Drill Design Writer’ Block

// July 31st, 2008

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Ok - I’ve been sitting here in fron of my computer now for over a week and the school for whom this drill is being written has got to be getting antsy by now.  We’ve had our initial meetings and a rough outline of the show staging.  The only problem is, right now I’m my worst enemy.  When sitting in meetings or even just sketching, its easy as a designer of any facet of performance, to lock your brain into what you want to see.  For me, it was the first movement (Vapor) or a show entitled Aqua. 

 At the staff meeting, we chose to utilize a molecular idea and of course my little brain took off in the “let’s do small groups working independantly of one another to create a sense of organized free form.  If only it were that easy.  The drill itself did not want to cooperate.  Everything I tried to do based on what I had in mind only lead to poor staging, poor development or just ugly sets.  I am in a state of writers block because I can’t let go of initial ideas.

The best remedy for this, at least for me and the way that I write, is to try and take my own advice . . . let the drill go where it wants to go.  I know it sounds a little artsy-fartsy but for me it works.  In this case, I settled down and focused on one aspect of the group and wrote what worked well for the them.  From there I began adding instrumentation in and around the existing section.  It is sort of the Beethoven approach to drill design as opposed to the romantic notion that it just flows from a creative font deep with-in.  I guess my wife is correct and I really am not much of a romantic. 

Now that I have something actually on paper and have let go of my preconceived notions of the look of the drill, I can manipulate what I have in front of me and concentrate on the fundamentals of good design.  It looks like this school will get its drill after all.

Scott Kurtzweil   www.kurtzweildesigns.com