Composing at or away from an instrument

Is it better to write at an instrument or away from an instrument?

Composers like Beethoven wrote their music at their instrument whereas some like Mozart or Bach wrote away from their instrument writing it straight onto paper.

Composing at an instrument lets you hear the sound directly (although this can be done using playback with notation software) and the composer can experiment and improvise.

Composing away from an instrument gives you more freedom as you are not restricted by your playing skill, and you can focus solely on the music.

What are your thoughts?

Is it better to write at an instrument or away from an instrument?

Composers like Beethoven wrote their music at their instrument whereas some like Mozart or Bach wrote away from their instrument writing it straight onto paper.

Composing at an instrument lets you hear the sound directly (although this can be done using playback with notation software) and the composer can experiment and improvise.

Composing away from an instrument gives you more freedom as you are not restricted by your playing skill, and you can focus solely on the music.

What are your thoughts?

It really depends and do what you feel is best.

I find that I do both. Which method I choose really depends on what I'm doing, and where I am. Firstly, I can't really carry a grand piano around with me in my back pocket, and so that factor greatly limits whether I write with the instrument or not.

But assuming I have the instrument, I'll normally start a piece with an idea sitting in my head. Normally, it's just an opening bar, I'm incredibly lucky if I have a full phrase in my head already. I'm not quite proficient at putting my musical ideas straight onto paper from my head, so this is normally where I write at the piano - I'll figure out the motif, maybe the phrase, and more often than not make little changes as I go.

Then once I have that, it's a free for all. I'll look at the motif and something will come to me, and I'll go straight there and write it on paper. If I'm not using a music notation software, I'll often play myself what I've written every few measures or so to make sure I like it, and maybe change a note here or there. Of course, if I'm composing in a spot that doesn't have access to a piano, the point is academic and I just write.

That being said, I'm really not a particularly good composer, so my pieces tend to be slightly more formulaic than I'd like. Motif, develop into a phrase, then a period, then vary the motif a little bit, etc. I'm working on fixing that particular problem. Ah well.

That's my method, for what it's worth :P

~Christian

For me, they are two different skills...

I've always used some sort of playback and only recently tried my hand at going straight from the head onto the paper. Even though I've been studying music for 2 years constantly, I still cannot hear the interval of a seventh, flattened sixth, raised third, and raised tonic properly in my head.

I think that developing the skills to write head-to-paper is important for all composers because you never know when an especially desirable idea will hit you and you'll have nowhere to properly write it down. Good ideas are hard to come by these days :(

My themes usually just pop into my head, and I can write them down fairly easily without an instrument. However, beyond that, I generally can't go too much further without either my viola or some kind of playback. I'll need to work on reducing that dependence.

That said, I think it's best to at least know how to compose away from an instrument, in the case that one is not avaiable.

For me, they are two different skills...

I've always used some sort of playback and only recently tried my hand at going straight from the head onto the paper. Even though I've been studying music for 2 years constantly, I still cannot hear the interval of a seventh, flattened sixth, raised third, and raised tonic properly in my head.

I think that developing the skills to write head-to-paper is important for all composers because you never know when an especially desirable idea will hit you and you'll have nowhere to properly write it down. Good ideas are hard to come by these days :(

I think of it this way....

If you have a good idea, it's not going to go anywhere. I never have a need to rush anywhere and write something down for fear of forgetting it. Chances are that thing is going to change anyway. The piece is a continually evolving organism until it is finally on paper and played by performers for an audience (of some type). I don't know how it is for others, but once I establish what a piece is, and where it's going to go (so to speak), the skeleton is there, everything else is just a matter of putting in the organs, tissue, and skin...

i usually improvise at the instrument and play around a bit, THEN i go to the computer or paper and make it "bigger".

I think of it this way....

If you have a good idea, it's not going to go anywhere. I never have a need to rush anywhere and write something down for fear of forgetting it. Chances are that thing is going to change anyway. The piece is a continually evolving organism until it is finally on paper and played by performers for an audience (of some type). I don't know how it is for others, but once I establish what a piece is, and where it's going to go (so to speak), the skeleton is there, everything else is just a matter of putting in the organs, tissue, and skin...

Yes, that's a good point. But maybe writing down the skeleton first and then thinking about it for a long time is a good idea. Writing down the skeleton, though, is hard when you are in a class or in an airplane, per se (like me)

Yes, that's a good point. But maybe writing down the skeleton first and then thinking about it for a long time is a good idea. Writing down the skeleton, though, is hard when you are in a class or in an airplane, per se (like me)

When do you write generally? Are you in class or on an airplane all the time? I don't understand.

I use a notation program, which could be considered the modern day equivalent to working at the piano. Prior to using this, though, I worked on manuscript paper away from an instrument of any kind - so that way my ears didn't interfere with what was in my head (so to speak). It's all a matter of preference really. Some like to drown there ears with all manner of sound prior to composing... others prefer complete silence...

Bach improvised on the keyboard and wrote things down, Beethoven wrote loads and loads of sketches before writing some parts of his music (the second section of the first movement of his 9th, for example) (I think), Berlioz played things on the guitar (hence the weird voicing some times), Stravinsky played everything on the piano, Feldman wrote everything straight on paper, Birtwistle doesn't particularly care about pitch, Cage doesn't particularly care about notation, Xenakis wrote music using formulas so sometimes pitchs were dictated by other means other than auditory (just like early pieces of Stockhausen and Boulez, among others) and the list goes on.

