# Prerequisites for Composing and Orchestrating.



## MrPlayerismus

Alright,I have been working on building my knowledge on orchestration and composition for years now,studying books,listening to a lot of stuff and practicing it on my own.However,I had a strange encounter yesterday.I went to my former music school to visit my music teacher there,and while conversing about composition,he(as well as three other teachers)insisted that I have to learn things in order and that I am not ready yet to compose and orchestrate.I got to showcase only a mere part of my knowledge,but he kept on insisting that I am not ready and have to go through counterpoint,fugue etc...(I got this response from the other teachers as well)Well,what is the knowledge I am missing?What more do I need to know?I thought I was ready to start writing on a pretty professional level,although this made me think of myself as an egotistical idiot.What are your thoughts on this?


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## emiellucifuge

There are serious benefits to learning music in the way your teachers refer to. But it certainly is no prerequisite to composing well.


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## MrPlayerismus

I see,but they were so discouraging.They didn't even care.I think I am lacking serious knowledge if they have this stance.


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## emiellucifuge

Everything will eventually be proven in practice. But why dont you tell me what you have studied and using what books for a start.


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## MrPlayerismus

Books I have read with great devotion and finished is Hindemith's harmony,Adler's Orchestration and I am currently studying Persichetti's book.I have also read various other books(not as carefully),including Jazz Piano Book,and I have been trying to 'decode' a lot of orchestral works from IMSLP/Freescores etc.


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## paulc

I had the same experience a couple of years back. I thought I was ready to start writing large works, then I went to uni and found out I knew very little! :lol:

Now I am educating myself properly. I have a list of things I need to learn to write in my preferred style:

Theory / Basic Skills
*Counterpoint / Fugue*
Harmony
Form
Orchestration / Instrumentation

In that order.


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## MrPlayerismus

I will never go to a musical university tho,so I need to study on my own.I have read a lot about all of the aforementioned skills,but only Theory,Basic skills and harmony with a tutor.


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## Meaghan

paulc said:


> I had the same experience a couple of years back. I thought I was ready to start writing large works, then I went to uni and found out I knew very little! :lol:
> 
> Now I am educating myself properly. I have a list of things I need to learn to write in my preferred style:
> 
> Theory / Basic Skills
> *Counterpoint / Fugue*
> Harmony
> Form
> Orchestration / Instrumentation
> 
> In that order.


Counterpoint before harmony? That's very interesting. I would have thought harmony would be a prerequisite, because one of the things that makes (tonal) fugues such a delicate feat is the challenge of making them work harmonically. (Plus, harmony's easier.) But maybe I just think that way because I learned harmony first, and I do sometimes fall into the trap of thinking that the way I learned things is _the_ way to learn things.


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## MrPlayerismus

I have learned Harmony without learning Counterpoint or Fugue as well.

EDIT:With a tutor,that is.


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## paulc

> "I have read a lot about all of the aforementioned skills..."


Well, stop reading and PRACTICE!  This is actually a good point...

Do you know of 'The Study of Counterpoint' by Alfred Mann? I recommend it if you already have basic skills and want to learn traditional voice leading. You work through the exercises in the book at your own pace. At the end of the day, you don't know some things in THEORY, but in PRACTICE. You will learn things that will make it easier for you to understand 18th century counterpoint, fugue and other musical concepts in those scores you try to make sense of.


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## paulc

> "Counterpoint before harmony? That's very interesting. I would have thought harmony would be a prerequisite, because one of the things that makes (tonal) fugues such a delicate feat is the challenge of making them work harmonically. (Plus, harmony's easier.) But maybe I just think that way because I learned harmony first, and I do sometimes fall into the trap of thinking that the way I learned things is the way to learn things."


That is just my opinion and I am only a student.

I read somewhere (I'll try to find the source*) that one of the 'pros' of learning species counterpoint is that a student can acquire basic skills without having to pre-plan harmonic progressions, or devise rhythmic and other elements of a piece. The harmony is implied by the given cantus firmus. I am talking from a learning perspective here. This is NOT to say that people can write satisfying fugues without ever studying harmony!

In my experience, it is easier to understand musical excerpts demonstrating four-part writing / harmonic practice after learning why the voices are lead as they are, eg. with regards to doubling, voice exchanges, the swapping of material between voices (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) etc...

