I'm trying to figure out the best workflow for me when composing orchestral stuff. So far it looks like this.
1. Singing melodies
2. Doing a harmony foundation in YouCompose on my iPad, or composing straight into Sibelius.
3 either moving to Sibelius for dynamics, voice adjustments, woodwinds, brass and percussion , and some last adjustments. Or doing the four part dynamics and pre adjustments in Notion on the iPad and then moving to Sibelius.
How does your workflow look like?
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I have never gotten my head around that auto arrange function. I have used the harmonize function, but YouCompose is more advanced there. I like it because it gives me a quick start and something I can easily change later. Like you I like to work fast. Composing is like riding a bike, it's very hard to do slowly.
Mine here lately starts with a live instrument such as a trumpet, piano, djembe, whatever, in conjunction with pencil and staff paper. Then I go to Cubase for a rendering and lastly Finale for a finished score. If the rhythms are very complicated, I might start off in Finale then bounce the midi file to Cubase for further sound manipulation.
1. Internalize the Monadological Zeitgeist of Universal Consonance and the Dialectic of Harmony and Counter-Harmony.
2. Choose themes generated from the imagination, mathematical patterns, God, the qualities of the physical elements (like boron and neon, for example), a synthesis of the sound impression of Western, Indian and/or Chinese culture, or African and Middle Eastern culture; the sounds of birds and dogs, UFO's or coughs, sneezes and slow breathing, or the equivalent of rhythmic patterns in human speech, in numerous languages (such as English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Hindi, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, and so on).
3. Orchestrate these themes, using piccolo's, flutes, oboes, the English horn, clarinets, saxophones and/or bassoons; plus trumpets, horns, trombones, tubas, violins, violas, cellos, double bass, harps, custom generated sound sculpture instruments, percussion of various sorts, esp. tam-tams, timpani, triangles, wooden blocks, cymbals, glockenspiels, drums, snare drums, tubular bells, key instruments (such as pianos, organs, harpsichords, cembalo), horses galloping, trains, and various synthesized sounds, from various devices, as well as "music concrete," that is, real sounds from life. Non-Western instruments are also used, such as the Indian Sitar, Indian, Chinese and Japanese flutes and oboes, the Japanese Koto, Middle Eastern String instruments (usually Persian, Arabic or Persian), and South American instruments, like Peruvian panpipes. And of course, the Erhu (Chinese violin).
4. Develop and vary the themes through inversion, retrograde, and retrograde inversion, plus contraction and expansion, breaking them up into motives, making slight or large alterations, transpositions, re-harmonization of lines, altering density and orchestration.
5. Listening repeatedly to the sound file, altering it before, after and during each listening, whenever possible, getting a sense of the work as a whole, as it develops, teleologically toward what it appears it was meant to have been, by attention to its own inner dialectical progress, its results and its ontological status both in the physical world of sound, and in the realm of ideas.
6. Alter the tonalities of the various instruments, by cents, or by intervals equivalent or larger than quarter tones; add glissandi, tone glides, pitch bending, and other engaging alterations of the harmonic and tonal landscape.
Procedures not necessarily done in this precise order.
But why can't "serious" composers use naked or clothed mushrooms or engage in naked (or clothed) yoga?
That seems prejudicial to me.
Why do you ask? Are YOU a serious composer? (Again, I hope not).
Aside from all that, I was informed that this place is called "Composers' Forum," not the "Serious Composers' Forum."
[I just checked, and as far as I can tell, Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart, Brahms, Stravinsky, Satie, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, John Cage, Giacinto Scelsi, Stockhausen, Morton Subotnik, Henri Pousseur, Pierre Henry, and Penderecki never referred to themselves as "serious composers." So I guess I'm in good company not calling myself such. However, Richard Byron Strunk does say, "I am a serious composer," on his blog. Others can evaluate the claim, I suppose].
Lennart Östman said:
Whot? No mushrooms or naked yoga? Are you a serious composer?
What's your workflow like?
I'm trying to figure out the best workflow for me when composing orchestral stuff. So far it looks like this.
1. Singing melodies
2. Doing a harmony…
Phew... You got me worried for a while there Olm! I was afraid I would have to have you banned for "seriousness" ; )
O. Olmnilnlolm said:
"Are you a serious composer?"
Serious? I hope not.
But why can't "serious" composers use naked or clothed mushrooms or engage in naked (or clothed) yoga?
That seems prejudicial to me.
Why do you ask? Are YOU a serious composer? (Again, I hope not).
Aside from all that, I was informed that this place is called "Composers' Forum," not the "Serious Composers' Forum."
