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Start Your Journey TodayA Guide to Dominant Seventh Nomenclature When composing music, one of the primary elements we work with is chords, which are often built by stacking intervals of a third. By stacking multiple …
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Do you sometimes get inspired to write, and then get stuck after the first few measures? Do you feel like your ideas are boring or weak. Most of the time, when I sit down to compose, I come up with …
Continue Reading about Beat Writer’s Block By Testing Your Musical Idea →
Where does the value lie in a piece of music? The answer isn’t so obvious. In the age of streaming, the primary focus is fundamentally on the recorded music. This seems to make sense as …
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Habits are critical to how your life will unfold. Good habits generally lead to many good things, while bad habits on the other hand will slowly bleed you of the accomplishments you think you’ve …
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I have been a composer since I was a young kid (I am currently 36 writing this), and so when I got into songwriting over the last year, I felt somewhat out of place.But I’ve also come to learn that …
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When I sit down to think about why Art of Composing exists, the initial thought is To Make Better Composers. This on the surface feels like it’s generally in the right direction, but it’s also very …
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If you want to grow, you need to start measuring. This has been at the back of mind for a while now. For the last 6 months, I’ve been deep into the art of learning… analytics and data science of …
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Why Learn the Melody and Chord Progression? One of the best ways to master composition is to memorize the musical meaning of a passage, and be able to use it in a different way. Memorization, …
What are harmonic inversions? If you're not using them, you run the risk of writing very boring progressions and pieces. But they don't have to be a scary confusing thing. In this episode, I …
It is possible to write without the aid of an instrument. Instruments can actually be detrimental to your composing. And it's not just instruments. DAWs, notation software, and virtual instruments …
The two main theme types, the sentence and the period have somewhat different musical goals. In this episode, I talk about how I use them in my own composing. …
In this episode, I talk about the basic idea, and why it's such a useful way to start your themes. …
This is the first video in a short series on form, or how your music relates to time. In this video, I talk about Formal Functions, the idea that your music can represent temporality. If …
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In this episode, I show you my scoring template. …
In this vlog, I show the techniques I talked about in the previous video on sketching. …
Sketching is a critical skill. Here are five tips to improve your ability to sketch. …
Watch me compose a functional chord progression. I took the music out that was around 9 minutes in. Major chart Minor chart Article on Diatonic Harmony …
Don't ruin your hearing. In this episode, I talk about why it's important for composers to protect their hearing. Listen to the music "Pancho Villa Rides" here: …
