Music Theory and composing.

My first goal in making my field of work music, was to sit at the piano and practise all day and call it a days work.

But i was late. So I considered my gift for making up music should get more focus than preparing myself as a performer..

I listened to the recent works and styles that come out of present day composers' forums though, and i didn't like it much.

I preferred to follow the style of the dead composers classical styles and, living in the the present, I found a liking for some popular styles.

I really liked the Grieg Piano concerto and the Schumann Piano concerto. So I had a serious ambition to try to write one. The result is a piano concerto called "THE BLACK MADONNA" and other piano pieces. One piece is called "QUEEN OF THE UKRAINE" one is called "QUEEN OF POLAND" and there are many others..

I thought I could compose music in the far wilderness and find a way to do smoe business that would make a living. I never heard anyone play my written scores other than some run-throughs.

So I worked at finding some audiences that would be interested in having me do some performing. Some places hired me to come and play every week and at special occaisions. Playing for the same audiences every week, I had to learn much music to keep it sounding new. I found that it was easier to grow a repertoire broad and deep quickly by composing new pieces rather than mastering the works of others.

I never heard anyone play my written music, so i lost the enthusiasm to write down scores. I just prepared it for live performance, and often wing it while the audience asks the names of the pieces. Well maybe we would play name that tune, and I would ask them to name it.

Sometimes i would take my students to do a recital. Or as many as three recitals in one day. They would be nervous for the first recital, but by the second and third recital, they wouldn't let me play much. The audience would comment sometimes..."wow its amazing those kids can memorize all those notes!" I would tell the kids I heard those comments... and they would laugh, because they were winging their way through improvisation and they didn't memorize any notes exactly. . Really they do have memorized repertoire too.

Well music theory...the distilled version...

Practise your drills. ...scales, arpeggios, chord inversions... and use those things to compose.

Please use a tune. Please have some harmony.

That might sound ridiculous to make that point of using melody and harmony however much contemporary music has little to do with melody and harmony.....

1) Please use a tune.

2) Please let there be some harmony.

3) Or ... let there be some therapeautic rythm, if you don't have a tune or harmony.

Now there are a lot of composers that have no use for melody (tune), harmony, and or even rythm. I wish them good luck, but i don't think i will acquire a taste for the results.

That's all there is to composing music. Wiggle your fingers on the keys and if it sounds good.... repeat until you can remember it. Then keep working. Stop to pray. Get some exercise (HINT: go out on the ice... the music will mix with the athletics..)

There was a college professor from an American conservatory of music who insisted that "YOU DON'T COMPOSE WITH YOUR HANDS!!!" Well I didn't enter into a pointless disagreement with him, but that's the only way I know how to compose. I wish I had a chance to present some music to the academic community. Maybe some of my ideas are worthy of consideration. I suppose after life's work of theoretical or avant garde composing or whatever, a professor who hears my work could be found composing an energetic piece of dissonant avant guar, expressionist music on the piano keyboard with his forehead.

This kind of composing is why I use the word ARGUMENT in the link to this page. I have a small protest against the din and dissonance that teachers require of modern students. I have gone to some composers forums with anticipation... and smelling all the different colognes and perfumes of the audience and seeing all the people.. and awaiting the new compositions........Maybe i don't know what i'm talking about, but some performances I have heard sound like angry snarled traffic.

The masters who are known for composing great works often had three chords, some scales and arpeggios to make unique masterpieces of distinctive character. This formula seems to have been disqualified as having exhausted all the possible combinations of harmony and melody.

I have been disqualified by some juries of musical experts. The only critique that came with their thumbs down was..."You (are trying to tell us that you ) composed that?????"

As you watched.

Of course i wished I had been given the challenge that lies beyond their review and been allowed a presentation of my work to the public in their forum. The disappointment of being rejected by some venues was eased by plenty of students that made me feel like the luckiest guy in the world, and plenty of audiences that do like to hear my work

So there's my argument.

Some people just don't want to behold.

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