The majority of well-known classical music composers were pianists. Having an instrument to try out musical ideas is pretty helpful in the creative process. I’m guessing these composers had “happy accidents” similar to those described here on this forum.
A lot of those composer/pianists were virtuosos, as well. Being able to play “anything” on the piano allows for more creative expression. Conversely, a poor pianist only knows how to do certain things, and their compositions may reflect their limited instrumental technique. For example, consider how many “four chord” (G-D-e-C) songs exist among guitar-playing artists. Low hanging fruit.
Bottom line: If you want to be a good composer, strive to be a good musician.
I tend to start with a pad sound or chord progression over 4 to 8 bars. Then I ‘progress’ that mood with other elements. Some times hit, sometimes miss. But for me this works better than starting with a beat or bass line.
There are times when I have an idea before I start but they often relate to mood and tempo of the track or how it swings.
It’s kind of a jumble of different approaches for me. I’m one of those people who has melodies (and beats and other musical elements) running in my head all the time, often several unrelated ones simultaneously, it can be awful at times. Anyway, when I make it to my little studio I’ll at least play whatever is in my head at the moment but most of what has been auto generated throughout the day is long gone by that point. Sometimes these parts (melodies, beats, etc) make it into tracks, sometimes they don’t. That’s not necessarily a goal. Once I’m playing these ideas they tend to change a bit or develop iterations.
I also like to just stumble across interesting melodies while screwing around, samplers have always been especially good for this for me. I like to discover a neat melody while mangling a sample and then learn to play it on another instrument (synth, etc) to get different sounds.
Once there’s a melody sequenced or recorded I find it easier to “write” the other parts like countermelodies, bass lines, chords, etc. I’ll often rewrite the beats to fit as well. The more there is to go on the easier it gets.
How do you come up with any musical ideas? How do you come up with thoughts? How do you come up with what comes out of your mouth? How do you come up with this post? How does Maria Carey sing the way she does?
I also don’t hear anything in my head. For each track, it’s something else. Sometimes it starts with a random jam, sometimes with something I heard or listen (Streaming my favorite people, Splice, sample pack etc.), sometimes I intentionally try to come up with something on the chord progression or the bassline etc…
But one thing that really helps is to finish tracks (I said this before). The more I finish, the easier they come because I kind of understand what fits where. I will have released 10 tracks by the end of the month. I have 19 tracks for next year all mixed&mastered. Today, I am sitting down to start new ones. I don’t claim to make “good” music. But, I like what I put out there. Each one gets better both technically and musically to my ears.
For me it’s a mixture of hearing stuff in my head and then playing it or just kind of a mindless messing around physically on the guitar, bass or keys.
Sometimes I hear something in my head and record it into voice memos but I don’t often revisit those and actually use them unless it’s for a part of a song I’ve already started. Usually I start by noodling around on bass or guitar until I come up with something I like and then record it.
Often it’s a realtime combo of the two where my fingers do something that sounds good based on some sort of shape or pattern and then in my mind I can hear where it needs to go next and I play that.
After some initial idea is down all of the additional parts happen the same way. Either I hear something and get it down, or I don’t know what to add so I noodle and explore until I come up with something.
With electronic music sometimes it starts with playing something on the keys but I’ve also done stuff with analog step sequencers and quantizers and get something kind of random/generative going and then jam on top of that on another synth.
I’m intrigued by this. I recall hearing alleged quotes from Michelangelo about viewing his art as “releasing the sculpture that already exists within the marble”. Do you have some examples of eastern art that references this same idea?
They way my music has come together in the past few years generally consists of either:
a) turning on a synthesizer and just playing on a keyboard until I start to hear something that leads me to record a part, or
b) I have a sound experiment in mind that I want to explore (for example, using a feature I just learned on a piece of my gear).
I find that once I have one musical part down it becomes easy to create the next layer, and the subsequent ones after that. I have a certain limit when it comes to the number of parts I’ll use (approx 8) before I lay out a rough arrangement and then start editing it into something with a bit more of a thoughtful progression.
Part you, part ‘what happens when I do X’ in the sense of experimental approach, part I really know I to dial in a specific sound.
Of course depends a lot on experience. A synth I know inside out will deliver the desired sound way faster, also if I’have produced the genre a lot lately.
Also, often I piece together samples and work them until I find a nice groovy thing.
I come from drums so that is where i usually start.
I make some drums happen and then work on making them sound the way i want them to. Once im happy with that general noise i work on making the drums flexible and playable so that i can make rhythmic events happen easily.
then i can float off into the area where i throw different sounds at the drums, while playing them, and see what sticks and where it sticks and why, and maybe i can get the drums to do some other stuff too.
this part can take a while and sometimes it goes nowhere.
But when something comes together really nicely i will then decide to take it down the path thats revealed itself and see where it goes. The ideas begin to take on a more focused shape at this point and i either fall in love with it or dont. either way i try and get a recording. Record at all phases is the habit i need to get into.
At this point I can either get lost in endless finetuning of things and never really see the thing become something or i get it down. sometimes when i do get it down i just take the first, best sounding take of it and run with it rather than run the risk of burning out on trying to make ot better.
I find it very difficult to work on more than one thing at a time, so i usually grind on the thing until its done or i cut bait and move on.
But to answer the question, i start with the drums and work stuff in to them.
I hear voices in my head, or whistle, hum, or pseudo beatbox stuff in public. I also pluck strings and punch buttons, and hope for the best. Sometimes I do that and then take it inside my head, whistle, hum, beatbox like a brain DAW, record shit on phone so I don’t forget, then listen back and make shit out of it all. The immediacy of doing shit in your head beats anything Teenage Engineering has come up with, and it’s free.
I never ever approached gear with some music ready in my head: I’m only able to improvise stuff. I’m also addicted to modular or semimodular gear, so rerouting things is a very important part of my improvisation. I found that I have more fun and achieve best results when I start a session with a signal flow in my mind, to give to each gear a role in the “band” I’m building. I sit in front of the rack and say: today you and you will be the beats, you will cover the bass regions and you the highs and so on. If the result is fine the roles may be stuck for a while, but is always refreshing for me to change it.
i just know well how my favorite scales work.
overall mood(s), characteristic notes, avoid notes — stuff like that.
it’s enough to write melodic lines that work well – for instance, there are tons of great tracks that are just 3 notes of phrygian scale.
I use music theory to make 4-8 bar chord progression first and after that try remember root note for each bar and then only improvise everything with extra focus on the root for some bars. Then when hear some i like i record it, but often when record it come bit different than when only improvised but that i still liked the result and kept it
