Throughout history, the products of musical creativity and labour (scores, sounds, ideas, etc.) have been exchanged for money, services, or goods. One of the earliest recorded demonstrations of this type of exchange, suggests Stephen Blum, is the indigenous Blackfoot Confederacy myth of the Beaver Medicine Bundle, where ‘the first human owner of the bundle receives a series of songs from beaver in return for prepared animal skins’.1 For many in the music industry today, the monetisation of a compositional commodity is an awkward by-product of artistic endeavours. The linking of creators and products through models of copyright, and the replacement of the patronage system with a capitalist model both offer an uncomfortable challenge to creative autonomy; a challenge that, for many, presents an uncomfortable compromise needed to counteract the low pay and insecurity of a precarious profession.2 Forging a meaningful career as a composer necessarily means negotiating one’s ‘sense-of-self-as-artist in the context of market economics … [alongside aspirations] to retain a degree of emancipation (both moral and financial) from the messy business of late-stage capitalism and the transitioning of business models within the recorded, published and live performance cultural industries.’3 In other words, activities that once attracted charges of ‘selling out’ (i.e. the act of abandoning previously held aesthetic commitments for commercial gain) are now considered savvy or even ordinary strategies for artists to be heard and make a living.4
This pull between autonomy and service provision sits centrally to the various ways that a composer might monetise their work. The commissioning model in concert music – i.e. writing music on demand for a particular venue, artist, or patron – remains a central vehicle for composers to (usually) have free reign over what they write: but the freedom to avoid market commodification also comes at the cost that these opportunities are few and far between. Creative autonomy does not mean an absence of limitations though, and having work commissioned requires a keen attention to the needs of the commissioner (such as deadlines, length, instrumentation, and other special requirements). Film, television, and games music also has a commonly established commissioning practice known as ‘bespoke’ composition, but in this field, it is far more common for the commissioner to be very specific – and often also very demanding – in their needs, often presenting composers with a defined brief for the work. The other option for a media composer is writing production music (sometimes known as library music), which is ‘generic’ music that can be licensed to customers – such as film producers and directors – directly by a production company without specific negotiation from the composer.
Whilst composing for the media and popular music industries is generally better paid than concert music, there is an expectation that composers at the earlier stage of their career will spend a lot of time writing in a pastiche style to simulate temporary guide tracks, and creative autonomy is something that is hard earned. The ideologies of competition, individualism and entrepreneurship are palpable in much of this world:5 for instance, there is a widely accepted culture of working for free in anticipation of paid employment and composers will frequently put advance time and labour into demos to present at competitive pitching processes required to obtain this work.6 How plausible this is for composers will depend on their personal financial situations (e.g. privileging those with access to support from family and friends) but also directly correlates to the funding system in their individual country, with countries like Austria or Scandinavia, for example, supporting artists through yearly salaries and tax deductions. Financial models likely correlate with creative practices: we see in continental Europe, where arts funding stems from state-funded opportunities, artistic innovation is rewarded, whereas in the US where there is little public subsidy, aesthetic adventure and risk is less commonly expected.7
Beyond commissioning, there are several opportunities to further monetise an existing composition. The most common of these is payment for live performances of a work (royalties) or record plays (mechanical royalties). Royalty collection agencies will ensure that the composer will be reimbursed every time a piece is performed live – through the ‘small rights’ of a concert, or the ‘grand rights’ of a dramatic work (opera, dance, musical theatre, etc.) – or a recorded track is played on the radio, at a venue or streamed by a digital service provider (e.g. iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, or SoundCloud).8 At the time of writing, streaming income is much less than through traditional royalties, with a five-minute track receiving around £150 from radio airplay on a major station, but £0.0066 on Apple Music and only £0.0028 on Spotify.9 The second route to finance is sheet music publishing, either for sale or hire, although, since publishers often keep copyright themselves, the small percentage that reaches the composer makes this ancillary income for many. It is increasingly rare for publishers to put a lot of resources behind marketing a composer, so more developed artists with existing followings are going to be more appealing to publishers, meaning that this option is not necessarily available to those earlier in their careers. The final opportunity lies in the exploitation of intellectual property through synchronisation (the licensing of existing music as soundtracks for visual media), which offers an increasingly eclectic and accessible pathway for monetisation regardless of genre or existing audience base.
It is extremely rare for composers to be able to earn their entire incomes from composition alone. The conflation of cultural and financial value within the production and consumption of new music often forces composers to either adopt a position of ‘flexible speculation’ – the ability to create a variety of products for sale in a number of markets, often with wide-ranging payment structures in response to rapidly shifting market forces.10 Composers today are largely freelance, and alongside compositional activities might earn money from performing (e.g. as composer-conductor), giving interviews or pre-concert talks, making YouTube videos, creative residences, arts administration, delivering community projects and workshops, or something completely different. One major patron of new music is academia, which offers steady income and financial stability to many composers who frame their work in terms of research and teaching. For some, this financial security offers greater creative freedom, as the intellectual arena offers a platform to pursue interests outside the regimes of domination imposed by cognitive capitalism,11 whilst for others the ivory tower ‘sanctuary’ provided by universities siloes composers away from the reality of commercial music-making, allowing them to become out of touch with prevailing societal trends and needs.12 Forging a career as an academic composer is now an established path for a composer, and an increasing number of institutions offer practice-based doctorate opportunities – many of them funded – as specific training in this field.13
Many composers struggle dealing with the precarity of the career, often encountering low income, constantly changing work patterns, decreased stability, and continuous travelling. A recent survey from the Ivors Academy in the UK found that over half of composers earn under £10 k from composition – most of which is from self-produced projects rather than professional commissions, and nearly a third have considered abandoning their creative careers after the Covid-19 pandemic.14 For a career where there is often little division between work and life, with frequent exposure to public criticism, and whose core activities are traditionally solitary, emotional management can be a challenge for the composer building their professional profile. This challenge is exacerbated for composers of colour and women composers, who ‘continue to experience a masculine bias that … [affects] income, work and learning, relationships and networks’.15 Composers from marginalised groups often find themselves pressured to adopt an ‘artificial ‘persona that eschews their cultural connections as an explicit part of their practice … to avoid being two-dimensionalized as an artist’,16 and report having to manage their public identity by ‘tailoring their behaviours in order to “fit in”’17 through concealment tactics and identity management.
One particular challenge in the industry today is the downscaling of labour, meaning that composers are required to become increasingly active within commodity chains (i.e. the different stages of cultural production), and less likely to be valued for their creative labour and expertise alone. In concert music, this might mean composers creating and formatting their own scores and parts (rather than this being taken on by publishers) and being responsible for an increased administrative workload, such as fundraising with (or even on behalf of) commissioning bodies. In the commercial side of the industry, composers are often expected to be able to record and produce work themselves – often including the procuring and managing of musicians – to provide high-standard music on a limited budget. Increasingly, compositional skill lies as much in immaterial production (conceptual insight, determining and costing the viability of projects), entrepreneurial skills (self-promotion, funding applications) and relational labour18 (building relationships with gatekeepers, understanding the strategic and structural dynamics of cultural institutions, and forming meaningful connections with audiences through social media) as it does in the construction of musical works.
