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I was just wondering what all your relationships with music is, for example, what is your musical upbringing or heritage; you are professionally engaged in music, academically or just socially? Is it a hobby, or something more?

It would just be interesting to know where you are al coming from.

I personally am aiming for music as a profession. I am currently in my second year of my Bachelor or Music doing composition. My background was limited, but I wrote my - non-harmonically accurate - piece at 4 years of age, when I was attending a piano academy. I dropped out of music from 6 to 14. When I turned 15 I took up piano and dabbled in composition, studying primarily Mozart on my own. When I turned 16 I was accepted into a certificate course at the same university I am at now.

http://www.soca.ecu.edu.au/students/waa ... gan-kiely/ is my composer’s “blog”. There are some samples of my pieces there, the clarinet one is the piece I won a prize with. With the same piece I have been invited to perform it at the 8th Tura Totally Huge New Music Festival in April.

That’s my background etc., what’s yours?!

Interesting topic!

I come from a very musical family; my grandfather played the piano, my mom used to sing, dad plays the trumpet and my sister plays the flute! It has always been a part of my life, and I think I knew very early that it would be (it possibly hadn't even occurred to me that it might not be).

I just remember dad buying recorders for my sister and me when we were young; mine has accompanied me all over the world by now.

In elementary school, I sang in the choir as soon as I was able, and I would've played in the band except that they cut the program. To spite the band, I began playing viola in the middle school orchestra when I was 12 (I also thought, and still do think, the alto clef was neat). About a year later, I joined a community orchestra for the first time, one that I've been with since.

In high school, I took a couple theory courses, and for my senior music project, I conducted the school orchestra on a piece of my own composition. This lead the director of the community orchestra I'm with to decide to take me as her assistant conductor, so this is my 5th year conducting.

For I time, I took up saxophone and played in a local jazz band, but I haven't been involved with that recently.

My aim at music is more of a hobby; if I were to try music professionally, I would quickly burn out! But it's a vital part of my life nonetheless, and I worry that if/when I move away, I won't be able to be as involved as I am now.

Anyway, that's my story!

Cool topic, really.

The music is actually a hobby for me, but I'm seriously thinking of doing my job with this. I am going into college, then there is still a year before I have to decide exactly what I will do later.

In the present, my relation with music is quite passional. Up to July 2006 I was studying piano just as a hobby in the music school of my town (about 30 minutes per day), actually more convinced by my parents than by my own. I decide then not to continue into this way and to quit the academy, to the big deception of my father, who is piano player too.

It seems to have produced an unforeseen effect on me, since a little year I'm indeed playing about 2-3 hours per day, taking all scores I want (actually a lot of classical/romantic pieces : beethoven's sonatas, Liszt's Rhapsodies, Brahms' pieces), making the neighbours and my whole family angry.

For the near future, I will get back again into the academy, to a higher level and with any better and "funnier" teacher, with who I could really take pleasure in studying piano.

I come from a family which loved music - my father was an oboe player in an orchestra in Poland (before migrating to Australia), my mum was (and sometimes still is) an (amateur) singer, and my brother and I both had music lessons from a young age.

Not sure how this compares to international music education systems, but music exams here have 8 grades (AMEB). I finished grade 8 on the piano, and grade 5 in flute and music theory. By then I was 16 years old, and the end of high school was fast approaching, and I had to decide what to do with my future career.

Feeling that I didn't have what it took to be a professional musician, and that I would not have survived in the world of professional music (which was far too competitive and aggressive and elitist and full of politics and back-stabbing), I decided to put the music to one side and studied medicine instead. (Yes, really...it is MUCH easier and more friendly.)

It was not until about 2 years ago, when I had finished all my postgraduate stuff and GP exams and settled in to work at my clinic, that I started to get my passion for music back. (I discovered how many frustrated would-be musicians there are in the medical profession!)

So now I work as a humble GP to feed the body, and play music in my spare(?) time to feed the soul. I try to practice an hour here and there when I can, as well as accumulating an ever-growing collection of CD's and a library of sheet music. I play piano and flute; my husband plays piano, organ and accordion. My brother plays some keyboard, as well as flute, viola (sometimes) and nyckelharpa. I share a clinic with another doctor who plays violin in the Australian Doctors' Orchestra and sings Schubert-Lieder. Another doctor who works a few miles away plays the cello. Unfortunately, times when we can get together to actually play are few and far between.

