a blog for the composers and audiences of today's music.
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DanLisMusic
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I recently acquired the score to Louis Andriessen’s De Staat, a great piece that I plan to spend many hours with in score and recording. I have just started my exploration of this piece, and so naturally I began at the first pages. In the Composer’s Note, Andriessen makes the case that music is inherently […]
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DanLisMusic
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What is a composer? One gives the simple answer first: a composer is someone who writes music. Simple enough, but there’s more meat to that. I think there are other qualities that define what a composer is, and so here’s a short list of my thoughts. I highly encourage you to contact me (Twitter, Facebook, leave […]
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DanLisMusic
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Terry Riley’s In C, by composer Robert Carl, is a fascinating read. I’m not plugging it because of my good experience with Dr. Carl in composition lessons, but rather due to the merit of this book alone. This book is part of a series of “Studies in Musical Genesis, Structure, and Interpretation” published by the […]
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DanLisMusic
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Good music makers are also good music listeners. Some people intuitively soak up information and internalize it naturally, while others struggle to decipher it and analyze its components. But, no matter where you lie on the spectrum of gifted/struggling analysis, it never hurts to be a better listener. I grew up hearing about “active reading”–asking […]
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DanLisMusic
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Firstly, why should one write melodies? Even if one doesn’t use melody in the “conventional” sense in one’s pieces, the ability to write melodies is a good asset to have because: A sense of line helps the listener understand a piece and make connections or distinctions between musical events. Melodies are often the result of […]
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