Janielle's Musical Escapades

Let the Music Flow

It’s a pity that my music blog has been rather inactive these months. I just never found the time! But of course, my home blog is still quite alive.

Anyway, I must not waste time, I just needed to write something important that I learned today about composing music.

After a quiet walk to the park, while listening to my iPod, I came home humming a tune. I thought it sounded quite nice. I couldn’t resist not giving it a go on the piano. (Sometimes, I’m too lazy to work on a new composition, so I just ignore it.) And boy, once I started, I didn’t stop. For the first time, I composed without looking back, without retracing my steps and replaying previous notes to check if they sounded right or wrong.

No, I kept the flow. I followed the pace of the music inside. This time, it worked. I got to the end.

I learned today that whenever I am struck by inspiration, by a melody from within, I mustn’t take it for granted. I mustn’t push it away. Most importantly, once I start to play it out and write the notes on the empty score sheet, I mustn’t be tempted to stop and look back. For once, don’t try to be a perfectionist and attempt to make the first time perfect! I realize that all the times when I stopped composing, when I stopped the music, in order to replay previous notes, I fail to continue composing afterwards.

The music that was flowing so freely and genuinely is abruptly halted and lost forever just because I looked back and tried to make sense out of it before even allowing the music to complete itself.

But even so, I must take note that sometimes the music does not complete itself in a short time, or within 2 hours composing. It takes days, months, years… Gosh, I can’t go on anymore because I don’t know what the next step is! How do I continue on a composition that is unfinished after so long? I don’t know. I have many un-ended compositions. I have much to learn.

So I am very much looking forward to VCASS next week, cause’ I’ll be taught to work on a lot of composition projects. Can’t wait. There’s so much to absorb, to discover! In the days to come, there are many more musical treasures to uncover!