Performers as Composers

By Jeffrey Agrell

I recently had the pleasure of participating in a panel (Douglas Hill, Charles Young, and Stacey Berke) discussion at the 2006 Midwest Horn Workshop at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point that addressed the topic of horn players as composers. It was an inspirational jam session between the panel and the audience, and I’d like to share some thoughts generated there in the popular form of Frequently Asked Questions.

Why Should a Performer Compose?

They once asked a world famous ski jumper if there was a maximum age at which one start learning to ski jump. He answered, “Yes. Three.” There are many activities and skills where it is a definite advantage to start early, and composing is one of them. Current music education is not renowned for exposing anyone early to the creation of music, but unlike ski jumping, you can still begin later – even much later - and not risk death, even though it may feel a bit scary in making the transition from consumer to producer if it’s your first ‘jump’. What awaits you for the effort?
-Fun!
-Personal enrichment
-Extending your practical knowledge of music
-Knowing music ‘from the inside out’
-A new relationship to music and to your instrument
-The ability to compose for yourself, your family, your students – and not having wait for someone far away to come up with something just right for you

How Can I Get Started?

One quick and easy way to begin is to bypass paper and improvise. As performers we a great deal of time learning to re-create. Improvisation is where you learn to create, quickly, cheaply, easily. If performing is reciting from a book, then improvisation is having a conversation with someone and composition is transcribing that conversation and polishing the grammar and syntax. Composing is not a big stretch to those who are familiar with generating material by improvising. Improvisation is where music is born, and it is the prelude to composition the way learning to speak is the prelude to learning to read. Improvise with other people - the inspiration and energy that arise in partner improvisation cannot be overestimated. Put on a CD and play along. A good way to get started is rhythms-only: e.g. using simple percussion instruments (you can make a great ersatz drum set out of cardboard boxes of various sizes). Improvise with your voice (composer panelist Stacey Berke insisted that she did not improvise, but admitted that she improvised vocally to create composition ideas). Include a Daily Arkady in your warm-ups. Invite passersby in for impromptu jam sessions. Record everything. Then transcribe your most interesting efforts and then polish and rearrange your inspirations into durable compositions.

What If My Composition Is… Not Very Good?

Dare to be bad – in the initial stages of composition. Perfectionism is the assassin of creativity. If you set out to write an immortal masterpiece for the ages, you won’t get past the first bar, or it will stink if you do. First drafts are for getting lassos around the neck of the wild mustang of passion and imagination; they are not like meticulous doily tatting. Not caring or comparing during the first draft is immensely liberating. You can always edit – or throw out the whole thing – later. Trying to be impressive, brilliant, erudite, perfect, etc. severely inhibits the creative process and turns it into an ordeal instead of jolly good fun. Don’t edit or judge at first, just record your idea any way that you can. Don’t hesitate to use what lyric writers call the ‘dummy lyric’ – you want or need something to fill in a section but don’t have it yet – write anything for now, replace it later.

What About Arranging or Transcribing?

Transcribing is a great way to get your feet wet in the process. There are many pieces written for other instruments or voice out that that have yet to be transcribed for horn. You will become acquainted with instrument ranges, characteristic idioms, harmony, and so on. Arranging is a step further and will give you experience in motive development, orchestration, timbre, and more. Go for it.

For Whom or What Should I Write?

Write music for specific occasions: recitals, recordings, weddings, funerals, supermarket openings, etc. The best way to write a piece that has universal appeal is to write for a very specific time, place, and person. Write for yourself, an etude, a piece for unaccompanied horn, a duet for you and a student, a lyrical piece for your girlfriend for Valentine’s Day,. Write music for people you know. Write it for their specific needs and abilities. Write music for children. They are the best – and toughest – audience. If you communicate and engage their fancy, you will have no more enthusiastic audience.

Where Do I Get Ideas?

Everywhere. Once you start thinking like a composer/improviser, you will find that you listen to music completely differently. You are now learning from every source – you can find useful ideas and techniques in every kind of music, every sound that you hear. Keep a notebook where you record all the little tidbits that you are constantly picking up: a snippet of melody here, a chord progression there, perhaps a timbre, a mood, an orchestration. It’s all grist for your mill. You soon find riches from the living music of every kind around you: classical, country western, zydeco, the Beatles, ragtime, field hollers, gospel, reggae, samba bands, African choral music, jazz, garage bands, Motown, on and on. You can even find inspiration in text and conversation: sometimes great titles come out of the blue (“8 Days A Week” – Beatles), and sometimes a piece writes itself from a catchy title. . Such a title can also generate interest among audiences or performers who haven’t heard your piece, and will keep it in their minds after they have heard it.

Your favorite music can teach much: use it as a model and copy big parts of it: form, chord progression, style, rhythms, length, instrumentation, tempo, meter, and so on. Then change a few things to suit your ear. There are, for example, many jazz tunes which use the exact chord progression of other tunes – but with a new melody.

How Often Should I Write?

Aim to write every day, but set the bar low: a couple of bars is fine. The Platinum Rule for Doing Cool and Useful Stuff is: Just Show Up. Showing up is 90% of it. Quantity, quality will happen, but you have to show up and start. The minimum you need for a piece is a tempo, a meter, and an instrumentation. That’s not much, but with it you could start ten pieces in a couple minutes.

How Do I Know If My Piece Is Any Good?

In the end, there are just three rules to tell if a piece is good: 1. Does it sound good? 2. Does it sound good? 3. Does it sound good? Don’t worry if your theory teacher would approve. As Charles Young says, rules are for people who don’t know what they are doing. Write something that you like.

Write something that you like to play and like to hear… What a concept! Just imagine – if the world were enriched by all of us writing music like this for ourselves and each other, all the time.

Just imagine... and start today.