I’ll be honest when I first started researching Darius Milhaud, pronounced “mee-YOH,” and The Creation of the World I was hoping for some scandal or outrageous story, but what I found was a lovable person that inspired so many and a strong drive to create good art.
The story that illustrated that touched me the most about Milhaud comes from one of his students. You may know Dave Brubeck, an inspirational person himself, who named his first son Darius after Milhaud.
Milhaud was known to say “Dare” and “Why not?” to his students. He encouraged them to “keep their ears as well as their eyes open while traveling the world, and to be cognizant of the various sounds, rhythms and fragments of melody that envelop us night and day.” Said former student Bill Smith. Milhaud was quite strict with his counterpoint instruction but had no rules when it came to harmonies and composition.
Another amazing quote comes from fellow composer Aaron Copland, “Others write music to express themselves; Milhaud, like no other composer I know, writes music to celebrate life itself.”
Milhaud himself said, “I love to write music, I always do it with pleasure, otherwise I just do not write it. Naturally, there are certain types of work that I prefer, but a composer should do everything with application, with all the resources of contemporary technique at his disposal. He can then hope that, after a life of hard work, he will see some works survive.”
Another story I loved about Milhaud was that he did not change his music after he penned it on paper. It is said that he wrote like he was copying music and that it seemed to simply flow from his head onto the paper. Maybe we could all take a lesson from that approach to creating.
The last story I will tell you happened after Milhaud’s 73th birthday when he conducted the New York Philharmonic in a performance of his 10th Symphony, coming on stage with the need of two canes. A critic wrote that, “His vigorous conducting gave the impression of a bottomless resource of energy.”
After reading about Milhaud I cannot but think that I could dig deeper inside myself to see the positive in my life and revel in the art around me and what I create.
Below is a wonderful performance of Milhaud’s The Creation of the World. I am excited to hear the Olympia Symphony perform this amazing work. I’ve always been a fan of saxophone in the orchestra, having written my own work that substitutes the oboe for saxophone in the orchestra.
If you have tickets get excited, if you haven’t gotten your tickets yet two words. WHY NOT!?
