# Developing longer pieces



## borisb2 (Mar 23, 2019)

i recently looked through my folders and found a surprisingly amount of undeveloped ideas (4 bars, 8 bars), mostly piano based, that have some interesting melodies or progressions here and there, so worth to bring it to the next level at least.

But it seems I got stuck too often in playing and finessing the idea on piano - which also often results that the piece/sketch became a piano piece eventually (because it evolved on piano into more than just melody + chords, but more themes played idiomatically on piano.

So what I would like to know, how do you guys in this case develop a rough idea into a more developed structure (either still sketch or final piece)?

- do you take the material from these „8 bars“ and start puzzleing it in to a longer piece? Still on piano? Still without grid?
- do you press everything in to a grid before starting to arrange?
- do you go to orchestration while developing the material? Without grid?
- do you go to paper for development?

Of course it depends on the style of music.. for piano style music I always have the piano as the anchor / root for the structure - so developing these pieces was never an issue. But complex orchestral stuff I find harder to tackle structure-wise sitting in front of DAW.

Thanks for your thoughts


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## BenG (Mar 24, 2019)

Structure will help a lot here! 

Using something like Sentences/Periods for creating themes and Sonata form for composing pieces goes a surprising long way and should help you really develop your basic ideas into much longer works. Always using different/complex harmonic progesssions to keep things interesting and motivic development to keep things tied together!


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## agarner32 (Mar 24, 2019)

I would highly recommend checking out Alain Mayrand’s courses (ScoreClub.net). Start with his courses on writing memorable melodies and orchestrating the line. All the questions you have in your post will be addressed. You could also just study scores but Alain will save you time because his teaching is so organized.


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## Eduardo Lopez (Mar 24, 2019)

borisb2 said:


> i recently looked through my folders and found a surprisingly amount of undeveloped ideas (4 bars, 8 bars), mostly piano based, that have some interesting medlodies or progressions here and there, so worth to bring it to the next level at least.
> 
> But it seems I got stuck too often in playing and finessing the idea on piano - which also often results that the piece/sketch became a piano piece eventually (because it evolved on piano into more than just melody + chords, but more themes played idiomatically on piano.
> 
> ...



@Leon Willett is your guy for this answer :D

I really struggled with the same things for years and he really has found all the answers to all this questions and more, like writer´s block, how to develop harmonically/motivically in a more "modern" style, all your orchestration questions, etc... would 100% recommend a mentorship/lessons with him.


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## borisb2 (Mar 24, 2019)

agarner32 said:


> I would highly recommend checking out Alain Mayrand’s courses (ScoreClub.net). Start with his courses on writing memorable melodies and orchestrating the line. All the questions you have in your post will be addressed. You could also just study scores but Alain will save you time because his teaching is so organized.



I have 2 of his "orchestrating the line" courses. They are absolutely wonderful, indeed - but focusing on orchestrating, not linear development. I will have a look at the memorable melody course though.

I guess, my main focus/goal is to "leave" the idiomatic piano-playing while still using the piano for composing. Since I am a piano-player most pieces - while maybe being complex, chromatic and what not - sound like a piano piece, especially when I am refining too long. I still have to find my way of abstracting and translating into orchestral world as early as possible


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## ed buller (Mar 24, 2019)

Eduardo Lopez said:


> @Leon Willett is your guy for this answer :D
> 
> I really struggled with the same things for years and he really has found all the answers to all this questions and more, like writer´s block, how to develop harmonically/motivically in a more "modern" style, all your orchestration questions, etc... would 100% recommend a mentorship/lessons with him.



Totally agree. Fantastic teacher

e


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## shawnsingh (Mar 25, 2019)

Ok a lot of thoughts...

Are you using an acoustic piano / VST? I find it very helpful to play directly on orchestral VST instruments to prototype ideas instead, even if it sounds dumb, it helps profoundly to imagine an orchestral piece.

Also, using only one hand, one finger, using the left hand for melodic brainstorming, using a secondary instrument instead of your primary one - Or, if you have the stomach for it, even using only mouse and keyboard on a midi piano roll editor - these kind of tactics could help prevent the "piano playing" mentality from dominating your creative process.

