Coherency

So last week I was quite discontent with my piece. I really liked all of the musical ideas that I've had, but they felt too marginalized, too blocky and didn't have the flow that I wanted it to have. I also felt that the ideas that I did have didn't match the character of the poem. I was tempted to just give up on what I had and start totally new.

However I felt too stubborn to throw away what I've already done. I talked to some of my classmates about it, and at their suggestion, I just made each of the sections longer. And this makes sense. Each of the ideas didn't really have enough time to settle in and have time to morph into the next idea. So when I began to extend each of the ideas into longer phrases, I began to see opportunities to quote earlier material in a different context.

The idea that I had at the beginning with the chords in the melodica seemed very unrelated to the rest of the piece to me, but I couldn't let go of them. Than I suddenly realized that the chords fit over several sections that I've already written, which was really exciting to realize. I was able to restate this exact progression 2 times in the melodica and once in the piano after the beginning.

Apart from those quotations I was able to bring back much of the melodic material in the different instruments. I am now much more satisfied with the cohesion and coherence of my piece. It's funny how you can get stuck, and be close to giving up. But thank goodness I have some people around who are able to point me in the right direction.

internal resonance

As I've recently mentioned I have finally found some ideas to base my text setting on. I did start with a completley idea before however that did function musically. I was aiming for this piece to have a gypsy jazz type feel, very swingy, implied diminished harmonies never resolving just moving, and melodies based on the gypsy scale. I had only worked out a sort of introduction in this style, and I beleive it was decent music, butwhen I listened to it after a little while of being away from it, I didn't like it. Not because of the quality, just because it didn't feel right. I wouldn't want someone to hear it and assosciate it with me. And I beleive that's what's difficult about being a good composer, well not necessarily a good composer, but a composer who is fufilled with their own music, not just settling for good music, but music that has that extra resonance with themselves.
Also, I realized that continuing in that style would have boxed me in a lot faster than I would have appreciated. It was just the introduction and I was already limiting myself to get it to sound like this one paticular style which drove me nuts, so how could I base 4-5 minutes of music on these continuing confines?

Slow Beginnings

starting the new composition is taking a great deal longer than I had anticipated. I had a lot of ideas of how i wanted it to sound, but no solid ideas of actual little motives or themes. I think a lot of it comes from the instrumentation that I plan to use. When writing for the piano, it comes more naturally because I can sit at the piano and wank away at some keys until I play something that resonates with me.

Where I have no intention of using the piano, finding certain chords I like can only bring me to a certain point. Organizing these chords into rhythms and finding appropriate ways for them to progress is where I find a problem, also with the voicing of the instruments.

However, last night I was fiddling with some of the chords on my guitar and finally found a rhythm that matched the chords I wanted to incorperate. So I finally had my first real pliable musical idea in about 6 days of chipping away at them. This worries me in a way though, I'm afraid I will be limited to ideas that I need to work out on an actual instrument first...and there are many instruments I would love to write for but do not know how to play them. Are there any solutions to this?