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The idea for this composition was inspired by @MK_Piano, after he sent me some footage of himself improvising in C minor on piano. I asked him if I could write something inspired by what he played, and was graciously allowed to do so. The piece utilizes a steady quarter note / eighth note moving rhythm and melody that symbolizes the passing of time during, and the emotional feelings felt in periods of contemplation, longing, rumination, and/or sorrowful reflection. Although, I feel as though it may be a bit too repetative, despite having variation in both rhythm, chord voicing, chord progression choice, including a modulation towards the end. I'm seeking to build upon the ideas I have in this score, more effectively. Any suggestions are welcome :) **UPDATE** Score Files updated to reflect any/all decided changes, based upon suggestions within this thread. 6/23/26 1:25pm EST Unread Letters.pdf 34823585.mp3

I’m a 16-year-old trying to become a composer, and I’m pretty much new to this forum! I really want to express myself in more modernist idioms, but I’m still developing my technique. Right now I’m working on a traditional harmony course, and I’m at the point of cadences and simple modulations. I’ve composed several tonal pieces, including a mazurka, a sonata movement, and a late-romantic waltz. I guess my question is whether I should compose many more “traditionally tonal” pieces before moving to the idioms that excite me more? If so, when is the point when I can move to non-functional harmony? Or can I just study traditional harmony on the side, but try to compose more modern-sounding music? I have already been doing this to a certain extent (my late-romantic waltz). Thanks for any suggestions! —Matthew

Hello, I posted an earlier iteration of this work some time ago. A lot has since formed. The general structure of the first movement is complete; I still intend to vary the recapitulation somewhat as I prefer to not simply repeat the second subject verbatim. But it is more or less done. I have also made a start on the second movement. This movement has a slightly unusual disposition and is on the way for becoming an ambitious piece with its emerging structure in mind. I am posting here in advance of completion to gauge people's feelings about the musical ideas. Perhaps if anyone has suggestions I would love to hear perspectives. Or even if you like it, that helps to say too. Composing is otherwise an activity for solitude! Second movement is @ 05:40. Thanks! Markus Symphony in A (Draft).mp3 Symphony in A (Draft).pdf

I’ve listened to the current version. I must say I loved it. And I’ll make a little confession. I like all musical styles and periods, from early music to contemporary. I have my favourite periods (the Baroque and Galant periods, late Romanticism, Impressionism and Expressionism, and in contemporary music, some things I like and others less so). The truth is that when I took the time to study music a little chronologically, I discovered how things develop. I say this because the Classical period is one of the ones that appeals to me the least. I think it’s down to the aesthetic they use, which is somewhat restrained – and well, we all know what this style is like. Your symphony seems to be in the Classical style, with hints of early Romanticism. It’s not that I’m obsessed with categorising things, but it helps to find points of reference. Regardless of that, when someone writes something like this with creativity, inspiration and a lot of hard work behind it, I love it, whatever it sounds like. Here I notice that the orchestra is of an early style; the woodwinds aren’t even in pairs and there are no brass instruments. But the way it sounds, it isn’t really necessary, to be honest. One of the things I’ve really liked is the clarity with which all the instruments sound when they have to stand out against, at times, a denser texture. There’s a moment when the bassoon takes the lead and it’s brilliant (bar 58). There are some lovely moments of counterpoint, such as the woodwinds from bar 20 or thereabouts. I think the score has been very carefully put together. What’s more, the music library sounds brilliant (is it the one from MuseScore?). Best regards.

Hello, thank you for listening. I agree with what you say on these two points: 1) that a piece of music is worth more or less (to each person) depending on whether it ‘speaks’ to them. It’s just like when you read a poem. I understand that many people feel comfortable listening to and making more traditional music. And one of the ‘mistakes’ I often notice is trying to apply patterns, structures or whatever from pre-20th-century music to music that aims to have a different, contemporary style. And I’m not just referring to dissonance, which for me isn’t really dissonance at all. It’s a question of tension and release, achieved through many different mechanisms. 2) Of course, from experience I know that there’s nothing random about making music of this kind. Or at least that’s the intention. The form isn’t traditional either. I’ve always liked writing music of this kind in a mosaic format, or as units or blocks that follow one another as one sees fit (as Stravinsky or Cage did). I’ll probably revise this in due course. Not necessarily to make it longer, but to refine certain transitions.

Hello beautiful souls, firstly I want to tell you I love listening to music. When I listen to a piece of music, I wonder what the inspiration of the composer behind it is. I want to know if all this talent is god gifted or we make it with practice. I want to pursue music composition as my new hobby, can you please guide me through how I can start? It’s not like that I know nothing about music as I used to play guitar and piano in my college days but I’m not remember that much now and yes please consider me as a complete beginner. Thank you.

Hi, UncleRed99. This forum often seems so advanced that I hesitate to comment on others' work, but I saw your Chatbox and decided to take this opportunity to leave a comment. Please note in advance that I am a beginner. Feedback/Impression: First, I tried to look for the video by MK_Piano, which was your source of inspiration, but I couldn't figure out which one it was. As a result, I wasn't able to check how you developed it, though I was very interested. In my honest opinion, while I did feel several transitions and the descriptive scenery based on them just as you intended, the piece felt a bit redundant. Assuming that redundancy wasn't the concept of this work, I felt that adding more dynamics to the left-hand chords could help improve it. The new section starting from 4:16 is wonderful. To me, it felt like a temporary relief and liberation. When I first heard this part, I imagined strings playing in my head :) I didn't have any particular complaints about the part from 4:16 onwards, but as I mentioned earlier, the sections leading up to it felt a bit redundant. I felt this especially during the section starting around 0:30. Also, for the transition starting at 1:52, I thought it might be nice to halve the number of times the left-hand chords are played, or reduce them even more, to make the texture sparser and create a more melancholic atmosphere, and then burst into the open atmosphere at 2:33 all at once. The transition starting from 3:22 felt so abrupt that it seemed a bit disconnected from the concept. I couldn't think of a concrete solution, but I believe a smoother transition would suit it better. P.S. I'm sorry if these advices aren't very useful, but I hope they help even just a little. By the way, I would love it if you could tell me what plugins you used. Thank you. Best, Lithl.