Just do what you feel comfortable doing.

I personally find an incredible satisfaction by writing music straight on paper, and then waiting until I give it to players to hear it. I certainly can't hear everything I write down, but it doesn't always matter - I know about how it's going to sound like (most elements of music other than pitch are easier to imagine, such as timbre, dynamics, register, and combination of all these, intervals), and when I give it to the players, I make some changes according to whether I like what I hear or not.

But some other times, I just write things on the piano (not literally ON the piano, that'd be bad for the piano) (and for me, consequently, when the owner finds out..), but that's mostly for piano pieces. I generally avoid using piano as an instrument to use while composing because my hands tend to get where they are used to going from the repertoire I know for the piano. I constantly try to play more and more contemporary pieces, but I just don't have much time for that, so my hands tend to go to places where I wouldn't normally go if I was just writing by hand. So I'm either just using paper or the guitar, if I need to (because I don't really have any repertoire to influence me on guitar playing).

Also, you might want to use the search tool:

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/finale-dependent-16377.html

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/wrong-compose-not-being-able-play-15573.html

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/anything-wrong-composing-computer-13408.html

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/composing-hand-versus-software-7703.html

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/do-you-use-your-instrment-aid-while-composing-752.html

:whistling:

If everyone used the search tool, we'd probably have like 5 topics, ever, and theyu'd all be 2 million pages long.

I consider my head my most helpful musical instrument, however technically speaking, the virtual piano roll found in midi sequencers is fun to have in the process of previewing. I hardly write from piano to paper though. Then it would usually be straight onto paper.

I cannot compose onto a piano roll. I have tried it, but unless the intent is something very simple (ambient/minimal music) It all comes out badly. I like composing at a piano, but i will usually try to write at least SOME things out before playing them, then i play it at the piano and mess around with it until its something nice. That being said, i suck at piano so there is alot of imagination involved with hearing some of the music. In some cases, i prefer to write away from instruments because it lets me be more creative. When i am in a hurry, or just want to try out a process or progression or something I have no problem going straight into Finale.. Its all going there eventually anyway.

When i am working with a sequencer, i usually get most of the notes down in finale and then export a midi file to the sequencer. I use cubase, and i can't get the hang of its score view, and like i said, piano roll doesn't do it for me.

Don't use Finale or Sibelius as a crutch. KNOW how your music is supposed to sound.

I do both - with and without an instrument. Obviously I conceive big things before approaching an instrument for details.

Macro: orchestration, form, structure, contour, rhythmic cells...

Micro: melody, harmony, rhythms...specifics.

I only ever play my piano right before I go to bed, and I never write down any good ideas I have. If it's a good enough idea, I'll remember it when I get home from school even the next day and I'll write it into a program.

^I personally disagree with that mindset. I have plenty of musical ideas that could develop into something that I like that I'm not totally wild about to begin with. And on the other hand, a lot of the ideas I have that I like often amount to absolutely nothing.

But they're still ideas. Dismissing something because it "wasn't good enough to stay in your head" just seems silly to me. You run the risk/do lose an enormous amount of work by adopting that attitude.

~Christian

One of my composition professors told me that to him, there is something different about sitting down at a piano and figuring out melodies etc. when writing a piece. I was skeptical because I have always just written straight from my head, but I tried it and have never gone back to the old way!!!

So, I prefer to sit at a piano (or whatever instrument I'm writing for) and write, and I do have a very strong ear as well so its tempting not to sometimes...

I do both. Once written a marvelous Waltz without a piano when I was at the sea. When I played it for the first time, the corrections were few. People, do this thing! It can be glorious!

Bless your hearts

I use both. I write a lot of stuff out that is non-pitched, ie. I am worrying about the textures and rhythmic flow first. I also use the piano, either to develop ideas or to discover new ones, or just to mess around and keep the creativity flowing. I think there are advantages to trying things out both ways. I may write a piece only at the piano soon, and I may write something without touching the piano ever, just to see what the two extremes bring me.

Keyboard is, of course, invaluable, and I usually use keyboard when I can, especially when a piece gets really complex, or for improvising to figure something out. A lot of times, though, I can fill in parts of the score without a keyboard, like when I'm expanding from a short score or filling in chorale-style harmonization. I try to compose (as opposed to just filling stuff in) away from the keyboard too because I think it improves the ear and the imagination, and besides, it's good to be in practice in case I have to write something and there's no keyboard anywhere. (I don't buy into the whole "if it's a good idea you'll remember it" school of thought--I've forgotten so many great ideas it's ridiculous.)

One thing I do when writing music away from a keyboard that I've been told is really weird is: I occasionally write graphic scores on, say, graph paper, using movable-do solfege syllables, where each square is a sixteenth note, notes held over two squares translate into eighth notes, etc. I grew up (musically) on solfege, and I think best in it: it makes counterpoint-writing a lot smoother for me.

If I have a really good idea, sometimes I'm not close enough to an instrument to use it at the same time. But sometimes composing at the actual instrument is really helpful for me too.

I find that using an instrument as you compose prevents you from losing anything you're writing, but I find it doesn't always produce the best ideas. Do both, see what works best for you, because it's mostly personal.

I also think it is a personal preference. Some might prefer to write everything at piano and write each line on manuscript paper.

In my case, I never write anything at the piano, or at the computer. Everything is written in my head (mostly because i'm pretty bad at piano, so I don't really have the playing power to compose at one), and then i sit down and plug what I hear in my head into finale. I find that everyone has their own different method.