"And over the last ten years, after my work with the Brodsky Quartet, I had the opportunity to write arrangements for chamber group, chamber orchestra, jazz orchestra, symphony orchestra even"
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Costello is quietly puncturing the cartoon version of himself: the snarling new-wave songwriter frozen in 1979. The sentence is basically a résumé line, but it’s delivered with the unshowy cadence of someone who wants the work to speak louder than the mythology. The key phrase is “after my work with the Brodsky Quartet.” That collaboration wasn’t just a side quest; it’s positioned as the hinge that legitimizes everything that follows, a passport stamp into rooms rock stars aren’t always invited into unless they arrive as novelty acts.
The subtext is about permission and fluency. He doesn’t claim he “composed” in the capital-C sense; he says he “write arrangements,” a craft word that signals humility and seriousness at once. Arranging is where you prove you understand other people’s instruments, other people’s traditions, other people’s discipline. It’s also where a pop songwriter can smuggle their instincts into classical architecture without pretending they were born there.
The list is the point: chamber group, chamber orchestra, jazz orchestra, symphony orchestra. It’s an escalation, but it’s also genre diplomacy. Costello is mapping a decade of movement across institutional boundaries, from intimate string writing to the full bureaucratic apparatus of the symphony. That final “even” lands like a small grin: not bragging exactly, but acknowledging the cultural hierarchy he’s been navigating. In a music economy that loves tidy branding, he’s arguing for the messy, credible version of artistic adulthood - where curiosity becomes a portfolio, and crossover means competence, not costume.
The subtext is about permission and fluency. He doesn’t claim he “composed” in the capital-C sense; he says he “write arrangements,” a craft word that signals humility and seriousness at once. Arranging is where you prove you understand other people’s instruments, other people’s traditions, other people’s discipline. It’s also where a pop songwriter can smuggle their instincts into classical architecture without pretending they were born there.
The list is the point: chamber group, chamber orchestra, jazz orchestra, symphony orchestra. It’s an escalation, but it’s also genre diplomacy. Costello is mapping a decade of movement across institutional boundaries, from intimate string writing to the full bureaucratic apparatus of the symphony. That final “even” lands like a small grin: not bragging exactly, but acknowledging the cultural hierarchy he’s been navigating. In a music economy that loves tidy branding, he’s arguing for the messy, credible version of artistic adulthood - where curiosity becomes a portfolio, and crossover means competence, not costume.
Quote Details
| Topic | Music |
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