Re: Composer Gender
Serenade girl (I don't know your real name!), if you want to know how to compose, I surely would be glad to offer any advice. I have been composing for 12 yrs now, and I think I have learned quite a bit. I think there should be more girl composers. I only know a small few, and it makes me feel lonely!
Besides, there are very few well known female composers that have ever been at all (Hildegaard von Bingen, Clara Schumann, Amy Cheney Beach, and Eileen Taafe Zwilich are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head!).
You have lyrics? Then please, by all means email me and I will either write the music for you or show you how.
Re: Composer Gender
*sighs* Don't worry, just call me by Serenade.
Thank you for the offer, I really appreciate it. But I suppose composing music is like poetry, you shouldn't really get help from others unless it's like, school work and out of necessity. So as much as I would love to accept it, I just cannot. I'm not trying to be vain or anything, but I suppose music to me would be different to what it means to you. And because of that, I guess I'll just leave composing for now, and perhaps return to it later when I think I've matured and am ready.
And just out of curiosity, how old are you? (No offense intended.)
Re: Composer Gender
Don't be so hard on yourself. Any musician can and should learn composition at any time. The problem with learning on your own is that, unlike poetry, composition is a huge, diverse, and almost endless subject which NO ONE can ever master. People may master individual areas of music (Haydn mastered String Quartets, Wagner Gesamtkunstwerk, Ravel orchestration, Webern serialism...), but it is too diverse for anyone to learn all.
While I strongly encourage you to go out and learn things on your own, please realize the scope of such an undertaking if you wish to learn composition. If you do not want me or anyone else to help you, that is fine, but I guarantee you will not succeed as much as if you had someone to help you, even if it were a hapless peer who knew as little about music writing as you do now. Encouragement and fresh ideas are what a composer needs all the time (trust me, I have writer's block and need it now myself!), and thats really where another composer comes into play.
If you want, I can recommend some good books for you. But I still encourage you learn from someone if not me.
As for my age, I am exactly 8 months older than Melissa
E-flat Major Scale
Posts: 89
(6/11/02 2:16 pm) Reply
Re: Composer GenderBut I suppose
composing music is like poetry, you shouldn't really get help from
others unless it's like, school work and out of necessity.
i can't believe you just said that!! i get help with my poetry :/ i post it on a popular teen writing site to get critiqued, and have improved because of that! and i'm not in school anymore...i just write poetry 'cause i like to. :) if you want to improve, then help is an asset. if i want to learn something, and have no idea how to make sense of it, i'll ask someone. that's what teachers are for--helping you see things in a way you couldn't see before; pointing you in the right direction so you can learn something. and if you don't like it, you'll eventually get sick of it, but if you're determined--come on. accept some help. ;)
So as much
as I would love to accept it, I just cannot. I'm not trying to be vain
or anything, but I suppose music to me would be different to what it
means to you.
curious--what does music mean to you?
And because of that, I guess I'll just leave composing
for now, and perhaps return to it later when I think I've matured and
am ready.
but if you really really want to learn something, you shouldn't leave it, you should go attack it. (lol, j/k) if you're determined enough & really want to learn something, it's not going to suddenly magically interest you--you're either interested or not; but if you leave it for awhile, you lack years of valuable practising--and you need practise to be good at something don't you? just like if you want to be a good musician (you're the one who isn't a musician? what is something you're good at?? use that instead ;) ) you need practise, then if you want to be good at composing...you need practise. i know music is a language; and when we were babies didn't our parents teach us how to speak? so other people can teach us how to speak music.
E-flat Major Scale
Posts: 90
(6/11/02 2:24 pm) Reply
Re: Composer GenderThe problem with learning on your own is
that, unlike poetry, composition is a huge, diverse, and almost
endless subject which NO ONE can ever master.
*LOL* no one can ever master poetry either; it's just as huge and diverse and almost endless! :) i'm still learning free verse! :/
People may master
individual areas of music (Haydn mastered String Quartets, Wagner
Gesamtkunstwerk, Ravel orchestration, Webern serialism...), but it is
too diverse for anyone to learn all.
it's the same with poetry :)
While I strongly encourage you to go out and learn things on your own,
please realize the scope of such an undertaking if you wish to learn
composition. If you do not want me or anyone else to help you, that is
fine, but I guarantee you will not succeed as much as if you had
someone to help you, even if it were a hapless peer who knew as little
about music writing as you do now.
*LOL* Serenade & i can pair up ;)
As for my age, I am exactly 8 months older than Melissa :)
Re: Composer Gender
Jsawruk — Again, I must thank you, but it's just not quite needed. Not at the moment anyway. Besides, we are covering a bit on composition in Music at school, so I suppose we just might get up to there soon enough.
As Mel as implied, poetry is in ways similar to music, how it's limitless, etc. And I suppose I've just ended up with poetry because I couldn't do music any good.
I've just tried too hard to compose. Now I've realised that I shouldn't really push things which I only dream are existent, and instead wait until I'm ready to take another step.
Thank you for telling me of your age, but it somewhat makes me feel more inferior.
I really appreciate your help offered, but I assure that whenever I would like your assistance, I shall ask accordingly.
Mel — Apologies, but I didn't know about you and poetry, so yes. I basically write all my own, and although I do become inspired by other's works, I don't really need help in that area. Well, not now anyway.
What does music mean to me? That is just too complex to explain. It cannot be explained. So I suppose I'll just leave it there.
As for going for something if you'd really want it... Sometimes it just can't happen. And right now, I suppose I'm just not ready.
Re: Composer GenderMel Apologies, but I didn't know about you and poetry, so yes. I
basically write all my own, and although I do become inspired by
other's works, I don't really need help in that area. Well, not now
anyway.
