Classical Music Buzz > Willful Composer
Willful Composer
© Time/Space Fabrics
Hank Hehmsoth, MacDowell Norton Stevens Fellow in music composition
35 Entries

Sooner or later you're going to realize, just as I did, that there's a difference between knowing the path, and walking the path.


I'm trying to free your mind. But I can only show you the door. You're the one that has to walk through it.


In a world of 1s and 0s... are you a zero, or The One?



Free your mind.
The Fight for the Future Begins.
Believe the unbelievable.
Reality is a thing of the past.


....... Written and directed by Andy Wachowski & Larry Wachowski.


Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
11 months ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story

I was asked today to contribute to a writer working on an article about the role of research in the creative process. She asked me these 3 questions:Is research critical to your work in general or only on occasion?Could you tell me how research figures into your own creative process?Could you describe the creation of a specific composition that involved research?
Here is what i responded with:

Research and the Creative Process


Research is absolutely essential in my work in virtually every aspect of my creative process. It provides a plethora of content to extract personal meaning and logical constructs for each individual composition.
I use my research to anticipate and search beyond my current boundaries. As a performer and composer I explore fellow musicians, composers, and arrangers, websites, music scores, and especially music that provides game-changing information at the periphery of my knowledge. I gather this material and extract concepts and theory to arrive at an intuitive personal approach.
The secret to Creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.- Albert Einstein
I can go on and on about any of my compositions, but this one is quite recent.
I was awarded a MacDowell Fellowship in music composition for 2011 for a 2010 composition, "Two Desert Dances," a jazz and string ensemble piece featuring live performance with 60-year-old recordings of Native American dance from the John Donald Robb Archive of Southwestern Music."These two dances are inspired by field recordings of New Mexican Native Americans," Hehmsoth said. "Arroyo Storm is derived from a Taos Jemez Indian dance. The source material for Blue Moon Mist is a four-note melody played on a pito, a Native American flute, similar to an ocarina. Both were recorded in the 1950s."
In order to find these two pieces I spent hours listening to almost all 6,000 recordings on line at the Robb Archive. Both fascinated me in many ways, both for their seeming simplicity, and yet full of musical content. I transcribed both, deconstructed them in terms of harmony, melody and rhythm, and ultimately wrote a contemporary jazz composition that allows a live ensemble to perform in sync with the 60-year-old recordings.
Research helps me to interpret and seek patterns from multiple sources, test concepts simultaneously, and ultimately decide and finalize a concept and personal artistic vision.
I begin with an idea and then it becomes something else.- Pablo PicassoPosted by © Time/Space Fabrics
11 months ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story
I have been researching how artists use social media to promote themselves and their music. And I am incorporating this into an undergrad and grad class I teach in music technology. But I am also seeing how creating content online is the same as writing music people will respond to.

Here is a glean from various sources:

9 Ways People Respond to Your Content 



Blogs and Twitter have almost eliminated any barrier to publishing. You have an idea and in a few minutes your thoughts can be online. Think about it – with every person thinking about more than 50,000 thoughts a day, producing online content can be simple.
Maybe. But simply churning out meaningless content does not guarantee that others will read what you write. Make this mistake and people will read what you write and write you off.
What’s the alternative?
Use your creativity to generate content that will inspire and transform the lives of the audience in a positive way. Remember that it costs time (and indirectly – money) for your audience to read what you write. And, they expect a good return for that investment.
You will know whether you are succeeding in influencing your audience in a positive way because the audience will tell you. No, maybe not directly but by the way they respond to your content.

So, here are the nine ways your audience will respond to your online content:

Spam: If your content does not provide a reasonable ROII (return-on-investment for an interaction) for the reader or is self-serving or simply useless, the reader will mark it as spam. Posting something that may be assessed, as “spam” is the fastest way to losing credibility.
Skip: The reader makes an assessment that he or she won’t lose much by reading it. In this case, the reader has not written you off yet but if you consistently create content that is worth “skipping,” the reader might write you off.
Scan: The reader thinks there are only a few parts that are of relevance and wants to get right to the core of the content and skip the rest.
Stop: The reader is touched by the article and stops to think about the article, it’s relevance and what it means to him or her personally and professionally.
Save: The content is so good that the reader might want to re-visit this multiple times.
Shift: The article is transformational. The reader is so deeply affected (in a positive way) by the article that it shifts some of their values and beliefs. In other words, this piece of writing will transform the reader and make him or her grow.
Send: The content is not only useful to the reader but also to one or more people in the reader’s network. The reader simply emails the article or a link to it to people that he or she cares.
Spread: The reader finds the article fascinating enough to spread it to anyone and everyone via a blog, twitter or the social networks that he or she belongs.
Subscribe: This is the ultimate expression of engagement and a vote of confidence that you will continue to provide great content. When the reader wants to continue listening to your thoughts, he or she will subscribe.

