Thread: Any time, any place

Hello everyone,

Do you feel like you can compose any type of piece of music (genre or style or something new) based on any theme at any time, whether it's terrible or not?

For example:

Atonal trio for viola, flute and bassoon

Or

Delicate Evening for classical guitar, electric bass guitar, djembe, sampler, maracas, snare drum w/ brushes, wine glass 'harmonica'

Well if you put it that way then yes. Nice arrangements, both of them.

hope you have piezos and an amp for the acoustic guitar, you won't be hearing a word from it otherwise, same with the maracas. depending on what the sampler is doing, you won't hear the harmonica either. just do a piece for snare drum and electric bass. so no, since you have to consider orch, these combos won't work (flute is very quiet whereas bassoon is loud, especially in it's low register. you'd need flute and bassoon in their high registers most of the time unless one is sitting out). I saw a piece using harp, timpani and I forget what else, but obviously the harp was inaudible unless the other 2 were silent.

I wouldn't say I could compose any type of music, but I find I express myself musically in a number of highly disparate styles. For example, my Piano piece 1 is inspired by Stockhausen's Klavierstuck X mixed with the jazz pianist Cecil Taylor; whereas I have written Joy, a setting of Blake for choir and organ, which definitely sits in the post-minimalist area colonised by John Adams (think Harmonium); and my work in progress, Out of danger, a song cycle to poems by James Fenton, is in a traditional tonal art-song form - think Rorem but not as good!

Question:

Originally Posted by Illuminatedtoiletpaper

Do you feel like you can compose any type of piece of music (genre or style or something new) based on any theme at any time, whether it's terrible or not?

...calculating...

Translation: Do you feel like you can compose anything whether it's terrible or not?

Simplified: Do you feel like you can compose?

Answer: YES

Sorry double post...

Originally Posted by chee_zee

hope you have piezos and an amp for the acoustic guitar, you won't be hearing a word from it otherwise, same with the maracas. depending on what the sampler is doing, you won't hear the harmonica either. just do a piece for snare drum and electric bass. so no, since you have to consider orch, these combos won't work (flute is very quiet whereas bassoon is loud, especially in it's low register. you'd need flute and bassoon in their high registers most of the time unless one is sitting out). I saw a piece using harp, timpani and I forget what else, but obviously the harp was inaudible unless the other 2 were silent.

They don't have to all be playing at the same time.
All the instruments listed are able to be played quietly or loudly.

but they don't mix.
http://classical-music-online.net/en/production/14531
notice how the cello is mostly doing plucks, the timpani has to keep quiet, and when it's not you can't hear the harp for shite. notice also how the overall dynamic never seems to be more than mp, though there are certainly some stuff from timpani borderline forte. it's the same thing with brass, trumpet in p is about the same volume as a clarinet p, but a trumpet in f is much much louder than a clarinet's forte, it's more like the trumpet's mf. if the piece were to reach too loud an overall dynamic level, you'd hear no harp. 5 and a half minutes in is a good example, as a main melodic idea is given to the cello since it can stand out so much better, and is marked up at least one dynamic more than the other 2. go to about 7 minutes in, notice how little the harp even bothers to attempt to chime in.

I once wrote a forty second piece for four timpani, viola and double bass. Also written two sonatas for unusual combinations of instruments: the first for piccolo, xylophone and trumpet; the second for vibraphone, harpsichord and cello.

Regardless of whether it's terrible or not? Yes, but that isn't how I work.

The 'terrible or not' may relate to work such as for advertising where the composer's 'masterpiece' might be used for a jingle for pile remedies.

The reality is that a lot of work we think of as artistic boils down to selling pile remedies when we need to pay the bond (mortgage for Americans).