Chess offers infinite variations and joys – it rewards strategic thinking, study, and repetition. I’m especially interested in the lesson it gives about the muddy middle of the game, and of any project.
Since middlegame positions are unique from game to game, memorization of theoretical variations is not possible as it is in the opening. Likewise, there are usually too many pieces on the board for theoretical positions to be completely analyzed as can be done in the simpler endgames.
Chess Middlegame, Wikipedia
There are only a few possibilities for openings, and once most pieces are eliminated, simpler patterns emerge that can be predicted and followed. The middlegame is more complex and difficult to understand.
It’s true for the middle of any project.
I start every composition project basically the same – blank staff paper, a text, and the beginnings of some motivic ideas. I start every rehearsal with vocal warmups, and I start every school year setting out some goals for the year and basic principles. Even school mornings all start with the same to do list.
And endings are the same – final copying of the piece, announcements at the end of rehearsals and goodbye concerts at the end of the year. Every school night kids get tucked into bed.
But in the middle it’s tougher. It’s hard to see which way the piece is going, what to focus on in rehearsal, which direction an ensemble is headed. A day, a week, a month can be filled with all sorts of work that is less clear in its direction and outcome, because it’s part of the middlegame.
But the middlegame ends, and it ends because you keep working through it, doing the best you can in the situation that presents itself in that moment. Before long, you’ve reached the endgame. And then, win or lose, you can start again.