*I think this is it, See 'The pedagogy of counterpoint' (Alan Belkin):
https://www.webdepot.umontreal.ca/Usagers/belkina/MonDepotPublic/bk.C/C.pdf


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## MrPlayerismus

Blame me for not being clear enough.I haven't only read,I have done all of the exercises in Hindemith's book(and trust me,I have hated writing for four voices so much,after all the practice ).In the sense of practice,I also improvise on the piano,write down the improvisation chord progression and analyze it,trying to reorchestrate and compose with computer programs,as well as writing musical pieces on paper.


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## Argus

What kind of music do want to create?

If we know that then it might be easier to tell you what you need to know and what won't be as useful.


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## emiellucifuge

When I studied at school, my teacher gave harmony and counterpoint excercises, voice leading etc.. same when I studied conducting.

When I started to study composition with a composer, we never once returned to those things.

Really its impossible for any of us to judge what you need to do through the distant internet. Your teachers may be right, or they may be overzealous theorists. Theres never any harm in continuing your study, thats my advice. And just start composing.


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## MrPlayerismus

Just to enlighten you further,the kind of music I want to create is,well,awkward.I have listened with great care all of the works by Beethoven/Brahms/Wagner/Mahler/Stravinsky/Bartok/Ravel... and I want to write in a style that encompasses all of them(awesome,isn't it? ).From the epic symphonic orchestration of Mahler and Bruckner,to the folkish idiom of Bartok,and the modernist chords of Ravel and Stravinsky.Blend all of these into a symphonic piece,and you get...Well,I don't know,I am still working on it.


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## PetrB

Counterpoint was first.

Since it was initially all about singing lines, and because it was the first phase in the development of musical thinking which led to the very concept and thinking of harmony as harmony, it is not at all a bad place-- indeed maybe the best place -- to start. MODAL, Not tonal 18th century counterpoint.

It was modal counterpoint that Mozart studied, ala Palestrina and earlier. It was a score of Palestrina's Beethoven asked his publisher to send him when he wanted to know more of counterpoint before penning his Missa Solemnis (imo, Beethoven's most successful and masterly essay in counterpoint.)

Bach, and thinking of music as 'Harmony,' came later: originally it was never thought of as 'harmony' other than as the Consequence of two or more independent horizontal lines.

18th century counterpoint is often as fatally misunderstood as it is fatally taught - it too, is not about 'chord progressions.' It is often taught and even more often analyzed as such. Bach was a wholly horizontal musical thinker, and born at the end of an era of modal diatonicism tipping toward tonal diatonicism. Often within his works, one sees and hears a fusion of both.

From this and later developments in the classical era was -- then again later and well after the fact -- extracted that dreadful American phrase and premise so loosely bandied about, "Good Voice-Leading." (I'm American, so have a bit of 'title' to knock some of what floats about in 'our' music education.) I cringe every time some youngster or amateur composer starts talking about 'chord progressions.' The thinking best lends itself to the popular genres, where you mostly have a simple melody accompanied by chords. You've locked yourself in a box as you've begun by thinking first of 'chord progressions.'

Counterpoint fell so out of fashion on the European musical scene that in the second half of the 19th century, conservatories did not even have it in their curriculum. A lot of later 19th century repertoire displays that lack of interest as well. 

Best to grasp and adhere to this deliciously truthful dichotomy:
"Good counterpoint is good harmony. Good harmony is good counterpoint."

The Hindemith is good as a general introduction to modern (1890 - 1975) concepts of harmony, but then he goes on in that rather horrible cliche manner of the least attractive of supposedly Teutonic Traits, proclaiming His System should be used by all, "You should do it This Way." Further, he has an insupportable argument for 'tonality' over any other mode of writing, and sets out to demonstrate the 'organic rightness' of tonality and the diatonic 12-step scale. This is a personal document from a composer who was increasingly bitter and angry he was not considered the worlds finest composer, at a time when his status was fast-fading, his musical style fading from favor -- it was really a brief hiccup vogue in the time-line of music history, which, oblivious to Hindemith's ego and desires, again moved right along. Hindemith's later works became a self-parody, his always present pedant-academic quality having taken over fully so that one work was indistinguishable from another, and that should temper your evaluation of the Hindemith text. Take what is good from it and dump the rest.

Walter Piston's "Harmony" is so good it is still used, even at high school level, it is that well done and that clear: likewise Kent Kennan's "Counterpoint."

As for your former teachers and your comps, the lack of interest could be for any number of reasons. Some teachers completely turn off giving former students any time at all because they are former students - rather cold, perhaps less than generous, and 'all business,' -- you are simply no longer a client. (What did you expect?)

If you have no real grasp of form, either the older formal designs or any newer manner of mapping out an extended piece to keep it 'cohesive,' I might say as much but then tell you, without giving you or your score more than a moment, that you need much more time looking into that.

