Lloyd Biggle Jr.: Tunesmith

The multichord sounded another fanfare, and Walter-Walter leaped back onto the stage, both arms extended over his head. “Now listen to this, all you beautiful people. Here's your Walter-Walter exclusive on Erlin Baque.” He glanced secretively over his shoulder, tiptoed a few steps closer to the audience, placed his finger on his lips, and then called out loudly, “Once upon a time there was another composer named Baque, spelled B-A-C-H, but pronounced Baque. He was a real atomic propelled tunesmith, the boy with the go, according to them that know. He lived some five or six or seven hundred years ago, so we can't exactly say that that Baque and our Baque were Baque to Baque. But we don't have to go Baque to hear Baque. We like the Baque we've got. Are you with me?”

Cheers. Applause. Baque turned away, hands trembling, a choking disgust nauseating him.

“We start off our Coms by Baque with that little masterpiece Baque did for Foam Soap. Art work by Bruce Combs. Stop, look—and listen!”

Baque managed to turn off the visiscope just as the first bar of soap jet-propelled itself across the screen. He picked up the Com lyric again, and his mind began to shape the thread of a melody.

“If your flyer jerks and clowns, if it has its ups and downs, ups and downs, ups and downs, you need a WARING!”

He hummed softly to himself, sketching a musical line that swooped and jerked like an erratic flyer. Word painting, it was called, back when words and tones meant something. Back when the B-A-C-H Baque was underscoring such grandiose concepts as Heaven and Hell.

Baque worked slowly, now and then trying a harmonic progression at the multichord and rejecting it, straining his mind for some fluttering accompaniment pattern that would simulate the sound of a flyer. But then—no. The Waring people wouldn't like that. They advertised that their flyers were noiseless.

Urgent-sounding door chimes shattered his concentration. He walked over to flip on the scanner, and Hulsey's pudgy face grinned out at him.

“Come on up,” Baque told him. Hulsey nodded and disappeared.

Five minutes later he waddled through the door, sank into a chair that sagged dangerously under his bulky figure, plunked his briefcase onto the floor, and mopped his face. “Whew! Wish you'd get yourself a place lower down. Or into a building with modern conveniences. Elevators scare me to death!”

“I'm thinking of moving,” Baque said.

“Good. It's about time.”

“But it'll probably be somewhere higher up. The landlord has given me two days' notice.”

Hulsey winced and shook his head sadly. “I see. Well, I won't keep you in suspense. Here's the check for the Sana-Soap Com.”

Baque took the card, glanced at it, and scowled.

“You were behind in your guild dues,” Hulsey said. “Have to deduct them, you know.”

“Yes. I'd forgotten.”

“I like to do business with Sana-Soap. Cash right on the line. Too many companies wait until the end of the month. Sana-Soap wants a couple of changes, but they paid anyway.” He unsealed the briefcase and pulled out a folder. “You've got some sly bits in this one, Erlin my boy. They like it. Particularly this 'sudsy, sudsy, sudsy' thing in the bass. They kicked on the number of singers at first, but not after they heard it. Now right here they want a break for a straight announcement.”

Baque nodded thoughtfully. “How about keeping the 'sudsy, sudsy' ostinato going as a background to the announcement?”

“Sounds good. That's a sly bit, that—what'd you call it?” “Ostinato.”

“Ah—yes. Wonder why the other tunesmiths don't work in bits like that.”

“A harmonizer doesn't produce effects,” Baque said dryly. “It just—harmonizes.”

“You give them about thirty seconds of that 'sudsy' for background. They can cut it if they don't like it.”

Baque nodded, scribbling a note on the manuscript.

“And the arrangement,” Hulsey went on. “Sorry, Erlin, but we can't get a French horn player. You'll have to do something else with that part.”

“No horn player? What's wrong with Rankin?”

“Blacklisted. The Performers' Guild nixed him permanently. He went out to the West Coast and played for nothing. Even paid his own expenses. The guild can't tolerate that sort of thing.”

“I remember,” Baque said softly. “The Monuments of Art Society. He played a Mozart horn concerto for them. Their final concert, too. Wish I could have heard it, even if it was with multichord.”

“He can play it all he wants to now, but he'll never get paid for playing again. You can work that horn part into the multichord line, or I might be able to get you a trumpet player. He could use a converter.”

“It'll ruin the effect.”

Hulsey chuckled. “Sounds the same to everyone but you, my boy. I can't tell the difference. We got your violins and a cello player. What more do you want?”

“Doesn't the London Guild have a horn player?”

“You want me to bring him over for one three-minute Com? Be reasonable, Erlin! Can I pick this up tomorrow?”

“Yes. I'll have it ready in the morning.”

Hulsey reached for his briefcase, dropped it again, leaned forward scowling. “Erlin, I'm worried about you. I have twenty-seven tunesmiths in my agency. You're the best by far. Hell, you're the best in the world, and you make the least money of any of them. Your net last year was twenty-two hundred. None of the others netted less than eleven thousand.”

“That isn't news to me,” Baque said.

“This may be. You have as many accounts as any of them. Did you know that?”

Baque shook his head. “No, I didn't know that.”

“You have as many accounts, but you don't make any money. Want to know why? Two reasons. You spend too much time on a Com, and you write it too well. Sponsors can use one of your Coms for months—or sometimes even years, like that Tamper Cheese thing. People like to hear them. Now if you just didn't write so damned well, you could work faster, and the sponsors would have to use more of your Coms, and you could turn out more.”

“I've thought about that. Even if I didn't, Val would keep reminding me. But it's no use. That's the way I have to work. If there was some way to get the sponsors to pay more for a good Com—”

“There isn't. The guild wouldn't stand for it, because good Coms mean less work, and most tunesmiths couldn't write a really good Com. Now don't think I'm concerned about my agency. Of course I make more money when you make more, but I'm doing well enough with my other tunesmiths. I just hate to see my best man making so little money. You're a throwback, Erlin. You waste time and money collecting those antique—what do you call them?”

“Phonograph records.”

“Yes. And those moldy old books about music. I don't doubt that you know more about music than anyone alive, and what does it get you? Not money, certainly. You're the best there is, and you keep trying to be better, and the better you get the less money you make. Your income drops lower every year. Couldn't you manage just an average Com now and then?”

“No,” Baque said brusquely. “I couldn't manage it.”

“Think it over.”

“These accounts I have. Some of the sponsors really like my work. They'd pay more if the guild would let them. Supposing I left the guild?”

“You can't, my boy. I couldn't handle your stuff—not and stay in business long. The Tunesmiths' Guild would turn on the pressure, and the Performers' and Lyric Writers' Guilds would blacklist you. Jimmy Denton plays along with the guilds and he'd bar your stuff from visiscope. You'd lose all your accounts, and fast. No sponsor is big enough to fight all that trouble, and none of them would want to bother. So just try to be average now and then. Think about it.”