For the next several weeks, The Creative will be taking an in-depth look at the steps I go through in composing a piece of music, from first ideas clear through the end of the publishing process. Realize this is only my process -- this may or may not work for you, so use it only as a guide. This is the first post in the series.
I've been composing for years, at least since I was in middle school. In that time, I've written for piano, strings, full orchestras, bands, chamber groups, handbells, choirs, and random bits of household equipment. Through all that -- whether I wanted to or not -- I've developed a process that works for me in composing each new piece. As I sat down to plan these posts, I realized two things:
1) There are an awful lot of steps in this process.
2) Multiple steps often happen at the same time.
I've separated things into their component parts, but please realize that sometimes I'm doing more than one thing at the same time, and that's okay -- the steps don't need to be totally separate.
Today, we start with the first step: the seed.
Just like a plant, every creative idea begins with a seed, that first little inkling of an idea. Sometimes it comes as a tickle at the back of your mind, the feeling that there's something there that needs to be expressed. Other times, it comes while you're doing something else -- talking with a friend or watching TV or trying to sleep. Still other times, the seed is forced upon you by outside circumstances.
I've written pieces with seeds found in all these forms, and they've all come through the creative process just fine. The first thing to realize about seeds is it doesn't matter where your seed comes from -- they're all equally good. I can buy a packet of tomato seeds at the grocery store, another at the drug store, and still another from a garden shop, and if I plant them and treat them all the same, in a few months time, I ought to have a tomato plant from all of them. The same is true of ideas.
The second thing to realize about seeds is they're not the whole idea. A tomato seed is not a tomato plant -- it's the potential for a tomato plant. If you put it in the ground and water it, it will start to grow, but if you leave it in a packet, nothing will happen. So it is with seeds of ideas: they're not the finished product, but treat it right and follow the steps in the creative process, and it may very well turn into a piece.
Likewise, you can't look at a tomato seed and see what the plant will look like. Oh, you have a rough notion -- main stem, smaller stems branching off, leaves here and there, the occasional tomato -- but you couldn't sit down and sketch out exactly what the final plant will look like. Ditto for creative seeds -- you may have a vague notion of what the final piece will resemble (maybe a handbell piece, probably three to five octaves of bells, maybe three iterations of the melody with a couple of bridges), but you don't know exactly where it all will fall.
That's okay.
The fact is, you've got the seed, and once you've got that, you can nurture it into existence, nurture it into the final form it is meant to be. Just like you can't grow a tomato plant without a tomato seed, you can't compose a piece of music without that idea seed. Getting the seed is just the first step, so don't worry about the rest of the process at this point -- it will all follow in time.
The last thing to realize about idea seeds is you can collect them. I can go to twenty different stores and buy twenty packets of tomato seeds, and each seed in each packet has the potential to grow into its own tomato plant. I don't ruin one seed's chance just because I have other seeds. I can store them and plant them when I'm ready, and they'll do just as well -- sometimes better -- as if I planted them right away.
That's why the Idea Notebook is so vital for a composer (indeed, for any Creative). Just jotting down the beginnings of an idea -- the seed -- in a notebook stores that seed away for later use. You may never do anything with that seed but leave it in the notebook, and that's okay, but if you don't write it down -- if you don't store it -- you won't be able to do anything with it later.
But what does an idea seed look like? It depends. (I know, not the answer you wanted.) I've had idea seeds be a measure of two of a melody. I've had idea seeds be a particular sound I want, or a particular flourish to start off a piece. I've had idea seeds be nothing more than, "I want to write a piece at a fast tempo in 7/4 time." I've had idea seeds be a publisher telling me he wants a level 2 arrangement of a Pentecost hymn for three to five octaves of handbells. They all look very, very different, but all are the seeds that start the creative process going.
So there's the first step in composing a piece of music -- getting the idea seed. The great thing about idea seeds is that almost anything has the potential to grow into a finished piece of music, so almost anything can be an idea seed. Look for them, store them, and leave it at that -- don't worry if you don't know how to finish the piece. That is NOT your main concern right now. Your only concern at this stage is getting that initial idea that has the potential to be something greater.
Next time, we'll look at how we start to nurture these idea seeds and start helping them become the pieces they're destined to become. As always, if you have any questions or comments, feel free to use the comment section below.
No comments:
Post a Comment