Do i need "Talent" to be a good composer?

Cuz genetic disposition = talent, yea?

Tsk.

Cuz genetic disposition = talent, yea?

Tsk.

...pretty much. Glad to see you're finally catching on.

...pretty much. Glad to see you're finally catching on.

Oh you're not serious, right?

Read back a bunch of pages on how that's not the case, bla bla bla.

Genetic and social, both of which are largely out of the control of the person, so in theory, they can be treated the exact same for this purpose.

Genetic and social, both of which are largely out of the control of the person, so in theory, they can be treated the exact same for this purpose.

Not only that, but "talent" is a wildcard for ignorance. It finds its place every time someone finds someone else's ability "out of the ordinary" yet they don't know how to explain it properly.

First problem comes when we get down to the actual "is your measurement of statistic rarity accurate enough or at all?" questions. Second is when the cause is well known (either by the individual or otherwise) but to the observer it isn't.

It's simple, if you studied music 20 years, to someone who doesn't know that, any time you display the ability you earned through those 20 years of experience it will be perceived as a "talent." That is, unless common sense kicks in and they'll figure to ask if you had previous studies.

If someone does indeed display the abilities of a someone with 20 years of experience (say, a concert pianist) without having studied a single day, we shouldn't say it's "talent", but instead there must be a real reason why this happens since it's absolutely amazing (not that it ever has, as far as I know.)

Since examples of "talent" are often very subjective (see the first problem) you get things like "learn faster" instead of automatic abilities. This is subject to scrutiny on behalf of the method used and other factors which may as well influence this judgment that are not the individual's ability in itself. When it IS clear, like someone with double joints, we would be rather silly to say it's a "talent," when it's clearly just a genetic mutation that allowed for it.

So what this all means is that, it's a rather pointless word which carries an absurd amount of baggage, both negative and positive, for no real reason at all. This is precisely why I oppose it. That, and like someone said before, it DOES cause problems.

Stop making me retype all of this.

PS: There was a lot of stuff in the past pages about heredity and so on, as far as it comes to music, so if you really want to see it go back and read those pages again, lol.

If someone does indeed display the abilities of a someone with 20 years of experience (say, a concert pianist) without having studied a single day, we shouldn't say it's "talent", but instead there must be a real reason why this happens since it's absolutely amazing (not that it ever has, as far as I know.)

So if that is not considered talent, then what would be the 'real reason' why it happens?

You can't explain it. Neither can I. That's why I call it talent. It's the innate ability that one has prior to formal study in an area. You keep claiming that there must be some reason why someone is capable of something prior to formal study, but no one can say what that reason is. Even if they could, what does it matter? A person is able to do something without being taught - that's talent. A person is capable of learning something very quickly - that's talent. I don't know why they can do it. It's surely a combination of various factors, but no one has time to trace all of those factors. I'm not going to stand around with the other band directors and say "There are a lot of reasons why the 7th grade class is capable of playing and learning at an above average rate. It could be their home environment, or perhaps.. blah blah blah" I'm gonna say "Man. There's a lot of talent in that 7th grade class" and everyone is going to know what I mean. Or when I say "Alex has a lot of talent, but he's a lazy bastard" OR "Lance doesn't have much natural talent, but he is a hard worker, and he really cares" then colleagues will know what I'm talking about. I appreciate what you're trying to say, but even if you were able to explain WHAT causes people to be better at something naturally, I would still call that 'talent'. It doesn't matter what you call it, it's there either way.

I appreciate what you're trying to say, but even if you were able to explain WHAT causes people to be better at something naturally, I would still call that 'talent'. It doesn't matter what you call it, it's there either way.

Then it falls under an arbitrary distinction then, which is held up by you almost superstitiously. I don't do that, it helps nobody. Saying "X is talented" is bullshit unless it actually means something useful, but it's generally not. Treating someone different, both in pedagogic sense and in social sense because they are or not talented is a dangerous thing to do.

And it's where it inevitably leads if one operates under the assumption that "talent exists (as I define it!), period!" Truth is, however, that knowing the reasons allows for much more adequate and responsible actions to be taken. This is very much a real problem if we start talking about the "untalented." It's anti-pedagogic to assign imaginary handicaps where there aren't any, instead of actually finding out the proper reasons for a learning disability (if it really is the case) and dealing with it properly (like trying a different approach.)

The word itself exists and the way you're using it, sadly, exists. But that doesn't mean it's proper; it doesn't mean it's useful or helpful.

I may have contradicted myself elsewhere on this.

Simple answer is YES. But we are also born with the INTELLIGIENCE to write a novel, sculpt,paint, perform triple axles, speak 7 languages, empathize with others, investigate mathematical problems, etc ...

Music and its subset composition is one of many intelligences we are born with. The degree at which each is developed is far more dependent on environmental factors than anything else.

PS. Per SSC and Corbin - talent in the modern meaning is nonesense. I like its ancient greek meaning - scale, balance - or more specifically, a unit of weight or money. It implies with proper "nourishment" and "work" this can grow. So in a sense , it has similar connotations to the idea of musical "intelligence"

thank you all for your replies

i have changed the title finally;) sorry for that!

