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Re: What do you think is necessary in order to have an excellentcomposition?
Quoting Richard Sales <richard@glasswing.com>:
> It's good to know the rules, like Picasso or Michaelangelo or Mozart or
> Coltrane or Charles Ives... but then it's good to throw them at the
> wall when they get in the way. I tend to like the music of folks who
> know the rules - from folk art skank delta blues rules to Bach - and
> then walk over them.
Great post!
I tend to do the opposite. I don't worry about "the rules" at all
when I compose. To work with Cubase really liberates me from the
score and I can do things by ear. However, when I encounter a
"problem", say an awkward passage or a progression that just doesn't
"sound" the way I want it to, the "rules" are there to help me find a
solution.
(This was a tough journey from the time I graduated. I had to
'liberate' myself from the expectation that every new work had to be
something completely 'new' ... or as I would say, 'novel'.)
I marvel at people like Frank Zappa who wrote orchestral compositions
(that would be graduate level work) without ever getting formal
training. And, heck... Mozart reportedly wrote a symphony at age
four! Since I am not a genius, the training in theory, harmony, and
form has enabled me to write music that is much better than what I was
writing before I got the training.
Actually, what we call "rules" I view as "tools". Or perhaps, "tools
of the trade". Thus, I utilize voice-leading, harmony, texture, and
other techniques to serve my music without feeling like a slave to
"the rules".