How to step your composition game up?

young_keyz wrote:This is a great thread guys. My problems with my tracks is i can come up with a good melodie buy pushing single notes(C to D to F to B) but i get stuck once i have to add a counter melody or a supporting melody. As of right now, all my beats never use any chords, just single note melodies and when i listen to them they all seem to have alot going on that seems to flow but not interlock with each other. When i compare my beats to ones on thats on cd's, I feel a lack of something. After reading Cyrus break down how some sounds work within a track with out having to do much compare to a piano and the fact chords is what makes piano sound shine.....i went back to the drawing board and instead of working on making melodies push one note(key) at a time i started to combine more than one key at a time to form chords try to make a melody. I have found my beats have a more ALIVE vibe. I use make four bar melodies pushing single notes and after a i just loose intrest in it cause it just was so thin and didnt blend with the other single key meleodies i put together. Now i come up with a freaky chord melody and i can let it ride for the who beat with out it getting on my nervs. I build my beats from the chrods and up now and they sound good but im still new so i need to practice more. I been teaching my self the piano as of this year using a teach your self book from boarders. The book is good but the chords they use are really simple(C,E,G,) or in that format and i havent got to the point where chords should have come into play with my music but reading this thread has gave me a new spark and im gona go buy a book on music thearoy so i can get lil understanding. Ill get for dumies one cause i just want o learn some of the basics and next year ill take classes .

inthe book for dummies....there is a good chart on how to build chord progressions. works awesome, especially for basic chords-although it can be incorporated for the harder chords-in anyevent, i posted on this forum like a month ago.

peace, ill try to find it

Yea i went to borders today to find that book but it was out but i found this book that has over 1600 chords with pichers of how do play them along with the notes. I just got the book to play around with but i know in the future im gona really come to need it.

Iceberg-Slim wrote:This is NOT another sampling vs composition thread, My intentions are more so along the line of trying to help my composition as well as others reading in the process

With sampling to keep getting better you have to work on your chopping, looping, ear for finding samples, etc, but with composing its not as easy to know what to do as far as lifiting your composition skills up

The most important thing would have to be Music Theory, so you can start to understand how Music interlocks, but after MT, whats next?

I am tired of not only hearing novice keyboard beats, but also spending ALOT of time just randomly searching for notes that sound good togethor with various instruments, trying to keep my keyboard beats from being novice

Anyone who is pretty good with composition can you please shed some light or direction to those that are trying?

a beat should have an intro, verse, chorus, bridge, build up /breakdown, outro(most of the time) sometimes its not needed. listen to your beats, if
it starts to sound repetitive, it is. take yo beats to other musicians, ask
them if they have any ideas. a song should spark feelings,
melody+harmony+rhythm= song
listen to somethin you think is tight, break it down, how did the parts
blend together. could spark an idea.

cyrus wrote:what kind of board do you use? peace

Triton Studio 88 mostly

And I have a Motif Rack that I use from time to time

Im thinking about getting a real synthesizer though, that way I can come up with those weird sounds that are going on inside my head, not to mention fine tune more so for the application, more so than being limited to the ROM

My optimal situation, I may make a thread on this, is to get a good list of some of the better sample disc, specifically into certain sounds, and convert my autoload folder on my mpc to basically set it up like a sound module, and have my own custom little mpc sound module

Would prob sound better than any thing I could get on the market

Science wrote:good stuff iceberg^^^^^^^^^ where can i study music theroy? leave me a link

No link, I wouldnt even suggest getting it like that, I'd most def go buy the Music Theory for Dummies book great book and explains shit very well, and has some exercises, I just cannot sit in front of my computer monitor and non interactedly(if thats a word, sleepy) read and scroll with a mouse thru shit thats like longer than 75 pages

Science wrote:good stuff iceberg^^^^^^^^^ where can i study music theroy? leave me a link

www.musictheory.net is fire.

that site looks very good Rem ^

Going to flick thru it

Iceberg-Slim wrote:

Science wrote:good stuff iceberg^^^^^^^^^ where can i study music theroy? leave me a link

No link, I wouldnt even suggest getting it like that, I'd most def go buy the Music Theory for Dummies book great book and explains **** very well, and has some exercises, I just cannot sit in front of my computer monitor and non interactedly(if thats a word, sleepy) read and scroll with a mouse thru **** thats like longer than 75 pages

yeah i like that book. It took me several times, reading several differant books to figure shit out.....sometimes certain books dont hit right with the reader. ya know? so just because you dont get it from the first book, or first read through doesnt mean you are an idiot, its just that it may sound foriegn to you. But the dummies book is the best for starters i think.


Iceberg, i use the triton studio 76. How do you like using combis? so far thats where i do most my sound creation because its easy. Ive also bought sample cds that i combine with shit. Maybe get some old Analog synth samples and try that with your triton. But i see what your sayin with the sounds in your head......you just gotta get there.

My next synth is gonna be a VA, like a nord lead, ms2000, or something like that. so i can go about things differantly.......change can help too. I get stuck in my ways of doing things on the triton, and get sick of the triton-but it takes me a few days to realize that im just sick of what im doing, and its not the tritons fault (how much i spent and how much i would loose if i resold it reminds me) anyways, then i try to do something differantly with it, maybe crack open the manual and flip through, something to refressh so i can be like "oh, i forgot about that....cool"


peace

most def good info there

and ya that MT for dummies they break it down so nicely, so its actually logical the first read thru

I got to get that MT for dumbies book. I been reading a lil bit of Music theroy from this one book that dont go to deep into but man i enjoy reading the lil bit i did. Its like seeing something everyday and not knowwhat it means and now you just unlock it. I find muic theroy to be like teaching a basketball player thats a playground god all the fundamentals of the game so he could make it to the pros.

I did a search on "Music Theory For Dummies", but couldn't find it. I checked out the whole Dummies series and nothing came up either.

What is the exact title and where did you guys find this book?

TZ wrote:I did a search on "Music Theory For Dummies", but couldn't find it. I checked out the whole Dummies series and nothing came up either.

What is the exact title and where did you guys find this book?

look for "idiots guide to music theory."

seriously thats the really title.

Cyrus, good lookin' out man......