>Reading 1. Read The Complete Musician by Laitz This book contains very in depth exercises and it expects you to sing and perform. If you don't want to do these things do 1.5 instead. But I highly recommend you stick to this book. If you want to be a good composer, you also need to be a good musician. 1.5. Alternatively you can read Harmony and Voice Leading by Aldwell and Schachter
Harmony and Voice Leading is also very useful as a reference.
2. Read Analyzing Classical Forms by Caplin Use this website with the reading: music.mcgill.ca/acf/
3. Read Fux's Counterpoint. Every important composer in history has read this book.
4. (Optional) Read The Study of Orchestration by Adler This book will teach you how to compose for many instruments. Consider also dabbling in every instrument you wish to compose for.
>Performing 1. Highly recommend you play Piano whilst reading all of this 1.5. Make sure the piano has weighted scaled keys. Or its a good acoustic piano. 2. See a piano teacher at least 10 times a year for the next 4 years. 3. Learn as many Bach pieces as possible. It is recommended that you learn all of Bach's inventions here: freesheetmusic.net/bach/15 Inventions.pdf
For being the music board of this site, they have some of the most plebian, base-level taste and understanding of music I have seen anywhere online. Truly the worst place to seriously discuss music. Would love me some higher-level music/composition discussion here.
Mason Ward
Do you know Mozart's 39? I love the opening: one of the most beautiful I know.
No, it's the 39. The slow building up, the slow arising of the music.
David Hughes
>Sibelius >Nielsen
against Brahms, Mahler and Tchaikovsky? I don't know, man...
Matthew Sanchez
I like it too, but the Prague symphony is better imo. It was some time my absolute favorite symphony. But as my taste evolved I learned that our entire understanding of music and art (especially tying the art to the artist) would not have come about if there weren't Beethoven's symphonies
>two greatest symphonists of the middle-to-late romantic >not deserving a spot on the list of greatest symphonies >two firetrucks and a great CHAMBER composer deserve it instead hmm...
Camden Thomas
It's shit
Ethan Campbell
it's not about the 'best' symphonies but about a personal best. there's nothing wrong with not having Nielsen and Sibelius in such a list
William Smith
...
Hunter Evans
The list I was commenting on was quite literally a poll to determine the top 10 greatest symphonies of all time, of course all the list proves is that the readership of "The Guardian" are musically illiterate philistines, which considering the quality of English art music isn't really that surprising.
Kevin Anderson
when you see it that way the list should be 7 Beethoven symphonies + 3 Mozart symphnies and that's it
Beethoven showed that the form is a field for creativity just as melody and harmony and can become beautiful just as them
Justin Lewis
anyone /classicalguitar/ here?
Andrew Turner
I'l be that guy
Reddit.com/r/letstalkmusic
Parker Robinson
Can i use this to learn theory while playing classical guitar?
Hi
Lincoln Morales
listening to symphonies? sure why not
Juan Price
If you are asking about all the stuff in the OP It analyzes classical form but technically you can apply it to any tonal music. Including modern and Jazz.
Dominic Sanders
Why is it that I always get such a craving for Wagner only when I am drinking?
Bentley Sanchez
>All that Mahler Gross. Beethoven's fifth and Schubert's ninth should definitely be in there too.
Alexander Ward
>Name (1) better site. Random facebook groups are better. Literally anywhere that discusses music is better.
Brandon Rogers
What book do I read if I just want to "understand" classical music?
Joshua Morris
>Tchaikovsky
Cameron Gutierrez
analisations of pieces you like
Ryan Baker
0. dont underestimate your dunning-kruger, op
Nolan Cook
What to do if I'm a complete beginner though, there is no introductory theory and I really want to dedicate most of my time on it.
Owen Torres
The aural equivalent of beer-goggles: beer-buds
Brody Wilson
Learn an instrument, preferably the piano, and sing.
Joseph Martinez
Yeah but how can I learn the piano? >sing What if I can't sing at all is there any hope and again what are some good starting sources.
Aaron Brown
Take lessons and practice everyday. You don't have any other options.
As for singing, you really just need to be able to internalize music. You don't need a great voice or anything. Sing along to melodies and push yourself to not hit wrong notes. It's a part of ear training. Playing an instrument is going to help you with this too.
