One Journey

To follow up on my first transition post, I'm sharing the license detail for the completed score, an interactive, multidisciplinary improvisational performance piece.

A year ago I had a long email exchange with pianist, composer, and publisher Dennis Tobenski about new music copyright. As a habitual user of free content, I want to encourage others to be inspired and draw on my work in an attitude of cooperative cultural development. At the same time, we're all striving artists. I've never asked a composer for a copy of a score and been denied or asked for financial compensation. I support the norm of expecting critical feedback -- of course that's why I've been crazy about Feedback Circle. But the controversy of making a living from our calling is silencing: I don't know an emerging artist who doesn't feel even a little conflicted about their uncreative or even creativity-robbing day job, and I attest to frequent guilt trips of underemployment; yet we fear marketing our art would cheapen it. So it does, but in whose eyes?

For now I've stopped posting full scores online, instead giving teaser pages like this for performers to consider and sharing electronic copies for individually.


One Journey by Qian Li is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.