5 Effective Ways To Compose Music

5 Effective Ways To Compose Music

Hi Charlie! After many requests, here is my second article! So, you may know it but I play the guitar for two years and I'm now in a music band. We are currently making an album and indeed we had to learn how to compose some songs for it so, I decided that it would be great if I could show you my tips to write music efficiently. Ps: Just a little precision before we start; these ways of writing songs work for all genres of music and anyone should normally be able to succeed if they play an instrument, even beginners. Moreover, I didn't invent these techniques, they are from famous musicians, I just collected and put them in this article. Without more delay, let's start!

1. Be inspired by the music you love or listen to new bands / songs

This is an usual way to write music for all musicians and it is one of the most used. This way of writing songs is really simple, you just have to be inspired by your favorite band(s) and try to create songs in their style! The only weak point of it is that you can be accused of plagiarism so, being inspired is a good thing but stealing or copying ideas of a band isn't. To avoid this situation you just need to create a music by being inspired by a band but with also putting your personal touch and style to change it in a good way. 

2. Play with other musicians

Indeed the union is the strength! Jamming (doing a musical session) with other musicians has a lot of benefits: you develop your sense of rhythm by playing simultaneously with the other musicians, you find ideas of songs that you wouldn't have thought of... It is therefore a really good thing of jamming to find ideas but sometimes you don't have the time for it or you don't know any musicians. That is not a problem because there are free (or sometimes not) softwares for that: If you have an "Apple" computer, you have the software named "Garageband" already installed and it allows you to play with programmed musicians and even to record your work! There are other softwares for "PCs" such as "Audacity" but I personally prefer using "Garageband" because of its better quality. 

Example of a programmed drummer on the "Garageband" software

We can see above, one of the several programmed drummers of "Garageband" (one for each style of music) and it creates automatic drums fitting your playing. I use this with my band and it is wonderful! 

3. Try new scales and modes

This is an advanced technique because it's music theory but it allows you to explore some new sonorities and therefore improving your style. A scale (suite of notes in an octave like C, D, E, F... for instance) and a mode (arrangement of the notes in a scale) may be things you don't know but they are the basis of all the existing songs. It is complex but you can use them with the use of helps such as the book entitled "Guitar Cook Book", explaining these things for beginner guitar players.

Example of different modes on the guitar

These modes for instance, will challenge you not to use major and minor scales (that are the most commonly used) and therefore improve your playing by including new sounds in it.

4. Try new instruments and equipment

Trying new instruments and equipment creates a changement and that can sometimes be beneficial for writing music. For instance, David Ellefson (bassist of the band Megadeth) found the riff (sequence of repeated notes) from the song named "Dawn Patrol" on the album "Rust In Peace" when he played on his friend's 8-string bass guitar. This is therefore a great way of finding melodies but it is an expansive one because a good musical equipment is usually not cheap because of its quality. Nevertheless, you can go in a music store and try some instruments without buying them. If you're a guitarist you can even buy guitar pedals that modify your sound (such as the pedal of distortion, the pedal of reverb...).

8-String bass guitar that I'm talking about above

Example of guitar pedals

5. Play for hours and be bored

This is maybe a strange way of writing music but it really works! You just have to play as long as possible, even if you're bored (that's even better, believe me) and you'll find at least one great melody! 

You probably think that this technique is never going to work but even the professional musicians use it so, it is really efficient. 

I hope you enjoyed this article, and if you try the techniques presented in it tell me, I would be glad to hear your opinion on them! See you later!

-William