Levi Gonzalez
>Take lessons What if I can't, what are some online sources, there are thousand books and I'm going to start it by myself anyway. I'm simply asking so I can spend less time doing worthless stuff and get straight on the point, usually people with experience can help with that. >As for singing, you really just need to be able to internalize music. You don't need a great voice or anything. Sing along to melodies and push yourself to not hit wrong notes. It's a part of ear training. Playing an instrument is going to help you with this too. Thanks for that
Xavier Harris
Well, you can start with something simple like Piano for Dummies or whatever; you just won't develop technique, which is fine if you only want to compose, but you have to be able to *think* music.
So immerse yourself in playing/singing/listening, obsessively, for the next five to ten years. Then, see where you're at. If you can play Bach on the piano and sight sing, move onto learning counterpoint and harmony. All throughout this, write music. Even now, go, make a melody. Make a melody everyday. Seriously, art is hard as fuck and it hurts and you need to be crazy to pursue it.
Chase Bailey
Responding to you but referencing >you just won't develop technique If you really can't take lessons then watch a lot of early piano lessons on youtube. Books can't teach technique. Videos, while not ideal do a much better job at showing you how to play well. But make sure you do learn technique. You can permanently fuck up your body by playing the piano wrong.
Wyatt Foster
Thank you guys, I appreciate it >permanently fuck up your body by playing the piano wrong What do you mean?
Matthew Bell
Playing the piano is a really unnatural thing to do. Our bodies were not designed for it. The sorts of stretches, fast finger movements etc are not something the human body is meant to do very much, let alone thousands of hours of. You can develop RSI, you can pull tendons and hurt muscles (though the last isn't serious). The first two can lead to permanent damage. Correct technique is not just someone that makes you play better, it's something that helps to minimize the risk of injury. So long as you have reasonable technique, you don't over practise, and you stop playing and rest when you feel any sort of weird pains you will be fine.
Henry Ross
The instructions are right there, read the complete musician. Theres a full introduction in the first 4 appendices of the book. Read that and then go back to the start
Joshua Nguyen
my top ten in no order: -Mahler Symphony No. 6 -Bruckner Symphony No. 8 -Dvorak Symphony No. 9 -Sibelius Symphony No. 4 -Brahms Symphony No. 1 -Beethoven Symphony No. 6 -Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 2 -Shostakovich Symphony No. 10 -Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 -Schubert Symphony No. 8
Jeremiah Hill
What's up with the Mahler hostility?
Blake King
It's a /mu/ meme
Landon Watson
...can't i just watch a youtube tutorial?
Tyler Peterson
why would anyone listen to all this obsolete grannycore bullshit
Gabriel Thompson
No youtube tutorial is ever going to cover everything in those books. You would have to pay people a shit ton of money to produce such a series. And nobody would care about it because its hard as fuck.
Pretty much all of the videos on youtube will be able to cover about 50 pages of music theory, which is just the normy shit everyone knows. Scales, rhythm, timings, intervals, triads, and finally seventh chords.
Everything past that you will not find in youtube videos. And the thats 700 pages of stuff.
Its a labor of love. If you love it you will stick to it.
Jason Wood
Is being a composer like a painter where if you didn't start from a young age you pretty much have no shot? Or rather like a mathematician where your best work is done as aa young person? Or can you be old like a writer and keep getting better?
Carson Bailey
You may keep getting better for your entire life since experience has a big part in the process of composition (and maybe not only for this reason), but being exposed to music early on your life is very important, yes.
Justin Powell
Daily reminder to ignore CLT /classical/ memes, he wants attention because he can't get it in the orchestra
Justin Hughes
Is there anyone who writes about music better than he does? Tallis is more at fault for /classical/ memes than CLT.
Christopher Williams
plenty of big shot composers started in their mid 20s
Austin Kelly
>a painter where if you didn't start from a young age you pretty much have no shot
Completely false. Art is a combination of knowledge and muscle memory. If you know the anatomy, and you know how light works, and you practice using your pencil well, you will learn to draw at a high level.
What you're saying is really an excuse for you to not take up the challenge and learn to draw.