If you are writing original music which is nonetheless in any of the older classical or romantic vocabularies, you are writing an academic exercise, of little interest to anyone other than a teacher looking over an assignment, I would not be less interested than you report they seemed to be. 

I remain surprised anyone would bother to write even the briefest of pieces in a mid or late romantic style, other than one of those academic 'model' assignments, let alone compose whole symphonies, concerti and other works in the same vein. But many do. That 'symphonist' thing too, if not dead, is for better or worse wholly out of fashion. 

For many who listen to or compose contemporary classical, anything which is still a sonata, symphony, or in that older sonata-allegro mold is not considered 'modern.' Indeed, anything with an identifiable and recurring theme is 'old fashioned.' I cite the somewhat popular Carl Vine, who works in the old forms, and whose harmonic palette is barely early-mid 20th century modern, let alone contemporary, and whose basic impulses seem very conservative late romantic, or, as Elliott Carter referred to even the Viennese serial music, "All that old Brahms Stuff."

Certainly even the most truly modest of hobby composers harbors a real desire to hear their works performed and probably recognized and lauded. So many though, find they have some gift or knack for writing, but it is often the case that gift is more a 'knack' for something highly derivative. I recall a posting on an answers forum, "I've composed a symphony (or a piano or a violin concerto) that is like Tchaikovsky. Where can I get it performed?" 

My instant thought, echoed by many another, "Why bother, since Tchaikovsky wrote all the good Tchaikovsky there is to be had?" Just look on YouTube or some posted "compositions," available elsewhere on the WWWeb. Piano music derivative of or in near exact imitation of Chopin, Rachmaninoff, etc. -- dozens and Dozens of endeavors from amateurs, the autodidact as well as the fully trained, each of them seemingly agog with having re-invented the wheel. Many of those works are blandly mundane to a degree where it is difficult to grasp the impulse which drove the composer to it, and their seeming lack of discernment about music altogether,since they truly seem to present it as if it might somehow 'stack up.'

Fresh contributions to music, 'what it is and how it goes,' are rare. It is primarily these (including some dross having arrived via the aegis of fashionable academic snow-flurries) which more or less garner current interest. Write like Sibelius, somewhat? No one is going to be knocking on your door for that. 

If you are not able or interested in composing in any one of the plethora of current vocabularies and styles of musical dialogue, I would not suggest stopping your activity, but cease to expect much enthusiasm from anyone, or attention paid it by composers-teachers.

If you are 'too' conservative, I would resign yourself that you are writing for your own pleasure and satisfaction, and stop wondering why others are not interested in the work.

If you write, you have to write what you can and as you can -- always. If you love doing it at all, I would hold that up above all, 

Meanwhile, meaning no discouragement, it seems it is, 'back to the drafting board.'

P.s. Your notion sounds more like a salad where the individual flavors cancel each other out or conflict! And I do hope, before you 'reinvent the wheel' on such a project, that you are aware of Berio's Sinfonia, the third movement? A link in a playlist, Berio conducting the premiere recording, I would think is a must for you.

P.p.s. The prerequisites for the skills you ask about are not just academically obtained: what you are really aiming at has another 'prerequisite,' and that is bundles of work done in the area 'once school is out,' in short, expertise, experience.


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## emiellucifuge

Some of those composers operated from fundamentally different, and at times opposing idioms...


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## Kopachris

PetrB said:


> If you are writing original music which is nonetheless in any of the older classical or romantic vocabularies, you are writing an academic exercise, of little interest to anyone other than a teacher looking over an assignment, I would not be less interested than you report they seemed to be.
> 
> I remain surprised anyone would bother to write even the briefest of pieces in a mid or late romantic style, other than one of those academic 'model' assignments, let alone compose whole symphonies, concerti and other works in the same vein. But many do. That 'symphonist' thing too, if not dead, is for better or worse wholly out of fashion.


I agree that a little less enthusiasm should be warranted. However, I believe the only people who care about modern classical music as you describe it are the academics. The general populous still prefers the older mid- to late-Romantic style, repetitive forms, and tonal harmony, judging by the popularity of film and other popular music. Therefore, assuming your goal is popularity, what style you should write in depends on who you want to be popular with. If you want to be popular with the academic folk, innovation is a must. If you want to be popular with everyone else, stick with what sounds pleasant and market yourself accordingly. In the end, popularity all comes down to marketing--a task which is far more difficult than composition.


