WHEN I WAS TWENTY, I wrote my autobiography. Short, laudatory, and in the third person, it told the story of my birth as a composer. I let my audience (who I hadn’t found yet) know what to listen for in my music (which I hadn’t written yet) so they could appreciate my artistic voice (which I didn’t have yet). Weaving together glowing superlatives, a tasteful catalogue of artistic influences, and the most stirring backstory I could extract from my middle-class upbringing, I announced the arrival of a major talent, just waiting to make its mark. Around me in the classroom, thirty young musicians were doing the same. Having completed our artists’ biographies, we handed them over to the greying, implacable functionary who ran our career skills seminar. She returned them the following week, with detailed critiques.