I recently acquired an alto flute and I am busy transcribing Schubert's "Arpeggione" sonata for it.

I'm afraid that much of my music fits the description in my signature, but I love playing and it keeps me from going insane.

aldona

aldona wrote:Feeling that I didn't have what it took to be a professional musician, and that I would not have survived in the world of professional music (which was far too competitive and aggressive and elitist and full of politics and back-stabbing), I decided to put the music to one side and studied medicine instead. (Yes, really...it is MUCH easier and more friendly.)

Hahaha... ouch Though that is not entirely false in some cases, unfortunately

I'm afraid that much of my music fits the description in my signature, but I love playing and it keeps me from going insane.

That's a very good reason to play music And indeed I can relate haha.

I recently acquired an alto flute

I just purchased a piccolo!!!
Have I gone insane???

Or is the start of something wonderful?

Is it possible to be proficient on the C flute, alto flute and piccolo? Or are my lip muscles going to go into meltdown?

(Yes, I know, I've heard Jean-Pierre Rampal play all three, but I am definitely not him. )

aldona

My family isn't overly musical. My father has no musical background whatsoever, but my mother is a vocal music major. She does/did not play professionally either. I started playing my violin about 8 years ago, when I was 8. I'm 16 now and loving it. Until about two years ago, all of my playing was just a hobby. Nowadays, it's very important to me. I plan on playing professionally someday. As like baragar, I too make my family insane because I play for about 3 hours a day.

I have taken up composition. I have only finished one work, a Romance for solo violin in B-Flat Major, which can be found under my name "Nickell" on IMSLP. I am currently working on a Quintet (2 Vln, 1 Vla, 2 VCl) and a Quartet (2 Vln, 1 Vla, 1 VCl). Those are going quite well.

That's my story in music so far. To sum it up: I am playing now for more than a hobby, it's more creatively, and I would like to play professionally someday. I plan on taking Music in college to major in either Composition or performace (My mother majored in performance).

I am currently an undergraduate piano performance major at an American university. I really hope to either perform or teach professionally one day. I do not compose at all, but I love studying music history, and listening to all sorts of genres of works from all eras and styles. I do a lot of solo performing, which is always exciting, but I really love collaborating. I recently got back from a festival where I played the Brahms F-minor piano quintet and the Schumann Piano Quartet, two masterpieces of the chamber music repertoire.

I do a lot of accompanying for money, although it is also something I really enjoy. I have an excellent sight-reading ability, a good ear for following, a tolerable voice and good language and pronunciation skills, so a career as a coach is also an option.

I also currently play organ at a Methodist church, where I occasionally direct the choir. I am not a very accomplished organist, and am good enough to fake it and just get by. I do enjoy directing choirs and this is also a possible career choice for me.

This summer I will be travelling to Salzburg to attend the Internationale Sommerakademie "Mozarteum". I will then spend a few weeks in England, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy.

Hi all, im 17 and from scotland, im an enthusiastic amateur musician, i play piano and cello. Im pretty good (at least i think i am) on the piano, good enough to be able to really enjoy myself, which is what really matters imho. Im not as good on cello, but i've joined the local amateur orchestra, we've got a great program of stuff for next year (tchaikovsky 5, dvorak 8 and beethoven 6 plus other good stuff) and i might even be able to play all the notes in one of the concerts!

I did consider going on to study music, but decided i probably wasn't good enough to play professionally and i would end up hating music, so im going to study chemistry instead, but Borodin was a chemist by profession, so who knows!

Im also interested in compostion, i wrote a few things (including an atonal fugue, i'd heard that it's hard to write fugues and to write good atonal music, so i tried, it's not too bad!) this year for my music course in school. Off at a slight tangent here: is submitting you own work to imslp encouraged or not? And is there a place specifically for people who want to put up thier own compostions and get feedback etc?

matthew wrote:Im also interested in compostion, i wrote a few things (including an atonal fugue, i'd heard that it's hard to write fugues and to write good atonal music, so i tried, it's not too bad!) this year for my music course in school. Off at a slight tangent here: is submitting you own work to imslp encouraged or not? And is there a place specifically for people who want to put up thier own compostions and get feedback etc?

Well, IMSLP is more of a library, so submission of compositional exercises are rather discouraged; however, submission of works that are presentable in a real concert is encouraged.

If your goal is for people to critique your scores and suggest improvements, I know that there are a few other forums which does this, though I would not be against doing this here too; though you'd have to link to the score hosted on an external site.