Also it would probably help to keep various orchestral idioms fresh in mind - i.e. ideas about how you can use different instruments and various "classic orchestral moments in history". Having that stuff in your mind can help counteract the piano-style tendencies a piano player brain might fall into.

as for longer pieces in general, personally I've found that you just have to consume more of your ideas in one piece and make them interplay and gotta trust that ideas are plenty so you don't need to save your masterpiece sketches all for separate songs. Also it takes a leap of faith to "switch" from one idea to the next and believe that it flows well together... But at least for myself I've found that taking that leap usually ends up working out. It's one of those things that is colored by self perception bias - your own phrase transitions might seem dumb while great compositions have such natural transitions between ideas. There is the subtle art of smoothing over those transitions, which can improve over time. But the alternate can be a debilitating mental block, when people get stuck trying to extend only one idea, and what they really need are just to bring in more separate ideas.

And similarly, I feel like in a lot of great compositions, there's a surprising amount of "filler material" in longer compositions. That stuff which develops, but is only remotely related to main themes, etc. That doesn't mean it's just junk to fill the time between glorious themes, but rather that you can feel more liberated about trying to solve "where does a piece go from here" or "how can I build on this". Don't need to be so deeply tied down by the 8-bar brilliant theme - it can still shine even if it's only 20% of the final piece, and actually having it be present too much could dilute it's brilliance anyway.


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## borisb2 (Mar 25, 2019)

shawnsingh said:


> Ok a lot of thoughts...
> 
> Are you using an acoustic piano / VST? I find it very helpful to play directly on orchestral VST instruments to prototype ideas instead, even if it sounds dumb, it helps profoundly to imagine an orchestral piece.
> 
> ...



These are great thoughts. Didnt check the existing skteches for the possibility of combining yet. .. sometimes one doesnt see the forest for the trees


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## ed buller (Mar 25, 2019)

"What I have tried to do, in many films that I’ve done, is to try to pretty
much work the ending out, so that I know where the musical material is
going to “land” and develop and then decompose it and take it apart, so to
speak, so that individual strands of a more mature thing can be exposed
singly, and then collect together in the end of the film."


John Williams 1999


Best Ed


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## D Halgren (Mar 25, 2019)

ed buller said:


> "What I have tried to do, in many films that I’ve done, is to try to pretty
> much work the ending out, so that I know where the musical material is
> going to “land” and develop and then decompose it and take it apart, so to
> speak, so that individual strands of a more mature thing can be exposed
> ...


Cool, that is a standard story telling philosophy as well!


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## Ned Bouhalassa (Mar 25, 2019)

The best way is to study with a teacher, take classes. Some lessons, ideas shared by profs and fellow students have stayed with me for 30 years.


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## borisb2 (Mar 25, 2019)

D Halgren said:


> Cool, that is a standard story telling philosophy as well!


thats pretty much what Mike Verta was mentoring as well: save the full idea to the end and build to it .. good advice


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## borisb2 (Mar 25, 2019)

Ned Bouhalassa said:


> The best way is to study with a teacher, take classes. Some lessons, ideas shared by profs and fellow students have stayed with me for 30 years.


and there's another thing that lets me derail too often: I did music full-time many years ago - but in the dance/pop-industry, working together with DJs etc. .. many years later I am coming back to music - but this time more orchestral work (musical background was always piano / classic) .. but so far I find it hard to not fall back into old habits (playing and looping in 4bar blocks, moving the lego-pieces around for developing a track - which mostly results in a more pop-based arrangement .. that may work for Hans Zimmer style music (like inception), but it doesnt for complex movements .. on the other hand I maybe just over-complicating things (reading this  )

thanks for all the good advice so far


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## JMJ33101 (Mar 25, 2019)

For me, I try to write music for a certain emotion or story. It’s a foundation for basically any piece of music. Romeo and Juliet by Tchaikovsky is a good example. The story is one that has some very dark and intense parts, but it has the romantic part of it because the piece was based on the story.


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## jmauz (Mar 25, 2019)

The most important book of my compositional career.


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## JMJ33101 (Mar 25, 2019)

You could also try having your musical ideas, and have for example the strings play the melody, and then have the woodwinds play a variation of the melody. Then have a another melody or “sentence” played by a section of the strings. So maybe for the 1st melody the Violins play and then the 2nd time the melody is played, the Cellos play the sentence.


