Teaching someone to compose is impossible! We all know that Bartok said it and refused to teach composition. My mentor Feldman taught composition but always claimed you couldn’t do it, for which he was often criticized by students. His now somewhat famous response to a student who asked him how he could possibly be so hypocritical as to teach composition classes and yet at the same time say that it couldn’t be done was to say that it was a sign of “matooority”…
