How do I improve my Compostions and Arrangements

[surreal]

Hi Everyone,

How does one improve own compositions and learn more towards creating better musical work.

What I really like to compose is like vangelis, movie music, soundtrack type of stuff and then also modern synthy pop music but not dubstep or edm ... there is plenty tuts for that.. I wanna create music that has soul and conveys emotional messages.

I know all my Scales thoroughly and have a great understanding of harmony and chord structures and can do drum programming.... what I battle mostly with is creating meaningfull and sensible melodies..

Its like I just cant get it together lately and feeling so despondant...

Please help and advise... my sound cloud has most of my work on... www.soundcloud.com/tb4c

Thank you Everyone

[dark water]

Hi Surreal,

I expect you'll get some helpful and varied opinions here.
I like to learn from books/texts, and three have helped me learn a fair bit about composition and arrangement:

https://www.amazon.com/Arranging-Techni ... 082561130X

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Songwriting-Se ... 0711981671

https://gumroad.com/l/electronicmusicarrangementebook#

In a nutshell, the first one above is a good general overview, the second one (although framed on the Beatles) is actually a very valid discussion of harmonies and chord choices in its own right, and the third one explores ways to focus on manipulating energy and emotion in your arrangements (it's aimed at dance music but general ideas carry over).

Lastly, critically analyze what makes your favourite tracks by your favourite musicians so appealing (also find ways that they might have chosen a different/better idea or technique for a passage in a song).

Cheers.

[surreal]

Hi Dark water,

Thank you for your help advice and links! !

I will definitely follow this up!

Thanks for your input!

Regards

[DJ Warmonger]

If there are any free books / articles on this subject, I would be mostly grateful.

[surreal]

Hi Dj.. me too...

Hopefully someone can give us some direction to wards free material to read and work through

[stillshaded]

a quick tip for melodies, as you say that you are having trouble with them:

When I write melodies I always "transcribe" something from my head. Meaning, I "sing" a melody in my head and write it out in the piano roll. It takes practice but it's a great way to go. This essentially what composers have always done.

If you prefer to play your melodies in with a keyboard, try singing the melody before you play it. Sing it out loud, or try to hear it in your head before you start playing.

It will give you a good basis for a melody which you can embellish later.

[Functional]

Hi surreal, I gave some listen to your soundcloud.

In particular, "I ENTER IN", as it was at least length of a full track. Your problem could possibly be (in there) that it doesn't really have any distinct form, it's just "floating around". Which is very fine if you were composing for a game. For example something like that I could imagine being in The Witcher 3 as a thematic background music in some village, for example.

But I would suggest that you might want to try utilizing forms more or read literature about forms. Or pay more attention to literature you already have at your disposal at the parts where song structure is of concern. I think especially in cinematic music, the form is of very high concern, where part of the "epicness" comes from. They often emphasize between the intro section and the "main part" of the music. There's some nice words to all of this, but I don't know them. Anyway, here's a great example from Nine Inch Nails, the 300 theme music.

First you get the rather dark, bit ominous ambient "noise", then piano to reinforce it, with that guitar strumming. Then the drums until you get to the actual meat of the song and so on. It goes for a while, then at 2:10 or so comes in a slight "breakdown" cue, just before in the climax, which then fades away and you have the outro left.

I think you might want more of that kind of stuff in your compositions. As to "how", well, unfortunately there are no magic tools or even literature AFAIK. It took me a while to understand that concept at all, but eventually it slowly sunk in and little by little it gets easier to answer the question "what's next?" with something else than "more or less the same that happened last 8 or 16 bars".

[surreal]

Thank you everyone for the very helpfull pointers and advice so far.

All valid and greatly appreciated! !

[Sampleconstruct]

One method to enlarge your musical horizon as a whole is to improvise, seriously, for hours, alone and in ensembles. Everything you experience during these impro sessions will settle in your musical memory, you can later draw from this pool of ideas, fragments, impressions and also learn to avoid things which didn't work. Studying books about musical theory and learning to play instruments is of course important, but learning to let it flow freely is just as important, at least it has been in my musical world.