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## MrPlayerismus

I seem to always be missing stuff.With the term chord progression,I generally was refering to the harmonic/contrapuntal motions made by the composers,I just assumed that this is supposed to be expressed as chord progression(I have been used to using false terms since these forums are the only ones with professionals on this subject.)

PetrB,thanks for your post,it is really helpful and it organizes a lot of things on my head.Just to clarify the kind of style I am interested in even more.The truth is,compositionally speaking,I cannot have my own 'style' right now because of the fact that I am young and not experienced,and like Adler says,personality on music comes after writing generic stuff(or something like that).

The 'mix grill' of those composers is something that comes out of me on its own,since I favorite those ones.I know that a lot of them contradict each other,you can see it because Bartok is on the same list with Beethoven.
However,it is not impossible to combine both,crudely speaking,you could have a Bartok folkish dance melodic line,while putting dry classical chords(that word again,sorry) on the background.

However,what I am truly interested in,is film/video game in a neo-romantic idiom(like Williams).However,for obvious reasons,that cannot be accomplished right now.

I by no means view composing as something of an obligation.It is a passion and something that took away a lot of my time studying it,in order that I can one day contribute into it.I cannot really think of marketable music right now,since I am hyped and have already started a kind of symphony with all of those idioms.(By the way,there are no movements on the symphony,it's just continuous.:\ )Once I finish it,instead of sitting on a desk all day long,I will send it to some orchestra,probably the Berlin Philharmonic(ridiculous idea,isn't it?) just to sit on their desk and not even care about it.Damn,I feel embarassed just for saying it,and just by knowing that I am surrounded by far superior people in this forum,yet having a huge aspiration...


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## suffolkcoastal

I taught myself to compose, by score studying and the help of many of the books mentioned above. I seem though to be able to do it naturally though and developed my own sound world and way of writing by listening. I largely have to compose at the piano though am able to work out some of the counterpoint in my head checking it on the piano later. I also taught my self to orchestrate through examining scores and Piston's orchestration.


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## MrPlayerismus

That's the way I did it as well,but teachers seem to not like this method,and this troubles me.


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## suffolkcoastal

They don't, I've heard very little of music. I'm usually dismissed as I'm self-taught and haven't been to the 'right places'. Sadly this kind of attitude still exists in the UK. It is completely forgotten that a number of well-known composers were either completely or partly self-taught.


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## Polednice

Your fundamental question ought to be whether you want your music to stand up to eager ears or academic analysis. There's no doubt that learning the fundamentals of music theory are important, but I think the depth of knowledge you need in the various areas of harmony and counterpoint _et. al._ is over-rated because it is espoused by academics. Much of creativity is intuition, and the more rules you learn, the more you might inadvertently limit yourself.


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## PetrB

MrPlayerismus said:


> Just to enlighten you further,the kind of music I want to create is,well,awkward.I have listened with great care all of the works by Beethoven/Brahms/Wagner/Mahler/Stravinsky/Bartok/Ravel... and I want to write in a style that encompasses all of them(awesome,isn't it? ).From the epic symphonic orchestration of Mahler and Bruckner,to the folkish idiom of Bartok,and the modernist chords of Ravel and Stravinsky.Blend all of these into a symphonic piece,and you get...Well,I don't know,I am still working on it.


"...and you get...." Phew!

Perhaps you would get something akin to Luciano Berio's Sinfonia, 3rd movement. 





Berio uses the scherzo from Mahler's second symphony as a vehicle for his own music, while along the way incorporating highly integrated quotes from: Schoenberg; Debussy; Mahler (Symphony No. 4); Hindemith; Ravel; Berlioz; Stravinsky; Richard Strauss; J.S. Bach; Berg; Beethoven; Pierre Boulez; Webern; Karlheinz Stockhausen and some of Berio's own compositions. Despite all the quoted and incorporated materials, the entire work remains in a clear and fluent voice unique to the composer.

This could only have been successfully made by a composer with an innate and extreme talent who also had decades of training in all of music theory and composition, including graduate level deep analysis of large works. This, de facto, incudes a keen, profound and deep awareness of all music history and its literature so well understood that all becomes so fully absorbed all craft skills operate on a near intuitive level.

Such a project as Berio's, and yours, requires a composer with brilliant natural talent who has also studied and practiced a lot of orchestration by way of many completed original works prior making something like the Sinfonia.

Just as we slowly develop physical muscle and stamina, it is the same learning the crafts of composing and orchestration. Muscle and stamina must be incrementally built and cumulatively built upon in order to fully assimilate much of the business of writing. The goal to have much of it as ready tool(s) and reflex, so when one conceives of a large work the concentration goes entirely into inventing the piece and making it work, without having to constantly puzzle out "How" to do it.