Music is a vessel that can communicate the most profound and powerful emotions and mysteries, the highest intellect; can express the widest breadth of the human condition, conveying qualities that cannot be put into words. Great music from the past speaks to us through the individual voice of each composer or performer. But what is a composer’s voice, and why is it important to your career? Each human being is an individual spark of the universal life force we all share, and each of us brings our own unique qualities packed into this life force. These qualities mark us out with varied personalities, and it is this individuality which can tell of the unspoken mysteries we have in common as a species. Made up of physical bodies and that miracle, the mind, we have a creative spirit, capable of reaching beyond any physical boundaries, of taking flight into unexplored realms and dimensions. Whether your choice as a composer is to work with science or mathematical formulae, or to visit far-reaching corners of the imagination, or to work with all of the above; it is the authenticity of an individual voice which is the primary quality of any great expression. Great music, as we shall see later in this chapter, need not consist of completely new ideas.
If the unique authenticity of the composer is strong enough, their voice will pervade and speak through the music. We cannot ‘unhear’ the music we have listened to, nor can we ‘unexperience’ our life experiences. What we can do is built on what has gone before with our own individual voices. Having said this, even if we try our best to emulate exactly what another composer has produced, it would be difficult to succeed. The sixteenth-century French philosopher Michel Montaigne said that ‘[t]here never were, in the world, two opinions alike, no more than two hairs, or two grains; their most universal quality is diversity’.1 Some individual voices show themselves without much effort. With intelligence and integrity, others not so sure can work towards distilling the individual essence of their own creative talents. In this case, it requires a certain amount of courage to plumb the depths of your own nature and so gain the self-knowledge to claim this badge of utmost personal authenticity. The ingredients you will need are curiosity, passion for your art, patience, diligence, commitment, and some amount of self-belief.
Everything we see around us, outside of nature, started as an idea, a thought, a flicker of inspiration: cruise liners, aircraft, space rockets, mobile phones, computers, monumental buildings. You are creating an intangible piece of architecture; a sound world which, though invisible, might conjure great vision and change in the listener. Believe in yourself, in your unique idea. Find your own flicker of inspiration. Build on that, enjoy it, and persist. You are now the voices of music, the keepers of this vessel that can be life-changing or inspirational for those who want to receive it; the vessel that touches all aspects of life, and without which our lives would be much poorer. It is now up to you to keep the flame alight and pass it on, keeping the vessel of music alive to continue enriching the world.
How do we do that in the present day? So many new ideas have emerged in the last century that it is worth considering the world environment during this time. Throughout the twentieth century there were unprecedented events in classical music: the start of atonality and many – and varied – innovations in composition stretched both the listener’s and the composer’s expectations of a central canon beyond what could have been imaginable before that century. Is this a great opportunity of freedom for contemporary composers, or is it a problem? It is a problem in that everyone seriously studying composition has now to decide which trend to follow – or not. Given that a large part of being a composer comprises making many decisions, this situation seems to add another aspect of difficulty to an already complex art form. However, freedoms as broad as these could also offer more possibilities for finding one’s own voice.
Past Eras (and What Composers Had to Say)
Let us take a look back. In the baroque and classical music eras, composers built their works on the traditional musical language of the day. Sonatas first emerged in the sixteenth century, already having developed as instrumental transcriptions from songs, most of them written for solo instruments. Domenico Scarlatti was one of the earliest proponents of the form, producing 555 sonatas, most being single-movement works for keyboard. Although he kept to the traditional form, his sonatas take us on an extensive journey, with splendid individuality showcased through unexpected modulations, textures, and sonorities. It’s even possible that one hears influences from Spanish and Portuguese folk music in his compositions. So here is a composer writing in an established form, but these works could only be Scarlatti’s. Then, about eighty years later, Beethoven starts on his colossus of 32 piano sonatas. In his hands, this originally simple form develops into a searing, vast emotional expanse of expression. He broadens the sonata’s horizons and takes us on a kaleidoscopic adventure, starting from the early ones influenced by Haydn and Mozart (the first three were published when he was thirteen) to Sonata No. 16, when he decides to take a new path; then even further to the late sonatas from Op. 101 to Op. 111, which are even more utterly unique, deeply personal and heart-rending. Of course, composers don’t exist in a vacuum. Beethoven’s deafness had a big effect on his work, but changing trends in the world of the arts might also have been catalysts for his radical development of the sonata: a hugely important genre for him.
Born the same year as Scarlatti and Handel, J. S. Bach wrote sonatas and partitas, the latter making full use of traditional dance forms. Suites such as partitas were a popular vehicle for such forms, typically the allemande, courante, sarabande and gigue. Other dances were sometimes added, like the minuet, gavotte and bourrée. But what is noticeable about the usage of these forms is that composers such as Froberger, Handel and Bach put their individual stamp on the dances, giving them a personal treatment recognisable as that composer’s work. One of music’s most famous masterpieces is J. S. Bach’s chaconne from his Partita in D minor. The chaconne is said to originate in Spain around 1600 as a fast dance-song, but by the early eighteenth century, Bach had transformed it into the highest art, with profound emotional expression and utmost technical skill, and again with a voice indelibly his own. Now, in the twenty-first century, composers are still using passacaglias and other ancient forms – baroque dances, sonatas, chorales, canons, fugues, and so on – as at least a starting point for some of their work. What you might take from this is this: if using an already tried and tested genre as a basis appeals to you and gives you freedom to express what you want to say, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. Originality can start from reworking a well-trodden path.
The Present Time (and the Potpourri of Modern Techniques)
The list of twentieth- and twenty-first-century composers below is as long as their styles are varied. I am listing very few, and you will know most – or all – of them. This is just to illustrate how many very different branches of music there now are on the classical music platform, and perhaps to provide a starting point to spark ideas for your own work: Edward Elgar, Gustav Mahler, Arnold Schoenberg, Charles Ives, Béla Bartók, Igor Stravinsky, Alban Berg, Rebecca Clarke, Florence Price, Nadia Boulanger, Sergei Prokofiev, Aaron Copland, Dmitri Shostakovich, Olivier Messiaen, John Cage, Benjamin Britten, Leonard Bernstein, Iannis Xenakis, György Ligeti, Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Harrison Birtwistle, Terry Riley, Brian Ferneyhough, Nicola LeFanu, John Adams, Oliver Knussen.
