Leaderboard

Me again. I didn't answer your second question. "How can I build up to more complex forms?" In the beginning, I would concentrate on ABA form. You could have 8 bars for the A section, 8/10/12 or 16 bars for the B section and then back to 8 bars of A. A=8 bars (modulating to dominant) B=8 to 16 bars (modulating to tonic) A=8 bars (staying in tonic, this will mean adapting your original A section to end on the tonic) Write in different keys each time and try out different time signatures. If you compose for the flute it sounds quite good on midi. Get good at composing short melodies. Don't be afraid to compose inferior music, you have to be comfortable being 'the fool' before you can be 'the master'. Thats a Jordan Peterson quote. I'm still a fool, I'm composing minuets, marches and other short forms, they are approaching 'good' in terms of quality but I have a long way to go before they sound anywhere near authentic and that's OK. To learn to juggle you begin with two soft unbreakable objects! Then you add a third, and a fourth etc. We would all love to be composing fugues like Bach or sonatas like Beethoven but we have to be realistic. They had the luxury of excellent instruction, hours upon hours of playing, and the need to make a living doing it. For most of us it's a hobby, we have limited time and limited instruction (textbooks can only take you so far). You can study juggling theory from a book but you have to keep dropping the ball in practice, over and over again. The typical place people begin is short form on piano. If you want to compose in the baroque style, Fux counterpoint study or any derivative of his work is a place to begin. From there you can add counterpoint to your melodies. Personally I think the classical style is easier to begin with because you can create melodies and add an alberti bass. That's just my opinion though and I'm sure others have theirs. Get good at melodies with an understanding of the implied harmony. If you play the organ you can add the chords under your melodies while you play them. Sometimes I hear piano music on hear and it's obvious the composer doesn't play and that they wrote for both hands simultaneously as they went. If you isolate the melody it's not so great and that would be obvious to them too if they heard it. First comes the melody, then the bass line, then the middle voices. If you're a genius maybe it all comes at once but to us mere mortals, it's like building a house. There's a process and isolating one aspect and to get good at it the way footballers practice penalties over and over is the best way forward. The impatient among us may disagree! It's fun to try complex forms but they'd get torn to shreds, or worse, ignored, by the fugue experts on here lol. I'm kidding, but it would be like drawing a stick man as an adult and putting it up on the fridge, people would be confused. In conclusion, study melody writing, there are a few rules that'll help you out to create catchy tunes. Put your melodies in ABA form. Play them at the organ with chords underneath. Study counterpoint along side this effort then you'll be able to add a second voice to create convincing baroque music in short forms. Darren

pardon mistakes, this is one of the harder pieces ive composed. not notated yet

Here is probably my best choral work, my motet "Vidimus stellam" in 5 voices (SSATB). I would describe the style as Late German Romantic Emulating Stile Antico, ca. 1875, for lack of a better term, and the work is dedicated to the memory of Liechtenstein-born German composer Josef Rheinberger (1839-1901), whose choral music is similar in style. This motet is for the occasion of the Feast of the Epiphany, traditionally celebrated on January 6, the 12th day after Christmas in Western Christianity, which among other things commemorates the coming of the Magi (wise men) from the Orient to pay homage to the infant Jesus. The Latin text translates: "We have seen His star in the East, and are come with gifts to adore the Lord." I made extensive use of counterpoint in this piece, especially in the climactic middle section. I hope you enjoy! Vidumus stellam - Motetum 5 voci – Communio, Epiphania Domini - Composed: October 27 - November 11, 2016 at Austin; revised September 3 - 9, 2020. - Premiere Performance: January 8, 2017, Epiphany of Our Lord (observed), by the Schola Cantorum of St. Mary’s Cathedral, Austin, Texas – Dr. Jeffrey Jones-Ragona, Director of Music. - Style: Late German Romantic emulating Stile Antico, ca. 1875. - Text: Communion, Proper Mass for the Solemnity of the Epiphany of Our Lord (January 6) - Language: Latin - Duration: 03:30 - Electronic Rendering by Finale 26 music notation software’s "Human Playback" with NotePerformer 3 artificial intelligence assisted interpretation.