You do need to 'go through a progression.' After only a relatively brief study of somewhat basic harmony you should really not expect to initially compose anything but short and relatively simple pieces. Start writing for instruments, with maybe first a short and effective simple piano piece, progressing to and through a string trio, other chamber music, say strings and then add a wind or two and a piano, chamber orchestra (Mahler, the song accompaniments - Des Knaben Wunderhorn, original chamber orchestra version are a great study.) By then, you may have had a chance to have accumulated enough craft and experience to have found a bit of original voice, and may be then nearer 'ready' to tackle such a project as you now imagine.

You started 'late' it is for you a passionate pastime, not a profession. I fully and directly understand the impatience of starting something late and having the large idea and hopes at the top of the list of desires, but - one . thing . at . a . time.


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## Polednice

I'm personally not a fan of the little by little, step by step approach. I think it is too akin to the learn-by-rote mechanism employed in our schools which dullifies everything we learn. You need to be creative while you learn. So read a little about music theory, but don't go doing little exercises and writing mock pieces. Think of something you _really_ want to write, and then just write it. It might be frustrating, and it might be absolutely crap, but you'll be forging something you love more than reducing music to mathematical rules, and the fact that you'll have a mental image of what you want means that you can reference the rules and techniques you need to learn as and when you need to learn them, rather than trying to stuff the whole system in your head prior to writing anything. And whenever you need inspiration or teaching, turn to a score of a piece, and only to a theory book if you've really got no idea what's going on in the music.

My approach is not universally applicable or fool-proof, and it may well not work for you - but you mustn't think that there is one way or a best way to tackle the process.


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## clavichorder

^^^^^^^^^
I agree that the best advice one can get, is to just TRY. Medtner rightly said that one cannot be taught composition, one has to figure it out on their own.


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## paulc

Excellent posts from PetrB, I couldn't agree more.

The 'intuition vs. theory' debate is now creeping into this thread. 

Personally, I have found that the more I learn about traditional practice, the better I am able to get ideas out of my head and onto paper. There was a time when I would try to compose and after failing to get some musical ideas to work or co-exist, I would give up in frustration. Others may find that their intuition is stronger and they simply write with little instruction. It depends entirely on the individual.

Perhaps it is the thought of all the hours and energy that some must expend to achieve mastery that dissuades them from intensive study? If this is true, then maybe the student has the wrong motive.

Fux - 'Study is pleasure rather than a task.'


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## PetrB

Hit button twice -- apologies for the clutter.


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## PetrB

I wonder if those who complain of or shy away from contemporary classical music know that in the past eras when the old composers were the 'modern' composers that those who mainly cared for Rameau, Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, etc. (now all those composers are evidently the 'easy' listens and sacred tonal heroes for current listeners) were the cognoscenti? i.e. Academia? And that the audiences then were not the general bourgeois class who are the majority of the consumers of that music now? 

Are some here that naive to think any symphony organization of any integrity would accept (and pay a royalty fee) for a contemporary newly written lesser quality easy-listening derivative 'comfort-food' macaroni and cheese regenerated cliche of romanticism because it would bring in and or make the punters happy? That era is already littered with bourgeois gentlemen composers, French, Russian, German, etc. who have already written the lesser and easier listening from the era itself, and the royalty fee, if any will be far less. There is plenty of second and third tier music which is 'pleasant' and less challenging to program, and it often enough is programmed and recorded.

Are some also naive in thinking they occasionally program John Williams' Star Wars Suite or run a performance of the episodic music from a video game score because they think it is fine music? Let me disabuse that notion. When a symphonic organization programs that fare, they too, are pandering to the easy listening crowd, who do hustle to scramble for extra-high priced tickets for those program events and who buy out the house in hours. That stuff is programmed in order to subsidize the classical music, which costs more and brings in less, as it always has. Ditto for all the 'pops' orchestras such as the Boston Pops - an organization to take advantage of the don't want a challenge crowd to subsidize the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

That statement on popularity pretty much just delineated the fundamental difference between pop and non-pop music. Not that classical composers - Of Any Era - are out to please only themselves, they are hoping that it is liked by others. Often they were beholding somewhat to please a patron - however that patron was an educated and 'cultivated' individual of uncommon discernment who was not commissioning a work in the hopes it would be a comfort, sooth or relax them.

If some do not want the art they consume to challenge them in any way there is always the option of not consuming that which challenges or makes them 'uncomfortable.'

