Composition questions

[chopinisque]

When composing, do you start with harmonic progression or the melody (thinking it up as you go along)?  Needless to say, my teacher goes for harmonic progression.  I, on the other hand (unquestionably many others as well) would prefer coming up with thematic material first.  However, I have worries as to whether the latter is viable with more complicated forms like three voice and fugues. 

Also, does modulation imply a change of key or a change of mode.  I recently read about modes and I'm now all confused.  In fact, I'm not really sure how to use modes.  Perhaps an explanation?  I've asked lots of people and they have no idea what I'm talking about.

[ted]

I start from anywhere with anything. I'm not particularly quick witted and if I worried about how to start I'd stand still. The starting point for me can be anything musical at all - a phrase, a rhythm, a keyboard figure, a couple of chords. I've heard about people who can always create in the same way but I'm certainly not clever or methodical enough to do it.

I wouldn't have a clue what modulation is; I'll leave it to the experts to answer that.

[berrt]

In fact, I'm not really sure how to use modes.  Perhaps an explanation?  I've asked lots of people and they have no idea what I'm talking about.

I just got the book by Robert L. Jakobs "Understandig Harmony" (a Bernhard-suggestion). It should answer many of your questions.
It is very systematically structured, starting from zero (perfect for me!).

bye
Berrt

[Derek]

Hi,

the truth is there is no right way to compose. The best advice I think anyone can give you is just start doing it. Are you using Finale, improvising-then-writing-down-ideas, or using pencil and paper?

Finale is great cause it can play back what you type in.

Improvisation I think is the best way to get a feel for writing music since all elements of music are inseperable as you play: rhythm, melody, harmony, are all acting at once, though if you WISH you can isolate one of these.

Modulation, as I understand it, is moving through a chord progression in one key, setting up a cadence in a key you plan (or happen) to resolve in, and then resolving in the key.

On the other hand it can just mean "changing key" or moving to another scale suddenly. Both techniques, in my experience, can produce great results.

Bottom line is don't get too caught up in the theory and start DOING it. By simply improvising obsessively for many years is why I know anything about music theory at all.

That is to say, music is a very intuitive thing. Music theory doesn't really explain anything, its only a heirarchy of labels.  I'm learning some of it just because....I want to, but it doesn't seem to help me as a creative musician very much.

Here's a good reason not to worry about theory:  In mathematics, if you do something wrong along the way, your answer will be WRONG.  In music, if you use parallel fifths, the ONLY thing that happens is some people obsessed with how bach did everything will say: THATS WRONG,  even though it might sound perfectly fine in what you're doing. Ignore that stuff.  BUT remain open to music theory as an optional set of guidelines for imitating old composers if you so wish.

[whynot]

Yes, whatever gives you your first idea to get started, just start with it.  I know a wonderful composer who gets going with whatever sounds happen around him... a bird, a chair falling, a person's voice.  What he subsequently writes doesn't imitate those things at all, he's just really interested in sounds and they get his imagination rolling.

Modulation is changing to a different key in the same piece.  Sometimes there's a clear point exactly when it happens, like one transitional chord, then boom, you're in F major when you started in C.  Other times it takes longer, a few chords or even many many measures.  If you fool around with it a little, you'll see that some changes are very straightforward for a composer, like C to F, while others need a longer path to get there gracefully, like C to Ab.  Sometimes there's not even a transition, just a hop into the new key.  This is dramatic, used a lot in pop music for the "just once more, a little bit higher" final chorus, almost always a mistake in my opinion, but they never ask me.   

Modes are scales of different "flavors" or characters.  A get-acquainted exercise is to play a C scale up and down.  Then play the scale D to D using only the white keys-- keep the notes of the original scale, just change where you start-stop.  Then E to E, still on the white keys.  Keep going until you've tried starting on every possible note in the C scale.  This changes where the half- and whole-steps lie, so each scale feels very different from the others.  That's it!  You can do this in every key, if you like that sort of thing (I do), just pick a scale and stick to those notes but change where you start.   

As you keep studying theory, you'll look a lot at Palestrina and 4-part writing and learn the rules of that.  He didn't have those rules, of course, the rules are based on his music.  He just wrote what he wrote, and it was so beautiful that composers are still studying what he did almost 500 years later.  That's pretty special, but hopefully you won't be intimidated by the rules.  It is good to know what great people did because  greatness doesn't come along every day, and the standard rules for part-writing teach how to make certain things happen in music:  having momentum, a feeling of inevitability, structure, flow... but sometimes you don't want that.  Sometimes you want things to feel like they're going backwards or hovering.   Hovering or feeling lost can be expressed very well by those forbidden parallel fifths--they are really disorienting, which is why they're forbidden.

Anyway, just play with different scales and forms, and write as much as you can.