Is Inspiration Needed to Compose?

Not all given themes can obviously be pleasing, but I think that where there is no inspiration, craft comes to the "aid," and those who do not know it can hardly go beyond, or at least with difficulty can find a way to start and continue.

Then there remains the fact that the composer must be able to go beyond inspiration, which (not grouping everyone together) in most cases (but it is certainly not a rule) helps in conceiving a composition, but for its continuation, for its development, mastery of the subject matter is required.

This is said by someone who often has ideas but does not yet know how to develop them properly.

Piccinesco wrote:

Not all the given themes can be liked, obviously

...actually I like it, that is the problem, even too much... and I feel like I am "ruining it". I don't know if I managed to describe my discomfort ...

I think the proportion between inspiration and craft is an honest 15% vs 85%, obviously in favor of craft. But I also believe that in the presence of a given theme, the percentage of inspiration drops significantly below 10%, so your discomfort is motivated by the fact that you probably do not have sufficient tools to continue the work started by others...

I agree with Carlos, the idea has already been given ... so an "inspiration" has already been spent.

It is probably too difficult for you, there is little to draw inspiration from and much to study ... no offense Zaccaria. We have all been through it, keep your chin up

Inspiration and craft feed each other, and the fact that there is a theme—contrary to what someone who is not a composer might think—is a great help in freeing you from a "burden"; paradoxically, one is freer with a theme than with a completely free piece. Every composer, when receiving a commission, wants as many indications as possible from the client precisely to relieve themselves of certain responsibilities. After all, it frequently happens in literature that many pieces are based on simple folk melodies from which something emerges where fantasy and inspiration find fertile ground, because inspiration is not just creating a sequence of notes from nothing (which, anyway, is never truly from nothing...), but inspiration can also manifest as an idea for arrangement, orchestration, form, proportions, or colors.

Imagine having to write a fugue starting from a given subject, as happens during an exam, and imagine having to create a fugue from scratch with an original subject; I assure you that you would spend days just on the subject and your fantasy would be even more "stuck." Besides, if in the fourth year of composition they give you the entire bass line, in the eighth year only the subject of the fugue, and at graduation they give you a piece from which you must extract a theme or a motif, there will be a difference: writing starting from zero or with very little basic material is harder than having precise indications. In practice, the theme is given to you precisely to put your fantasy in the most comfortable position to express itself. I know many think the opposite—that a given theme is a cage, that you would want to go in one direction but perhaps it's out of context, etc... but it's not like that.... if you go to an ice cream parlor and there are 5 flavors, you will immediately choose the one you like; if there are 300, you will be indecisive for a long time...

In practical terms, the advice I can give you is to try to reproduce the salient feature of the theme and vary it slightly: if you find that this theme is appreciable from a melodic point of view, try to vary the given melody, even simply by singing it; it is not necessary to write it down at this stage, sooner or later you will obtain a valid response and perhaps you can note it down somewhere; then try to do the same from a harmonic or rhythmic point of view: the theme itself is an enormous source of inspiration; you don't have to look for it somewhere else, inspiration isn't the singing of birds or the shape of clouds.... then there are those who are more musical and those who are less, but that is another matter...

Zaccaria wrote:

Do you need inspiration to compose?

I am asking this question because despite the clarity in the analysis by Cristian, Gozzo and Geppino in the analysis of the theme for the May workshop ... I haven't been able to find anything that satisfies me.

I think I am lacking inspiration ... what should I do?

.. you remind me of someone I know, who is always complaining ... I won't mention names but I think he is listening

I am sharing what has been written by the other forum members and I really like Geppino's contribution, which I obviously quote in full.

Zaccaria wrote:

...actually I like it, that is the problem, even too much... and I feel like I am "ruining it". I don't know if I managed to describe my discomfort ...

Yes, but if you do that you won't get anywhere ... I don't know how happy Bach would have been with my interpretations of his WTC when I repeated the seventh reading of the score.

Just as when I used to take Schumann's themes to prepare the romance, I don't know how enthusiastic he would have been about my "ideas" and my inspiration ... and yet...

It is known that in one phase of life one also makes messes, precisely in order to learn

But, I ask, do you think inspiration and fantasy are the same thing?

Carlos wrote:

ispiration and fantasy are the same thing?

No; inspiration helps to produce questions, fantasy to find answers.

I don't respond to everyone promptly because I would never finish; I have read it and now my ideas are a bit clearer. The point is that I feel the gap between myself and the author of the topic too strongly. It was also evident from the time it took me to understand which harmonies were used

Carlos wrote:

in your opinion, are inspiration and fantasy the same thing?

...you know, it could even be so, it's just that ... what would fantasy rely on if not on a defined idea?

I agree with both CromaDiBrera and Zaccaria. The question occurred to me while reading Geppino's post, which I share, if it weren't for the fact that it seems to me he is talking about fantasy, not inspiration. It is thanks to fantasy that one can develop work on a given theme, not thanks to inspiration, at least in my opinion...