Jonathan Sanders
i demand answer you poseur twits
Bentley Gray
Mozart 25 is underrated much like the man himself.
Ryan James
>grannycore
Have you tried actually listening to the music bud? Here listen to some Bach. Look at the player and his passion for the music. Every note Bach rights came from the heart and it is a reflection of a deep human emotion.
Don't know why you don't like Gould but I'll give you another:
Dvorak took inspiration from Native American music and used it to create a symphony that symbolized the break of dawn and the discovery of the new world. You can hear and feel hope and cheer in the music. Like Bach, its a reflection of the human spirit.
his personality gets on my nerves, he also plays 1080 using piano, which says a lot about his grasp of the piece
Landon Thompson
I have music popping up in my head all the time. I've done some basic theory study, but I really just want to be able to reproduce or preserve those random compositions before they disappear from memory. Are there any books/methods that deal with that aspect specifically?
Cooper Watson
Does anyone have anything for people interested in violin? I've missed the chance of learning an instrument young and I am interested in violin. I am a complete illiterate when it comes to reading sheet music, I just need a starting point.
Robert Robinson
When something gets into your head get out your phone and sing it. Then play what you sang on the piano and your done. If you don't know how to play things by ear, practice.
"If your happy happy happy clap your hands" C F G G G G G G F G A
Took me 5 seconds to get that.
Carter Reed
Ear training. Learn to sing solfege.
A good exercise: play a cadence (e.g. I-IV-V-I ), then play a random note. Guess what scale degree it is by ear. This is probably easier with another person.
Lessons. Learning violin is going to be a bitch to do alone. I just picked up a cello and I'm hesitant to get too serious until I find an instructor. I've already picked up a million bad habits from over a decade of self-taught guitar playing. It's easier to learn good habits than unlearn bad ones.
Cameron Ortiz
I am an Indian acoustic guitarist. The complete musician doesn't really tickle my fancy. What other books do you recommend?
Can you read this as a complete beginner? If not, which resources, if any, would be useful for the would-be composer whose skills are completely lacking in this area?
>New World Symphony (Dvorak) not on that list >Beethoven No. 5 not on that list >Mozart No. 40 not on that list >Shostakovich not on that list Dropped
Elijah Young
What yesterday's scientific experiment has shown me is that it takes me approximately 1.25 70cl bottles of whiskey and 10 cigarettes to get through one complete performance of Parsifal
Cooper Collins
underrated post
just like Mozart
Ryan Perry
Unironically does not have enough Mozart Tbh
Tyler Peterson
>Read Fux's Counterpoint. >Every important composer in history has read this book. No one Pre-Bach read it, and it wasn't translated into German until Bach was almost dead (so he likely didn't read it or didn't pay too much attention). Bach tended to teach his students using figured bass examples rather than species counterpoint.
Not saying people shouldn't read Gradus ad Parnassum, but many many great composers didn't read it - and Fux himself wrote it with his own "ideal" of what Palestrina's work should have been, rather than Palestrina's actual work (Fux didn't have access to very much of Palestrina's music)
Props for making this thread though, we sometimes have /comp/ on /mu/ but it has been dead for months now.
Trained composer here, I'll drop by from time to time. I mostly write fugues these days so nothing too exciting. Have had my music recorded by symphony orchestras and performed / recorded by chamber groups, although I'm still firmly small-time
oi, stay away from Liszt the stuff he did after he shaved his head and become an exorcist was pretty good
Jonathan Reed
I reject this idea that you need to read about music to write music. You might be able to learn HOW to write if you absolutely cannot write at all from nothing. But if you have the gift, you have the gift.
>Arnold Schoenberg called himself an "autodidact" in an interview.[13] Other largely self-taught composers include notably Hans Zimmer,[14] Danny Elfman, Havergal Brian, Nobuo Uematsu, Joachim Raff, Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji,[15] Bohuslav Martinů,[16] Georg Philipp Telemann, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Toru Takemitsu and Edward Elgar.[citation needed]
Music is abstract, and even infants can recognize scales. It is intrinsic to being human. Infants can't read and they can barely speak.
There's a disconnect there.
David Reyes
And not even one (1) good composer was mentioned in that text.
