How did you learn to vary compositions, and not be repetitive?

[Infenro]

This has always been one of my biggest issues, my compositions are extremely repetitive.

I've always wondered how people manage to consistently change things up and keep it interesting naturally. I imagine I just get too lazy with how I write songs and am okay with doing what is just good. I've never gotten the feel electronically to write music that is varied consistently and feels fresh the whole time. When I improvise though it's a different story, but I'm not the best at any particular instrument so I never try it.

Any help on this would be... helpful.

Yeah.

[Dissidia]

Try getting ideas and being inspired by music that isn't like the one you are writing.

[dannthr]

Stop listening to the same shit over and over again.

I find myself in creative ruts when I only listen to my iTunes library over and over--even if there is great music on there.

You need to keep expanding and listening. Listen to stuff that is not in the genre you typically do.

Listen to everything.

[Meteo Xavier]

A MECHANICAL answer as opposed to a philosophical one - whenever I want to write a track with a lot of changes and variety in them, I just manually write each note of each track in a single part - starting with drums, bass, chords, chordal riffs, etc. etc, and on to melody.

If I want to reuse a section over, just copy and paste, but I make it a point to specifically go over parts and examine them to look for ways to get creative and unexpected in that part, then I do it and see if it works. The trick is making sure you're starting with the foundation first and building on top of it.

It can be like digging a tunnel with a spoon, but surprisingly successful at achieving awesome variety.

[Chimpazilla]

I've been listening to a lot of tracks on OCR and some friends' tracks, each of which is totally different. One person writes jazz, another orchestral, someone else deep house or dubstep. I love all of these genres! So recently I made a song where I did several different sections each a different genre, yet tied together through good transitions. This song used tons of different instruments, as the entire soundscape was different for each part.

Also, when I'm remixing, I like to use two or three or more source songs from the same game source. The verse can be based on one song, the chorus another, and the breakdown yet another. That's one way for sure to vary your composition.

One area where everyone gets lazy is drums. Even if you vary your drum writing, it's a great idea to vary your drum timbres for different sections of your song, too. It's amazing how much impact that has.

[Argle]

Listen to prog rock. Also, develop an obsessive fear about repetition.

[Meteo Xavier]

Or better yet, go download some MIDIs from Star Ocean 2, Valkyrie Profile, Tales of, and a bunch of Motoi Sakuraba from the late 90s - mid 00's and you can SEE them in their DAW and how they work, instead of just listening to them.

Come on people, you can offer better actual help than "just listen to shit".

[Radiowar]

if the problem is you find that you are writing music that lacks "variation" i dont see how listening to music is any help. the comparison op draws between their typical writing process and "improvisation" says to me that the music sounds/feels repetitive because the process has become repetitive. if that's the case, switch up your process. you can apply an improvisatory ethic to composition in the sense that you dont chase sounds, but ideas. dont let yourself accumulate patterns or habits, instead approach a new piece with a question, like "what would happen if i did this."

[timaeus222]

Since you improvise in some form, try getting a MIDI keyboard. You can improvise your ideas there while you want to write a new part.

[eilios]

just randomly switch genres. if you have to nail down a completely different sound you might find your compositions will be radically different in that genre. when i felt my music was getting too repetitive i switched genres, and next time i started making music in the genre i usually did(house music) i found that my entire sound was slightly different because of it

[AngelCityOutlaw]

Each time you have a repeated section, just simply change it up somehow. For example, if you have a particular melody for the verse, try putting a different rhythm beneath it and/or imply the chords rather than playing all the chords normally etc. That tactic is actually quite effective because harmonically it is the same, but the listener likely won't notice unless they listen closely. You can also make changes to the melody, add counter melodies, modulate to a different key etc. You can also change the instrumentation or surprise the listener a bit by making the phrase end differently than they expected. Basically.....just make repeated sections noticeably different somehow lol.

