The first college that I attended was Kansas City Kansas Community College, where I studied Music technology. While there, I learned how to compose music using computers and electronics. This opened up a new realm of possibilities for me and my music. If a piece was to difficult to play, all I had to do was make the instrumentation for MIDI, and all would be fine. I didn't have to rework any of my compositions. I was free to compose whatever I wanted. My professors were supportive of my art. They did not make me rework any of my pieces, even though they were technically impossible. By making the pieces for MIDI, they would be possible. I remember in one piece that I wrote, I had written a cluster that included every note on the piano. While not impossible, for two or more performers, it would be difficult for the tempo. Many of my pieces were like this while at the community college. I took a particular liking to 20th century music. The harsh dissonances really struck a chord if you will ( I know, bad pun).
Next, I attended Fort Hays State University. Here I studied Music composition. Here, I struggled to complete all of my classes as I was unaware of some of the minuscule asks required to complete all of my coursework. One such class was recital attendance. THis class had a lot of small requirements in order to receive a passing grade. To make it worse, the class was a pass/fail class. All I knew was I had to attend twelve concerts throughout the course of the semester. That was not entirely true because each concert was assigned a point value. What I had to do was attend twelve points worth of concerts. And there were always three concerts that were required for a passing grade. finally I figured that out and passed the class.My music composing skills continued to mature and become refined. by the end of my collegiate career, I had composed over one hundred pieces for various media. Mostly piano sonatas and solo piano works.
Finally, after eight years in college, I finished.
