Be More Than Just a Composer
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 22 ก.ค. 2024
- In this video, I discuss my personal beliefs on what makes a good composer outside of just mastering music theory.
Background Music:
Bach: Air on the G String, Performed by the USAF Strings
Nocturne from my own Piano Suite written 2016
A special thanks as always to musopen.org for offering public domain recordings online.
I think its important to note that some of the best composers/musicians who ever lived had interest in scientific subjects (Saint Saeins, Borodin, Xenakis), or painting (Mendelssohn, Scheonberg), literature (Liszt, Wagner), foreign cultures (Messiaen, Debussy, Ravel, Bartok, Godowsky, Szymanowski, Sorabji), poetry (Liszt, Ravel), religion (Bach, Liszt, Messiaen) and they all shared a deep love for nature and philosophical questions (Scriabin, Ives). You cant make music _only_ knowing about music. Its pointless and it damages intellect. Writing music for the sake of music wont produce good art.
Right you are!
BTW, I am somewhat annoyed I forgot to mention Dr. Borodin, that would have fit in nicely after I mentioned Bach..... oh well.....
Plus Liszt was 90% of the way to joining a monastic order and was very devout. I wonder if any were dancers.
@@mechanussunrise to be fair, Liszt kinda lived 7 lives in one
@@mechanussunrise I've heard somewhere that Mozart was a pretty good dancer
This video got me emotional, i'm 19, I painted from 11 years old to 17, when I decided to study music, and I thought I had to choose, I thought I had to surround myself with music only, and that painting couldn't have a place in my life. Hearing your thoughts has widen my view, it's liberating for me, honestly. Thank you for sharing, take care♥️
Its really quite a shame you don't get more views
I second that
Part of this is that people need to share my videos on other platforms. If you like my content, share it elsewhere. Sometimes people post my videos on reddit and that alone helps a lot.
Ill be sure to do that. I think its safe to say that on behalf of all of your subscribers we all immensely enjoy your videos.
Composers that took hikes or long walks regularly: Richard Strauss, Brahms, Beethoven, Mahler and Wagner. I'm sure there's more. Personally I've found it's just incredible for my mind. You might think you're wasting time but walking you're actually working out ideas while exercising and letting mind 'breathe'. Once you go back to your desk you're gonna feel you have so much more energy
Video: be more than a composer
Liszt: ho are you challenging me?
I wholeheartedly agree with this. When I get burnt out from composing, I fall back to my various other hobbies: gaming, talking and spending time with friends and loved ones, drawing/painting, finance and listening/passively studying music. I find that when I come back, my creative output and the quality of music improves drastically. Such an interesting phenomenon. It’s as if your brain conducts a meta-analysis while on break!
Very inspiring video! Thank you for your perspective.
This video really spoke to me, thank you! I agree with your opinion, however, I think that your advice is directed more to professional composers. But I'd guess that composing is more of an interest/hobby for a big part of your audience and if we apply your advice to our hobby, this might not be the best: Really getting into something intellectually and creatively challenging as composing can be the source of a lot of happiness in one's life, especially nowadays when this kind of hobby is very rare among people. Honestly, I'd rather encourage people to focus on one thing than starting new hobbies and giving up on them a week later.
I know that this video was mainly talking about what composers did and that they were not just composers but human beings and I will truly agree with you on that; but this video was probably also meant to be inspiring in a way. And yes, it could help the "nerdy counterpoint student" with being more open-minded but probably not the typical youtube-watcher.
Great video nonetheless!
Very inspiring video, thank you!
I can get the same amount of work done in 4 hours, divided thus: 2 hours of work / 1 hour walk / 2 hours of work; than I would get in 5-7 hours working straight.
The mind and the ears become tired after a couple of hours, we have to give them at least half an hour break, in order to have optimal activity.
This culture we have, of working 8 hours a day, is somewhat counterproductive, in my opinion.
4 or 5 with full focus, a crisp mind and a pause in between goes a long way.
Very true, I've been going for daily walks and it really helps in the overall balance of my life in its many aspects. When I go back to composing or mixing music, I come with a fresh look and a cleaner mind.