These composers were all born within 100 years of each other, but their music covers avant-garde, microtonality, neoclassicism, serialism and post-serialism, minimalism, musique concrète and new complexity, to touch on a few areas they inhabited. Which other century has produced a musical phenomenon of so many splintering genres and new ideas? Was this connected in any way to a parallel splintering in other fields throughout the world due to international and national events? During this century of many turning points there were two world wars, the aftermath of which changed the balance of global power, destroying or altering some of the most powerful empires and leading to the creation of nuclear weapons; the start of exploration into outer space and man landing on the moon for the first time; the Russian revolution; economic depressions; the rise of dictatorship; the Holocaust and decolonization; the invention of television and transistor, which hastened and revolutionised computer development; and the emergence of China as a world power.
Composers living through these events could not have been totally unaware or unaffected by them. And how about other art forms? There is evidence that across the board they too were impacted by twentieth-century events, including life’s quickening pace and the broadening of ideas. Visual artists looked inward and searched for new techniques, resulting in another divergent evolution and multi-splintering of styles which still influence today’s art scene. These styles included expressionism, Fauvism, cubism, Dadaism, surrealism, pop art and postmodernism. The theatre experienced a burgeoning of new forms: experimental theatre, modernism, impressionism, political theatre and expressionism, along with continued development of older forms.
Architecture and design were affected, bringing in the modernist movement where functionalism gained importance and a new aesthetic flourished. As new ideas developed, many techniques emerged: arts and crafts, De Stijl, Bauhaus, blobism, brutalism, deconstructivism, to name some. The Empire State Building, an example of Art Deco, went up in 1931. Some leading architects of the new movement were Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, Jørn Utzon (who coined the term ‘additive Architecture’,2 referring to his work as following the growth patterns of nature), Antoni Gaudi and Frank Lloyd Wright. Literature, meanwhile, entered the modernist and postmodernist era, through the writings of: L. Frank Baum, Franz Kafka, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Hermann Hesse, T. S. Eliot, Jean Rhys, George Orwell, Samuel Beckett, Stanislaw Lem, Germaine Greer, Richard Bach and Alice Walker.
I have selected these lists because of the importance that delving into important works offers a composer, maybe revealing new ideas about how to see the world, or at least demonstrating the breadth of human thought and creation in the twentieth century, sparked by many turns of world events.
A Plethora of Choice
It can be incredibly daunting to set out on the search for your own voice, given the dizzying variety and vast spaghetti junctions of styles that already exist in new music. How do you navigate the endless sea of genres and find something original? You may have strong feelings about the music that appeals to you, and that which does not. This may be a clue for you to follow a similar path to the music you like, using it as a starting point or as a model for experimentation. You might, however, discover just as much – or even more – by studying the music you don’t like. If your own voice needs some encouragement to emerge, you might want to investigate what it is that appeals to you in one piece and does not appeal in another.
To start with, what are the components of the big picture? What are the molecules that make up the matter of music? Music is sound; that sound is organised by the composer, who becomes the author of the work. The best works have some things in common, and to be authors ourselves we need to be able to recognise these qualities. A freshness – in other words, the unique voice of the individual – is definitely a prerequisite for the greatest music. A musical language that is undeniably very much itself; an original character in the same way people we know as standout characters, even to the point of eccentricity, are instantly familiar as themselves.
After freshness, a sense of integrity or inner truth should be present in a great work. Just as a person has substance and weight of character, so too should we be able to recognise this in a good composition. The idea or concept behind the work will contribute largely to its integrity. Honest emotional expression behind the notes or the sonic conveyance of aspects of our human condition also gives a communication of inner truth, as would the personal vision or honesty and truth of the author themself.
In any art form there has to be cohesion, making from limbs and organs, blood and bone, a whole being. Or putting together a chassis, engine, gearbox, steering wheel, tyres, brakes and numerous other parts into a motor vehicle not just good enough for the roads but for high-performance racing at Nürburgring Nordschleife. Each human being or animal has their own genes, but even identical twins are genetically different because of gene mutation or plasticity occurring before birth. Complex genomic variation is part of evolution and possibly the reason we adapt and survive. So, to state the obvious, cohesion does not necessarily mean using always exactly the same pitch or same chord throughout a piece, but finding what aspects you want to keep in common to make the work hang together, whether similar and related intervals, corresponding rhythms, related pitch classes or harmonic language. But keep in mind our genetics, leaving room for variety.
Technical skill is a necessary tool without which even the best imagination or idea is likely to flounder. With all the will in the world, lacking knowledge of how to use and manipulate musical material can only lead, at best, to a weak example of work, and at worst, to communicating nothing and leaving the listener bored, or even irritated. Technical skills can be learnt by studying scores and listening to great works in order to see how the composer has used particular techniques, and then writing exercises to sharpen your own methods of that particular technique. This in itself will not lead directly to finding your own voice, but it will oil the wheels for later when you are finding your way to individuality. Without some technical skill, you won’t be able to communicate your musical ideas clearly and articulately. Think of a performer. They know the interpretation they want to achieve, but without hours of practice they won’t be able to come near to the outcome they hear in their mind’s ear. Think of technique as a stairway leading from the loft of the imagination or concept of the music, lowering to the landing of construction of the score and finally descending to the ground-floor performance of the work. The sturdier and more beautifully the staircase is built, the more connected and similar the loft is to the ground floor.
The best of techniques still can be empty without strong intention from the composer showing itself in the writing. This intention, at its best, is like an invisible horizontal power line through the music, taking the listener on a fascinating, compelling journey all the way to the final destination. An interesting journey needs some contrasts, and these can be presented by changes of mood or atmosphere in the music, changing dynamics, rhythm and pulse. Changes of pitch, timbre and texture can add colour and variety, especially in orchestral pieces. Similarly, different tempi, contrasting layers at the same time and unexpected modulations may provide surprises. When thinking of the ‘big picture’ for your piece, coming up with types of contrasts can be a helpful springboard.
That horizontal cable of intention carries with it a pacing of the whole work, which is crucial to a captivating musical journey. The importance of how long one idea, mood, texture, area of pitch or harmonic landscape lasts cannot be stressed enough. Ligeti and the minimalists have made a virtue of taking repetition to extremes and making it work, but not without ample consideration. Just as important is the decision of which ideas lie contiguous with each other, and how the application of one idea affects others along the line.
Shape, structure or form play a huge part in how a piece of music is perceived and received. Although mentioned last, this ‘molecule’ of structure is of immense importance in the scheme of the whole work. Whether working with traditional forms or aspects of them, inventing your own, making a start from a strong musical idea and carrying on and constructing a shape in retrospect, or whether you have a clear concept which helps to shape the piece, there must be some cohesion present. Do you want to wear your technique on your sleeve as the minimalists do, creating a piece that sounds the way the Lloyds building in London looks, or does your narrative, for example, transport the listener while the technique supports the narrative in an underground cable? All these possibilities, when decided upon, can be a tremendous help in finding your way into a new composition. Before you know it, that threatening snowscape of manuscript paper could soon be filled to the brim with numerous sketches or nearly complete scoring; could at least hold the scaffolding of the work, its spaces quivering in anticipation to be filled in with resonant bricks and mortar. Make a start in your mind’s ear, pencil the first stroke – there is always an eraser if you decide to start again. Don’t be daunted.
