WHEN YOU FIRST THINK about how a composer comes to write a piece of music it can seem like quite a simple question – especially if you imagine that they compose in a kind of trance with the music flowing from their brain on to the page, piano, or whatever it is they’re using.
Almost no composition, especially if it is longer than a few minutes, is ever composed like this.
A composition is usually the end of a long process that starts with a composer having an initial idea, which then has to be built up into a composition. It’s often impossible to say where an initial idea comes from. Some composers are inspired by nature, some by an event in their lives. Some are inspired to start a new composition in response to a piece by another composer. Some, like David Horne, have an idea given to them out of which they have to construct a piece of music. Their ‘inspiration’ comes from what their imaginations are inspired to do with the idea – in David Horne’s case the SoundJunction seed rhythm.
In this audio clip, David Horne talks about how his compositions start.
