ever get an idea and cant write it down in time?

I think it is important to strive for a level of comfort with musical invention where you don't find yourself in this situation, and like anything it is achieved with practice. This sort of feeling of spontaneity in coming up with musical ideas should really be worked against to the point where you can invent what you want when you want. I'm one of the people who think inspiration for the most part is an imaginary notion. This feeling of forgetting a nice idea should really be absent because you should strive to systematically come up with quality inventions whenever you want, not wait for a nice idea to spontaneously come up. When you analyze the details of what makes a good melody, forgetting an idea will not be a big deal because when you have a chance to write it down you can either work out something very similar to what you had in mind, or something better.

.....human computer? :thumbsup:

So you would rather not get spontaneous ideas at all then get ones you occasionally remember? :P

I guess that it varies from one persone to the other. Some composer does have lots of ideas always. That's my case. The problem of this is that I don't tend to need to devellop material (since I always got french and new ones)... so I got to turn to computer aid to devellop sometimes. But composer who gets fewer ideas must learn to devellop thus become better at it. For the last case I'm thinking about Beethoven who was working a lot on a single motive.

So I guess that for me what PraeludiumUndFuge just told might be true... but not necessarily for everybody... human nature is diversed ! eheh ;)

Ideally, yes, one should be able to create things on demand. But as we all don't have that ability (I don't, anyways) I always have a small microcasette recorder in the house in a known place. Just like many other people here...

Also on long trips, in the car--useful not only to record people in case a car accident occurs (good evidence in case they change their story later:D ) but for whistling/humming melodies when neither hand is free to write while driving.

Actually nowadays those small digital recorders (eg. Olympus) are the way to go, as ideas can be bookmarked in separate files and revisited later easily.

Other than that, if a piano is nearby, I definitely try and write it down.

The worst is recalling fragments of pieces from dreams. Or, because I'm sleeping and tired, my mind tricks me into thinking I already whistled the piece into the recorder...but in the morning nothing is there:sadtears: That's definitely the worst. Sort of like thinking you already got up to get dressed, and you're still in bed sleeping:)

The worst is recalling fragments of pieces from dreams. Or, because I'm sleeping and tired, my mind tricks me into thinking I already whistled the piece into the recorder...but in the morning nothing is there:sadtears: That's definitely the worst. Sort of like thinking you already got up to get dressed, and you're still in bed sleeping:)

Weak up! your next dream piece could be your next $100 000 000 piece.