Towards Your Own Voice
Yes, writing myriads of exercises to practise technique and then finding a starting point may be important, but before you do any of that, where are you coming from? All life and all epochs are unmatched miracles, but in this unprecedented and extraordinary era we are experiencing the aftermath of world-shattering events. Events from which emerged a rapid acceleration of technology, a tidal wave of electromagnetic data flooding our lives, our homes, our sense of touch, our ears and eyes, our entire selves. There is a constant stream of information instantly available if we want it, and the ubiquitous presence of social media in each person’s close orbit. I am not sure if human beings have evolved at the same breakneck speed needed to keep up with these technological breakthroughs. This ‘cyber noise’ can be virtually all we experience if we let it, blocking out our own thoughts, musings, and reflections. In other words, we may cease to see ourselves in a true light, in our most human and primal form because we are drowning in the noise of today’s world, obscured by social media’s ability to network us to the billionth degree, way beyond what was feasible on a normal human scale in the ancient days of pre-computer times.
If you do nothing else to find your own voice, spend at least fifteen minutes a day alone without mobile phone, without computer, without television or any other electronic device. Be outside in nature if you can. Find a park or some countryside. Have an attack of amnesia and forget what worrying is; forget how to dwell on everyday matters. Gaze at a leaf or a blade of grass instead, and let your mind float, taking in the wonder of nature. Listen to the relative silence and your inner voice. Physical exercise is also good, so maybe on some days go for a walk in nature if you can. When you are back at your writing desk, where to start? You have listened to music that appeals to you and music that does not. This should help you narrow down choices of the sort of music you want to compose and help you find what’s close to your heart, and therefore is a part of you. To be yourself, it is always a good sign when you feel some excitement or love about your direction of choice and the start of your working process. If you felt excited by a particular technique you worked with in an exercise, then that’s a good place to start finding your voice. Or perhaps you loved the overall structure you heard in another piece, and it sparked your imagination and made you want to build on a similar structure. Or perhaps you are passionate about a concept or narrative that means something in your life; in fact, I think this is the biggest clue to recognising your own voice. If there was an experience that affected you deeply – it could be nothing to do with music, or it could be a piece of music you heard – there is no better sounding board for finding your voice.
So, remember profoundly affecting experiences, the emotions they brought up in you. How would these experiences translate into sound? The several lists I gave before are hints to a starting point for your own identity as a composer. See films and theatre, visit art galleries, observe striking buildings, read good books and poems. You will begin to see yourself reflected in the works that evoke a strong response in you – although, I believe that once you have found your uniqueness and the composer in you is awakened, looking at a piece of linoleum should fire you up with an idea and the inspiration and impetus to compose. Encourage your imagination and learn, as William Blake said, ‘to see a World in a grain of sand’.3 Once you find that connection with your true voice, anything, even a drop of water might become a catalyst for inspiration.
Then, how do you want to affect the listener? Good music can satisfy the intellect while moving and transporting the listener to fantastical dimensions. But in what vessel? Are you a Dan DeCarlo or a Leonardo da Vinci, a Shonda Rhimes or a David Lynch? Are you Mills and Boone, Agatha Christie or John Milton; Paige Bradley, part of the CowParade, Henry Moore or Rodin? Are you uninterested in the existence of an audience? Keep in mind that your music, if you’re lucky, will be heard and responded to by listeners – whether you acknowledge them or not – and they will be more convinced by a true picture of you than something second-hand. This is why having live performances of your pieces early on is vital to the process of becoming a composer. If you become your own audience, the experience could be a good teacher, a testing place to develop further as a composer. In this situation, try to be as objective as possible about how your own music is coming across. Does it sound the way you envisaged? Part of composing also bears the responsibility of taking your performers into account in the way you score a work, so that your original intentions can be clearly brought by them to an audience. These intentions should sound as close as possible to what you heard in the resounding ether.
Back to your daily minutes of solitude and silence. Music comes out of silence and needs it as a backdrop. These precious minutes of solitude and silence can be the framework for you to recognise your true self and what it is that you want to present as a composer. These times can then be lengthened to incorporate the first ‘hearing’ of the music you are starting to compose, or the growth and development of music that you may have already started on a manuscript page. Silent solitude can be the doorway where your musical imagination enters. Encourage it to come in; there will be time enough to censure and criticise what you are doing when you work on the piece later.
While you develop as a composer you might notice that some ideas come to you without much effort ‘out of the blue’, as it were, from your imagination, your personal wellspring of spirit. Some theories tell us that the left brain governs the right side of the body and produces logic and intellectual abilities, while the right brain governs the left side of the body, along with instinct, imagination and creativity. If we accept this theory for the moment, such an art form as composition can engage the right brain as well as the left. And who is in control of your brain? Take the reins. You are the creator, the pilot guiding the vessel, deciding which hemisphere to traverse, which planets and stars will guide you, how you will mix the instincts and mysteries of the right brain with the intellectual rigour of the left. With all the many ingredients of structure, mystery and intellect, technique, overall concept and so on which make up music, there is much to consider when embarking on a new work. Be patient with yourself. You are working with many dimensions to make something that is whole and that is meaningful. This will not happen overnight; many great composers of the past worked through exhaustive sketches and then re-worked material before arriving at their final masterpiece. Through all this process, if you keep ‘touching base’ to connect with your true voice, your own truth should give you some of the strength and forbearance you need throughout the voyage. If you have a powerful musical vision connected to who you are, this will also inspire and impel you to completion.
So, quieten your mind and begin to recognise your unique compositional essence. When you feel passion, love or excitement during your working process, these are strong clues that you are connecting with your individual voice. Then be patient; work and re-work the material if you need to. Push the boundaries of what you have set out for each piece as far as you dare, or beyond – you might break through into unexpected and extraordinary territory. Remember, you are writing a new piece of music, not music that will sound like another piece you think is good. But even if you have started by using aspects of that other piece, keep ‘touching base’ with yourself by putting those aspects on the conveyor belt of your factory, and so transform them into something undeniably yours.