I think that, whatever your knowledge based around composition, you'll still just be composing what "sounds good" to you. The trick comes in with being creative and original. Anyone can do D# - D - C ...but no it sounds good and applicable so why don't everyone just use it?...sigh...

You're not necessarily limited to just the use of 12 notes over and over again...it's the creative use and combination and notation that makes it twinkly, pretty, silly, funny, sad, mad...or bad.

I try to be creative but I know I just do what sounds nice to me LOL

To answer your thread title: No. You do not need talent to be a 'good' composer. However, a natural understanding of your personal compositional process (which some define as talent) certainly helps you on your way.

No such a thing as a "good" composer, therefore talent is irrelevant to the question. :x

PS. Per SSC and Corbin - talent in the modern meaning is nonesense. I like its ancient greek meaning - scale, balance - or more specifically, a unit of weight or money. It implies with proper "nourishment" and "work" this can grow. So in a sense , it has similar connotations to the idea of musical "intelligence"

I never use the word "talent" when I teach. I don't really use it ever, in fact, for precisely that reason. It is a catch-all phrase used by those who cannot define a person's strength. When I teach a tango couple, I can say, "You are a strong lead," or "You are a sensitive follow," or, "You have a very well-developed sense of musicality/footwork/invention/innovation/etc." Saying "You're very talented" is unhelpful, because it does not offer any meaningful feedback, other than a sense of very general, perhaps subdued, approval.

What is compositorial "craft", if not the ability to put your artistic ideas into reality, especially today where all other clear parameters for judging music are no longer universally valid? Did the composers you mentioned fail to write the music they wanted to write? Maybe, maybe not, but how can we know without seeing into their minds?

And taking that further, doesn't this mean that the higher a composer's expectations in her or his own music are, the less likely she or he is to meet them and thus is more likely to be a "bad craftsman"? Do we have to say Webern was a bad composer because he failed at writing longer pieces, which (according to some biographies) he wanted to? From this perspective, he obviously "lacked the craft" to write longer pieces, but might the reason for this not simply be Webern's extreme diligence and determination to get every note to be exactly right, whereas other composers were happy enough to get a general idea across without worrying much whether the 3924th note of their symphony should be played piano or mezzopiano?

If we talk about craft as "successfully realizing ones ideas", logically a composer without any musical ambitions, without daring, without any inclination to go out of his comfort zone would likely the "best craftsman" and thus the "best composer". But I'm sure most of us (probably including yourself) would agree that this is a silly notion.

You see, the problem is that even judging "craft" becomes quite as vague as judging the "artistic spark" or any other buzzwords, as the judgement of the ability to realize ones ideas musically is entirely dependant on what these ideas are.

(P.S. The examples of composers you brought up are especially interesting, seeing that Bach had great trouble structuring his fugues formally until he studied Vivaldi and "learned some craft" there. Particularly the idea of "lightening up" the music by adding relatively free episodes between the strongly thematic "ritornelli" (respectively subject entries in a fugue), something that Bach only started to do in his fugues after he had studied Vivaldi's solo-concerto form.)

(P.S. The examples of composers you brought up are especially interesting, seeing that Bach had great trouble structuring his fugues formally until he studied Vivaldi and "learned some craft" there. Particularly the idea of "lightening up" the music by adding relatively free episodes between the strongly thematic "ritornelli" (respectively subject entries in a fugue), something that Bach only started to do in his fugues after he had studied Vivaldi's solo-concerto form.)

... Um. And here I was thinking that Bach got his structures from the Buxtehude clique so... I don't see how that's problematic or how he could've had a problem at all, he just used their formula. He got his own ideas later, but I don't think he was ever troubled by it. He just didn't settle for doing the same thing over and over...

... Um. And here I was thinking that Bach got his structures from the Buxtehude clique so... I don't see how that's problematic or how he could've had a problem at all, he just used their formula. He got his own ideas later, but I don't think he was ever troubled by it. He just didn't settle for doing the same thing over and over...

Of course. We can't know whether he found it problematic. It was just an assumption I made based on the fact that from a certain point on he wrote his stuff in a different manner to which he stayed more or less true until his death. This makes it seem that he preferred this new form over the one he had used previously.

But yes, it's of course possible that he just wanted to do something differently than before. We'd need more exact biographical information to judge that.

I haven't really read through this thread, but to answer the question plainly, talent stems from hard work. Practice and do what you love, der.

Also, through a combination/re-elaboration of those and other techniques, he was able to write something like the first chorus of his St. Matthew's Passion, an unprecedented masterpiece the scope of which had never been approached before, during and for many years after his lifetime (by expanding the ritornello principles, for instance)

I remember hearing Leonard Bernstein speak about that opening chorus, and he questioned whether it has ever been equaled.

I haven't really read through this thread, but to answer the question plainly, talent stems from hard work. Practice and do what you love, der.

just pretend i said the same thing.

i do not agree,as people with talent sometimes do not go far as they do not workhard.