Musical output

Hey everyone!

I'm new around these forums and I am so excited that there is an active community in these forums.

I was wondering about your opinions on musical output, please set aside remarks such as 'quality before quantity' as this is obvious and not at all the aim of my question.

So the question is: 

What are your practical methods to meet a deadline or/and amplify your overall musical output

1) assuming you have no specific idea

2) assuming you have too much ideas

Do you use charts to measure the time you spend composing?

Do you reward yourself at the end of the process or each session?

Basically, share every little bit of your process both psychologically and musically

I'll start...

I usually decide what to work on on a monthly basis, usually for solo instruments just to practice instrumentation. Each day I write down a schedule for tomorrow by the hour and I adjust accordingly. Of course it is not possible to complete everything by a foresaid time so I try not to be strict with myself and enjoy the creation process itself.

I alternate between starting with harmony or a motif depending on the goal of my composition. ( A specific idea would require a motif IMO while creating a 'feel' or a sonic environment is mostly around harmony for me)

Each month I reflect on what I completed and what I could do differently. Bigger projects require bigger deadlines (3 months or more).

What are your experiences? Try to be as specific as you can please!

Jeepers.... you're way more organized and methodical that I could ever be. DEADLINES?  GOALS?!  HA!

When I'm writing, I'll usually have 2 or 3 or 10 VERY raw shreds of ideas. I have to poke them a bit, but one will always bubble to the top. I'll work it until it solidifies and I can finish it; or until it disintegrates and I toss it.  Rinse. Repeat.

Your point about not being strict and enjoying the process is KEY.  Unless, of course, there's a hard-stop deadline - it's true that a fixed endpoint can force you to focus and hone in on things quicker; I've had that happen on occasion, but I try not to let myself get into situations where something needs to be finished on time.  

Robin thanks for your reply!

Do you think that grandiosity equals large output? Or quality over quantity?

Does it not interest you to maximize your output as much as you can? 

Please share!

1 Write a lot and write often. It's a numbers game.

2 Be fearless, not overly critical of yourself when fishing for ideas.

3 Store your failures on a computer. It's like money in the bank. When you need something in a hurry, those half cocked ideas can suddenly sprout wings a year later.

4 Try to envision an ending for your piece early in the writing process. This makes everything that goes in between much much easier.

5 Be confident (see 1 and 2)

Lovely advice Ken! You are so right about the whole 'money in the bank' part! 

Saved my arsenal multiple times!

Would love to hear more ideas!

On 1/20/2017 at 6:39 PM, Anthony C Lynn said:

Do you think that grandiosity equals large output? Or quality over quantity?

Does it not interest you to maximize your output as much as you can? 

 

Please share!

 

Quality over quantity, 100%.  I don't care if you write a dozen pieces a day, if none of them are worth hearing.

Maximize your output, for sure - but maximize it in the places that matter.  If you're like me, it might take you three months to write something, but making it beautiful and powerful and meaningful it much more important than the speed in which it gets written.

That said, I don't want to negate @Ken320's perspective.  Because he's also right. When I say quality over quantity, I'm ignoring the 2 months of rejected 8-measure sketches and garbage that looks like this: rj-process.pdf 

Yes, write a lot ... write often. But don't be afraid to swiftly reject something and move on. Do keep everything you sweep aside. It'll be useful eventually. For me, the output is only about actual completed works - it might (like it does for me) take a LONG time to find something worth finishing, and it's these gems that are important to unearth. 

@Ken320 He's right.  I KEEP a vault.  Heck, that's how a lot my finish projects come about!