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## Pantonal (Mar 26, 2019)

borisb2 said:


> thats pretty much what Mike Verta was mentoring as well: save the full idea to the end and build to it .. good advice


I'd like to add a counterpoint to this. While the advice given is good it negates the effect of learning about the capabilities of your materials as you use them. When writing I find lots of ideas on how the themes work and so when I'm getting ready to write the end I feel better able to craft a glorious climax and subsequent ending. I rarely have my best ideas early on. For me composing is an exercise in exploration where I can't wait to see how it ends, but I have to.


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## Leon Willett (Mar 26, 2019)

Late to the party! I see I was mentioned above but never got an alert, not sure why!

The structure of a piece of music only really has 2 important factors.




1) The *subjects *-- the musical heroes of your piece

and​
2) The *harmonic journey *




A subject is a musical idea (usually a melodic idea -- but it doesn't have to be) *that you would recognise if it came back later*. Subjects are exactly analogous to characters in a movie... If you would recognise the idea if it came back later, it's a subject. You don't necessarily have to plan a subject: sometimes they just arise in your piece naturally. 

The harmonic journey of your piece involves waves of harmonic traveling, where you "travel" from a chord that feels like home, to somewhere else... and perhaps back (though you don't have to), or perhaps to a "new home" chord. Each chord that has a home-like feel to it that you hit during your piece marks the begining of the next wave -- the next harmonic adventure of the piece. 



To develop your piece of music means two things: 
1) to have ever *bigger and deeper waves *(that travel further from home each time, or stay away from home for longer), 
2) and to *develop your subjects *and have them gently evolve over time, the way characters evolve in a movie.​



That's it.



What music is, at its core, is:

* subjects that go on an adventure through your harmonic waves*​



There are no "sections" (A, B, C, bla bla bla). 

This is the true meaning of "Form"! 




Consider what subject or subjects you have. And consider your harmonic waves.


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## ed buller (Mar 27, 2019)

As if on cue Meastro Mayrand has delivered his new course. It’s pretty much perfect for this question

https://scoreclub.net/course/practical-counterpoint-2/

Best 

Ed


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## borisb2 (Mar 27, 2019)

well .. I did have a second look on alains courses. While I think these are one of the best available, and I really love the way he teaches, he still never leaves the 4 bars cycle or talks about longer forms. The topics in all courses are mostly about harmonics, orchestration and voice leading, less about form.

My focus is mainly on 2 things at the moment:
1. finding the best tools to stretch ideas into a longer piece (development of motifs, combining motifs), addressing binary or ternary form etc.
2. finding the best workflow of when to move from piano to DAW, when to just play/jam without metric grid or click, when to move to grid for arranging / development

to 1: transcribing and practise - so far I find artofcomposing the best course for classical form (that can be applied to modern scores as well)
to 2: try and error - coming from pop-production click, looping and thinking in clear units was everything for us .. I am still in the process of letting go ..didnt Hans Zimmer come from pop-background as well?  .. so far the decision of when to "translate" into cubase world slows me down ..


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## borisb2 (Mar 27, 2019)

thinking in waves (as mentioned in Leons post) is a really nice way to visualize it .. thanks for that

Is there any (technical) info on how Thomas Bergersen composed his demos for EastWest? I mean did he write on paper, just played in sequencer etc?


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## kevthurman (Mar 27, 2019)

I always write the piece out before even opening the DAW. figure out a form you want to try and then come up with a couple themes that go well together. Repetition is part of the foundation to most music and you should not stray away from it. See how you can change your theme. Modulate its pitch, rhythm, speed, change the orchestration, etc. Listen to some music you like and analyze each section and how it relates to the source material. You might be surprised to learn that a lot of John Williams' cues for example often only use two themes which are then modified and manipulated into new material, but this is obviously the case if you listen to it carefully and analyze it.


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## Greg (Mar 27, 2019)

I struggle with this too and what I found helpful is to take a motif / rhythm / pad / whatever from the first few bars and bring the levels down so it's super quiet, that way my brain has a slight image of the building blocks but my ears aren't stuck to it.