The suggested mention of popularity and marketing = the nadir of fine art, as much as fine art, too, needs 'marketing.' But then it was here couched in contemporary terms of 'product' as matter-of-factly as if it is a kind of Running Shoe being discussed here. The film / video / anime crowd have yet to produce anything yet I would consider truly 'original.' It is usually an amalgam or stew of derived styles from more distinct and truly individually voiced artists, vs. -- sorry -- a sort of on hire hack. Where I have heard some wonderfully fresh and highly musical 'art-worthy' music is more from some of the alternative pop crowd, who are very much pursuing something for its own sake and not with the eye on the sales and money as their primary concern. I know of not one true professional artist, including the performing ones, who anywhere along the way thought of the practicality of what they were training for and practicing to become, not a one. For them, it was something they just had to do, and the consequences of - here are the words again -- Comfort and Security, were as remote from their thoughts as a light years away solar system is from ours.

However, I am near screaming in reaction to the statement, matter of fact, that 'some like the less challenging, or however it was put.' I want to shout that No One Owns Music, no matter how ardent a fan they are. So fine, one has 'announced, speaking for others I might add, that they are more comfortable with the less than challenging fare like film scores and the like. Beethoven, especially, but Brahms, and just name any old-school major composer you claim to love, each curl their lips and snarl and laugh at that type of music consumer, because that listener is concerned about art being 'uncomfortable.' People are welcome to say it, this is an open forum; but that, to me, has no place in any discussion about any kind of real art, ever.

Unless someone is the artist who makes it, or the performer who plays it, their only option is to consume what they will - or compose what they like to hear. The great composers and the cognoscenti Are a de facto 'elite.' There is no PC adjustment for that fact. They have spent a lifetime learning about and making art, including much preoccupied time thinking about it, how to evaluate it and find ways to speak of it. The current trend of these times have allowed for a mass delusion that the inexperienced and lay population, non-specialized nor professionals in the medium, all have an equal weight in the voting booth on the arts.

That just ain't gonna happen. So no requests, please. This is a classical music forum, not a piano bar. Feel free to drop something in the tip jar on your way out.


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## PetrB

Theory is a set of models of how others made their music work - most of the time. It should not be thought of and never was 'a set of rules.'

Part of the nitty gritty technical study of any craft is not only to give you fundamental tools, but a survey, with some essays as exercise along the way, if well taught and the student open, of Many Modes of Thought on how to solve problems within that medium. All that was learned, it is to be hoped, 'absorbed' and then, almost unconsciously, operative on an intuitive level. 

It is the various modes of thinking that are of the most help when composing, not any longer the actual theory. After all,theory only tells you what other composers did, Not How They Did It.

All the general advice about sit down and write what you can as you can I second with a roar - only asking that you scale down the size of each of those, and Here is why: 
You also have to learn how to begin, get through the middle of, and then conclude an original piece. That also, needs repetitive practice, which is another cumulative experience.

My comp lessons never had one word about theory in them. It was all, "Something is missing between this passage and that one," Or, arriving at a consequence making a harmony, and then the next would have the teacher say, "Not Yet!" 
or 
"The bass seems a little muddy or vague here." 
"I question this One Repeated Pitch (!)" 
Physical gestures accompanied by contoured non-verbal sounds would come out of my comp teacher. There would be mention of overall shape, intent, a contour, graphic non-notational visual illustrations would show up on the board 
"This is a waterfall effect." 
"This is a cantilever device." 
It is sounding to me, now years later, more and more like a lesson about 'art' or architecture.... That is a huge hint / tip.

Point is, at that juncture, you are actually quite on your own, only generally guided (Guru = guide) and not specifically taught much of anything, with, at least in my case, not one mention of any theoretical term, no roman numeral analysis, no Shenker analysis, or any of the rest. 

"I'm hearing too much of g# here (the single pitch)." ...and so it went.


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## PetrB

Arnold Schoenberg, Edward Elgar, and George Gershwin are the three 'big' composers I can think of who were primarily self-taught. So it Can Happen. The odds of you or me having their native talent and quick grasp of all the medium involves, though, are slim to say the least. Every other 'important' composer I can think of went through an extensive training.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

MrPlayerismus said:


> I see,but they were so discouraging.They didn't even care.I think I am lacking serious knowledge if they have this stance.


My advice: ditch the teachers. Who needs them? If you think you're ready for counterpoint, I say go for it (but take it one step at a time please.)


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## Kopachris

PetrB said:


> [big long rant]


Was that directed at me?


