Matt Spencers

Composing Conducting Playing OH MY!

and and

This is a guide to how I compose music; however this method might not work for everyone.

Matt Spencer 6/2/2011

Introduction: What is going to be covered? Here is my simple guide to how I compose music, and how I make it work. Most songs start out with a line of lyrics or a melody. This creates and emotion of comes from an emotion. Soon you will realize you want to write it down and perform it so that you never lose the song. But where do you begin? What notes are you singing? If you write it down will people be able to perform it? Hopefully this guide helps you figure out how! What you will need: a melody instrument such as a flute, piano, guitar, trumpet, voice, etc. (Drums are not a melody instrument since they do not produce specific pitches), a recorder, knowledge of conducting patterns, knowledge of music theory (You might want to use the book Tonal Harmony from McGraw Hill or the website www.musictheory.net), and a love for learning something challenging.

Chapter 1: Basic Beginnings of a Song First, know your melody. This melody is important because like a quote, the song is one thing that will make people remember you. Play, sing, or speak the lyrics into the recorder (however the lyrics can be written down also). This is important for instrumental music especially because you might not know how to write down the music yet. Listen to the recording. Try to discover the pitches again on your instrument; this will help you find the key signature. After listening to the recording try and stomp or clap you hand to find a steady beat. Once youve found your steady beat, try and find the appropriate conducting pattern to create a time signature. Here are a few of the common conducting patterns: Time Signature Diagram

2/2; 2/4; Fast 6/8

3/4; Fast 9/8

4/4; Divided 2/2; Fast 12/8

Remember that the highest point of a pattern is the beginning and end of a measure. Once you do this you may begin writing music.

Chapter 2: Writing the Music When you begin to write down the music you are composing, you should start with your simple melody. First using the process list previously, you need to figure out how to write your melody down onto the staff paper (one recording device that you could use is the MicNotator feature on Finale programs made by the MakeMusic Incorporated. With this feature you can play your music into a microphone and then the sheet music will appear as you play). However, if you choose to go the traditional route of handwritten music, try starting with the simple melody, once you figure this out you may expand on the music thus adding chords and harmony around the melody. The thing you must remember is that your song must create a picture in your mind or release/create an emotion. You must ask yourself, Why am I writing this song? Is it for my emotional benefit or because I just want to make money and be famous? No matter what you write, you will be faced with both choices. I cannot make you choose what I say but I hope you consider and respect it. I suggest that you write for your personal pleasure and for your emotional benefit, or a therapy. Back to writing the music, if you want to add more character to the music, try adding dynamics and articulation. Chapter 2 : Section 1 : Dynamics

Dynamics denotes the degree of loudness or softness at which the music is played (Machlis 22). Dynamics let the musician know what notes/phrases to play loudly or softly. If the

instruments of an orchestra all played at different volumes the listener would not be able to listen to the music easily. Here is a chart that includes some common dynamics and what they mean:

Dynamic Pianissimo Piano Mezzo piano Mezzo forte Forte Fortissimo

pp p mp mf f ff

Meaning Very quiet Quiet A little Quiet A little Loud Loud Very Loud

Other dynamics are not just symbols such as the symbols above, but can include crescendos, decrescendo/diminuendo, or sforzandos. Crescendo means to grow louder. Decrescendo/ Diminuendo means to grow softer. A sforzando is a sudden stress, and accent of a single note or chord. A forte piano is a dynamic in which you attack a note (typically a long note) then get a soft/quiet as possible then a crescendo follows. The crescendos and

decrescendos look like the >, < signs. A sforzando is abbreviated as sf. Here are the symbols: Expression Crescendo Decrescendo/Diminuendo Sforzando Forte Piano Symbol

Chapter 2 : Section 2 : Articulation In music, Articulation is a very important aspect of a song. Along with dynamics

and expressions Articulations add to the character of a song. Some songs in music are very

boring. These songs have no character. Other songs are upbeat, lively and have some very striking phrases. The part of music that can create this effect is called articulation. Here are some articulations: Articulation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Notation_accents1.png Left to right: Staccato, staccatissimo, marcato, accent, tenuto

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Articulatie.jpg In order from most fluent to most separated (Left to Right) In music there are ornaments and accents. There is a difference in them even though they are both articulations. Accents put a certain emphasis on a note. Ornaments change a note and how that piece of music is played. Ornaments are not necessary but give the music more Character. In orchestra music these ornaments are seen much more than they would be in church music. Such things are trills and grace notes. In baroque music ornaments were used much more and were much more complicated than in common times. Here are a few common ornaments and how they are written to sound: Names Trill Mordent Gruppetto (turn) Ornaments How its written

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ornament_(music)

Chapter 3: Performance Yikes! I can tell you that, from my experience the hardest thing is to get the music performed. Depending on the group you are performing your music with; you need to make sure it is playable. Make sure youve added breath marks and rests for players where you feel they are needed. Lastly, make sure everything is written correctly. Do not give transposing instruments parts for C instruments. Make sure everything works!!! So everything works, where do you begin? My strategy is to give everyone the piece of music that they will be playing. Play a recording of the song or play it on a piano so they can hear the song. Tell the performers to let the song paint a picture in their mind and that this picture is for their minds only, dont share your thoughts with others. Sharing your thoughts on this with others will make others think they have to see what you see and as you know music is about your artistic expression. Make music your own. So let them paint the picture for themselves. After playing the music tell them its their turn to make the picture real through the music. Make sure that they play the music correct because that is how you wrote it. To get the best results with a large performance of a song (such as a band or orchestra) tell the performers to worry about their part and their part only until they feel confident on their playing, then tell them to listen to how the whole song sounds. Convince them to memorize their music and practice on their own time too. This will help with their practicing and listening skills. Its very important that you know the performers capabilities, do write something to hard for them or too simple. Write something you know that they will be able to play so that they can show off their skills and you too can show off yours. Hard music might show your skills but hard music also shows that some performers are incapable of playing music of such difficulty. Easy music will

not show off their skill because most people dont want to hear what you can do, they want to hear what you had to work on to do.

10

Conclusion This is music guide to conducting. This guide might not work for everyone but this is my method I hope that you can use this method because I have found it to work with the music I write. I want to tell you of some music notation (composition) programs that will help with the creating of sheet music. The program I use is called Finale. This allows you to use the MicNotator feature I talked about. Finale can be bought at http://www.finalemusic.com Another common program is called Sibelius. This program does not have a MicNotator feature. But can be bought at http://www.sibelius.com/home/index_flash.html