# Composers 'Wall'



## Jord

Do any of you when you're composing hit 'the wall' or whatever metaphor you might use to describe not being able too carry on? or how do you compose? or how do you get round figuring out what to do next?

Personally i'm constantly hitting the wall after i write one new thing then about a week later come up with another idea, I always compose based on how i think it sounds and then change it usually to make it theoretically correct and usually ends up being better, i usually write one idea or melody, then write after it what i think should come after, anyone else do this? or differently?


----------



## Crudblud

Frequently, and it is usually prolonged. Most of my work is completed in bursts of anywhere between a day and a month, with longer periods in between.


----------



## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Composers block? It happened a lot last year when I tried to use leitmotifs in every programmatic piece I wrote. I discovered that leitmotif is not for me.


----------



## StevenOBrien

The last time I hit the wall, I broke my hand and couldn't compose for nearly a month .

Seriously though, I know exactly what you mean. The inspiration just stops dead and might not return for weeks or months. It can get very depressing. One method to get the inspiration going again I've discovered that works for me is to try composing in genres that you enjoy listening to, but have never composed in before. Do you like rock music? Write a rock song!

With regards to "hitting the wall" on individual pieces, sometimes a piece just isn't meant to be finished, at least not yet.


----------



## Jord

StevenOBrien said:


> One method to get the inspiration going again I've discovered that works for me is to try composing in genres that you enjoy listening to, but have never composed in before. Do you like rock music? Write a rock song!
> 
> With regards to "hitting the wall" on individual pieces, sometimes a piece just isn't meant to be finished, at least not yet.


Writing rock songs is too boring though, i've recently had an idea to write some kind of Jazz/Rock/Pop song from a chord progression i came up with, so i might give that a go

and the piece not meant to be finished yet is the thing i think of everytime i can't think of what too do next, i'm just really getting into a piece i'm writing and want to finish it, it's stressing me out!


----------



## jani

I always have inspiration but the quality of the "inspiration" isn't always good.


----------



## Ramako

jani said:


> I always have inspiration but the quality of the "inspiration" isn't always good.


I agree with this. I used to get composers block, but now not so much. I can always get an idea, but what to do with it is more troublesome. However, with enough thought most problems can be unravelled, in a manner more or less inspired.

Usually if I find I have hit a dead end in a composition, and there is a passage I just can't write, then there is something wrong with the passage before it. Looking at what comes before can shed light on why what comes next just doesn't work I find.


----------



## Jord

Ramako said:


> I can always get an idea, but what to do with it is more troublesome. However, with enough thought most problems can be unravelled, in a manner more or less inspired.
> 
> Usually if I find I have hit a dead end in a composition, and there is a passage I just can't write, then there is something wrong with the passage before it. Looking at what comes before can shed light on why what comes next just doesn't work I find.


I'm the exact opposite, i usually always know what i want to do, it's just getting the idea in the first place

Interesting idea on the passage before being wrong, i'm gonna try that


----------



## etkearne

It doesn't happen to me very much. I usually have TOO many ideas going on in my head. However, about three months ago, one day I just didn't know "where to go next". I reached a crossroads where I had to decide if I was going to start writing strictly atonal music, and thus get in-to serialism, or to continue my eclectic mix of extremely dissonant harmonies with established melodies. I felt like I had exhausted the established techniques for the second style, so I got rather dumbfounded as I really didn't want to spend my life writing music like Boulez (although I like his works - I just feel bad for him because he tends to be extremely laser-focused on serialism only, which may work fine for him and his fans, but to me seems rather monotonous - I am not bashing Boulez though - he's great!) or one like Bartok or Ligeti. 

I knew that the Bartok/Ligeti path would be harder and cause some of my music to be rejected, but I knew it would be more fulfilling. So I started to put down the "Advanced Music Theory" books and started to really just think about intervals and how they related, and, in turn, about the deep relationship between melody and harmony (more than just the obvious textbook relationships). 

At this point, my despair lifted, and I wrote three pieces of music in one night (my first three movements of the "Piano & Brass Suite"). I figure that I will come to a cross-roads like this again, but I am sure that I will figure out some way to escape a life of monotony.


----------



## Ramako

ARG!

Yes, I am hitting a few walls in my composition and just felt like expressing my frustration.


----------



## Jord

Ramako said:


> ARG!
> 
> Yes, I am hitting a few walls in my composition and just felt like expressing my frustration.


We should create a thread if there isn't already one too express anger or emotions when being frustrated by this kind of stuff :lol:

I think earlier today i may have broke the way through my wall, haven't had time to get any ideas down yet though so i'm praying!


----------



## clavichorder

I'm am hitting a major wall in trying to understand a new method of composition that will help lengthen my pieces.