[dermichl]

Hi Surreal,

I expect you'll get some helpful and varied opinions here.
I like to learn from books/texts, and three have helped me learn a fair bit about composition and arrangement:

https://www.amazon.com/Arranging-Techni ... 082561130X

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Songwriting-Se ... 0711981671

https://gumroad.com/l/electronicmusicarrangementebook#

In a nutshell, the first one above is a good general overview, the second one (although framed on the Beatles) is actually a very valid discussion of harmonies and chord choices in its own right, and the third one explores ways to focus on manipulating energy and emotion in your arrangements (it's aimed at dance music but general ideas carry over).

Lastly, critically analyze what makes your favourite tracks by your favourite musicians so appealing (also find ways that they might have chosen a different/better idea or technique for a passage in a song).

Cheers.

where did you learn about the third book? i can't get no sample text or other info on this book...

[elxsound]

You can also recreate the music that you love.

This will teach you both about what they have done, as well as provide you with a better understanding of why you love it.

This might provide you with your best results, as it is highly subjective when defining what is "creating meaningful and sensible melodies."

By recreating passages and whole compositions that you consider to be meaningful and sensible, you'll be able to isolate the things that resonated with you personally to better understand how to better convey what you wish, in your own unique way.

[surreal]

One method to enlarge your musical horizon as a whole is to improvise, seriously, for hours, alone and in ensembles. Everything you experience during these impro sessions will settle in your musical memory, you can later draw from this pool of ideas, fragments, impressions and also learn to avoid things which didn't work. Studying books about musical theory and learning to play instruments is of course important, but learning to let it flow freely is just as important, at least it has been in my musical world.

True... but to me lately its like that creative flow has been switched ofg... its driving me nuts.... feels like soooo much time lost and wasted enrgy

[surreal]

You can also recreate the music that you love.

This will teach you both about what they have done, as well as provide you with a better understanding of why you love it.

This might provide you with your best results, as it is highly subjective when defining what is "creating meaningful and sensible melodies."

By recreating passages and whole compositions that you consider to be meaningful and sensible, you'll be able to isolate the things that resonated with you personally to better understand how to better convey what you wish, in your own unique way.

Was considering thisapproach... then I felt guilty as its like cheating.. but then its all in the learning process.. maybe I am hard on myself.. but I wanna be original and not a copout... I suppose we all feel that way..

[elxsound]

You can also recreate the music that you love.

This will teach you both about what they have done, as well as provide you with a better understanding of why you love it.

This might provide you with your best results, as it is highly subjective when defining what is "creating meaningful and sensible melodies."

By recreating passages and whole compositions that you consider to be meaningful and sensible, you'll be able to isolate the things that resonated with you personally to better understand how to better convey what you wish, in your own unique way.

Was considering thisapproach... then I felt guilty as its like cheating.. but then its all in the learning process.. maybe I am hard on myself.. but I wanna be original and not a copout... I suppose we all feel that way..

This is not cheating. This is learning.

You are cheating yourself by thinking you have to reinvent the wheel.

This has nothing to do with not being original... This is a learning tool, so I'm not saying to steal someone else's work.

The whole point is to demystify what makes you believe those songs are so great. This is like pulling the curtain back in the Wizard of Oz.

Its important to be a student especially when you have so much self-doubt.

Build your foundation and then you create freely and uniquely.

[surreal]

Thank you for your encouragement. . Its that stupid mindset that I must conquer..

You are correct.. its learning.. fundamentals once masterd that will give me the freedom of expression... so that I can achieve what I have set out to do musically!!

Thank you to all the respondents on this thread for your encouragements and wisdom! Thank youfor taking the time to assist and for listening to the work on my sound cloud.

You guys are awesome!!

Kind regards
Surreal