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Interview with Peter Gresser
April 3, 2013
Peter Gresser is a composer for media. For information about his work, visit www.sonofactori.com.
Tibbetts: How long have you composed, and what made you decide to become a composer?
Gresser: I was eight when I co-wrote my first thing. I can promise you two things about that piece: I promise that I remember every word and every note, and I promise that it's *terrible.* LOL. So bad! I really started to take writing seriously when I was about 16, when I got a bad case of the FEELINGS and OMG HAD TO GET THEM OUT. Man, I do not miss being a teenager. I started playing piano at two-ish/three-ish, and I'm thirty-one now, so...I guess I've been doing this a while?
Tibbetts: What inspires you?
Gresser: Technology, actually. Which, I know, sounds kinda clinical, but I think that technology is both great (in every sense of the word) and terrible (again, in every sense of the word). We can do things now that, within my relatively short lifetime, were once completely impossible. Like, when my mind starts pondering the internal conflict of "wow, we have a pretty good sense of what every person who is at all connected to a data source is doing right now" vs. "good God, we have a pretty good sense of what every person who is at all connected to a data source is doing RIGHT NOW," I just wanna write about it.
Tibbetts: Can you describe your compositional process?
Gresser: I wish it were more artistic-sounding than this, but here we go: when I'm writing for someone else (I've composed for television pilots, commercials, plays, cartoons, webcomics and games), I meet with whoever is in charge of the production and we brainstorm ideas. If the music needs to be limited in a certain way--for example, if it's specifically a period piece set in Ancient Mesopotamia and a theremin will sound crazy out of place in a bad way--I put on my music history and theory hat and we discuss those limitations. If I'm composing for a visual medium, I try to have the visuals in front of me. I'll usually make a few different tracks for a scene, and we'll cut down to the best one, or sometimes just the best elements of one. Wash, rinse, repeat.
Now, the times I'm just writing for myself are a bit more capricious. An idea gets in my head--a lyric, a melody line, a rhythm--and I just build from that. I try to find a balance between keeping an idea cohesive and keeping it from being limited. I find that if I sit down and think, "today I will write a song about LOVE. LOVE, LOVE, LOVE" I will instead write a song about robots or spice traders or the Challenger Disaster, but never a dang song about love. So yeah. In that respect, my composing process is "don't force yourself. Revise as necessary. Don't go crazy."
Tibbetts: Of all you have done, what do you consider your best work, and why?
Gresser: I...agh. That's tough. I'm intensely self-critical, so the second I say, "man, I really got this one right," that little voice in my head will say, "but but but you fucked up the final mix and you used a shitty sounding sample and it doesn't have enough depth and and and...!"
Tibbetts: What is your 'typical day' like?
Gresser: Mostly? Reading blogs, the news, sitting in front of my piano, plinking away; hopefully hitting "record" before it gets good.
Tibbetts: Do you have any words of wisdom to offer to aspiring composers and musicians?
Gresser: Two things:
1.) My music teachers, of which I have had many, are laughing a bitter laugh at my hypocrisy here, but: Practice. Learn the basics. Do it over and over and over. Going back to my talking about technology: we're in a place, now, where computers really can do impressive stuff. You don't need a lot of studio musicians, because sampling really is just that good. But if you don't know what you're doing; if you don't know the fundamentals, it will sound obvious and lazy. Don't let technology be a crutch for a lack of chops.
2.) NEVER THROW ANYTHING YOU COMPOSE AWAY. This is so important. Even if it's shit. Even if it's the worst, corn-riddled shit you have ever passed through your bowels, DO NOT THROW IT AWAY. Keep it, revisit it, reflect upon it, build and improve upon it. Music is a dynamic and living thing. Sometimes all a work needs to mature is time. Give it that time.
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