Composing Tip: Write Music as if You are in the Audience.

Here is a nice Christopher Rouse interview I found on youtube. For those who don’t know who he is, Rouse is a composer who has won a Grammy and Pulitzer and is currently Composer-in-Residence with the New York Philharmonic. My personal favorite works (in case you are wondering) are the Trombone Concerto (depressing, but good) and Gorgon (imagine the orchestra as a rock band). 

My favorite quote from the video is:

“To me as a composer, I try to write as though I am listening to it, and the music is by somebody else…”

One of the difficulties when writing music (or any kind of creative activity) is to get some distance from it (seeing the forest instead of the trees). This can be difficult because you (the composer) are intimately wrapped up with the piece. You know its inner workings (and desires, but I digress…).

Here are a couple things I do:

1. I will shut my eyes and listen to the computer playback. I find if I shut my eyes I won’t look at the sheet music and the music will be more of a surprise (at least as much as it can be).

2. I will conduct and “hear” the music in my mind. I will often do this with a metronome to make sure the rhythms are the way I want them to be.

Here are a couple general questions I will ask myself:

1. Will the audience be able to follow what is going on in the music from beginning to end?

2. Is the musical journey interesting?

-Rob

scores, tabs, and mp3s available at http://www.robertlunncomposer.com