----------



## PetrB

"Stuck" (it is not 'a block') seems to be common enough with those of us poor souls who do not get 'wholesale' notions and / or the form of the complete piece from the very outset.

If that is the case, then it is typical to have only 'chunks' of what is, with a lot of 'missing' material.

Inspiration, folk(s), is as brief as one inhale and exhale. The rest is work, and lots of it. 
[_Be prepared to work, then, and a lot _]

Often, something comes along in a piece as a natural result of working on it any length of time and getting more deeply familiar with its basic idea when it then tends for you / it to generate something apart which has no business being in that piece or movement. (It is common enough working one idea spawns others.)

It took me a while to recognize those 'not part of this piece' segments and learn to set them aside in another notebook of 'ideas,' many of which will die a natural death while a few will later yield when picked up again. As tedious (and frustrating) as that may seem, recognizing 'that which does not belong' can often better clarify for you 'that which does belong.' You have to work with what you've got, and if there is a 'not got' it is good to define 'what it not got'

It can happen all ways: you get a good premise and its beginning, or a middle, or an end, but never (_damn!_) the whole thing. In any instance, notate what you have as much as you can, then perhaps set it aside and work on something else (for me, this working pattern seems to be the general rule) and later return to the first piece. If one is very active on a regular basis, unconscious 'processing' and 'thinking through' takes place, and then it becomes possible to again proceed.

I recommend 'skipping over' any areas where you are stuck and moving on to the next bit(s) -- i.e. write what you know or believe will come later. This too can help clarify 'where the piece wants to go: then you can go back from where you left off, the knowing where it goes being more than helpful in finding that missing section. (Of course, that section written to help you 'know where it goes' may later get revised or re-written, but it had value in 'leading you there.')

There is much to be said for working the craft on a very regular basis (whether you have a great idea, or 'anything to say' or not), the tools oiled, the pump always ready and not needing priming. I am perhaps most pleased when I have 'filled in' those missing bits, they are relevant (Logical, if you will), and am confident the listener will never be able to detect where inspiration stopped and the toil began -- really, this is part and parcel of the terrain, and part of the very real job for any composer I've spoken with.

Totally stuck? Start another piece, completely, perhaps a short study or just a sketch, with some of those discarded 'scraps' or ideas which sprang up which did not belong to the piece you are stuck on... I've found there is a direct (but not easy to define) effect, resulting in being able to then solve the problem of being stuck in the first piece by working on the other... because it is a sub-conscious 'processor' at work which bring that result about, I'm afraid I cannot say more specifically exactly what happens or why it works. I'm happy to report it does / has worked for me, and I hear the same from other composers.

One positive benefit of working as recommended, and regularly, is you can get pretty canny about quickly recognizing if a kernel idea will or will not 'yield.' Ditto for coming up with further ideas / development, etc. So... you just get cannier, and that makes your ratio of work-time to yield more efficient.

Toil, but don't ever let it show / be heard in the piece....


----------



## Jord

PetrB said:


> I recommend 'skipping over' any areas where you are stuck and moving on to the next bit(s) -- i.e. write what you know or believe will come later. This too can help clarify 'where the piece wants to go: then you can go back from where you left off, the knowing where it goes being more than helpful in finding that missing section. (Of course, that section written to help you 'know where it goes' may later get revised or re-written, but it had value in 'leading you there.')


When i write i always have a basic overview what will be coming next until the end of the piece, especially if i'm sticking to a specific structure. I often have a few ideas already of what i'll add in later while writing, but it's impossible for me to move on in the piece if a part before it is unfinished, i think this is mainly because sometimes what i write is completely influenced by what comes before it, so if i already have A, stuck on B, write C, then write B, i might not be happy that C is the next thing that should happen after B


----------



## PetrB

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Composers block? It happened a lot last year when I tried to use leitmotifs in every programmatic piece I wrote. I discovered that leitmotif is not for me.


AvantGarde + Programmatic? Sounds to me as very close to being an oxymoron


----------



## PetrB

Just a perhaps helpful reminder, that even the most practiced can and do have walls:

Ravel, literally half-way through his masterpiece, Daphnis et Chloe, "hit a wall." He had completed what we know as the first half, and was completely stumped, out of ideas and didn't have a clue as to what should come thereafter. 

Somehow, he managed to sit down, and 'just start writing.' Many, aside from Ravel, are happy he did.

I have found nothing which says 'what got him over it.' A decent guess is that a combination of knowing he had completed many other pieces, but more likely, the fact the work was a commission, which if he failed to deliver would be a lot of work already done for nothing is what got him back to it.

If you are not in that (desirable) position of having an expectation the work be delivered for performance by a particular date, an imagined /self-imposed deadline can be helpful.

Quoting a former teacher of mine, "Sometimes you have to goose the Muse."


----------