However, some people say "change the genre". I'd advise against doing that. At least, I would not make a piece where the verse is metal, the chorus is dubstep and the bridge is country. If you have elements of multiple genres, you should have just that; "elements of multiple genres". Like how in this trance track I just did, there was an orchestral break in it, but there were always some orchestral elements throughout the rest of the track. So it doesn't seem out of context with the rest of the piece.

[eilios]

Each time you have a repeated section, just simply change it up somehow. For example, if you have a particular melody for the verse, try putting a different rhythm beneath it and/or imply the chords rather than playing all the chords normally etc. That tactic is actually quite effective because harmonically it is the same, but the listener likely won't notice unless they listen closely. You can also make changes to the melody, add counter melodies, modulate to a different key etc. You can also change the instrumentation or surprise the listener a bit by making the phrase end differently than they expected. Basically.....just make repeated sections noticeably different somehow lol.

However, some people say "change the genre". I'd advise against doing that. At least, I would not make a piece where the verse is metal, the chorus is dubstep and the bridge is country. If you have elements of multiple genres, you should have just that; "elements of multiple genres". Like how in this trance track I just did, there was an orchestral break in it, but there were always some orchestral elements throughout the rest of the track. So it doesn't seem out of context with the rest of the piece.

nonono! i dont mean switch genres in the middle of the piece, i mean try writing something in a different style to get you completely out of your comfort zone!!

[timaeus222]

However, some people say "change the genre". I'd advise against doing that. At least, I would not make a piece where the verse is metal, the chorus is dubstep and the bridge is country. If you have elements of multiple genres, you should have just that; "elements of multiple genres". Like how in this trance track I just did, there was an orchestral break in it, but there were always some orchestral elements throughout the rest of the track. So it doesn't seem out of context with the rest of the piece.

I still recommend changing the genre in the middle of the song, and it's a great way to put variation. Just don't do it to an awkward extreme.

[Radiowar]

ehhh imo you should never really "do genre". in my experience thinking about genre leads to thinking about other people's music which leads to frustration, self-loathing, but most of all a pattern- or characteristic-based approach to writing.

you want to avoid repetition? be creative. you want to be creative? don't think, do.

[Chimpazilla]

nonono! i dont mean switch genres in the middle of the piece, i mean try writing something in a different style to get you completely out of your comfort zone!!

What's wrong with changing genres in mid-song?

[AngelsDen]

Sometimes its essential to change instruments and not let the same combination play throughout the whole song.

[ectogemia]

ehhh imo you should never really "do genre". in my experience thinking about genre leads to thinking about other people's music which leads to frustration, self-loathing, but most of all a pattern- or characteristic-based approach to writing.

you want to avoid repetition? be creative. you want to be creative? don't think, do.

Here's a man who knows what he's talking about.

Music is about being creative. If something sounds repetitive, then do something creative to make it sound fresh. There are an infinite number of things you could do to keep things sounding interesting, and it's up to you to listen to music which you find to be particularly creative and interesting and dissect the techniques those artists use so you can employ similar methods or novel methods inspired by those you've heard.

So to answer your basic question, I learned to vary compositions by listening *very* critically to tunes I love and looping interesting bits again and again until I understood what I was hearing. It gets easier and easier to do this as your ear improves and your production and compostional toolboxes expand until you can easily come up with creative flourishes and variations on your own. And as always, I'll plug improv as perhaps the best tool to develop your musical sensibilities. A lot of my ability to be musical comes from playing short-ish phrases on piano I came up with and altering them in any number of ways again and again to keep it sounding fresh. With this technique, like Alex said, don't think; just do.

And Alex's music just so happens to be something I listen to and analyze to figure out cool techniques ;o so give his stuff a listen if you haven't already.

[Skrypnyk]

you want to avoid repetition? be creative.

really this is all that needs to be said

[Meteo Xavier]

really this is all that needs to be said

Not really, it's far too broad without explaining the best ways to be creative while composing in a DAW. Again, none of this philosophical advice is much good for the same reason. Offer some actual practices and things you do while composing that can be useful.

