Revenge Body (String Quartet No. 1)
Year Composed
2018
Duration
10:00
Instrumentation
string quartet
Program Notes
Revenge Body is part of a series of works I wrote over four or five years about youth—not to memorialize or idolize youth, but to present it in its sort of plain, true, messiest form. (Plenty of youth-oriented works exist, but they're often written through rose-colored, retrospective lenses, presenting youth as an idyllic time with no low points or learning curves.)
The first movement, Wishful Thinking, is just that: the youthful penchant for assuming everything will shake out for the best—everyone's on your side, the world wants to buoy you up. We all then experience, at some point, that big snapping point—an argument that dissolves a relationship, an injury, a rattling failure—and it reshapes us overnight.
The second movement, The Rest Will Take Care of Itself, is the other side of that same coin: the idea that, if we follow the thing we're passionate about, everything else will streamline around it (organizationally, financially,) when the reality is often quite the opposite. This references the often well-intentioned but deeply unhelpful phrase that folks say when suggesting that passion, by itself, is sufficient: “do what you love, and the rest will take care of itself.”
The third movement, Revenge Body, is about perceiving ourselves. The literal (and deeply unhealthy) original meaning of the phrase is one of self-punishment, a brutal process of exercise and deprivation after a break up in order to achieve a “perfect” body, done only to spite the former partner. Out of context, however, the words took on a different meaning for me, especially having struggled for years with body dysmorphia: the idea of cherishing your body regardless of how it is socially perceived—the idea that a body that is authentically itself can be revenge enough against those who would judge or ask us to change.
Additional Information
Commissioner: New Music Festival at Michigan Tech University
Movements:
Wishful Thinking
The Rest Will Take Care of Itself
Revenge Body