezady's contact info is listed in the description. I would appreciate it if you could show her some support. For further updates and notifications on the Theorist Composer Collaboration, make sure to follow our Instagram and Facebook pages. You can listen to future episodes through our host website, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, iHeartRadio, and YouTube. So make sure you subscribe to the platform of your choosing. If you want to monetarily support the work of the TCC, you can click the link to our Buy Me a Coffee page. All donations are highly appreciated. All of the relevant links to follow, listen to, and support the show are in the description. TCC episodes are posted every other week on Mondays, and don't miss our blog posts, which go live a few days before a new episode is added. Make sure to follow our social media accounts. Relevant streaming platforms because you won't want to miss it. But, until then, this is Aaron, and thank you for joining the TCC.