[AngelCityOutlaw]

Not really, it's far too broad without explaining the best ways to be creative while composing in a DAW. Again, none of this philosophical advice is much good for the same reason. Offer some actual practices and things you do while composing that can be useful.

I agree with Meteo. Personally, I never found the "philosophical" advice when it comes to composing music to be very helpful. That's because, despite what a lot of people will try to tell you, writing music is a craft; It's a skill that can be taught, learned and improved upon.

[Moseph]

When you're trying to figure out where to go next in a composition, pay attention to how the elements of your music can be divided into small, discrete parts. Your melodies, for example, can be parsed as groups of three or four notes, or you can take particular rhythmic gestures that stand out to you, or maybe there's a harmonic change that you particularly like. I think a good guideline for deciding what these bits are is to ask yourself, "What aspects of this music are likely to catch the listener's attention?"

Once you've identified these bits of your music, think about new ways to combine them. In my own composing, I find that it's often very effective to take a small bit of my melody and just repeat that melodic gesture several times at various pitch levels, with various rhythms, to create a new melody. The idea here is that the materials you are using are already familiar to the listener because they've heard you use them earlier in the piece, but you're now using the same material in a different way -- this helps the musical development seem connected to what came before it even if the overall feel is very different.

As a practical example, my ReMix Darkness Fears Light, and We Fear the Darkness does some of this between statements of the actual source melodies. The section at 0:54-1:12 develops the source melody that started at 0:19. The section at 2:52-3:32 develops the part of the source that was heard at 2:33. In both cases, note how the development sounds similar to its source, but is able to go somewhere new because the material I chose as the basis for the development (melodic fragments, in both cases) could be bounced all over the place, leading anywhere I wanted it to, without losing the flavor of the source melody. And if you already have some idea where you want the development to lead (in this ReMix, both of those developments lead into new parts of the VGM source), getting to the new place is just a matter of massaging the fragments you've selected until you're in the right key/have the right feel/whatever and can step off into that new place without it being jarring.

Edited August 5, 2013 by Moseph

[eilios]

What's wrong with changing genres in mid-song?

i dont think its bad, i personally dont do it but my point wasnt that you should change genres mid song. it was to try something in a different style to get out of your comfort zone and try to think about the music in a different way.

[Skrypnyk]

Not really, it's far too broad without explaining the best ways to be creative while composing in a DAW. Again, none of this philosophical advice is much good for the same reason. Offer some actual practices and things you do while composing that can be useful.

Alright.

Use a different time signatures.

Use a different tempo speed.

Experiment with different synths.

Experiment with the effects you have.

Experiment with samples you don't usually use.

Experiment.

[Radiowar]

Not really, it's far too broad without explaining the best ways to be creative while composing in a DAW. Again, none of this philosophical advice is much good for the same reason. Offer some actual practices and things you do while composing that can be useful.

the question "what are the best ways to be creative in a daw" is a lot like the question "what is the best way to get from toronto to california". practical (ie. non "philosophical") advice might be something like "take such and such highway", which doesnt address the more realistic concerns of where you'll end up sleeping, or what you're going to do when your car unexpectedly breaks down, etc. (i am totally stealing this analogy from somewhere, but i cant remember where) the point is so-called practical advice only takes you so far, while the majority of the creative process is going to be defined by how you as an individual navigate through it.

i think of video tutorials in much the same way. if i watch a video about, for example, how to produce a certain synth tone, what ends up happening for me is i may or may not end up with the result intended by the tutorial, but more importantly i will have been exposed to a new method or perspective, and that is far more valuable than a point-a-to-b approach to "how do i get good creativity".

obviously this is just something that works for me. maybe for someone else they absorb video tutorials and forum posts and find that they have an infinite tool box to perfectly recreate the music they hear in their head. ive never been any good at that. for me, composition is the question "what happens when i hit this thing with that thing" and music is whatever comes after.

[ectogemia]

Experiment.

All I have to add to that is also to be creative.