Here is a score that was composed for orchestra In C major, hope you enjoy the score it was a pleasure to compose! Friend.

Hi here is a short 4 minute keyboard concerto I wrote in 3 days hope you enjoy my score!

Here is a basic score that I still enjoy even though it's short. Has a catchy melody in the middle that I'm fond of. Enjoy!

Welcome to the forum Lucas! "How can I come up with good ideas?" That's the age old problem for artists of every type of art; from poets to tattoo artists. Every composer has their own way of approaching this. You might be inspired by a chord progression, or a fragment of a melody, or hear a beautiful hymn and want to create your own. I think when you are confronted by an empty, lifeless manuscript paper, or a newly-created, empty midi file it can be a bit daunting. No different than a poet sat by candlelight with his quil and ink pot faced with the infinite expanse of his plain empty paper. But, there is music in you! You said your favourite composers were Bach and Vivaldi, they too would have had this problem from time to time. How did they come up with good ideas? An empty stomach sure is a good motivator for an aspiring young composer, they didn't have much choice but to face the frustration and dig deep. You may have 10 ideas but only one of them is any good. It's a bit like mining for diamonds on Minecraft, you'll dig through a lot of rock before you find anything of value and that's OK. When Haydn heard Mozarts six string quartets he remarked that Mozart had such good taste. He didn't say how clever his music is, or how beautiful his harmony, he referred to his taste, meaning his ability to discern good ideas from bad ideas. That's interesting. The question could be reframed, "How do I discern good ideas from bad ideas?" That takes 10,000 hours of experience, trial and error, perhaps talent too. There are so many unfinished fragments from the great composers, you won't get to listen to them on the radio, but if you did you'd realise they had this issue too. Although to be fair, their castoffs are of such good quality, but they were chasing a higher art form, that us, as beginners needn't concern ourselves with. To point you in the right direction reflect on the fact that a motif is the unit of thought in music. We can all hum or sing a short musical idea, try it. The motif from Beethoven's fifth da da da daa. From that idea sprung a symphony. If you try to invent an entire melody spontaneously it most likely wouldn't make much musical sense. So come up with many short one or two bar ideas, let's say 5 of them, then with you watchmakers eye, scrutinise them and cast off fools gold and keep the one that you believe is half decent at least. Then develop the idea, maybe come up with 5 more ideas that develop it to 4 bars. Delete 4 again, keep 1. Another way to tackle this problem is to have goals and constraints. Choose a form, let's say a minuet, do some research to see how long they typically are, do they typically modulate at the end of the first 8 bars? What chord do composers typically use at the beginning of the B section? How long are B sections? How much material from the A section do they use in the B section? Once you have an inderstanding of a typical baroque minuet that will create constraints which will narrow the infinite expanse of possibilities. Then, what mood do you want to create? Some minuets are quite sad, some are pompous, some are naive and playful. Again, that will create a limiting constraint. Then, what key would suit the style of minuet? Grave but dignified might suit G minor for example. Little by little, constraint by constraint, you will build a discerning ear that will cut down any roots of mysical ideas that clearly do not fit the mould. In the beginning, being a composer is more akin to learning to juggle than a brooding artist trying to put his soul on paper for the world to admire. Its a craft no different than that of a bricklayer building a house or a blacksmith fashioning a horse shoe. Art comes later once you're a master of the craft. Apprentice yourself to others on here that are a little further down the path. We are all really helpful, we were all absolute beginners at one point. If you would like me to take a more critical eye to your scores I can help you learn a few rules that will help guide you and point out a few errors? I found that helpful when I first started uploading scores on here. Darren

Hey Alex, I like the added sound effect! I love the wind! I am thinking of having strong chords or tone clusters by the piano. First you have the scales quicken, and then it turns to thicker chords and tone clusters instead of scales to signify the culmination of water on the cloud, and it combines with the drums to create a scarier effect. Thanks for the update! Henry