My own take on compositional criticism is an ambiguous one. On one hand, if you are the kind of person who would willingly accept scathing or otherwise negative criticism, I guess it would be alright. But honestly I have not seen a single composer who would take well to negative criticism, and thus we generally (in conservatories at least) do not criticize (except for the teachers, because its their job).

Anyway, all of the above is just to say that you must be prepared for rather negative criticism regarding your pieces if you actually want to learn something from them; however, this at times may not be a good thing (may very well destroy your confidence). My own experience says that the best criticism may be self criticism; just study the works of the great masters, and slowly you will be able to criticize yourself and improve your compositional skills And yes, you must also compose lots (and get them performed).

In any case, if you still want to have your compositions reviewed, put up a file on another site, and start up a thread in this forum

[q](including an atonal fugue, i'd heard that it's hard to write fugues and to write good atonal music, so i tried, it's not too bad!)[/q]Not to be a party pooper, but the only thing that makes a fugue hard it when it is tonally logical. The combination for dominant, real, tonal, stretto, answer, counter subject, and the amount of voices and the various chords they suggest, is not possible with atonal music, for anything is possible and fits.

A lot of what you say is true, but atonality doesn't nesecarily mean just throwing any notes in and not everything works well so although there aren't the pretty strict rules of conventional harmony and counterpoint, you still have to make sure it sounds how you want it (i hesitate to use the word "good" here), and calling it atonal it can't make throwing random notes at a page into good music. So it's not quite as simple as you seem to be implying.

I'm not saying it's simple, but it is illogical, and tonal music is more complex.

I'm just saying that having an atonal fugue takes the complexity from the fugue because you don't have any limitation apart from what you or your critics "like".

[q]My own take on compositional criticism is an ambiguous one. On one hand, if you are the kind of person who would willingly accept scathing or otherwise negative criticism, I guess it would be alright. But honestly I have not seen a single composer who would take well to negative criticism, and thus we generally (in conservatories at least) do not criticize (except for the teachers, because its their job). [/q]One at my university is like that. He or she will take no criticism constructive or negative from lecturer, proven composer or student ever.

I am open to criticism, I have got some close relationships with students and lecturers and both will say quite opening (And to a full Music Auditorium) that they "just don't like it", but I do appreciate their confidence in me to be able to handle the criticism.

[q]My own experience says that the best criticism may be self criticism; just study the works of the great masters, and slowly you will be able to criticize yourself and improve your compositional skills[/q]But it can be VERY dangerous when severe. What of Scriabin's 8th symphony, Bruckner, Debussy(?) and several other composers. They all destroyed there own works because they were self critical. It is good, but you also will never hear things that others will hear. I have cataloged my first ever piece, I will openly admit my first 10 or so pieces are dreadful but I will still keep them for historical purposes. I HAD "TI" MOVING UP A STEP IN THE BASS AND MELODY TO "DO". How bad is that.
My first piece I didn't know ANYTHING and was doing it all by ear, but I still managed to get "V" "I" somehow.

With my own compositions I prefer not making them public.

Musically my family has dabbled in it, thats about it. My mother played flute in high school because her parents made her, my father played percussion in high school, because his mother thought it would be too rough on him to play football. My sister played Bb clarinet for 2 years in middle school.

I on the other hand, well... its fun. So I was in choir from elementary through the 4 grade, played recorder for a year with an ensemble in the 5th, then picked up the Bb trumpet for 3 years. During that time I also picked up a bit of clarinet from my sister. From the 9th grade on up to the present, I played guitar. Recently I started violin and piano at the local music studio and plan on pursuing those two instruments up to the completion of my Masters.

Having talked with the music department head at my local college and showing him some chamber orchestra works, he recommends I major in Composition/Arranging and minor in Conducting for my Bachelors program on up, which I do plan to do.

Music is not a hobby, its how I support myself by way of commission, its not glamorous, and it hardly pays the bills, but I wouldn't have it any other way.

ummm...i started learning music when i was about five, and i just loved it. i loved the piano, the sound and how it could play chords. two years later, i picked up the violin and less than a term later, i picked up the viola. it was pretty cool, to be honest, to be finding that i could actually do something well.
nobody in my family had ever played music before - they were too poor - so i was the first one to actually pick up music, and gosh, were they proud!!!
i love music. there is no other way to say it, but i love music. i loved it from the very first moment i started playing because it is just so beautiful.