How do you claim a structure as your own? Well, it is the details within the structure of your work that will stand out to carry your voice. Some people like to start writing and see where it takes them, but even then, like falling dominoes, each note you put down has an effect on what follows. The composer controls the process and has to decide what material comprises the first falling domino and how that material governs the consequences it has for the rest. If you work within a pre-thought-out structure, no matter how complex the details, keep the whole in mind – both the integrity of the piece and your own integrity. At the same time, allow your creative instincts and mysteries to mix with your intellectual workings-out. If music is your gift and your passion, you hold one of the richest treasures of human life. You possess a conduit, capable of transporting an audience to other dimensions, or of changing and deepening their perception of their own dimension. This conduit can explain what the essence of life force means, speaking to that part of us usually hidden or obscured by our conscious minds, but able to connect with – and instantly understand – the deepest mysteries and highest communications that music can convey. The voice through which the music speaks to us of these mysteries must have a depth and integrity of spirit to impart such treasures for which no words are adequate.
There are many reasons for why you might be writing music, and how and why you are doing it, but to sustain and build a career as a composer it is vital to control the guise in which you are recognised. This guise is how you communicate what you are as a composer and the music you write; in essence, how you relate to your audience and keep them engaged. Your audience is your career. They should be considered from a very broad perspective: not just the people who stream, buy a CD, or listen to your music live or on the radio, but also the music industry, ensembles, soloists, festivals, venues, funders, publishers, record labels, commissioning organisations, sync agents and more. They are all part of the vital ecosystem that supports your career and helps you access who you need to reach. There is no set way to reach these audiences – and you will need to forge your own unique path as you develop your own personal ecosystem – but there are some strategies of engagement and connection that I shall outline in this chapter to start you on the journey of telling your story.
Networking and Building Your Tribe
People in every walk of life (especially musicians and composers) hate the term networking! For many people it brings up negative connotations, anxious thoughts and worries whenever it is mentioned in any scenario, but I try to consider it in a positive sense. Networking represents chances you have to meet people, tell them about you and your work and build meaningful artistic and creative connections. Networking is the way you find other people doing interesting work, who might in turn find your work interesting. It offers moments of chance and serendipity, where you can share your thoughts and ideas with others and invite them to help your ideas to expand and grow. This could be from the external advice you receive, or even from people who might want to join you on your journey and support your ideas or work in some more tangible way. If you shy away too much from networking opportunities, it will likely hinder where your career can go by limiting the possibilities you have to create your own tribe – that is, champions and supporters in the industry – around you; a crucial step in enabling the work you are most excited about to get off the ground.
I am not suggesting you cannot do it on your own, but think of the possibilities that finding like-minded people to support your music and collaborators might lead to. If you sit in your room every day and write music, never talking to anyone, it will be extremely difficult to generate the opportunities for your music to be regularly performed, build an audience, or ultimately, to even sustain a career as a composer. As we’ve seen in the pandemic, much can be achieved remotely, but when we can get together in person it quickly becomes apparent that collaboration is a vital part of building a career. There are many levels and places where making connections is important:
Finding Musicians to Play Your Music
From the first moment you are studying, harness the potential to make new friends and contacts around you. If you are at a university, college or conservatoire, you will be mixing with artists who all have the possibility of becoming successful professionals in their own right, perhaps by creating their own groups and ensembles with commissioning opportunities, or leading professional organisations in the industry and having future influence on funding. If you build strong connections from the start, you will increase the possibilities of having peers you can reach out, who will play a role in your future by making useful introductions or championing your music in a wider arena than you can access by yourself. Outside of education institutions, there are myriad schemes and competitions that are great entry points to present your music to ensembles, organisations and venues (e.g. in London, we have the London Symphony Orchestra’s ‘Panufnik Composers’ Scheme’ or the London Sinfonietta’s ‘Writing the Future’), offering an opportunity to forge relationships with fellow composers and influential contacts in the industry that might lead to more work in the future.
Talking to People about Ideas You Have
It is often advantageous to contact gatekeepers of cultural institutions directly. If, for example, there is a venue your music could be performed at, suggest a specific project or piece by outlining what might interest them and why they should be part of your journey. Think about what their goals are as an organisation (e.g. venue or music festival) and what they might be wanting to entice their audiences with, and whether there is an interesting idea behind your piece that is relevant specifically to that organisation: something that makes a collaboration with you exciting and will benefit their own communities and audiences.
Applying to Funders That Support Composers
Being supported by funders can not only offer directly financial support for your music and projects but also aid your profile and offer important PR (public relations) and image management potential. Not only are funders like the PRS or ASCAP Foundations influencers in their own right, but also the panels they form to select projects to fund include other influential people, who might be inspired to talk favourably about your music behind closed doors. National organisations also run networking events that are ideal opportunities to connect with people who are not already directly in your sphere of contacts in order to expand your network further and create the potential for exciting and unpredicted connection and collaboration.
Starting to Build a Support Team
Use your networking to start conversations with people from across the industry to start building a holistic and wide-ranging team around you, perhaps including publishers, labels, agents, managers, and patrons in your networks. Even if you aren’t looking for these more ‘establishment’ contacts specifically, people working in these areas can also be useful people to signpost you to those who can offer advice and help make connections for the future.
Making and Releasing Recordings
An audience, commissioner, concert programmer, or ensemble’s main way to get to know your music is through high-quality recordings; definitely audio but increasingly video where possible. Recordings not only help present your work but also show a level of professionalism that’s important for commissioners needing to know they can trust you to produce high-quality performance and marketing materials to a specified deadline. Recordings also hold increased potential for reaching new audiences via radio airplay and streaming. Even if you are not releasing something commercially as an EP or album, well-made recordings can be useful to make in order to share with competitions, potential venues and ensembles, or funders.
Of course, an official release is a major moment to help promote you as a composer both nationally and internationally. Releasing a single-author album for a composer can be a significant way to build your profile by creating a calling card that is specifically focused on you (as opposed to being on multi-work discs from orchestras or chamber groups where your music is concealed amongst that of other composers). Depending on what you are intending to record and the profile you already have, it might be straightforward for you to be able to approach a label or publisher and set up a collaboration; in some instances a label may be able to offer you a financial advance or other in-kind help with some of the recording costs, whilst in others you may have to raise funding in order to be able to get a label involved. There can great benefits to having label involvement: having a known name makes you more likely to be able to get reviews in specialist classical magazines, national newspapers, or influential online blogs, for example. They will likely have in-house PR and marketing departments who can help promote your release so that it is not all down to you, and in the world of streaming they will already have distributors who may also be able to reach the all-important editorial playlisters at individual streaming platforms. As tempting as a proposal of working with a label or publisher may be, do not be blinded by the offer of signing without first doing your research and finding out (a) what reach they are really likely to have, and (b) the likelihood that they will spend any time promoting your release or work.
It is true to say that today as many artists and composers self-release as go via the institutions of a label, and for all the extra effort this entails it does enable you to control every aspect of the project. In fact, many streaming platforms actually make self-releasing incredibly easy. Regardless of genre or contacts, it is now simple to pay a small amount of money via an online distributor (such as Distrokid, CD Baby, Disko, etc.) and have your music available for anyone to hear across the world on major platforms, or directly on Bandcamp. If physical copies are important to you, it is also straightforward to produce a limited run of CDs to ‘release’ on Amazon. This allows a lot of freedom for you to build your own strategy to create a moment of celebration around your music without having to wait for too many gatekeepers.
