Music composition resources

Hi there! I'm new to Young Composers, have been browsing it for a while, but it's time to post.

I'm looking for resources for helping me get into music composition.

I've 24 now, and have been playing instruments since I was 7. I'm a competent baritone vocalist, pianist, violinist, guitarist, and drummer. I've always wanted, though, to compose classical music. I recently purchased Sibelius 5. I have been mainly trying small piano quartet compositions - piano/violin/viola/cello - so I'm not being overwhelmed by large orchestrations. However, I can't get past about 60 seconds of music. I have little direction, though I'm capable of creating a theme and have it wind between voices and creating nice (at least in my head :P) harmonies.

As such, given where I'm at, I have a decent knowledge of music theory, but little compositional theory. Also, I'm familiar with the roles/sounds of stringed instruments, but am pretty lost when it comes to brass/woodwinds. Any suggestions of good books, websites, or other things that may help me get on my feet?

Thanks in advance! :thumbsup:

I'm not sure what you're asking for, but if you want orchestration books, there are thousands. Rimsky-Korsakov has a pretty good one, but it's also pretty wise to look up Ravel/Stravinsky's orchestrations for their various ..orchestral pieces of course.

As far as composition technique or whatever? I'm not a fan of books for this kind of thing, but you could give Schoenberg's composition bookthing a try. It's called "Fundamentals of Musical Composition" by Schoenberg, obviously.

It would be more helpful to know what type of music you're writing, because it's very easy to go find books on classical forms, and it's also pretty simple to study forms just with literature examples. But if you're writing more modern stuff, maybe Schoenberg's book is more helpful since he deals with core elements which you can use in a lot of ways.

Stuff like repetitions, motives, development (through sequence using pieces from a motive), etc etc. Very typical stuff. If you're writing atonal or non-traditional-sounding music then forms start breaking. There's also a lot of interesting pedagogical material from Paul Hindemith when it comes to theory and counterpoint, etc. He had this whole thing about how counterpoint techniques could be applied in modern ways, etc etc. Plus his music is nice (look at his chamber music, orchestral stuff, etc. Great orchestrations, too...)

So, yeah. I hope this helps some. But more information would be nice.

Absolutely - I'm mainly looking for information on classical voice leading. Basically, just a hint of composition technique. Not to directly steal from other composers, but to get some ideas and some practice.

I'm looking to write traditional forms - essentially from very late renaissance period to early romantic - essentially Bach through Chopin/Schumann/Liszt.

Hope that helps.

Edit - for what it's worth, I'd like to be able to write with the tension/release of Chopin, arguably my favorite composer. I'll never get that good, but I'd like to attempt to somewhat mimic his abilities. His Piano Concerto no. 1 - Romance may be my favorite song, although I typically prefer minor keys (Romance does go minor for a bit).

Knowledge on voice leading you can obtain from theory books on counterpoint and harmony. SSC have already told you some of the best books I am aware of. As for the compositional style and harmonic language of specific composers, I think it is best to closely analyze their works and make conclusions based on your observations.

Absolutely - I'm mainly looking for information on classical voice leading. Basically, just a hint of composition technique. Not to directly steal from other composers, but to get some ideas and some practice.

I'm looking to write traditional forms - essentially from very late renaissance period to early romantic - essentially Bach through Chopin/Schumann/Liszt.

Hope that helps.

Edit - for what it's worth, I'd like to be able to write with the tension/release of Chopin, arguably my favorite composer. I'll never get that good, but I'd like to attempt to somewhat mimic his abilities. His Piano Concerto no. 1 - Romance may be my favorite song, although I typically prefer minor keys (Romance does go minor for a bit).

Then, well, you may want to grab a book which has an analysis for Chopin's work, or maybe just do it yourself.

I suggest that if you want to get "the hand" in Chopin's style, you should A: Be playing it on piano if possible, B: Copying/transcribing his work. By B I mean that you take a score and copy it note by note. While you do that, look carefully at what you're copying. If you want, as an added exercise, you can analyze harmonically what you're copying and each passage. It may be a little harder, but it's good insight. Of course, pay attention to the form, too.

As far as books and such on classical forms and whatnot, I already said that there are many. I myself have tons, and I never use them, haha. But things to look for in a good theory and form book is a chronological historical approach. That's always nice, and you can see how forms change/evolve over time, or somesuch. The stuff that I'm aware is pretty good is sadly in German (and therefore uses the German theory system) and probably hard to get and I'm not even sure if it's translated, so nevermind that.

