If you don't know music notation or theory, can you "compose"?

[Phait]

Title asks it all. Is it right to say "I composed that" if these 2 things are true? I suppose if I were to paint a portrait yet knew no technique or art form, I still painted it.

[bp]

Yes.

[the stranger]

I don't know any theory per say, but I do compose...I tend to always think it terms of the parts and how they work together.

 

I did this piece a long time ago, but I always imagined it was a decent little motif that you could hear worked up on a grander scale, and it was pre-thought out, not the usual improv I do:

 

http://www.strangersound.com/4guit.mp3

 

Could all the classical pianist/composers read and write music, or are their examples of winging it?

[MichaelSaulnier]

John Lennon

Paul McCartney

 

Prolific composers.

 

M

[Beck]

Sure.

[Rekel]

Of course.

[DavidJones529]

 

Is it right to say "I composed that"

 

 

I suppose if you want to sound like a pompous ass.

[blue2blue]

Of course, you can say that.

 

DavidJones' trenchant warning not withstanding.

 

 

But it's probably a lot more on point than to say I wrote that... if you can't actually write notation.

 

Still I often say I wrote the music for a song (even when I don't so much as jot the chords down). And, even on those rare occasions when I composed and memorized instrumentals (as opposed to simply improvising them and never doing them again), I still thought of myself and probably referred to myself as having written them.

 

[EDIT: Full disclosure: I know a little harmonic theory.]

[Jimbroni]

yes.

 

But you should study theory. You'll never learn it. No one ever does, but you should study it. You simply can't know theory, anymore than you can know why we are here.

[D Charles]

I think the theory and writing notes on staffs and all completely takes all the jungle out of you. I can read, but I choose not to because you're putting a left brain filter in to your playing.

 

Case in point, got the sheet music to 'Mood for a Day' by Steve Howe and was really struggling with it. Tossed the pages, started listening to the record and learned it in a couple of days where I'd been fighting the sheet music for a week. Convinced me.

 

Everyone is different, but I need to be all right brain about my playing.

 

Writing is exactly the same, I write down words and if it's brand new might put chords on there as well but that's about it. Put new ideas on a micro cassette thingy. Just the way I do things, you just have to sort out what works for you.

[rasputin1963]

Nowadays there are so many ways to get your musical ideas down on staff or on paper, aren't there?

[Johnny-Boy]

My signature speaks for me.

 

Best, John:thu:

[amplayer]

Quick answer is "YES".

 

Long answer is:

The more you know, the better equipped you are. Composing is just like playing an instrument. The more sharp tools you have in your shed, the better off you are. Theory and reading are great tools, especially for certain kinds of music like orchestral, film scores, etc.

Know what your limitations are, and spend time overcoming the ones that keep you from composing the type of music you want to compose.

[Magpel]

 

I suppose if you want to sound like a pompous ass.

 

 

Sounding like a pompous ass terrifies you, doesn't it?

[Magpel]

 

Know what your limitations are, and spend time overcoming the ones that keep you from composing the type of music you want to compose.

 

 

This is a nicely balanced take on it, I would say.

 

Reading and writing--one has been done by machines since the 19th century, the other since the 1990s. If it behooves you to learn it, learn it.

 

I would add one other thing: it is quite possible to "know" harmony on levels other than the theoretical. There are people--I know them and sort of am one but not entirely--who would have no clue what you mean by "ii V I" and yet have that and much much more in their ears to be discovered by wandering fingers and then directed again by the ears. I am working with a songwriter right now in fact who is an almost total naive, and yet his songs have nothing to do with the Ramones or Hank Williams. They are harmonic gardens with more in common with Randy Newman, Brian Wilson and Andy Partridge.

 

He has people who can analyze what he is doing and chart for him if necessary, but the point is that his stuff makes beautiful--and expansive--musical sense even though he lacks the language/tools to explain or analyze it. I think there are a lot of people out there like that, if their ears are tuned that way. I think I am sorta one. Half--and poorly--trained, but with ears attuned to jazz and broad-palette pop and a willingness to reinvent the wheel every time out...

 

I think theory gives you quicker access to "styles" and can also help you perceive and transcend your own ruts and limitations, but theory didn't invent music, now did it? Isn't it the other way around?

[alfonso]

 

Case in point, got the sheet music to 'Mood for a Day' by Steve Howe and was really struggling with it. Tossed the pages, started listening to the record and learned it in a couple of days where I'd been fighting the sheet music for a week. Convinced me.

 

 

Well if you think that no one of the classic Yes group, except for Rick Wakeman, could read or write music....and that Wakeman didn't compose almost nothing for them....and that stuff is not 3 chords at 4/4.....

"Mood for a Day" has been composed by ear.

[DavidJones529]

 

Sounding like a pompous ass terrifies you, doesn't it?

 

 

Yeah, a little. You?

[Hard Truth]

Nothing wrong with knowledge, but people should keep in mind that if you study music theory you are studying the practices of a particular genre. Studying jazz or European classical music theory won't help that much if try to compose or play Indian or Chinese music.

 

Similarly, European classical theory has limited usefulness for playing or composing rap, sample-based electronic music and many other types of music. Criticizing a composer of these types of music for not knowing European classical theory is trying to impose the standards of one genre onto one where it is not relevant.

[Atomic Sitar]

You don't have to know theory or written notation to compose, but if you want to get other musicians to play your stuff it sure helps!

[Jeff da Weasel]

Yes.

 

And if you die, you can decompose.

[Johnny-Boy]

 

Yes. And if you die, you can decompose.

 

 

Funny one Jeff. Here's another:

 

Mozart was once approached by a young man who was interested in Mozart's advice on how to compose a symphony. Since he was still very young, Mozart recommended that he start by composing ballads. Surprised, the young man responded, "But you wrote symphonies when you were only ten years old." "But I didn't have to ask how," countered Mozart.

 

 

John:lol:

[WRGKMC]

Write to Tape or learn tab. Memorization only works so far.

[fetishfrog]

I have a friend who makes quite a good living as a composer for TV and film and he cannot read a lick of music and knows very little theory. He is absolutely one of the best musicians I've ever known and has incredible ears, rhythm, sense on melody, etc, etc, etc.

[Jeff da Weasel]

Someone brought up Yes awhile back.

 

A guy I knew had a job working for Jon Anderson. Jon would talk walks with his microcassette recorder, and hum melodies into it. This guy's job was to take those tapes and transcribe them into sheet music, or enter them as MIDI data to a sequencer.

 

Jon is still "composing". My pal's job was transcribing. He wasn't writing the tunes. Jon was.

 

So there you have it. Proof in the pudding.

[Magpel]

 

Yeah, a little. You?

 

 

Heh heh. One man's pompous ass is another man's pious weenie. I can't win.