Social Media
Social media is fickle and a seemingly ever-changing arena, but it can be an important medium to easily reach audiences on a global scale and really impact your career. Used as a marketing tool, social media has the potential to allow even the most niche or ‘difficult’ music to build an audience base and is without a doubt more powerful a tool than any other marketing tool available to you (e.g. print advertising or flyers). Consider its use carefully. Choose platforms that you feel suit you and the way you like to communicate, and do not feel that you must be ever-present and on all social media platforms. As useful as it is, social media can also be a toxic place; if you are worried it is detrimental to your mental health, there are other ways to engage and find your audiences. Here are some specific marketing suggestions for each of the major platforms that an entrepreneurial composer might be interested to note.
Facebook (Established in 2004)
The leading social platform, with 2.94 billion monthly active users and reaching 66 per cent of all social media users1
Video content (especially Facebook Stories) will be promoted more than other types of posts, reflecting the platform’s general values
Paid advertising offers a good opportunity to reach new audiences, as well as remarketing strategies (i.e. ‘re’-targeting audiences that have already visited your website) or targeting advertising specific community-interest groups
A dramatic increase in Facebook presence on mobile devices should be taken into account when designing posts
Instagram (Established in 2010)
1 billion monthly active users2
Primary purpose is for posting photo or video content
Posts with ‘candid insights’ into the lives of artists have the highest click rate
Aim for at least 70 per cent of your content to be authentic, non-promotional (photo and video) posts
Important to cross-post between platforms (e.g. integrated Facebook advertising capability appears on Instagram)
Twitter (Established in 2006)
353 monthly active users3
Primarily a discovery platform, with 79 per cent of users looking for something new
Tweets with video (up to 2 minutes and 20 seconds can be posted natively) appear larger than text-only tweets
Aim for a similar ratio of 70 per cent personal tweets to 30 per cent promotional material
Go live via Periscope for more direct engagement with fans
Avoid linking to other social media platforms from Twitter, as it loses engagement
TikTok (Established in 2016)
1.2 billion monthly active users4
Primary audience of people between the ages of 16 and 24 (though many of TikTok’s biggest influencers are not in this age range)
TikTok’s main philosophy is it’s an app for all ages, so broad appeal in content is welcome
With no rules as to what kind of content to make, it’s important to stay authentic to your interest as a creator
YouTube (Established in 2005)
2 billion monthly active users
95 per cent of the global internet population use YouTube, making it the second-largest search engine after Google5
Possibly the most invaluable and effective marketing asset
Consistent, engaging and creative content is key
Using live-stream can be a genuine and timesaving way to engage with your audience
Can be monetised through sponsorship (e.g. working with brands like many YouTubers do or direct donations from viewers via third-party platforms like Patreon)
Avoid cross-posting
Twitch (Established in 2011)
7.3 million active streamers, with 30 million unique daily visitors6
A relatively untapped platform for classical and experimental genres
Consider creative and social ways to present your work digitally (e.g. possibility to host concerts where you chat with your audience)
13,000 of its broadcasters are now part of its partnership programme, able to make money from their channels through a mixture of advertising, subscriptions and merchandise sales
One cannot ignore the importance of social media platforms in both connecting with current fans and developing future audiences. There are billions of people who use these platforms to find content of interest – with music, art and culture being a big part of that – and if you were a marketeer, you would be researching these stats on a regular basis to decide how to reach audiences and sell your products. For you as a composer, it is vital to treat your music as a product that you share with other people by finding ways to reach, understand and engage with audiences.
Websites
As your career grows, you will need somewhere that people can access easily to provide a focal point in your online profile. A publisher, manager or agent could host information about you on their own platforms, or some organisations might have other ‘shop-front’ websites (like the ‘British Music Collection’ or ‘Sound and Music’ in the UK) with a synopsis about you, or if you have won any competitions, they might also have a website presence with information about you as a composer. However, if you want more control over the narrative that is out there and to construct the way you are presented as a composer, I recommend having your own website. No matter whether you are only just starting to be commissioned or already approaching festivals, ensembles, and venues, a website is a vital step for developing opportunities. You want to create a space where it is easy for people to listen to your music, know your style, and get a sense of what kind of composer you are and what you are passionate about in your writing.
It is possible to build a website yourself with ready-made website platforms (e.g. Squarespace, Wix), which offer templates to help get you started. Even if you spend more money to pay for a developer to build a website, the most vital step is to think about what information or assets (such as videos, audio files, or images) to share. You might want to include a short biography which outlines what is unique about you, your music and your background; an easy way to listen to your music and see videos; a list of the pieces you’ve written, including recordings where available and details of the instrumentation, length and where to buy the performance materials; and, of course, how to contact you. It should not be underestimated how important the look and feel of a website is. You want it to be clear and easy to navigate, translate well from desktop to tablet to mobile phone, and use imagery, colours and fonts that reflect your aesthetic. whether you are aware of it or not, you already have a brand as a composer, and a website is a clear extension of this. If your website is hard to read or navigate, it can not only effect whether influential people decide to programme your work or get in touch with you, but also have a significant bearing on how people view you more generally.
Press and PR
This is a huge topic but one that can have a major potential impact on composers. There are moments in your career where you will receive publicity in relation to albums you release or pieces that are being played at significant venues or by prominent ensembles. Through this you may be offered interviews, have features written on you, receive reviews or have your work previewed ahead of an event. When those opportunities are presented, they are valuable ways that you can (partly) control how your music is talked about; but often if PR is being controlled externally, you might not be aware of how you have been presented (e.g. within the ensemble or festival’s broader marketing strategy). Whether you are a composer with some profile already or an up-and-coming composer, it might be worth strategising certain moments in your career to invest in PR services to help direct the narrative more actively.
Deciding between using a PR agent, PR agency, or PR resources at a label or publisher, or doing PR yourself can be an overwhelming one to make. If you hire an agency or PR agent, they are likely to already have key contacts in the industry, have the resources to do research specifically for your campaign and will have the skills needed to pitch a story in a way which gets journalistic attention. The downside, of course, is that you will need significant financial resources to afford their services, and the best PR companies are often selective about what work they take on. If you are hoping to employ the service of an agency or agent, always ask for their fees in advance – these can be put into funding applications, if you cannot finance it yourself – and a proposed approach, so you can compare across a few agencies. Beware of companies who are happy to take on your campaign without offering a full proposal of what they plan to do to raise press interest (who they will approach, etc.). If you are working with a label or publisher, they may have an in-house PR team, but again be wary of how much of their resources they are able to focus on you over the other people they are representing. It is always possible to do PR yourself, and if you have the energy to put a bit of work into building a good story, this is obviously a much more financially viable option. Do not, however, underestimate the amount of time it takes to research the right journalists to approach (including finding their contact details) and properly formulate your project in a way that will excite them and their readers.
