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An Odyssey of Creation

Music Making » An Odyssey of Creation (Posts 1 to 9 of 9)

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      CommentAuthorDavid
    • CommentTimeMay 4th 2010
    Hello all! It's been a while since I've posted on the forum, or visited even. School work, actual work, and what I'm posting here today has kept me busy for a very long while.

    A few months ago, I had the urge to start composing music. Because I don't play an instrument, and was basically told at a young age by my school that I didn't possess the natural talent to play an instrument, I have always told myself that I would never be able to compose music either. Well, I have recently said to hell with that and have been having more fun as well as creative and intellectual challenges. Not only am I writing, but I'm teaching myself to play piano, with lesson coming up this summer.

    I've read about 5 books like crazy in the last few months -- two on orchestration, one on harmony, one on counterpoint, one on the "basics" of composition, and I've checked out numerous full orchestral scores by Holst, Mozart, and Williams to look over and study.

    If you have some time, I'd appreciate it if you could listen to some of the stuff I've come up with in the last few months and give me critical constructive criticism (this does not include telling me to give up :P ). It is the only way I will improve.

    My newest piece, "Earth and the Future" is by far my most polished piece:

    http://davidjbond.com/ooc/05_04_Earth.mp3

    My other pieces can be heard on my blog:

    http://odysseyofcreation.wordpress.com/

    Thanks for listening, and remember "harsh critical feedback" (but try not to be too discouraging, haha)!
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeMay 8th 2010
    It's not a bad piece, David, especially considering you're self-taught and basically new to the game. Some quite good harmonies in there.

    If I can put my finger on something, it would be the lack of a pronounced melody and structure. Much of it sounds like you're basically just exploring harmonies on your synth, and I'm not sure how much overall design you had in mind?
    I am extremely serious.
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      CommentAuthorDavid
    • CommentTimeMay 10th 2010
    Thanks for the feedback, Thor.

    In terms of structure, yeah it's pretty much all over the place. I had an idea of what I wanted to do with it and where I wanted it all to go, but it kind of got away from me while writing it and I decided to just go with it at this point, haha. There is a melodic phrase in there that repeats a few times, but I'll be the first to admit that it does not stand out. I can clearly identify it only because I've heard it over and over again while writing it, but it is fairly unremarkable. I've been looking at a lot of scores recently to see how different composers write a melody and different variations on it, but I know it's probably one of the (if not THE) most difficult parts of creating music.

    I think one of the aspects that may cause that is I'm being very cautious in how I'm harmonizing everything and using really basic chords. For the most part I'm just using basic triads. I think a few times I used a major 7th chord and add9 chord, but for the most part just the triad. There are so many different chords to be used it's really daunting, but incredibly fun at the same time.
  4. About the Earth cue, I like it, it has a nice ethereal quality to it. I don't have any technical understanding whatsoever about composing and reading notes and whatnot but it does have something, a kind of gentle flow by using musical textures instead of actual themes to hold the piece together. I can't say anything else than I like it, especially from the 2:30 mark until the end. It reminds me of new age music, a la David Arkenstone and the like.

    If this is your first experiment with writing music on a serious basis, I have to say: keep learning dude, there is a good melodic idea going on in here, and with more learning it could grow into something really great.

    Did I mention I like it? smile
    "considering I've seen an enormous debate here about The Amazing Spider-Man and the ones who love it, and the ones who hate it, I feel myself obliged to say: TASTE DIFFERS, DEAL WITH IT" - Thomas G.
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeMay 10th 2010
    David wrote
    Thanks for the feedback, Thor.

    In terms of structure, yeah it's pretty much all over the place. I had an idea of what I wanted to do with it and where I wanted it all to go, but it kind of got away from me while writing it and I decided to just go with it at this point, haha. There is a melodic phrase in there that repeats a few times, but I'll be the first to admit that it does not stand out. I can clearly identify it only because I've heard it over and over again while writing it, but it is fairly unremarkable. I've been looking at a lot of scores recently to see how different composers write a melody and different variations on it, but I know it's probably one of the (if not THE) most difficult parts of creating music.

    I think one of the aspects that may cause that is I'm being very cautious in how I'm harmonizing everything and using really basic chords. For the most part I'm just using basic triads. I think a few times I used a major 7th chord and add9 chord, but for the most part just the triad. There are so many different chords to be used it's really daunting, but incredibly fun at the same time.


    Maybe one way to structure the piece is going by the traditional sonata form that we use in Western music (home-away-home again). The possibility to return to a tonal centre (or a melodic centre) is often very gratifying and gives the piece a sense of unity. The trick is then creating smooth bridges between the sections, bridges that make sense and feel organic to the piece.
    I am extremely serious.
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      CommentAuthorDavid
    • CommentTimeMay 10th 2010
    Thanks for the kind words, Gilles.

    Thor wrote

    Maybe one way to structure the piece is going by the traditional sonata form that we use in Western music (home-away-home again). The possibility to return to a tonal centre (or a melodic centre) is often very gratifying and gives the piece a sense of unity. The trick is then creating smooth bridges between the sections, bridges that make sense and feel organic to the piece.


    Yeah, that's what I was originally had planned when I started writing it because the A-B-A form seemed to be the simplest of the forms I had read about. Unfortunately, when I went to bring back the beginning, I didn't want to just copy and paste it again, I wanted to change it up a little (A-B-A' I think...?) and when I tried that, it ended up going in a wildly different direction! :p

    As for bridges and transitions, that's probably what I've spent the most time listening to when analyzing other pieces of music. They sound like they're so easy to create, because they just work and seem so natural, but I've quickly come to realize that they only sound that way because there are some very skilled composers behind those transitions. That's something I think I might focus on in the next few weeks -- creating a few short pieces of a minute or two and really focus on the transitions. I think the transitions in "Earth" work OK, but they certainly aren't natural and do stand out.
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      CommentAuthorDavid
    • CommentTimeMay 16th 2010 edited
    So far, I've been using the Garritan Personal Orchestra samples to mock all of my music up, but last week I decided to buy the EWQL Symphonic Gold library while I still qualify for the academic price. This is really an outstanding package of samples. Who would have though for so little money you could get this close to realism? Of course, these still sound like samples, but the gap is getting smaller. I can't wait to see what kind of results I can get when I have a better grasp of the entire library (and become a better writer).

    Here's a short piece I wrote this afternoon using these new samples. The Metal Gear Solid theme reference in the beginning was entirely a coincidence.

    http://davidjbond.com/ooc/05_15_Joust.mp3
  8. Sounds good cool

    Now make it a full-blown heroic theme. wink
    "considering I've seen an enormous debate here about The Amazing Spider-Man and the ones who love it, and the ones who hate it, I feel myself obliged to say: TASTE DIFFERS, DEAL WITH IT" - Thomas G.
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      CommentAuthorDavid
    • CommentTimeMay 17th 2010
    As a matter of fact, that exactly what I plan to do sometime soon!

    But today, I really wanted to write something for cello, so I've been working on this for the last... 14 hours. Wow, doesn't seem like it's been that long. Now that most of my friends have left for the summer, I'm glad I have something to keep myself occupied!

    http://davidjbond.com/ooc/05_17_lost.mp3

    If anyone is interested, I did do a little write up about this on blog:

    http://odysseyofcreation.wordpress.com/ … and-found/

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