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## borisb2 (Mar 27, 2019)

Greg said:


> I struggle with this too and what I found helpful is to take a motif / rhythm / pad / whatever from the first few bars and bring the levels down so it's super quiet, that way my brain has a slight image of the building blocks but my ears aren't stuck to it.


very interesting idea ..


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## jononotbono (Mar 27, 2019)

Get Omnisphere out and...


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## borisb2 (Mar 27, 2019)

holy sh*t: just looked into Mike Vertas "putting it all together" .. that is spot on EXACTLY what I was looking for: showing his process of how he was developing his themes for "the race", sitting on piano, modulating the motifs, sequencing with DAW, his process of putting together the puzzle pieces etc.. very inspiring


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## kevthurman (Mar 27, 2019)

Take a look at this for example. JW is a cliche but I like to use his works as examples of techniques which are absurdly effective yet very simple when analyzed. This theme to the Jurassic Park sequel is 3 and a half minutes and there are... two themes. Pretty much everything in the cue, except little ornaments and countermelodies which break up the phrases, is derived from those two themes. After listening, you know the main theme. If someone asked to you sing it, you probably could, after only one listen! Do not fear repetition in your music, instead abuse it to its maximum effect. Try to do as much as possible with as few ideas as possible.


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## MartinH. (Mar 28, 2019)

borisb2 said:


> holy sh*t: just looked into Mike Vertas "putting it all together" .. that is spot on EXACTLY what I was looking for: showing his process of how he was developing his themes for "the race", sitting on piano, modulating the motifs, sequencing with DAW, his process of putting together the puzzle pieces etc.. very inspiring


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## Leon Willett (Mar 28, 2019)

borisb2 said:


> My focus (...):
> 
> (...) finding the best tools to stretch ideas into a longer piece (development of motifs, combining motifs), addressing binary or ternary form etc.



Hey man, I encourage you with all my heart to re-read my post from before! There is no form in that way that you describe  . It (binary, ternary, etc) is a fairly destructive half-truth that proliferated in the books and which hurts our thinking, because we think in terms of sections which are ultimately impossible to construct naturally as your music evolves note-to-note, bar to bar.

If we think in terms of sections, we get these weird "cliffs" between them, and the awkward idea of "transitions" arises, which is all very "frankenstein-ish", where you awkwardly stitch stuff together because of some large scale idea.

It's just waves + subjects! I promise <3

If you think only in those terms and let the piece build organically, paradoxically, you often (though not always) get something that a musicologist would then identify as having sections. Just extremely elegant ones with no cliffs and no transitions 

I'm just mentioning this again because I wish I had understood this much earlier, and perhaps you can nip it in the bud.


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## Pantonal (Mar 28, 2019)

How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice man, practice!

Seriously, composing is dictation, you dictate what's in your mind. Get good at that and then you can start thinking about larger issues such as dramatic arc and form. What helped me was to constantly think, what comes next? Eventually, what comes next is the end.


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## kevthurman (Mar 28, 2019)

Pantonal said:


> How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice man, practice!
> 
> Seriously, composing is dictation, you dictate what's in your mind. Get good at that and then you can start thinking about larger issues such as dramatic arc and form. What helped me was to constantly think, what comes next? Eventually, what comes next is the end.


It's a lot more than just dictation though. Its not just figuring out how to get what you have in your head but knowing how to manipulate that on paper such that it gets your ideas accross in a different way than if you just said it.


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## Pantonal (Mar 28, 2019)

Of course it's more than dictation that's why I mentioned dramatic arc and form. The thing is if you buy into someone else's formula you don't learn to think for yourself about what you can do with the musical materials. It takes practicing and pushing yourself to higher degrees of creativity. I'm sure Mike Verta's masterclass is useful and helpful to get someone thinking of possibilities, but ultimately every composer finds their own way. OTOH, if you want to composer derivative music that sounds like everyone else, then memorize all the cookie cutter formulas and have at it.

I've often suggested composers write a theme and variations, then suggest they throw out the first three or four (the obvious ones) and proceed from there. Write as many as you can, push yourself, try to get to twenty variations. How Bach came up with 30 Goldberg Variations amazes me. It's surprisingly hard, but a worthwhile exercise.


