It takes strength to create. I mean, truly create...

It takes strength to cut out an idea that was easy to find but is just a cliche, especially when you know it will sound pleasing to people.

It take strength to avoid writing extremely complicated "works" that will sound completely random to the human cognitive process.

It takes strength to keep digging when your fingers are already raw.

It takes strength to wade through your own sh*t and not come out smelling like crap.

It takes strength to have the confidence to write something pretty, melodic and nice in the current new music climate.

It takes strength to stand face to face with that blank piece of manuscript everyday, not knowing if anything good will come out.

It takes strength to constantly push to the brink and be faced with the dark, empty unkown.

It takes strength to be faced with your own incompetence on a daily basis and still believe in yourself enough to keep going.

It takes strength to believe in yourself when your parents keep telling you to get a job, and you receive thank you cards from your credit card companies.

It takes strength to sit down and be creative when you only have 30 minutes before you have to go to work.

It takes strength to work when the kids are screaming upstairs, when the house is dirty, the dishes not done, when you have no clean underwear and that pile of laundry is calling out to you.

It takes strength to compose in a world where Bach and Beethoven have lived.

Some pieces go astray. It happens. It all sarts off with a promising idea and then it just goes nowhere. How does one avoid getting lost along the way?

I believe in inspiration, but it is an unreliable partner when composing. In any case, having a plan of attack, a method to your work does just as well or even better than inspiration.

The goal is control over musical ideas and the shape (form) they eventually take. There are many ways to achieve control and here is one.

Know Your Idea

Before rushing into the composition of the piece, get to know your initial idea. For me, that is usually a line, that's what I like to start with. I write until I get that line just right because it will be the backbone of the piece and once I get going I can't change it.

Once the idea is ready to go then here are some ways to get to know it intimately.

• Sing it
• Play it
• Analyze it: motives, structural lines, high note, low note, processes inherent in the material, and any other salient features.
• Explore the material by developing it strictly using inversion, retrograde, RI and everything else you can think of. Keep going for a while and really exhaust your possibilities. Seeing what your initial material can bring is part of knowing it well.
• Transpose it at the keyboard.
• Improvise with it.

The analysis part is important and the most difficult, because you need to really look and see what is there. It will provide much information that can lead to logical development of the material.

Also, a good way to really know an idea intimately is to sleep with it... I mean sleep on it. So don't rush into composing the form, fool around with it for a few days and you will have much more control.

If you don't ask "why this?" often enough, somebody will ask "why you?"

If you hit every time the target's too near.
- Tom Hirshfield, Inventor

Nothing is more dangerous than an idea when it is the only one you have.
- Emile Chartier, Philosopher

The best way to get a good idea is to get a lot of ideas
- Linus Paulin, Nobel Prize winner

If you spend too much time warming up, you'' miss the race. If you don't warm up at all, you may not finish the race.
- Grant Heidrich, Runner

My objective is technical perfection. I can strive inceasingly to this end, since I am certain of never being able to attain it. The important thing is to get nearer to it all the time. Art, no doubt, has other effects, but the artist, in my opinion, should have no other aim.
- Maurice Ravel

I don't know anything about music. In my line, you don't have to.
-Elvis Presley

Writing music can be intense work, and like any intense work, taking a break helps keep the juices flowing.

Do I ask too much of myself? Probably, my wife always says so. I do think it's important to aim high, but the drawback to that mindset is all the stress it can create. Because let's face it, how many Bachs have there been in history? So the paradox is you should always aim for the top, but when the top is Bach, well, good luck buddy.

So I have found that tension builds up easily when I compose, and I have become increasingly aware of this. So recently I have started taking very frequent short breaks. Just walk over to the computer, check my email, come back, that sort of thing. I don't beat myself up over this (I used to) and I come right back to work.

That little break, which occurs every 10 minutes or so, makes a big difference. I find ideas more easily and without tension. It's like a little pressure valve. Just open it for a second, let out some steam, get back to work.

Email is okay, but Google is bad.

Familiarity breeds contempt, which is certainly true of a composer and his themes.

Scenario: A motive is written, put aside to provide some distance, and then revisited a few dyas later. Still being satisfactory, it was then choosen as the basis for a new piece. A melody is then written based on it, played a few gazillion times, sung a few more, analyzed, reworked, played some more, tweaked a bit more and then finally, a melody is born.