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## MrPlayerismus

Thanks all for your helpful posts.What would actually help you all guys is a score.I could try writing just a short orchestral piece demonstrating...well... my knowledge and post it here so you actually can know exactly what I know and not just me speaking theoretically about what I know.I just need to figure out how Sibelius works,because I love paperwork and never wrote computer scores.Nevermind,I will try working on it and post the score as fast as I can.Then you can 'critique' the ideas/orchestration etc.. and 'rate' the knowledge I have in the various aspects of composing.

Any preferences as to what you want me to write?Or just me doing things freestyle?


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## Polednice

Well, PetrB, that was a totally unnecessary tirade, and a complete mischaracterisation of the alternative methods people have described here, apparently because you think yours is intrinsically superior. I have the urge to take it apart, but it's so long and tedious that I'm not going to bother. Do whatever feels right for you MrPlayerismus, and, most importantly, whatever it is that you enjoy, and whatever it is that makes you feel like you're developing. Study and knowledge and technique are important, but don't let academic snobbery fool you into thinking that there's only one way to achieve it.


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## MrPlayerismus

Thanks for the rather inspiring words there Polednice


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## chee_zee

I find you get better at things by doing them. My method is the best method. A slight improvement can be made however. If you enjoy doing it, you get better at it better, capiche? I enjoy sitting there writing notes on a piece of paper or pixels, that's the fun part to me. I always found writing to be fun and easy, so that somehow translates well into writing music. if you have about more than a few years of music experience, all you need to do is listen and you will learn more than any other thing, even score reading. score reading is when you want to learn the exact harmonic planes and the instruments doing them, and can't quite grasp that by listening alone (and you don't feel like transcribing). just listen to any random orchestral piece, and think to yourself 'flutes are doing this, while violins are doing that'...etc

do that for random genres, like film music, preclassical, romantic, etc, and you will have a pretty good idea of what can go on without even reading orch books to learn the limits of each instrument. listening is how you LEARN the blends and nonblends of orchestration, much better than reading a spectratone chart. it doesn't have to take 10,000 hours of that if you have deliberate goals in mind. if you want to hear what high range bassoons sound like, listen to rite of spring. if you want to know the sounds of low bassoon, listen to mahler. etc etc, find a short term goal (today/this week I want to learn as much about blending and not blending the oboe as I can), listen to oboe concertos, clips of oboe bits in operas and symphonies and voila.


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## MrPlayerismus

Thanks for the help,but I am beyond that.What I was referring with this thread,is the more complex contrapuntal and harmonical issues there is in a piece.Orchestration is pretty easy.I have spent nights listening to Bartok,Debussy and Mahler (No,not Strauss) and decoding which instruments play what and how they play it.By the looks of things,I really don't think I lack any mandatory knowledge to write orchestral pieces at a pretty satisfactory level...


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## chee_zee

seems you've kinda done things backwards compared to the college kids then, usually orch comes last. I found luigi cherubini's text on counterpoint to be the best, after reading like 5 others before that. tonal harmony by kostka is by far the most thorough.


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## Praeludium

I liked PetrB's posts here (even if I seriously never understood this "Bach was thinking horizontally" thing. Wasn't he writing continuo ? Actually even in Dowland there's music that can't possibly be horizontally thought (example : Frog gaillard)), even if they're a bit aggressive in a way.
But talking about the artistic implication music has is important, I think.

If I were you, I'd : continue taking lessons. By the way I don't believe you when you say you've mastered orchestration. My harmony teacher studied and Lyon's and Paris' CNSM, and yet he told me studying orchestration is hard, because there are chances you'll never get what you've written performed so that you can hear what you've written. But he also told me to listen to music and just analyze the sheet. It's just that writing is also a part of the learning (like in harmony, counterpoint, etc.).

Nothing prevents you from compose, it's just that if I were you I wouldn't try to compose an hour long symphony, even in a well-known romantic style. At the moment I'm working on small (64 measures, for instance, at a quite slow tempo but still) scales pieces for less than 10 instruments and I find that very satisfying. It lefts me room to study one particular point per piece (they're studies), and by doing that I can think of what I do, what I want to do, and find personal solutions.

Another advice, which I haven't seen here, is to cultivate yourself. Not just with music, and not even just with art. I think that as an artist you have to develop your tastes, your criticism and your mind.


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## paulc

> "Bach was thinking horizontally" thing


I think this alludes to the difference between homophonic and polyphonic writing.

Homophonic - An accompaniment made up of say, three voices, exists mostly to enhance (harmonise with) the primary melody. The material in each accompanying voice is usually less interesting (serves a middleground / background role). 'Vertical' thinking refers to the notes in each voice being determined largely by harmonic function (relationship between notes arranged vertically on a page).