Whether you are working with a PR agency or taking on the role yourself, engaging with PR is an important step in framing how the public experience your personality and music. By selecting key moments to focus PR on, you have a potential to enhance your career and create opportunities in ways that you had not even imagined. There is no hard-and-fast rule about when the best times to go down this path might be, but in general, strategising around your career goals (e.g. the major collaborations or big ideas you have) is important to find the right spaces and arenas to focus on. What is key for PR is finding a good story linked to the music. Why might journalists be interested in writing about your album launch or installation, and what behind it will engage their audiences? Here are some examples of important ‘PR moments’ within an album campaign, and the strategies you need to think about when reaching out to the press. An album campaign has an enormous potential to help build your profile and is a great time to consider doing PR. When designing a campaign, plan your PR to start at least three months before the album release date. At this stage you need to ensure you have:
All recordings mastered
Video content captured from the recording process (to be used for social media and online interviews)
Music videos near completion
Album artwork finalised
Press photographs ready
Radio edits of one or two tracks (i.e. tracks cut to 2–3 mins: anything longer than 4 mins will likely make your track less likely to be played)
(If self-releasing) a distributor selected, and an agreement of how long it will take from upload to digital release
Having video, picture and audio content is vital to promote to the press with ‘concrete’ and compelling assets, which is a good starting point for finding potential interviews, features or reviews in print. Magazines famously have long lead times on their print runs: contacting editors even six months before the publication date for magazines such as (in the UK) Gramophone, The Strad, BBC Music Magazine, or Songlines would significantly increase the chances of you being featured. At the start of the PR campaign, you or the PR agent needs to prepare the story to get the press’ attention, usually called a ‘Press Release’. It is important to find the uniqueness in your story; those small quirky or impactful details about your album that will catch a journalist’s imagination even (or perhaps especially) if you are not yet a well-known composer.
Think about moments other than the album release date that could be the focus of press interest: is there a live performance that could be tied in too, for example (which would also provide a valuable opportunity to invite industry contacts, press and supporters to a ‘real’ event), or even a tour of concerts? Concerts are particularly good for local press and online promotion and offer the potential for inviting journalists to come and review the event; if it is part of a festival or concert series, you might be able to rely on the festival/venue PR team to oversee getting exposure. It is also worth releasing a track or two in advance of the album (for a commercial recording, these ‘singles’ are often each released 4–6 weeks at a time), which could be individual pieces or a movement or two of a longer work. Releasing music in stages also allows for multiple possibilities to pitch for radio airplay and to use streaming services (Spotify and Apple Music are the big ones here) to be featured on all-important playlists more than once during an album campaign.
Marketing
The next stage in your public development is marketing; teaching people why they should choose your product or service over your competitors (i.e. in our world, why listen to your music or choose to commission you over other composers?). Drawing on the terms used in commercial business, some things to consider here are:
Advertising (social media, website, programme notes, live performance, radio airplay)
What the customers hear about you (press interviews and features, word of mouth)
Customer service (your presence and interactions at concerts, newsletters)
Follow-up care (audience retention, communicating with them (e.g. by finding ways to thank them for their support, inviting them to more, etc.))
Each of these points of contact with you affects someone’s decision about whether to listen to your music and engage with you or not. This does not just mean fans who may listen to your music or not, but also includes music programmers, festivals, and ensembles or performers who might want to collaborate. Rather than the broader and ongoing project of network-building discussed earlier in this chapter, marketing is something for you to direct, focus and plan in small, concrete steps. When marketing, it is important to plan a realistic end goal and the specific steps needed to achieve this goal, beyond the overall aim of building your audience and promoting your music. Some specific goals you might have include increasing CD sales, repertoire sales (e.g. sheet music), concert tickets sales, streaming numbers, mailing list sign-up, new market interest, or social media follows. These specific activities link to growth in many ways, enabling you to increase the money you earn from composition whilst also staying connected with (and growing) your audience, and in some cases to gather data to help you engage with your audiences better and retain new audiences.
To get an audience to take note of an event, artist, or concert, you need them to view it three times, and only then will you have success directing them to specific outcomes. Think about what audience you want to attract, and use what they like to help design the content you create. Think carefully about messaging and do not leave your audience wondering: great advertising works because of a straightforward call to action for the people you market to. When you are marketing – whether that be via print or online adverts, social media, flyers, and so on – consider:
The message (i.e. your call to action). Are you wanting them to buy a concert ticket, an album, visit your website, or follow your page? Clearly share what you want your audience to do.
Targeting who you want to reach. Do not market without focus (this will only waste your time and money), but rather think about who would be interested in hearing from you and how to reach them.
Research your audience. What are their interests and behaviours?
Whether you like it or not, everything you already do as a composer – from your website, the recordings that are available, what you share on social media, the ensembles and venues you are associated with, the press, PR and marketing and even the funding you have received – all add up to build a picture of how people see you as a composer: this is your brand. It is crucial to think of what you want this brand to be: How do you want to make your own stamp? Are you accidently sharing an image that is not in line with your career ambitions? What is the uniqueness in your work and personality that helps you stand out from the crowd? This chapter has offered some tools to present your brand to the world and strengthen the connections you have with the industry. What it is that you present, however, is up to you.
This final chapter offers advice on the opportunities and challenges of being a composer and is intended to be useful and encouraging for anyone developing their practice. We would like to thank our students for their contributions and feedback, particularly Kit McCarthy, Antoine Veillerette, and Dominic Wright.
Be curious.
Experience the world and expand your horizons. Go to concerts, theatre performances, art galleries, and places of nature. Listen as widely and as deeply as you can. Travel, read books, volunteer. Feed your creative brain.
Analyse the things that you love.
Devour films, books, and music for the first time because you love them; but then watch, read, and listen a second time to understand them. How are they working? Which artistic questions are being asked? What approaches and ideas are being used, and why do they resonate with you?
Refine your technique.
Technique helps us develop our ideas and allows us to communicate what we hear in our imaginations with others. Score study, listening, analysis, trial and error, workshopping your ideas with performers, and developing your understanding of instruments are all important ways to increase your knowledge and strengthen your technical skills.
Challenge yourself.
Work in different environments and mediums, and don’t be afraid to explore extremes. Go outside your comfort zone by embracing ideas that feel bold and exciting rather than safe and cosy. Using new tools and approaches will help you to avoid ‘idea fatigue’ whilst also keeping your mind open to different ways forward.
The Creative Process
Collect ideas.
