David,
You have to know something about how an instrument is played to write good music for it.
I think everyone agrees with this.
However, this statement:
Someone who can't even handle alto clef seems to me to not be likely to understand much about writing idiomatically for the viola.
... doesn't necessarily follow.
Being somewhat unfamiliar or uncomfortable writing alto clef might make it harder for someone to familiarize themselves with the published viola literature, that's true enough. But there are other ways of learning something about how an instrument is played -- for instance, consulting extensively with a player, or learning to hack away on it yourself. And even if someone does learn alto clef as well as the average (non-violist) conservatory grad, they might well prefer to actually compose using the clef they are most familiar with.
To use a real-life example (albeit one involving a different instrument), lots of bluegrass fiddle players don't read any kind of music notation at all, but are nonetheless more capable than most of writing idiomatically for the violin.
We conservatory-trained musicians tend to be biased towards musicians whose background is similar to ours, and discount the abilities of those who came up via a different route. But conservatories graduate lots of mediocre musicians, and many brilliant musicians never attend conservatories. I think that's the essence of what Ryan is saying.
- Darcy ----- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Brooklyn, NY
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