So by the time the melody is written I have already lived with it for a few days and heard it so many times it's a wonder I even continue with the piece at all!

From the author's over-familiarity with his subject comes the tendency to develop it too much too soon, forgetting that the listener has never heard it before.

This has always been a problem with me. That is why I often follow a few guides, one of theme being "Develop slowly, and make your development audibly linked to the main material."

Let's face it. If you are trying to write something new, different, or just pushing yourself further than before (and reaching for something new is the composer's M.O.) then you will be uncomfortable and this can lead to stress and a decidedly UNrelaxed state of mind - the antithesis of a creative state.

I find that a creative state of mind is a relaxed and stress-free state of mind. Which is ironic because when you are striving for a big idea, as stated above, you will most likely feel stressed. But stay relaxed we must...

When the going gets tough, when an idea won't budge, taking a break is not the solution. I take a breath, walk around the room and start to sing the idea, play it on the piano, relax, lie down, whatever. Letting go at this point is always bad, you must stay immersed in the idea for it to yield. You must keep pushing to gain momentum.

Gotta push, hang in there, but stay relaxed as you do it.

Although this is usually uncomfortable, the idea invenitably starts to yield, to move, gaining momentum and if I work long enough (usually 2 hours or more) I can barely catch up to it! But you gotta work long enough, without break or interruption for this to happen.

It's not easy, though. It takes stamina to hang in there long enough to build that momentum.

What constitutes a well-crafted melodic line?

I have begun work on two-part inventions, of course influenced by Bach, and being in the first part of the working process, I am confronted with the problem of crafting strong lines.

Here are some inital thoughts and observations:

Well-crafted melodic lines have some or all of these features.

Interesting rhythmic design.

• A variety of rhythms is one of the keys to writing lines that feel natural.
• I suggest looking for unique and instantly recognizable combinations of rhythms. Let go of obvious ideas as they will be more likely to appear trite and common.
  
• Rhythmic activity can increase when leading to a cadence.
• Rhythmic cells are strong motivic features, even more so than pitches. Remember that when developing your material.
  

Memorable and logical interval contour.

• The DNA of a melody is found in the pitches, and each should be a unique combination.
  
• Each motive or line must be logical. One approach is to find the ideas instinctively and then dissect them to fully understand their interval structure, the inner relationships between the notes, whatever features make the music work well. From there one can adjust pitches and rhythms as needed to achieve a more logical flow between the notes.
  

Limited DNA material
Even within one melodic statement there should be only a limited amount of motivic material. These motives can be transformed in to create endless variety, resulting in "beads" that can be "strung" together to create a cohesive whole. This has always be a basic tenet of composition.

Directive pitches are clear and logical.

• High points in a melody should be properly and logically prepared and achieved.
• Repetition of pitches shoult not be haphazard as they are crucial in achieving a sense of centre in a non-diatonic or tonal chromatic environment.

Inner voice-leading.
This is a manifestation of logic in the structure of a melody.

• High notes and low notes tend to be associated together in our minds. Think Gestalt theory. These are especially important to consider when aiming for a well-structure melodic line.
  
• Of noo less important are the inner notes, which can benefit from thinking in terms of voice-leading.

"But do I need to think of all this, did Bach really think of all this stuff?"
A question all composition students ask at one point or another. The answer is yes to both parts of the question.

"But no one hears these things, why should I bother?"
Of course people hear these things, they just don't have musical erudition to explain or even be aware of it. Consider the following:

People that don't understand visual design in all its forms - print, architecture or whatever - react strongly to what is well structured and poorly to what is not, but they can't discuss contrast, symmetry, repetition or even the rule of thirds.

People react strongly to well-crafted stories, but they won't be able to tell you about a three act structure, a plot-point, metaphore are anything else. And they don't need to, they are users not creators.

The brain is wired to seek structure, patterns, and we find beauty in them. Think of this: we straighten the frames in our house, the magazines or utensils on a table, and we do this instinctively. It is our nature.

So why bother? It is your job as a composer to care how the brain naturally react to things when you compose, and as a result to always infuse your music with a perceivable structure and logic. To do otherwise is either lazines or ignorance or both and will always create inferior music.