Polyphonic - The independent voices are equally strong. Any one of the lines could be the primary melody (serve a foreground role) if placed into a homophonic context. 'Horizontal' thinking refers to the notes in each line being determined by melodic function - the relationship between successive (horizontal) notes. Mostly step-wise movement (excluding arpeggios), good CONTOUR and easily combined with other material. The lack of repetition when sequences are not deliberately employed. Also, the motions between multiple lines (a vertical aspect) - each line has to 'balance' every other in terms of contrary and oblique motion. Ideally, the lines will be partly or fully invertible. The harmonic progressions can be considered incidental.

Good homophonic writing is almost a condensation of material written according to polyphonic rules. Though, whether a composer writes homophonically or polyphonically depends on the emphasis he/she wants to give to material at the time. Polyphony is also used with tonal harmony / modulations in mind. The best of both worlds!


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## chee_zee

I still doubt it was all that incidental, somewhat but not as much as some would seem to believe. once you have a decent grasp of the nuances of counterpoint, you can bend it to your will, depending on the instruments and harmonic idiom. the IV's and ii's would be in large part incidental, with iii's just in passing as more of a tonic seventh. the I6, all Vs and vii6s, and most viis would be deliberate, everything else, such as other tonic inversions, other vii inversions, and at specific cadences, V inversions, were left out. ever try writing an actual fugue? go read loevrich's 'examination fugue' in addition to hugo norden's fugue book. avoiding resolution above suspensions, bad six-fours, the fact that Vs and viis cancel each other out, not shirking the countersubject by not starting it until after the tonal change of a tonal answer, keeping things within an octave.

that's assuming you allow yourself considerable freedom in the treatment of dissonances like mendelssohn. I spent two solid months of nothing but fugue writing for several hours a day, never came close to doing a decent 4 part piece (though the preludes were pretty cool!). they were proper theory wise, had good melody, playable, no bad harmonies......just really dissonant and dense, indian style overly melismatic lines don't seem to works so well in a four part fugue:









I imagine in the same amount of time I could crank out 3-4 really good 3 voice fugues by now, but that won't come for several years as I've still got orch to study for at least another year, of several different cultures, not to mention several books on the art of organ registration.


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## MrPlayerismus

I shall not really try and contradict any of your views guys.I shall take part in this conversation after you have a sample of what I am capable of because I honestly don't think that talking theoretically will lead me anywhere.However,just to organize again my knowledge,because in each post people present new things and do not really understand what I know.Some people even think that I cannot think beyond basic harmony.

Theory and basic stuff:Without question,mastered it(Oh,I'm awesome )
Harmony:Finished it in 2 years with a tutor
Counterpoint:Studied it alone for about half a year
Fugue:Haven't really studied it,to be honest
Instrumentation and Orchestration:Studying it since last year and continuing.(I do not agree that orchestration is all that difficult.Orchestration is the most free of all of the above.Orchestration doesn't have a lot of rules,you can write whatever you want,you just have to write it for an ensemble,and that alone gives you unlimited freedom.Personally,my favorite excercise that proves that I don't have any problem with orchestration,is taking a score of a composer,i.e. Sibelius,and trying without a score to orchestrate it as close as I can to the original.The results are pretty close by 65 percent,I dare say.)

These have been posted just to clear out people's minds,because from a lot of posts,people do think that I am a starter...

However,you will get a short symphonic piece,just to prove my point...


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## chee_zee

to your defense there isn't much fugue helps without outside of fugal writing. I'm just obsessed with organs, math, counterpoint, canon etc, though I'mma be holding off on that stuff besides decently complex counterpoint and canon for some time to come as I study orch more and more and other things like form and harmony less and less. I'd still master canon writing if I were you though, get hugo norden's 'technique of canon' and read my write up on it, 2 weeks of that and voila you've mastered the canon (it really is that easy).


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## Couchie

MrPlayerismus said:


> Prerequisites for Composing and Orchestrating.


Some parchment and a good pen.


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## emiellucifuge

PetrB said:


> Arnold Schoenberg, Edward Elgar, and George Gershwin are the three 'big' composers I can think of who were primarily self-taught. So it Can Happen. The odds of you or me having their native talent and quick grasp of all the medium involves, though, are slim to say the least. Every other 'important' composer I can think of went through an extensive training.


How about Telemann?


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## chee_zee

bach was self taught. he studied scores of telemann, frescobaldi, buxtehude, scarlatti etc.


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