This may seem like a nonsense question, but how do I compose faster? Ever since school started, I've been really busy and all, but I still really want to compose. I'm working on a piano trio right now, but it seems like I never make any progress no matter how hard I try. Anywhere from shortcuts and tricks in Musescore to changing the way I look at composing, please give me some ideas. I really feel like I could do much more if given more time!  ..read more

Hi there amazing people,  I am conducting a questionnaire for my dissertation on the topic of instrumentation and orchestration in composition and I am hoping to find people to take part in my survey who compose/produce music for film/TV. If that’s you and you wouldn’t mind sparing 5-10 minutes of your time you are my favourite person in the world! All responses are anonymous and it should only take around 5 minutes to complete. Here’s the link: https://forms.gle/zx9pipdgzdNaGosw7 Have a wonderful day ..read more

I have recently had an interesting mind experiment with myself.  I have sometimes thought of maybe going back to school for a master's in music and I've heard some great advice on discord stating that one should seek out a good composer/composition teacher that one would want to study with and go to that school where you'd be able to study with them.  So I imagine to myself that I have already done that and I'm sitting with my teacher in their office, listening to some of my music, and they ask me "So what are your musical goals in regards to musical composition?  What do you re ..read more

I've been thinking about this a lot lately, partly because when I listen to symphonies post-Mahler, they seem to lack a certain justification or grounds for their existence.  I know that many composers consider the symphony to be the pinnacle of instrumental (and sometimes even choral/vocal) music and definitely have the goal of writing one themselves.  I personally am flabbergasted by the task of writing a symphony - should I start with a classical symphony like Prokofiev did and evolve the form in some new direction?  But when I listen to many symphonies even by composers who ..read more

I'm jotting down some ideas for a future violin sonata, though the real work will only be started after I acquire basic knowledge of violin playing. I encountered two problems: 1. Why is the red warning sign activated when I typed in #G6 and A6 on the solo violin staff? They are well in the range of the instrument 2. Why does the violin sound non-legato even when I have added slurs? Is playing technique markings required ..read more

Hello people!  I just wanted to share a quote from a musical book that was recommended to me by @Thatguy v2.0 "The magic strings of Frankie Presto" by Mitch Albom about a fictional character (Franke Presto) who was purported to be the greatest guitar player to ever walk the Earth, told from the perspective of music itself, narrating.  Feel free to share your own favorite quotes from books you've read about music! Quote 1953 _____ "The stage is right behind this door," Hampton whispered.         Frankie nodded.         "You get in there ..read more

I think that as composers we are all trying to do something new and innovative that nobody else has done before. One of the ways to do that is in unique, non-stanndard instrumentation for classicail music. Or maibe there is an instrument in the orchestra that is used commonly, but dosen't get the spolight enough, or has extended technuiqes that nobody uses. So, lets discuss instrumenation, everything from a liuqin to a Tabla to an Ocarina, there are no limits! And lets not leave out electronic instruments. I think that the Ocarina in perticular makes a great addition to the orchestra. It's ton ..read more

What do you think about your weaknesses in music?  What are they?  (Take the poll and if you can't find your weakness in the poll respond to this thread!)  And what is your relationship to your weakness?  Do you use your weaknesses or avoid them in your music?  (Or if you can't avoid them do you settle for simplified versions of them?) I've often found that some of my best works were made by embracing my weaknesses.  Composing these pieces was relatively easy because I didn't question whether I should include "weak" passages and I just went with the flow.  Do ..read more

Hello! I started to self-study this book a few weeks ago and the progress isn't great. My sense and imagination of pitch is not good though I‘m trying to improve this doing solfege exercises on an app. I have a hard time utilizing 4-part harmony principles (which is more charting than intuition for me) and feels more and more insecure about my answer.  After a little bit of searching, I understand that the standard key to the exercises are hard to obtain. My confusion is from the exercise of the 4th lesson: give the tonalities and modes of these progressions question b: if i regard this ..read more

As a composer and Young Composers Forum member, what do you think motivates people to review your music?  The poll is multiple choice and the results are public.  And also - if you review frequently ::ahem:: @Henry Ng Tsz Kiu ... Let us know what motivates you to review others works ..read more