Why are "accepted" standards taken so seriously?

^^

You just posted the 7777th post of the Composers Headquarters.

Feel special.

I'd say the reason people write in the standard forms because those forms are what emerge naturally from the toolsets we share as composers: sheet music, basic harmony, counterpoint, the orchestral intsruments, etc.

For example, If you think up a bunch of small, independent bits of melody and want to arrange them into a song, it'll naturally start taking the form of a rondo. Got a story to tell? Probably sonata form, which is in many ways an instrumental opera, is what it will end up sounding like.

Beyond that, if you describe the piece in its title using one of the forms, then it gives the educated listener a set of expectations for the work they're about to hear. The classical-era listener knew just what to expect from songs titled in this way, so that necessarily figured into how the composer created each work.

Without at least some small measure of these expectations, the symphonies of Beethoven, for example, are largely incomprehensible to the listener.

The same goes for instrumental groupings -- we have an expectation of timbre, and to depart from our expected groupings: rock instruments, quartet, orchestra, etc, means you've got to work extra hard to be understood.

I'd say the reason people write in the standard forms because those forms are what emerge naturally from the toolsets we share as composers...

The same goes for instrumental groupings -- we have an expectation of timbre, and to depart from our expected groupings: rock instruments, quartet, orchestra, etc, means you've got to work extra hard to be understood.

:huh: People write these forms/ensembles...because they're there? They're obvious? They're expected?

I think if you look a little further outside your comfort zone, you'll find many things surprising and unexpected...

...

I personally like the "accepted" standards. I love giving the title of Symphony No. 5 or watever. I like for some odd reason even though a lot of people hate it.

It kind of keeps me organized. Im sorry if you think I'm totally stupid.

But thats that.

robinjessome, I'd say my comfort zone is always what comes next in my process of learning.

In addition to the expectations and the 'natural evolution' bit, to me personally it is worthwhile to learn to write using the guidelines of the forms, as I've just learned to comprehend basic harmony and counterpoint. It seems that the next thing to do is to read up a bit on how people worked with this toolset back when it was new, and there are thousands of common practice era scores (Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert) available to me which show me endless examples.

It seems like I'd be cheating if I were to jump straight from Bach to Schoenberg...I'd be missing out on how the best of the best practiced their craft during *the* formative period in Western music.