epic composer FAIL #40

What makes this composer FAIL so epic?

I was rejected by THE New York Times.

(!!!)

I know, total bummer, right? Because if you've contributed to a news source that is read by hundreds of thousands of people globally each day, who cares if you've never won an ASCAP or BMI Young Composer Award or if your orchestra piece wasn't selected by the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute? Who bloody cares that you have not "made it" yet as a young composer when you have HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE knowing who you are and that you must be super-awesome because you wrote for the New York Times. You could have HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of fans!

(Or hundreds of thousands of haters—that's what I keep telling myself. Sigh.)

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In April Daniel Felsenfeld asked me if I wanted to contribute to The Score. I absolutely remember this moment because the email arrived on my Blackberry right when I was having lunch with my friend Annick and her mother in Vermont and I was so happy that I could share my good new…