What an incredible video. Sometimes composers focus so much in writing and push themselves in challenging their skills. Sometimes all we need to acknowledge is that we are all human beings, music is just how we express some things, though music does not represent entirely our hobbies, our virtues, our thoughts, our life! And knowing that just makes one feel free. Thank you so much for making this beautiful video, I'm sure you'll get further eventually! :)
Don't forget, Bach was also very good at producing musically talented offsprings 😁
Hands down, greatest composition channel on TH-cam.
I compose, I study langauges, participate in chess tournaments (I just recently won one) and I go for long hiking trips (thousands of kilometers) and absolutely love travelling - life is a journey! You may wonder if I compose while being alone on my hiking trips for so long. Yes, occasionally I do. I walked 3000 kilometers in 2017 (took me seven months) and at the end I was bored so I composed a minuet based on a children's song for piano while walking thru the majestic landscape. Larger forms are too complex for this purpose so I often do stuff like a small four part canon while I walk. Mathematics is also of great interest to me (I've composed my own problems) as is science in general. (I hate politics. ;) )
In my experience you cannot compose being enitrely on your own in the long run. My inspiration I get from meeing other people eye to eye. I am polyamorous and absolutely love meeting people inside the community.
Wow, you are completely right.
I have the same point of view.
I’m a composer myself and the hardest part for me is when I get composers block and nothing helps except time. Improvising on the piano, asking other musicians for advice, being outside, those help in the majority of cases of composers block. But sometimes it’s so severe that I can’t do anything but wait or work on a different composition. Worst case scenario, I have a great compositional idea but just can’t seem to write it down. Have you ever run into this issue yourself as a composer?
Song Ju So as I improve in composition, I should be getting this composers block less and less frequently? I think that is already happening. And after just 2.5 years of composing, it feels like the symphony and the concerto are almost within my grasp. I have went from having a hard time with quartet writing to writing a 10 minute piece for orchestra within that time span. That’s some fast progress. Like young Mozart fast. And to think that it all started as piano solo works that emulated Mozart and Beethoven. Maybe the spirit of Mozart is living on inside me?
Interesting topic, i also like to make a walk to clear the mind and thing about something other than music, because sometimes i force myself to do something and it end up that i get unconcentrated and do nothing :D. Also if you thing about something for a while and make a break, your mind keep working on the problem, so sometimes there comes a solution in a situation like walking or when you in the shower, or something. Good video, keep the good work :D.
My hobby is playing car games on time trial mode with absurd perfectionism
Absolutely correct
Great video. Another problem I think contributes to this is the prevailing trend among young people to make fun of everyone's taste. This is detrimental, especially for people new to the art form. It does not encourage growth, it encourages, as you said in the video, for people to stay in their holes where they know they are experts in. It does not promote trying new things. Being new to an art form should be embraced, not make one feel bad.
It's very important to take those "creative breaks". We live in a world where productivity is governed by the views of economists and managers who regard humans as resources, like machines. Humans aren't. Creative and productive humans need those breaks.
I keep coming back to this video over and over. It’s really something that should be said more in music circles, and especially in the conservatory system. If anything, the course of the pandemic has only further illuminated this disconnect between many musicians and the wider world: the number of composers I saw who have just wanted to keep on trucking, keep worrying about how their music fits into some theoretical framework or whatever, seemingly ignoring the massive global crisis around them, was astonishing. But I suppose this isn’t too surprising, when the push for “productivity” as artists encourages people to disconnect and just work work work.
Personally, I think we need to stop idolizing the “consummate musician” as the ultimate goal for people in this field - so many people end up overworked and burnt out from surrounding themselves with only other musicians, only doing musical activities, and intrinsically tying their sense self-worth to their music. We shouldn’t be training people to feel guilty for taking a break off of practicing and study, so they can actually read a book.
We do music because we love it, but ultimately it is still work, and as human beings we can, and need, to be more than just the work we do.
I mean that one sentence really changed my entire outlook as a composer, “If you know everything about music, you still know nothing.” I’m glad to have had someone say that to me while still being rather young.
What is a good piece of music for you? :)
Great points, you make. Btw, the island landscape@8:04, wea is that?
Where can i find some of your compositions?
On my/this channel there’s a “Compositions” playlist, where you can hear some of my stuff.
7:20 wtf is this
My thoughts too. Wtf is she doing? Never seen conducting look so...putrid 🤢
dude i have a 9 to 5 how the fuck can have more then one hobby especially if its as time consuming as music is
You mean, be more than just a white man who is a composer, since that’s all you have on there…