Still, take a look at Schoenberg's book if you have the chance, it may be helpful regardless in what style you're composing. Definitely check out Hindemith's stuff, specially his counterpoint book. It's pretty nice.

I'll never get that good, but I'd like to attempt to somewhat mimic his abilities.

Never say that. If you want to be as good, the only thing stopping you is you. If you put the work in, you could be as good if not better, nothing stopping you.

Analyzing music all the time can be a pain, maybe at the beginning just copy his style by ear.

These are several books that I have used throughout the past couple of years that have helped me:

Tonal Harmony by Stefan Kostka and Dorothy Payne - this book gives a lot of information about voice leading, chord analysis, part-writing, etc. Though this book has been very helpful for me there are some flaws with it. While many of the music examples are helpful, some are not. Also, some of the wording of the text is confusing and only seems to complicate things, but a majority of it is very informative and has helped me considerably when composing.

Hearing and Writing Music by Ron Gorow - Though this book primarily focuses on ear training, I have found it to be an excellent resource for writing for instruments I am not too familiar with. It has a section dedicated to talking about the different instrument groups, how to write for them, their ranges, and how to notate the different ways of playing them.

I have also heard that Understand Post-Tonal Music by Miguel Roig-Francoli and Music Composition by Reginald Smith Brindle are also very helpful books, however I have not read through them personally.

I hope this has helped, and have fun composing!

Hello!

Welcome to the forum...when I decided to learn composition the book "Creative Music Theory Skills" by Dr.Wallace earl de Pue Ph.d is certainly very helpful as the issues of counterpoint, forms, analysis and technique and other composition stuff are treated in a very simple and direct approach. Dr. de pue is the student of William H bailey(student of Nadia Boulanger) and H. Oween Reeds.

You may find his site as it is easily searchable.

God bless you!

Rolan, aspiring composer from the philippines

God bless you!

Not everyone is religious, and if that were directed at me, I would be offended. Not saying anything about Driver (as he hasn't stated any reigious convictions), but it would be wiser to be respectful to chance.

I'd totally suggest "Fundamentals of Composition" by Arnold Schoenberg. It is one of the best books on the subject of themes, motifs, phrases and their development (as well as small and large-scale forms, but nothing too extended there), and it has many many examples (mostly by Beethoven, but also from other composers) which is good.

small piano quartet compositions - piano/violin/viola/cello

That's a piano trio, not a piano quartet :P (a piano quartet would be piano + 2 violins/viola/cello).

If you're interested in writing music, you should get a book on notation as well. Sibelius is good, but it's not perfect. You need to know how to notate properly so you can correct sibelius when it's wrong. I would totally suggest Gardner Read's "Musical Notation: a manual of modern practice".

In order to write for instruments you don't play, the best thing to do is to consult players of those instruments and have them help you with what that instrument can or can't do, and give you feedback on what you write. If you don't have that luxury, however, the next best thing you can do (which would also be good even if you *do* have players around you that play various instruments) is read a book on instruments. A very good book with many details about each instrument (about how they are played, techniques, effects, modern techniques, notational problems) with more than 500 examples from other composers is Sam Adler's "Study of Orchestration", although it's a bit expensive (so it would be better if you could find it in a library or something).

Also, two online resources you might find interesting are: Dolmetsch Online - Music Theory Online Contents (a very good introduction to musical theory and history) and Alan Belkin's homepage (he has many writings on composition, piano technique, orchestration, harmony, counterpoint and form). Also, a free online version of Rimsky-Korsakov's book on orchestration (which is quite decent, although he only uses examples from his own pieces to demonstrate what he is talking about, which is a bit arrogant): Principles of Orchestration On-line - northernsounds.com - It isn't as good as the Adler, but hey, it is free :)

I hope this helps, if you need anything extra or anything more specific, feel free to ask me :)

[EDIT] P.S., if you want/feel like improving your aural skills, there is this very good open-source (i.e. free both as in freedom and as in beer :P ) application called GNU Solfege.

Not everyone is religious, and if that were directed at me, I would be offended. Not saying anything about Driver (as he hasn't stated any reigious convictions), but it would be wiser to be respectful to chance.

It's been a long time since a compostion thread turned into a debate about religion...those were the days...