[I just checked, and as far as I can tell, Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart, Brahms, Stravinsky, Satie, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, John Cage, Giacinto Scelsi, Stockhausen, Morton Subotnik, Henri Pousseur, Pierre Henry, and Penderecki never referred to themselves as "serious composers." So I guess I'm in good company not calling myself such. However, Richard Byron Strunk does say, "I am a serious composer," on his blog. Others can evaluate the claim, I suppose].
Lennart Östman said:
Whot? No mushrooms or naked yoga? Are you a serious composer?
What's your workflow like?
I'm trying to figure out the best workflow for me when composing orchestral stuff. So far it looks like this.
1. Singing melodies
2. Doing a harmony…
My workflow usually starts with a strong impression, or feeling … which can come from anywhere, from the dancing varying rhythm of the left turn signals from 2 or more cars waiting in the turn lane, to the mockingbird just outside my window, or 2 seconds from the middle mov't of Ravel's piano concerto, or the sound of an 'animated' conversation … the sound of flowing water, river, or the grand spectrum of the waves at the beach has inspired many tunes for me...
Replies
1. Internalize the Monadological Zeitgeist of Universal Consonance and the Dialectic of Harmony and Counter-Harmony.
2. Choose themes generated from the imagination, mathematical patterns, God, the qualities of the physical elements (like boron and neon, for example), a synthesis of the sound impression of Western, Indian and/or Chinese culture, or African and Middle Eastern culture; the sounds of birds and dogs, UFO's or coughs, sneezes and slow breathing, or the equivalent of rhythmic patterns in human speech, in numerous languages (such as English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Hindi, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, and so on).
3. Orchestrate these themes, using piccolo's, flutes, oboes, the English horn, clarinets, saxophones and/or bassoons; plus trumpets, horns, trombones, tubas, violins, violas, cellos, double bass, harps, custom generated sound sculpture instruments, percussion of various sorts, esp. tam-tams, timpani, triangles, wooden blocks, cymbals, glockenspiels, drums, snare drums, tubular bells, key instruments (such as pianos, organs, harpsichords, cembalo), horses galloping, trains, and various synthesized sounds, from various devices, as well as "music concrete," that is, real sounds from life. Non-Western instruments are also used, such as the Indian Sitar, Indian, Chinese and Japanese flutes and oboes, the Japanese Koto, Middle Eastern String instruments (usually Persian, Arabic or Persian), and South American instruments, like Peruvian panpipes. And of course, the Erhu (Chinese violin).
4. Develop and vary the themes through inversion, retrograde, and retrograde inversion, plus contraction and expansion, breaking them up into motives, making slight or large alterations, transpositions, re-harmonization of lines, altering density and orchestration.
5. Listening repeatedly to the sound file, altering it before, after and during each listening, whenever possible, getting a sense of the work as a whole, as it develops, teleologically toward what it appears it was meant to have been, by attention to its own inner dialectical progress, its results and its ontological status both in the physical world of sound, and in the realm of ideas.
6. Alter the tonalities of the various instruments, by cents, or by intervals equivalent or larger than quarter tones; add glissandi, tone glides, pitch bending, and other engaging alterations of the harmonic and tonal landscape.
Procedures not necessarily done in this precise order.
This is only a very short summary of the process.
"Are you a serious composer?"
Serious? I hope not.
But why can't "serious" composers use naked or clothed mushrooms or engage in naked (or clothed) yoga?
That seems prejudicial to me.
Why do you ask? Are YOU a serious composer? (Again, I hope not).
Aside from all that, I was informed that this place is called "Composers' Forum," not the "Serious Composers' Forum."
[I just checked, and as far as I can tell, Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart, Brahms, Stravinsky, Satie, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, John Cage, Giacinto Scelsi, Stockhausen, Morton Subotnik, Henri Pousseur, Pierre Henry, and Penderecki never referred to themselves as "serious composers." So I guess I'm in good company not calling myself such. However, Richard Byron Strunk does say, "I am a serious composer," on his blog. Others can evaluate the claim, I suppose].
Lennart Östman said:
O. Olmnilnlolm said:
'mushrooms"?
k, i'll bite.
… from the tassili plateau - circa 3500 bc.
http://www.angelfire.com/mn/burnonedown/images/AncientShroom.gif
musing on the ancient culture which has produced this image has had An effect on my musical 'thinking'.. :)
"Phew... You got me worried for a while there Olm! I was afraid I would have to have you banned for "seriousness" ; )"
Thank goodness we got through that. A narrow escape for all concerned !
gregorio X said:
'old masters'… :)
My workflow usually starts with a strong impression, or feeling … which can come from anywhere, from the dancing varying rhythm of the left turn signals from 2 or more cars waiting in the turn lane, to the mockingbird just outside my window, or 2 seconds from the middle mov't of Ravel's piano concerto, or the sound of an 'animated' conversation … the sound of flowing water, river, or the grand spectrum of the waves at the beach has inspired many tunes for me...
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