Hi @Yoni, For me I think you have a good attempt on this! However, it's real hard to compose a three part canon since it's not just about strict imitation and conterpoint rule but also smooth voice leading and full harmony. E.g. the C#-G-F#-D in b.2, the unresolved G-C# in harp b.11 will be less smooth voice leading. You have three instruments here so I think you can go for fuller triads in the strong beats, but sometimes you're having triple unison like in b.13 first beat, when the chord is D major but you're having triple F# there. There are parallel octave in b.11, 12, 18 btw harp and cello, btw b.2 and 3, b.18 btw harp and oboe. Maybe start out with two part canon first plus a free voice will be easier? Thanks for sharing! Henry

Hi @olivercomposer, You have included some exotic instruments and sound effects here with middle east scale for me. I like your new try here! In 2:18 when the brass appears I think you are heading to your familiar style, but you return to the exotic style which is good! Thanks for sharing! Henry

Hi all. It's one more attempt to create a piano opus by mostly free improvisation. Score prelude-2.mp3

Hi @lucasa223, Welcome to the forum! I think the chorale is quite good! The harmony there is standardized SATB. I feel like the minuet 2 has too many parallel octaves in the first part, but overall it's a good attempt. I like the minuet 1 most like @HtWinsor even if it's short, since the harmonic progression is smooth and the mood is graceful which fits a minuet. I think every idea can be good idea if you drill on it and develop them. There's no bad idea, but not idea undeveloped. Brahms is criticized by Wolf on how simple and commonplace his ideas are, but actually this is what makes Brahms a legend on motivic development, since he always treats those motivic skeletons with magical hands and transformed them to great pieces. You have to get more familiar with formal structure of music, like drill on the larger forms like Sonata form, rondo form etc. Reading books on the subject and analyze the scores with intention with form helps you with that. Enrich your harmonic language will be great too. Another method is, look into the posts of our members!! There are many different styles here and I'm sure you can learn many from them. Thanks for sharing and joining us! Henry

Hi. Thank you very much for the detailed review, it's highly appreciated. I feel that after some time, I'll have to come back to this opus — it will allow me to hear it, so to speak, from a different perspective.

@Henry Ng Tsz Kiu Omg, thanks so much for the response! Forgive me, I’m still beginning to learn how this app works so I can’t make as fancy of a reply as you did yet, but hopefully I’ll pick it up pretty quickly! Since I can’t make the little red boxes, I’m just going to label the different sections if that’s okay. 1) I’m so glad you enjoy the music! I get what you mean about the strings (to be honest, I was thinking the same thing) but I’m wondering if you have any ideas about how to do it. Like should I keep the strings pretty similar harmonically to go with the melody and then just add more complex rhythm and movement within the strings? 2) I also see what you mean about the piano playability and I will definitely look at that pretty soon. That’s something I really need to work on myself because I tend to write music that is probably impossible, to be honest. So yea I will definitely look at that. 3) I’m also alto, I think. It’s interesting, because it really depends on the day. Some days I’m better with higher notes and some days I’m better with lower notes, and so I definitely want to look into why that is so I can find ways to increase my range on a specific day without having to rely on how my voice is on a certain day. Hopefully that’s helpful, and not confusing. But yea, overall just wanted to say thank you for the feedback because I never get this kind of feedback on my music! I’m the best composer I know irl, and the people on flat don’t really give a ton of attention towards my music, so I really appreciate the critical thought towards my music. But yea, hope these responses helped!

This is such a clean composition, and well structured. I'm getting impressionistic vibes here (Debussy, Ravel), and this is music I started getting into later in my composition endeavors. Your middle section does sound challenging, but I love it! The repetition is fun to listen to, and your staccato playing is really quite good. I hear 2 themes in this Nocturne, and the way you transition between the 2 different themes is actually very smooth. It's impressive how you were able to include two themes, write variations around these themes, and transition between them....in just 4 minutes! What the heck? Really good job here, you sound like you have racked up some experience around composition.

