Tuesday, January 12, 2021

COMPOSING WITHIN YOUR STUDIO

 Denise Frost, UMTA President-Elect, presented an inspiring workshop zoom meeting for our January chapter meeting.  Zoom has made it possible for more of our members to attend and it was wonderful to see so many there.

There were three handouts, but the "Ideas that Initiate" was covered the most.  There were excellent ideas and demonstrations about how to implement these composing ideas with our students.  It made "composing" seem so much easier to implement.  Everyone seemed to appreciate what they heard today!

If you need to contact Denise, her email is:  frostbyte@frontiernet.net

Her phone is:  four-three-five 459-one-six-seven-nine.


IDEAS THAT INITIATE

1. Person, Place, or Thing

2. Image, Painting, Sculpture

3. Write a little rhyme, choose a melody from a 5 finger pattern

4. Try rolling a dice (Mozart) or spelling your name (or your dog's name!)

(Use the Secret Alphabet Code!) 1 2 3 4 5 6

a b c d e f

g h i j k l

m n o p q r

s t u v w x

y z

1-do, 2-re, 3-mi, 4-fa, 5-so, 6-la

Example: “Patrice” would be 5 1 2 6 3 5

so do re la mi so

In the key of C Major: G C D A E G

5. Comic Strip, Cartoon, Story, TV Show, Super Hero, Video Game

6. Color, Weather, or Animal

7. A Feeling: Scared, Reverent, Confident, Lonely, Excited, Angry

8. Mode of Transportation: Train, Horse & Buggy, Car, Jet, Pirate Ship

9. Poem

10. Telephone number, Address (435 459 1679)

11. Familiar song with a different melody or rhythm

12. Create a rhythm first—use fruit or candy bar names, then add melody

13. Imitate sounds: Waterfall, Lightning, Thunder, Wind, Birds, Chimes

14. A season or holiday: Christmas, Spring, Halloween, Autumn, July 4th

15. An idea from another piece of music

16. A pattern, repeated or sequenced

17. A chord progression (Jon Schmidt style)

30 great chord progressions free @ timtopham.com/chords

18. 12 Bar Blues / “Andalusian” Chord Progression (Am, G, F, E)

19. How a conversation or argument might sound

20. Fiddle around!!! Have a happy accident!

21. EXPERIMENT EVERY DAY. RECORD EVERY TIME.

“In order to compose, all you need to do is remember a tune

that nobody else has thought of.” --Robert Schumann