Writing Methods, Instrumentation and Structure

My apologies for this very long and rather self-centred post.

To start with one of your simpler questions: I cannot know what book your teacher recommended, but it may have been Principles of Orchestration by Rimsky-Korsakov. You can also find a lot of resources on the Internet. An article like this one answers another of your questions:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_horn

NB! Like many other wind instruments (clarinets, saxophones, trumpets etc.), the French horn is a transposing instrument. If you use MIDI files, that doesn’t make any difference. But if you use real instruments (which of course is better if you have the right musicians at hand), you must know how to transpose. If you write a piece in C major for a horn in Bb, you need two sharps, and a written D will sound like a C.

I don’t play the violin, but my experience is that you should be a little cautious when it comes to double stops (playing two notes at a time). I once played in a band with a violinist, and she wasn’t very happy with fifths. Thirds, fourths and sixths are apparently easier due to the tuning of the instrument (it’s tuned in fifths: G, D, A and E).

It’s not easy to write idiomatically for the guitar unless you play the instrument yourself, and even the best guitarists have their limitations. My best advice is to buy a cheap guitar and learn to play. I don’t know where you live, but in Norway you can get an excellent beginner’s guitar for less than 200 dollars. The normal tuning is E, A, D, G, B and E. (Keep in mind that classical [nylon string], steel string, 12-string and electric guitars are different instruments and must be treated differently.)

I’m afraid I don’t know much about percussion. Again, check Wikipedia and other resources on the Internet.

Musical form (open the links in the article):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_form

Inspiration is a problematic word. I may find inspiration in the orange baby lizard I saw two days ago. And then again, maybe not.

Earlier, I nearly always made the music after the lyrics were written, but then I didn’t write the lyrics myself. Now it’s often (but not always) the other way around, or I work on the words and the music at the same time. In a few instances I’ve even written new lyrics to old songs, and once I made a song while I was asleep. The lyrics are by Catullus, so they were definitely made before the music, but it was remarkable that I remembered the music when I woke up. The result is here:

http://www.supload.com/listen?s=cxKRbw

Most of my main ideas stem from improvisation (though no improvisation is really free; you’re always guided by your skills and knowledge, for better or worse). However, composing isn’t only about ideas, it’s just as much about what you do with your ideas to achieve the result you want. Personally I spend a lot of time writing notes, following the rules (or, rather, guidelines) of counterpoint where I find it fit and breaking them if I think it creates a more pleasant or interesting effect. In studio I often try different instrumentations — if for instance a flute is hardly audible, I can try an oboe instead, or maybe double it with a clarinet.

Forgive me for droning on about myself — and shamelessly promoting my own music — but I feel the need to be more specific, and that requires musical examples. Here is The End, the first song in my opera/song cycle Ashflame:

http://www.supload.com/listen?s=O0zjwX

The vocal part — or rather, from where the oboe picks up the tune — was made by “improvisation”. The intro, however, is based on the simple motif G-C#-D-G-Ab (which will recur in The Writer, the Play and the Critics, only in 6/8 and starting with an E). On top of that I placed a melody in the alto flute (a melody that will recur in another song not yet recorded). The polyphonic work here is clearly not improvised, and I believe it could not be improvised.

Note that at the end of the oboe solo (and also later when I sing … free to go) there’s a parallel octave between the oboe/voice and the bass. This “mistake” would make me flunk an exam, but the effect is exactly what I want.

Another example — the instrumental Afterthoughts and Permutations:

http://www.supload.com/listen?s=nMpv7p

(You may think I’m a sucker for the curtain sound, but the fact is that between these two tracks there are nine others without it.)

The first part is based on an instrumental in 5/4 for classical guitar. It’s what you would call “improvised”: It’s made on the instrument and written down later. Then I arranged it, using strings and woodwinds.

The second part is completely opposite: Most of it it’s pure maths. I’m not a mathematician, but I found a way to permute a tone row of 24 tones (actually 12 tones played forwards and backwards) and thus create nine more rows. Based on this, I made a fugue theme (or “subject”) and composed a fugal exposition. From the 13^th bar I introduce the tone rows one by one, using a technique called stretto (Engfürung in German), meaning that the next permutation (or “answer”) starts before the previous one is finished.

It’s probably more or less impossible to detect the structure without reading the notes (and even then it would take some hard thinking, I guess). After the fugal exposition I ignored the traditional principles of counterpoint completely and tried to compose an atonal piece of music working entirely on it’s own terms. To balance the density of the music I went for a transparent instrumentation, using the symphony orchestra more like a chamber orchestra.

The time signature is 2/4 all the way through. The rhythm is, believe it or not, inspired by a passage in Mr. Blue Sky by ELO. Still, it’s probably the most complex piece I’ve made in terms of rhythm.

Links to the rest of the recorded parts of Ashflame, in the right order:

http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=66430

Final advice: Use the Internet (and especially Wikipedia) and, if possible, try out your ideas with MIDI files. Good luck!

(Sorry for this long post, but you asked for it.)

Cheers!

Espen