Finally, here are a few things to consider before you post your next online content:
1. Understand Your Audience

Unless you are writing something for your private consumption, your audience should be the center of the focus and not you. The more you know about your audience, the better you can connect with them. Think about:
Who is your audience?
Why are they reading what you are writing?
What are their concerns in general and what are their concerns NOW?
2. Check Your Objective

Some questions to think about:
What is the purpose of your article?
What assessment do you want the reader to create by reading your article?
3. Unleash Your Creativity

You know the audience and you know the purpose of the article. Now the next step is to unleash your creativity and create something that will generate the kind of response that you are looking for.
Some questions to think about:
What would be unique (content, point-of-view etc.) in this article that will make the audience do what I want them to do?
How can you make this article “extremely relevant” to the current times?
What can you include that will increase the “longevity” of the article?
4. Learn from Feedback

You already know the nine ways that people respond to your online content. When people act the way they do, they are providing you valuable feedback. Keeping your emotions aside, learn from the feedback and incorporate this learning into your next article.

Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story

Anticipate 

Look for game-changing information at the periphery of your knowledge
Search beyond your current boundaries
Scan the horizon better with wide external networks to help you, people, reading, websites


Think Critically

Critical thinkers question everything. To master this skill you must force yourself to:
Reframe concepts and theory to get to the root function
Challenge current trends, beliefs and mindsets, including your own


Interpret 

Seek patterns in multiple sources of music styles
Test multiple concepts simultaneously


Decide

“Better done, than perfect”
Carefully frame the concept to get to the crux of the matter
Balance speed, rigor, quality and agility. Leave perfection to higher powers
Finalize even with an incomplete overview and amid diverse understandings


 Align

Talk it over with friends, colleagues, and mentors. 
Understand what drives other people's creativity, including what remains hidden
Discuss tough issues and opposite beliefs, even when it's uncomfortable


Learn

 Honest feedback is harder and harder to come by.  You have to do what you can to keep it coming. This is crucial because success and failure--especially failure--are valuable sources of learning.  
Encourage and exemplify honesty to extract lessons
Shift course quickly if you realize you're off track
Celebrate both success and (well-intentioned) failures that provide insight

Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story
The secret to Creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.

- Albert Einstein

Creativity comes from Trust. Trust your instincts, and never hope more than you work.
- Rita Mae Brown (20th century American author)Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story
A student of mine, Iram Reyes, wrote a jazz composition during our grad comp lessons.


And submitted it to Downbeat for the student Jazz Composition contest.


I enjoyed playing the electric piano solo on it.


Here it is:

On The Flip Side


Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story
 Entrepreneurship is the pursuit of opportunity without regard to resources currently controlled.


The Art Game is the pursuit of creativity without regard to tangibles.
By focusing on creativity as a process, this definition opens the term to all kinds of people.
Time is the only real resource you have.



Every time you want to create, there are two possible courses of action. You can look at the array of artistic choices that present themselves, pick the best available option and try to make it fit. Or, you can do what many do: Figure out the best conceivable option and then make it available. That's the key. Conception. Can you open up your ability to conceive ideas without restraint?
And that, folks, is what makes writing, creating, composing.. so hard. And so necessary.Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story

Ligeti - Artikulation by tonicadominante


What does music look like? With new sounds and new technologies, the question is more apt than ever. Music notation takes on a different meaning in the age of computers. After all, the essential divide in notation – between sound representation and realization – is blurred in the digital domain, in which we move between visual and sonic information seamlessly and a sound can be reproduced exactly. But, perhaps in that fluid context and without the musical conventions that grew up with notation, the importance of notation becomes that much clearer.In this case, the classic experimental electronic composition Artikulation by composer Ligeti has already had a visual score associated with it. Rainer Wehinger created the visuals above after the fact as an “aural score,” intending visuals to present a visible “reading” of the sounds of the piece. That makes the score itself closer to the digital visualizations we see as motion graphics works all over the Web. The point isn’t to create a set of instructions by which you can perform a piece, but a visual counterpart that allows you to (presumably) hear it differently.To be honest, I’m not always certain what to make of these results. Does this score really help you hear the piece? I’m curious to hear different reactions. But I wonder if the real holy grail comes back to software and interface. Seeing a pre-composed score is already interesting. But make that score interactive, and, in short, you have music creation software. Perhaps we’ll get beyond simple sequencers and step sequencers and start to see a growing number of interactive software designs that play around with that concept. Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story


To The Crazy Ones

Here's to the crazy ones.


The misfits.
The rebels.
The troublemakers.
The round pegs in the square holes.
The ones who see things differently.
They're not fond of rules.
And they have no respect for the status quo.

You can praise them, disagree with them, 
quote them, disbelieve them, 
glorify them or vilify them.

About the only thing you can't do 
is ignore them.
Because they change things.
They invent.
They imagine.
They heal.
They explore.
They create.
They inspire.
They push the human race forward.
Maybe they have to be crazy.
How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art?Or sit in silence and hear a song that's never been written?
Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?























While some see them as the crazy ones, I see genius.
Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, 
are the ones who do.Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story

Posted by © Time/Space Fabrics
1 year ago | |
Tag
| Read Full Story
1 - 10  | 1234
InstantEncore