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## Parsifal666 (Mar 28, 2019)

The first movement of my first symphony was mostly a bunch of self-penned 2 minute loops that I dicked around with until they all shared either/and germ motifs, rhythmic patterns, different orchestrations of the same motifs, etc. I used pauses liberally, but worked my ass off until there was at least somewhat of a flow.

People liked it, in fact that was easily the most popular of the 4 symphonies.​
In the following three symphonies I did whatever the hell I wanted, becoming more avante garde (mostly in attitude for 2 an 3, with the 4th getting even more out there...blessedly). The avante garde tendencies were completely natural and came completely from within. 

What I mean is, unless you're positive you have a certain form you'd like to follow (the folks above have outlined these options admirably) you should just do what your heart soul and mind tell you.

Except for stuff you're getting paid for, of course​


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## Parsifal666 (Mar 29, 2019)

kevthurman said:


> Take a look at this for example. JW is a cliche but I like to use his works as examples of techniques which are absurdly effective yet very simple when analyzed. This theme to the Jurassic Park sequel is 3 and a half minutes and there are... two themes. Pretty much everything in the cue, except little ornaments and countermelodies which break up the phrases, is derived from those two themes. After listening, you know the main theme. If someone asked to you sing it, you probably could, after only one listen! Do not fear repetition in your music, instead abuse it to its maximum effect. Try to do as much as possible with as few ideas as possible.




JW a cliché? Nooooo! The Lost World score was the only good thing about that movie outside of maybe the hilarious adolescent kicking of a velociraptor (this is also the point in history where the term "jumped the shark" was dropped in favor of the now widespread "kicking the raptor".

...







uh, ha ha just kidding, nobody calls it that but me.)


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## RobbertZH (Mar 29, 2019)

Many classical music composer created longer pieces with relatively little base material. To create longer pieces (up to symphony length) they create all kinds of variations on this base material and put them to use in various parts of their composition.

You can create variations by modyfying the theme (melody) or by modyfying the orchestration.

One really wonderfull example is "The Enigma Variations" from Elgar, which consists of 14 pieces. Rather famous for its use of one motif (with a recognizable interval jump in it). In each piece, he may use the (variation of the) theme in the foreground or in the background.

This is maybe the best example of how by varying one theme and orchestration you can create totally different moods !!!

*I really, really recommend listening to the following BBC program episode:*

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p01zvfz4

Around 18:30 the Enigma Variations are analyzed. A real orchestra plays parts and then Charles Hazlewood describes were the motif is clearly hearable or is hidden in the background and in which way the theme is varied.

PS: The BBC discovery website has a goldmine of insightfull program recordings in which classical pieces are analyzed, composers are looked at, instruments, etc:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/discoveringmusic/index.shtml

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p012ypbp

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006tn54/clips


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## borisb2 (Mar 29, 2019)

great links from the bbc .. this thread becomes more and more a goldmine as well


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## RobbertZH (Nov 18, 2019)

JMJ33101 said:


> You could also try having your musical ideas, and have for example the strings play the melody, and then have the woodwinds play a variation of the melody. Then have a another melody or “sentence” played by a section of the strings. So maybe for the 1st melody the Violins play and then the 2nd time the melody is played, the Cellos play the sentence.



On re-use of a musical idea to create different moods, I recommend the following course:

https://ask.video/course/music-scoring-101-creating-moods-and-styles

In all lessons, he starts with a simple idea, then changes one element (harmony, rhythm, orchestration, etc) to create multiple (totally) different moods, still using the same base idea.


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## Maxtrixbass (Nov 30, 2019)

One exercise that might work is to take a single theme and say it different ways. I'm not talking theme and variations, that can come next, but literally the same notes expressed in different ways. From this comes unity and a connection. From that comes theme and variations which is a shorter leap to a suite, then tone poem or something longer.

I found it easiest making the variations paint a portrait of real characters: a friend of yours, your boss, your dog or cat. The same melody or idea, just said in a way that captures the personality...

In the end longer pieces hang together by common threads, sometimes that thread or theme can be amazingly small (short short short long- Beehtoven 5). In fact I would probably say people struggle with trying to come up with too many ideas rather than saying the same thing in many different ways. Its easy to get bogged down in formal complexity and notebooks of ideas, but this simple exercise really changed my entire outlook and helped me cut through the clutter.


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