guitar_composer

That's some good advice and I have thought of doing it that way as a whole a couple of times too. But what if the piece is maybe like 5 minutes long then you want to add the next few bars. You would have to listen to the whole 5 minute piece first and then punch in after taht and if you don't like what you have played you need to start again waiting 5 minutes to punch in again. If you do that 10 times you have nearly spent an hour just to fill up the next bar. Could that be right? :hmmm: I feel like I would like to save some time ;) Anyway, would you recommend doing it that way?

Hello everbody, I am seeking advice concerning the following problem. I hope some of you guys can help me with my problem. When I write music I do it bar by bar and by ear (although I know all of the theory as well), so for example I would loop one bar with the accompaniment (chords, bass..) and try to figure out one good sounding melodic motive that fits the bar. When I'm done I would do the same thing for the next bar and so on, without listening to the bars before. I also do that when composing the bassline or drums or whatever. So every bar sounds good now by it's own, but when I have composed some bars like that and I go back to the beginning and listen to the whole part (all bars) now in succession the parts (bars) don't make sense as a whole musical piece. It sounds as if the bars don't belong to each other and the whole piece doesn't seem to make sense in a logical way. So I wanted to ask here if somebody knows how to link the small musical units so that each bar can be written isolated (without listening to the bars before) but so that it makes also sense when listening to the whole piece with the bars before.

Hello everyone, I am trying to compose instrumental rock music and instrumental acoustic guitar music (flamenco/jazz style). But the problem I have is, I know how to develop a motive and construct themes etc. but nonetheless when I start creating a melody and than add chords or whatever (drum rhythm, synths, bass lines etc.) to it ... the music that is coming out of it doesn't sound like a piece, that makes sense. You know what I mean ? it doesn't sound like it has a beginning, a main body, an end and so on. It doesn't give me the feeling of a story being told. From the first note on it sounds like you are already somewhere in the middle of a song. So I thought maybe it is because too many instruments are introduced right on from the beginning, but then I listen to music of great musicians and they often start their pieces with all the instrumentation in there right from the beginning and it works, it sounds like the starting point of the song, but when I try to do it it doesn't sound like a beginning, it doesn't make sense. Most of the time I start composing a piece by creating a melody and then any ideas why? i got so many question about composing, but this one is one of the most important for me to be answered. hopefully someone can. thanks guys.

Yeah I mean augmented when writing the "+" sign. This is a common way of writing. "-" for diminished and "+" for augmented. The "+" doesn't mean that the tone is added, I would have written Emadd9 then. I really begin to love those altered chords with augmented and diminished chord/scale tones in it. Because if I can use different scales to solo over the chords. Before I was always using modes and so on to solo, but that was all diatonic stuff, now I can play wh-scale, diminished scale, arps and so on. And I don't care at the moment if the dissonant parts make it harder for average listeners to like my music. If I like it, its good ;)

Ok. But what you are all talking about - Cmaj7 and C7 - aren't dissonant chords (for me). This is all in the diatonic scale (maj7, dominat7 etc.). But what I experiment with at the moment is: chord sequences with a high tension and release factor. I play one chord (for example I am in the key of Aminor), that is diatonic (for example an "Am") an then the next bar a chord that has one note in it which is not in the Aminor-tonality (for example an "Em+9"). To resolve the tension (of the +9 which is an F# and is not in the Aminor-tonality) I play the next bar again one consonant chord, that is in the Aminor-tonality again (for example a "C"). Then I might create tension again and play the next bar a "Dmb11" which has the F# again, that is not in the key of Aminor, so I have a dissonance again. Then I could do a modulation, from the Dmb11 to D, than I could start with the D in the Dmajor-Key for example. This is what I experiment with at the moment. For me all these altered chord tones like b9,b11,+9,+11,+5 sound really dissonant and I really have to get used to that. But I think it is possible to use them, if you don't play such a chord more than one bar or less. After one bar you should resolve to a consonant chord. But I am still not shure if it is the right way, because it really sounds crazy if you play an "Am"and then an "Em+9" for example, because of the +9. But I hope its nothing wrong with playing such chords like an Em+9 after an Aminor.

So there is nothing wrong with using dissonances or notes that are not in the key ? I always thought, that this would be false. I thought that one can't use notes that are not in the key or are not diatonic or are not blue notes. But I am happy if you say that it still can be "good" music. I am sorry, I didn't want to say that atonal music is wrong music, I just meant that in the ear of the average pop-music listener it seems to be "wrong" music. But what I found out is also, that when I compose a melody and play a second melody, a counterpoint (no chords) over it, I can't use such notes, that are out of the key, because then you hear really extreme dissonances. Or am I wrong with this ?

Hello everybody, I was used to compose strictly using only diatonic harmony and scales. So when I composed a piece, I usually chose one key and took all the material, like the chords and the melody from the notes of this key. And I tried to compose pieces that I like with this diatonic material, for years, day after day, but I never came out with any stuff that I liked, although I used thousands of note combinations and chord combinations over the years (imagine, I try to compose a piece that I like, every day), there was not one thing that I liked. So I began to be in doubt about all the diatonic cage, I thought I had to experiment with other scales or harmonies. Obviously the sound of diatonic music, was not what I was searching for in my brain, which confused me a lot, because there were many diatonic pieces of rock-bands that I liked a lot. But I was composing for two acoustic guitars and everything I played, which was diatonic, sounded like folk music on the acoustic guitar. And I was looking for a more jazzy, complex, flamenco-style. So I stated to experiment adding non-diatonic-scale tones. I build up progressions from a diatonic scale, but add some altered chord tones, that are not in the key of the piece. So I play one bar for example a "Bm" chord and then the next bar a "D+5" (which is dissonan t)and then again resolve the dissonance in the next bar with an "A" chord, than mybe a "Bmadd-11" etc. If I play the chords on their own it sounds very dissonant, but if I add a melody/theme to the progressions it seems to fit and the overall diatonic sound character is gone and it seems please me. My question now is, is this still tonal music and is it possible to play such chord progressions, where one chord is dissonant and the next consonant again etc. ? Or is this already atonal music or "wrong" music?

I want to start composing music that sounds mediterranean-like, like the music that one associates with Italy, Spain, Greece etc. My Problem is, I know the Western Music Scales, like the modes of the major scale and so on, as well as harmonic minor, meldoic minor, bebop scale, blues scale, pentatonic scales, diminished, w-h-scale, h-w-scale, etc. but with none of them I get a mediterranean sound. So what scales are used in mediterranean music ? I can't find anything about mediterranean music scales on the internet and as long as I don't know which scales give the mediterranean feel, I cannot compose mediterranean music. So please help. Or the Latin-Music, I also like that sound, what scales do they use ?

Hello guys, I have problems composing great melodies. If I analyse and play the melodies of famous musicians, I am always disappointed, because their melodies sound so great and because I would never have come up with this melody. The problem is, when I try to compose a melody it always sounds like a mindless order of notes. I don't now if it is the order of the notes (i play), which is unmelodical and just senseless, or if it is the duration of each note (of the melody) which is senseless and so doesn't shape the character of the melody well. And often I want to play a melody or solo in a particular musical style, but I don't know what makes a melody sound like jazz, pop, rock, blues, flamenco, new age, classical or whatever.