In my opinion, the question we should ask ourselves in this specific case is the following: does the friend who opened this topic lack inspiration, imagination, or craft? I think that just by the fact that he tried to write something, he must have had inspiration, because inspiration is the theme itself; if the theme hadn't inspired him, perhaps he wouldn't have even wasted his time. It is therefore not a problem of lack of inspiration, perhaps it is a lack of craft, and anyway at this stage I wouldn't dwell too much on the etymological meaning of individual words, as in the musical field the boundary between these things is very thin, each one merges with the other, feeds it, and is fed by it in turn.

When elsewhere I suggested to those interested in orchestration to acquire the best possible libraries, it was because even just hearing one of those sounds so similar to reality is a source of inspiration, and this in turn stimulates imagination, which in turn is again a source of inspiration, in an all-in-one where, to put it like Croma di Brera, the answer is itself a question for subsequent answers... appetite comes with eating, as they say... It is clear that if the craft component then fails, the whole thing can result in being mortifying: I want to do something but I don't know how to do it and I feel my inadequacy; we have all felt it and still feel it, and it is precisely to overcome this sense of inadequacy that study exists, continuous improvement, constructive comparison, the humility to learn from everything and everyone, and all this process is encapsulated in a single word: style. In the end, in my opinion, all efforts should be aimed at creating one's own style, recognizable and consistent with one's own tastes; then perhaps other factors come into play, such as commercial considerations, etiquette, or those related to passing an exam or participating in a competition, but fundamentally if you have your own style, you have achieved a good goal...

geppino12575 wrote:

In my opinion, the question we should ask ourselves in this specific case is the following: does the friend who opened this topic lack inspiration, imagination, or craft? I think that just by the fact that he tried [...] but fundamentally if you have your own style, you have achieved a good goal...

Thank you. Very clear. I agree.

Look Zaccaria, in this specific case, the inspiration is already present and comes from two elements, one musical and the other not:

a) the provided theme (including question and answer, among other things, therefore easy to develop in a "mechanical" way);

the context in which the theme was proposed, i.e., a workshop on a forum (which may or may not "inspire," but offers possibilities for comparison for a thousand possible reasons).

Therefore, there is no need to discuss whether inspiration exists or not.

Fantasy is useful but not indispensable for developing the proposed theme in an absolutely "correct" way (even if in a way that is not at all original or personal, perhaps...).

So, what is missing is what many call "craft," but which I would call a background of studies, exercises, etc.; it seems obvious to me that this is the case.

That being said, I invite you to try at all costs, without letting yourself be intimidated by the idea of having to prove who knows what. In fact, these workshops are precisely the opportunity for those with less experience to hear many, many useful things. It's a bit like going to a doctor, a psychiatrist, or a gym trainer, where there is no point in having to prove that you are "better."

You must sit down and just do what you know how to do, without fear of being judged. This is not about taking exams, but only about getting useful advice to improve; and that is exactly the beauty of it! In short, draw from the background that has allowed you to make music until now, rely on what you know how to do and let yourself go... The worst thing that can happen to you here is that there is little desire to comment on your piece. The best is to receive so many criticisms that you learn a lot. That's all.

P.S. Inspiration and fantasy are not the same thing at all, and I do not find it at all tricky to keep them well distinct; on the contrary, doing so seems to me to have great practical implications: one must learn to know oneself, to understand how we function, in order to know how to stimulate ourselves to produce in the appropriate way: if I don't have inspiration, I take measures in one sense; if I don't have fantasy, I take them in another. So it is not at all just a matter of terminology...

CromaDiBrera wrote:

P.S. Inspiration and fantasy are not at all the same thing, and I do not find it at all tricky to keep them well distinct but, on the contrary, doing so seems to me to have great practical implications: one must learn to know oneself, to understand how we function, in order to know how to stimulate ourselves to produce in the appropriate way: if I don't have inspiration, I take measures in one sense; if I don't have fantasy, I take them in another. So it is not at all just a matter of terminology...

Well, I don't know, I wouldn't be so categorical; I think I know for the most part the mental paths that occur within me when I write, and I know there isn't a very precise definition nor a very precise temporal sequence of these three events (inspiration, fantasy, craft), assuming they are only three and that it is indeed these three... It has happened to me sometimes that a simple doubling, which perhaps I did because it is theoretically correct to do so, might have inspired new solutions in that point or in other parts of the piece.

But reflecting on it a little more, another element comes to mind that influences the creative act: the time deadline; having to respect a deadline is a great stimulus to bring out what one has, which is why I often complained that the workshop deadlines were too extended, I was losing this stimulus...

Anyway, I respect others' paths especially if they lead to good results; I am only saying that in me, the creative process can start from any point, even simply from a purely technical or mechanical fact.

Nice topic, how do you frame the capacity for imagination within the discussion? Or can it coincide with something already mentioned?

In my opinion, imagination is the ability to prefigure the result of an association of ideas. Example: in a certain phrase, choosing an instrumentation never before practiced, or thinking of an unusual harmonic succession, can be choices suggested by fantasy; but "having it in mind" (the effect) — without having had experience of it, that is — is a matter of imagination. After all, the word itself says so: to imagine, that is, to render through images.

I think a person can have more fantasy than imagination, or vice versa.

I am not a composer but... can it be that imagination feeds fantasy?