*LOL* but you just asked if we could exchange poems & tips and stuff! also i'm curious about how old you are too ;)
Re: composer gender
I still think music is more limitless than poetry because poetry is actually a subset of music. Music, as the organization of sound, contains all sounds. These sounds include phonemes, which connect to form words, and words can be arranged in one manner in poetry. Therefore, I say to you, you already compose!
I do not know why my age makes you feel inferior. Don't feel that way. There is no need to. Yes, how old are you?
I would very much like to teach you composition. I am helping Melissa with it. Should I forward the emails I write to her to you also? Maybe it would be helpful. I would much rather you take my advice that I have struggled in my composing to understand rather than you struggle yourself and reinvent the wheel.
Trust me on this one. Every composer has been in your position and has become frustrated by composing. Do not feel bad; you can become as great a composer as you want. I cannot make you great, I can only do that to myself. In fact, no one can make you great. But other composers can help you and guide you (or in my case, kick me when im down ).
Re: composer genderI still think music is more limitless than poetry because poetry is
actually a subset of music.
or is music a subset of poetry? ;)
Music, as the organization of sound,
contains all sounds. These sounds include phonemes, which connect to
form words, and words can be arranged in one manner in poetry.
i think they are extremely related...poetry can have rhythm and form just as music can...but i'm not sure one is more diverse than the other...there are several styles of poetry...just as there are several styles of music...
Should I forward the emails I write to her to you also?
*LOL* you are really going to do that? /all/ of them? ;)
But other
composers can help you and guide you (or in my case, kick me when im
down :( ).
Re: composer gender
Ooh... I like how Melissa attacks my rhetoric with my style rhetoric. I like , but I still think poetry is a subset of music because of the arguments I made. Either way, BOTH are subsets of sound.
I don't know, I have read lots of poetry, and I have heard lots of music. I think what is important though is a union of the two to create song.
I won't forward ALL the emails, especially not the... oh wait, nevermind
Sorry, that last statement was against my comp teacher and a certain composer, named Melissa, who hates me. Thankfully that Melissa is not this wonderful Melissa
Re: composer gender
Hi, I'm a girl and I compose a bit... *blushes*
I'm not very good for the moment because I don't have much time to compose. I started study music in college last september, I've got very few knowledge, but we started a group with friends in which we had to compose one piano piece every week, in imposed caracters (walzt, marzurka, canon, etc), I did learn a lot... and this summer, I started to compose an opera - but I still have a lot fot hings to learn before calling myself a real composer. I suppose it comes with time and sweat!
"On n'a pas fini d'écrire en do majeur..." -Prokofiev
Re: composer gender
Please, feel free to send me your stuff and/or post links here. I would love to see what you're doing.
Wow, I am impressed with the response from girl composers . I thought that it would be 100% male, 0% female, but you proved me wrong!
TrumpetEgo E-flat Major Scale
Posts: 86
(7/6/02 2:45 pm) Reply
well
This has been my experience with composition.
I started writing a few years ago. It was all short things without much direction or integrity or harmonic novelty. My parents went and got me a music program shortly after I started writing (I don't know why) and I suddenly had the power to write things for orchestra. Needless to say, these sucked. Through this time I didn't have any help or teachers and just wrote what I felt like writing.
Then, one day I went to hear a free concert with the San Francisco Symphony. It was one of their summer concerts out in a park. They played Stravinsky's Circus Polkas, Stravinsky's Symphony in Three Movements, Copland's Billy The Kid Suite, and to close the concert Copland's 4 Dance Episodes from Rodeo. When I heard the Hoedown, I was hooked. Of course, I'd heard it a billion times before but I'd never really payed any attention to it.
The next weekend I went to the library and started looking at every piece by Copland I could find. I wanted to write exactly like him, and some of the stuff from that time does sound a lot like Copland. But the important thing is this made me start looking at scores. And looking at what Copland did to sound like Copland. I started picking up things by other Composers at the library. Beethoven, Dvorak, Mahler, Britten, Holst, Shostakovich. Before long I was looking at Debussy, Schoenberg, Rimsky-Korsakov, Brahms, Strauss and anything else I could find. When I looked at the scores I listened to the recordings and heard what the things they were doing sounded like, and I looked at what instruments they used and how they used them to sound like that. By doing this, I learned how to orchestrate. I'm still young, of course, but even now I have friends and colleagues who compose asking me how I would orchestrate something.
I think this is one of the most important things for someone who is starting to compose to do. Look at what others did! We have nearly 500 years of history in western classical music. All of the styles can be easily found in score and recorded form if you know where to look. The old masters are the best teachers.
Just a few years ago I got into a composition program. In my Freshman year in High School I was near the top of that class. This summer I got accepted for an intense composition program at CalArts in Valencia, Cal. I got in on a taped audition of a midi file. The only reason these sound anywhere near good (I really hate midi) is because I know how to orchestrate things to not have them sound like crap on midi. Magically they sound good with real players also. I think that you can have the best melodies ever written, but the real key to having good sounding compositions is to learn to orchestrate well. If you don't do that, your pieces will sound too bad for anyone to be able to hear the great melodies you may have written.
I also do communicate with many composers about my age around the country. I'm actualy working on a project with one in Massachusets right now. I also keep in touch with several musicians around the country, who are good for giving practical feedback on compositions.
Yes, I realize this is very long, but hopefuly I helped and didn't sound too pompus.
IOrangEI C Major Scale
Posts: 13
(7/6/02 8:40 pm) Reply
I'm a composer, not a pianist
Interesting story, Triumphant. YOu said you converse with other composers your age? Is this in person, or on-line, and if it's on-line is there any way you could direct me to the link?
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Composer Gender
i'm not really a composer, but i try sometimes. *g*
Re: Composer Gender
