You’ve heard me say before that the two areas I see student composers struggling with the most are melody and form. One teacher at the Composition for Kids lecture I gave in KC this week asked the following question:
How do you make suggestions about form?
This is such a great question since so many students struggle with form. Let me first explain ways in which students struggle with form.
- Students often have too much material (too many great ideas) and do not understand the need to prioritize and repeat key melodies and motives.
- Students often have too little material and tend to constantly repeat their material with little variation.
- Students struggle to understand how to create a contrasting theme or B section. They often don’t see how these can actually relate to each other and be derived from each other.
If a student struggles with form, you might take a minute to diagnose what the real problem is. Is it too much material? Not enough material? Too similar of material? Understanding the real problem will help you determine how to help them.
If the problem is that the student has too much material, I would suggest doing the following:
- Ask the student which of their motives or melodies is the most important. Then, spend some time talking about the importance of repeating important things.
- Analyze their current pieces and show the student how the composer repeats key motives and melodies. When the student sees how others do it, they will usually understand this concept better.
- Go through a well known piece of music (such as Fur Elise) and ask the student how many times they hear that beginning theme. This is just another way of demonstrating the need to repeat key motives.
- Encourage the student to stick to their favorite 2-3 ideas in the piece. Since ABA is a great form for student composers to use, I often ask students to just pick 2 main themes that they like and use them to form an A and a B section.
If a student has too little material (which is similar to having trouble creating a B section), spending time teaching them how to develop a B, or contrasting theme will be beneficial. Here are a few ways you can do this:
- Analyze the music the student is currently studying to see how the theme in a B section relates to the A section. You will often find that the material used from the B section of a piece is derived directly from the A section.
- Ask the student to circle small motives in their melody. These circles can be overlapping and will often contain new rhythms and seemingly new motives. When a student is forced to circle at least 4-5 small motives within their A section, they will have material for which to create their B section. I will post more on this at a later date.
- Help the student identify the “essence” of their A melody. For example, perhaps the essence is in the driving rhythm or the repeated notes, or the opening large interval. If they can identify what makes their melody interesting, they may be able to create a better contrasting theme for their B section.
I think the biggest favor you can do for a student struggling with form is to analyze music that they are already studying.
- Compare the A section to the B section and ask what is the same and what is different about them.
- Compare the introduction and closing with the main theme to see where the material comes from.
- Analyze how long (how many measures) the A section is compared to the B section.
Though this analysis will not always directy apply to a composition on which the student is working, this analysis will become a part of their “vocabulary” of composing techniques which they will use for future compositions.
To see other questions in this series:
What sage advice!
Students who cannot discern similarities and differences in the music they are learning to play will always struggle to create interesting musical structures. They may be gifted at creating a hook, riff or melody that lasts a bar or two, but will never manage to take that original thought and construct a complete composition unless they have developed the ability to perceive music at this more ‘macro’/structural level.
Instrumental teachers would give their students such a gift if they encouraged a perception of pattern right from the first lessons…..
I agree. That’s why I think analysis of pieces the student is playing is so important. There are reasons things work in music composition and when students can see how the motives are repeated and developed in a piece, they can mimic that in their own pieces.