G'day @Henry Ng Tsz Kiu, I hope you're well! Sure, no worries. Thanks heaps for the feedback! Regarding whether or not the change of key is too fast to modulate I'm hoping to insert a variation of tempos throughout, I guess I could add the odd più lento here and there! I'll also see what I can do to modify the latter section of the A Major one. That's so cool! I've got to give them a listen. Cheers! G'day @PeterthePapercomPoser, I hope you are well, too! As requested, here are the .mp3 versions. All the best, Quinn

I'm real slow on this one. I first think it's an easy one but there are quite some tricky spots like those wide leaps in b.23 & 30. Also you have no time to flip the scores since this piece is a continuous one with no rest between. So I decided to stick those pages together and finally recorded it. Henry

Hi Henry, Many thanks for your lightning fast review! The glissando piano runs were supposed to represent the sound of raindrops streaking down from the sky; but I thought they might get tiresome if I used them all the way through. That's why I switched to percussion only to represent the height of the thunderstorm. There are actually no gaps in the percussion, just a wide dynamic range, so the drums are sometimes very soft. Perhaps I should add a sound effect of running water, or gusts of wind to enhance that section?

G'day @Quinn St. Mark, Can you provide the pdf score of your draft? That helps us capture yoir thoughts better! For me the Scherzo in E is real funny. Your modulation is real great, first to a G# minor and them to a hexatonic pole C minor!! Will it be too fast to modulate to that key? Or playing with the hexatonic keys will be great, e.g C major and Ab major. Your rhythmic and motivic sense in the A major one is really great. You make use of the opening fate motive really well with the tactus. I feel like it's more developed here before getting to the unknown territories like the G minor, befor returning to the opening A major, since you are heading there with a dominant chord. Great job! I have written Scherzi for the second movements of my 1st Piano Sonata, 1st and 2nd String Quartets and 1st Clarinet Quintet. The former three are in Scherzo and Trio form, while the last one (which is posted here on YC)is in Sonata form. For me they are inspired by sheer energy, whether the energy is powerful, youthful or evil. Thanks for sharing Quinn! Really happy you will keep staying here! Henry

Hey there Wow, this is only your 4th composition? Usually I'd expect to hear something far more tonal, but you jumped into the deep-end of languages vastly more dissonant, eh? Of course it qualifies as music. I like your exploration of tone clusters. But, I'll be honest, it doesn't seem very idiomatic to piano writing. It sounds more like an experiment on the style. For instance, throughout the entire piece the left hand plays nothing but block chords. It sounds like you came up with some sort of progression with your chords, wrote a melody on top, but forgot to flesh out more pianistic textures. I don't mind block chords for parts of your piece, but it was the whole thing. I think you're off to a good start, but if I were you, I would go back and mess around on a piano to figure out how you can make those left hand chords more appealing in their rhythm and texture. I also didn't really care for the B section. It felt very out of place. I know you were going for a change, but a more tonal approach just didn't vibe with the A section imo. So here are some thoughts: -I like how you stretched out the tone clusters for some of the chords, maybe expand upon that? What about low pedal tones for the B sections, and hence creating a bass line we could follow. A dynamic change of texture could be all you need to achieve the contrast of a B section without changing languages, which is always confusing. -the melody/motif was really cool, so what if you developed that a bit more? Maybe that could be your bass line for some other spot in the piece, or experiment with the intervals a bit more. -again, don't neglect rhythm. Sometimes a simple ostinato is all you need to give your piece drive when the harmonic content is more ambiguous and unable to do so with it's lack of function. -you probably already did this, but I'll say it anyway. Don't reinvent the wheel. Listen to what other composers have done with the type of music you're writing. Expand upon their thoughts and ideas, or steal (YES, STEAL) their ideas and embellish them to create your own. And if all else fails, do what I did and listen to everything of a particular style that you're interested in, and when you hate everything about it, tinker and craft that idea in your own way as you see fit to make it pleasing to you. And if only you, then that's okay and all that matters. Since you're here, you might as well get to know some of the other members on our forum. You'd be surprised at their willingness to share thoughts and bounce ideas off of you, all for the low low price of nothing. Thanks for sharing, I'm excited to hear either edits to this piece or brand new works you're eager to share with the composing world. 🙂

Well I listen to my own recording and still feel touched lol. It's like another unknown person who plays this. I certainly enjoy playing your preludes very much that's why I keep trying to play them! Henry

I am a real badass as I've forgotten to mention I've charged Vince $10000000000000000 for each prelude recorded. So I am already a trillionare now! Henry