Yeah, that's the idea and one of the possible changes! However, in this version you changed the melody at the cadence right before. In this new version the melody at the end of the previous section soars higher than in the original one. I think, if you play the melody an octave higher, it is better to keep the melody prior to that in the same range as in the original version, since, otherwise, it breaks the novelty of the higher rang. You could also keep this new melodic ascend at the cadence and that might add some contrast for the entrance of the original melody you had in G5. Also, I think in both versions, one of the main issues is that the Cmin accompaniment chords are too loud. I would make those chords much softer and, in general make that whole section softer than the previous one (both melody and accompaniment, but specially the later). Thiis dynamic change could also help quite a lot.

Very nicely done! The romanesca bass never stops giving! What is the software that you use? PS, watch out for the voice leading in a few places. I spotted an instance of parallel fifths between the bass and Viola, but otherwise you have done an excellent job. May I ask what your inspiration is when you compose such music… what do you set out to achieve?

Hi Luis, To those familiar with my work - and indeed myself - the words, "free, non-functional, chromatic style" might be thought to ring disaster to my ears. Although this is not quite true. I am particularly fond of Ligeti's work (his Six Bagatelles for winds), for example, as well as some early work by Arvo Pärt (see his Pro et Contra). Even madness has its place in my world of listening. For me, what matters most is producing something of character in a way that somehow embodies the human experience in a convincing narrative. I felt you did this quite well, actually. I recognize that the decisions behind the atonal approach, while seemingly devoid of foundational theory, can be intentional rather than a mere free for all. You should develop it more. Will keep a look out ☺️

You're welcome @JorgeDavid. I am planning to do my reviews in that manner. I am thinking it will be more helpful that way.

@JorgeDavid So something like this...? (Screen recording converted to MP3 of b.26 - b.49) Recording 2026-06-22 153224.mp3

It's been a long time! I used to frequent this forum in my 20s, now I'm 42 years old, living abroad, haven't really written any music in the last decade, but I never fully gave up on writing music. It's time to fix my writer's block. I'm setting up this topic as a challenge to myself. Writing music in my 20s was something that came very slowly and painfully as I am a massive perfectionist and not terribly disciplined. So this plan is designed to cure me of that. - Only writing fragments for now. No aiming for completed pieces. - Focusing on practicing use of musical elements I like, experimentation over destination. - Loosely tracking my time in order to force something out the door, rather than get stuck on revisions. - Long term learning goal is to build the skills to write hybrid electronic/orchestral music for games. If anyone wants to take on this challenge with me, feel free, and you are welcome to post things here. For my part, the pacing is starting at one small post per week. As I feel able, I may increase that. Music will be hosted on flat.io and eventually Soundcloud, and linked here by Sunday evening USA-Eastern time, which is Monday morning my time. Feedback is welcomed, but I will be trying to take feedback lightly and focus on quantity of music creation, on volume, rather than refining the quality. First entry: https://flat.io/score/69930d12f4b7f4206442ca2c-sus-slash?sharingKey=4f68cd0e43730c91e48416b8978810ab0c63680a3161fb07fbfcbc75e85c135b02a6f15102ff10978621f147508f16a2ade8791783c86664bb7ed9f0e3b671f9 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14lZ2g_oCxI For this eight-bar melody, I chose the musical element described in the above youtube video - suspended chords above a slash bass note, essentially sparsely voiced tall chords. I wasn't following any particular progression principles, just whatever sounded good, but trying to follow the structure of the chords described in the video. Couldn't quite nail down the last chord, sorry it's unsatisfying, but according to the rules we are moving on!

Thank you for showing me a path. I’m very inspired with your ideology “start with what you’ve,” I’ve an electric guitar and a macbook. I’ve done my research and I have found that I can use the garageband to record my guitar and do my experiments with it. Now, I’m researching how I can take full advantage of garageband. I’ve watched a lot of YouTube tutorials on it. And yes this is a good idea to start with children's songs or folk music. God Bless You 🙂 Thank you for guiding me

Did you ever have any music theory lessons? How old are you? I started by improvising on the piano and then writing down these improvisations. During my intermediate school studies I was intensely studying harmony and counterpoint from 16th to 19th century theory. I learned the use of instruments by arranging numerous popular pieces - I had a band with a flute, clarinet, violin, trumpet and trombone players. They were not advanced players but sufficient enough to learn how to late compose for these instruments. If I were young today, I would recommend anybody to start with arrangements and harmonizations of folk pieces or children pieces. Initially to use basic functions of tonality (tonic, subdominant, dominant, followed by supportive functions of IInd, IIIrd and VIth chord of the key, and then beginning to venture outside the single key).

Just begin composing. Don't wait to "feel ready" 🙂 You can start for free using Musescore and read scores (highly recomended) on imslp a long with youtube for audio. Start learning how to read scores with some basic music theory. find a teacher or teach your self. Then post the scores here on the forum for feedback. That a lone can take you far with some patience. Just focus on small improvements constantly every day! Good luck! 🙂