Start From Rhythm
May 7, 2023
In the previous article I wrote about how to play the song in my head on the guitar. Then where does the song come to my head from?
I think it comes from some ‘mood’. I just have to wait until I get the mood, but what can I do when I can’t get it.
The first article of this ‘More about Composing‘ series was ‘Start With Melody‘. When I started composing, I thought that the melody was the first thing to create in a song.
One of the reasons I thought so was the word ‘accompaniment’. It means that melody is the leading role and accompaniment is the supporting role. Without a leading role, the supporting roles have no meaning. So I thought melody first, accompaniment second.
And if you want to let someone know a song without telling them the title, what should you do? Telling the lyrics is the best, but instrumental music has no lyrics. The next good way should be to sing the melody. Even if you sang the backing band sound, the song would not be recognized.
So somehow I had thought that the melody is first, accompaniment is second. But that was only a way of identifying existing songs, and I realized that things are very different when creating a song that doesn’t exist yet. Then what comes first?
Imagine a situation like this. You were suddenly called to the stage at a party and introduced. “Everyone, he will sing an original song now”. The hall was filled with anticipation and silence. What would you do? I don’t think I could sing any songs.
But then what if the band started playing a slow blues rhythm? I think I can sing something like♪Ooooh it’s a hard day. But so this is the life of mine…♪ Melody is not first. If I don’t have the ‘mood’ to sing, I can’t sing. Accompaniment creates a mood, and the mood creates a song.
Then what does accompaniment consist of? ‘Rhythm and chords’ would be the general answer. But when I create a song, I am aware of ‘rhythm and pitch’. First, I will write about rhythm.
Rhythm and melody are contrasting in terms of originality. There is a famous movie song ‘Over the Rainbow’. Even though I played it in a jazz rhythm, it is ‘Over the Rainbow’. If I say, “It’s my original song,” that’s plagiarism. So it’s the melody that determines what song it is.
On the other hand, it’s not a plagiarism to use the rhythm of jazz or blues, and waltz or habanera. Rhythm is allowed to be imitated, so using a known rhythm is an easier way to start composing. Imitation seems to be sneaky, but it is a way to get in the mood to create a song.
Waltz and habanera are famous rhythms and good for classical guitar. Rhythm alone is not enough for composing, but it makes composing much easier than I have nothing.
The following two songs were created with the rhythm set before I started composing.
Waltz of La Seine ; Dancing mood on Waltz
Noclock Islands ; Laid back mood on Habanera
Rhythm itself has no pitches (the movements of high and low of notes). But by adding pitches to it, it becomes an accompaniment. The reason to be aware of pitches rather than chords is that pitches change more frequently than chords, and therefore strongly determine the direction of the song.
The following is an A major waltz. It is a simple one in which I shifted the second and third beats without changing the bass.
When I started to create ‘Waltz of La Seine‘, I decided that the song would be ‘Waltz’ and ‘Paris’. But this was not the mood of Paris.
This was better than the previous one. I could make a song with it, but I continued to look for other pitches.
Yes, this is it! I got in the mood to make a waltz of Paris. After that, it’s the same as the man who was called to the stage. Just singing as the mood takes me. What is different from the stage play is that I can try and try in the peaceful mind.
Waltz of La Seine : Stuff Notation ↗️
In this case, the accompaniment became part of the melody. By continuing the phrase, I could make the first 8 measures, and was able to catch the pace. After that, I searched the photos of Paris and found some good photos of the Seine. The theme was reset to “The Seine, the water keeps flowing but the river never changes. Paris, the city seems to keep changing but the life never changes”. I continued to create the song according with the theme.
Next is about Habanera. The following is Habanera rhythm with typical pitches.
When I started to create ‘Noclock Islands‘, I decided that the song would be ‘Habanera’ and ‘Tropical’. I wanted a more tropical feeling than the above, and searched good sounds.
This was more tropical. It’s pretty good, but I tried skipping the 3rd beat as a test.
A more laid back mood. It’s good, OK I’ll make a song with this! I thought so, but the bass was repeated A and B. The bass B wasn’t playable in open string. It was difficult to play if I had to press the low strings every two measures, so I gave it up and looked for the other pattern playable in open strings.
This was commonplace but easy to play. It had higher notes in the rhythm, so it felt like the waves of the sea. The theme was vaguely “Tropical”, but I reset it to “Calm sea of southern island”. And while I continued composing, the theme became “The life not tied to clocks” in the end. The story of considering the theme is on the Blog.
⇒ Noclock Islands: Stuff Notation ↗️
After all, I wanted to move the bass in order to express the laid-back atmosphere, and used no-open strings that I could play. 🙂
As for my actual composing, it is more common to start composing by looking at photos rather than starting from rhythm. What is the difference between the two?
Whether composing songs or making other works, creating is an act of gradual restricting of freedom. Creators change “the work could become anything” to “the work must be this”. Complete freedom means that I don’t know what I want to create. Complete restriction means that the work completed and no creativity needed any more. So I need a moderate freedom and restriction in order to have the mood to create.
Rhythms restrict the song tightly. There are some well-known rhythms. Just by deciding one from them, the degrees of freedom is reduced to a fraction of that. But if I try one and I can get in the mood to create, it’s a good restriction.
On the other hand, photos don’t restrict songs very much. What people feel from photos varies from person to person. Different songs could be made from the same photo.
However, some special photos inspire me – just ‘me’, not ‘people’ in general – and they immediately and strongly tell me the direction of creation. But such photos are rarely found. On the other hand, well-known rhythms are ready to use.
The mood to compose gets higher when I feel “OK! I’ll go with this restriction.” Photos and rhythms are the means to get it. I use either case by case.
Here I wrote about starting from the rhythm to get the mood. I’ve noticed another thing about rhythm, so I’ll write about it next time.
← Sing With Chord / Sing The Mood →
Photo by skeeze on Pixabay