Write down or record melodies, thoughts, and ideas when they come to you (e.g. in a notebook or on a phone) so that you have a bank of material to visit in the future.
Explore your ideas in different mediums.
Record yourself improvising and then transcribe it, discuss your ideas with others, and draw graphs, pictures, illustrations.
Learn where your inspiration comes from.
When and where do you generate your best material? Maybe it happens when you are reading, or in nature, or meditating, or with the adrenaline that comes from an imminent deadline. See if you can recreate that environment to feel inspired as regularly as possible.
Don’t be afraid to use broad brushstrokes.
Using big shapes and gestures can be a useful way to map out musical ideas and structures without worrying too much about the finer details. You can then let your analytical brain find what to focus on, develop and finesse.
Compose, then analyse, then compose again.
Both steps are vital, but we cannot do them at the same time. It is important to let your creative brain be free to play, and not make artistic or analytical judgements too early in the process; however, the way forward can only be revealed by understanding what is already present. Composing involves carefully balancing creative play and freedom with your inner critic.
Try to get as much as you can out of your ideas.
Whilst it can be tempting to throw everything you have into a new piece, exploring one or two ideas in detail can produce a surprising amount of material. Focus on specific parameters – timbre, rhythm, melodic shape, harmony, and so on – and play with abstract elements like rate of change, stability and instability, or degrees of chaos. Try to be deliberate and methodical in your exploration. Think about contrast and balance, how ideas might sound higher or lower, slower or faster, louder or softer, longer or shorter, layered or sparse.
Find strategies for when things go badly.
Develop personal approaches for overcoming problems, which might include setting yourself limitations, trying to compose the same passage in several different ways, reordering your material (e.g. to put the beginning at the end, or the end at the beginning), or combining completely unrelated ideas. Different strategies will work for different people and contexts. Find out what works for you.
Working Habits
Write something every day if you can.
Composing is a muscle that needs exercising to develop the fluency, consistency, and accuracy needed to translate your ideas and thoughts into music. Don’t wait for inspiration, just start!
Know your tools inside out.
Whether you write with manuscript paper, an instrument, or a computer, understanding the full potential of the tools you use will speed up your workflow enormously. Understand their limitations as well: a blank project file or score will come with its own default settings, but your creativity does not have to exist on five lines or in regular time signatures and cycles. Use the tools that suit your ideas the best.
Share your work-in-progress.
Cultivate a trusted team of people with whom you can share sketches and ideas. Talking through material when things still have a good degree of flexibility can often lead to the best learning experiences and might reveal things about your ideas that you may never have considered. To help this process feel less intimidating, ask focused questions and direct feedback towards specific creative problems. Hold any feedback you get lightly so it does not influence you unduly, but recognise that all feedback communicates something valid, even when you have to read between the lines.
The creative process is messy, and that’s ok.
It can be difficult to maintain energy and motivation over a long period, and often the excitement of an initial idea diminishes the more a project is worked on. Try to focus both on the long-term goals of a piece and what you want to achieve each time you return to work on it.
Take time off.
Move. Walk. Get some fresh air. Go on holiday. Whatever you are able to do.
Work deep, not long.
Discover the conditions you need to get into a flow state, where you will happily focus on the task of composing and let the world disappear around you. Find a good and comfortable workspace and turn off all distractions around you.
Community and Network
Be generous.
Prioritise community building over career building and find ways to serve the field and empower those around you. Whether this involves suggesting a book to a friend who is working on a particular topic or something more practical like lending someone a microphone or proofreading parts for them, work-related kindnesses will always be returned to you in some form in the future.
Find friends for your music.
Developing relationships with performers, ensemble directors, commissioners, and critics who can champion your work is key to creating opportunities and commissions. Collaborators and supporters might equally be choreographers or mechanical engineers; everyone has a huge amount to offer.
Keep a contact list of musicians who you enjoy working with and trust.
Performers who are interested in you and your work can not only perform your work (either now or in the future) but are useful to contact with specific questions relating to their instrument. There is nothing more reassuring than testing an idea or technique directly with a player, whether this is in person or remote, and asking advice is a great way to start building a relationship.
Treat your collaborators with respect.
Help to make them feel comfortable and excited to be working with you. Establish clear lines of communication, be approachable and open minded, and be aware of their time and needs. Be proactive in finding and developing shared opportunities that appeal to everyone and support your collaborators’ creative visions as much as they support yours. Make sure you always credit collaborators for the work that they do.
Professional Profile
Understand the industry.
Learn basic music business skills like intellectual property (i.e. copyright), contract writing, filling out a tax return, self-promotion, and marketing, and join a rights collection agency such as the PRS (UK) or ASCAP (US). Be aware that the industry you are joining now will not be the same industry at the end of your career, so keep aware of the changes going on around you.
Use a portfolio career to support you financially.
Composing is not the most profitable or stable career by any stretch of the imagination, but fortunately can be done alongside other work. There are many jobs that you might already have the transferable skills for – teaching (composition, instruments, theory, etc.), conducting, performing, music editing and formatting, music administration, grant applications, artistic direction, music supervision, sound recording and production, and so on – but it is just as valuable to work in an unrelated field. Portfolio careers encourage exposure to people and ideas that you would not otherwise encounter, and often improve your practical understanding of how to make things happen.
Apply for existing opportunities.
There are lots of schemes and projects designed to support emerging composers, which are listed on websites like www.composerssite.com and www.soundandmusic.org. Apply to the schemes and opportunities that interest you and resonate with your work, and importantly, if you don’t succeed the first time, try again and again.
Do it yourself.
Be creative and resourceful rather than waiting for opportunities to come to you. Start your own ensemble, concert series or collective, for example, or set up a solo gig at a local venue and play your own music.
Make recordings and document your work.
A high-quality recording is invaluable for encouraging a conductor or ensemble to programme your works, and well worth investing in. Learning the basics of video and audio recording and editing is also extremely worthwhile, and there is some excellent open access software available for this (DaVinci Resolve, Audacity, etc.) that is relatively easy to navigate. Learning sound recording techniques will mean that whenever you are able to access spaces and performers, you can jump on the opportunity to have a lasting record of your work.
Share your music and make it accessible to others.
Host your work online, and have a bank of resources available (e.g. sound recordings or a press kit) to send out to potential collaborators. This might involve using social media and an online presence to promote the work that you are doing or contacting ensembles or promoters directly to ask for opportunities.
Self-Care
Know your motivations and goals.
What does success look like for you? Is it to obtain a specific commission, or collaborate with certain artists, or to be able to pay the bills and be self-sufficient? Creating can be an obsession, and obsessions can swallow you up if you let them. Having clear and achievable goals will help you focus your work and let you celebrate the wins when they come. Focusing on what is important also allows you to be strategic about which projects you take on and will help to balance your workload.
Make work that excites you.
It can be difficult to balance what you want to write with what you feel others are expecting of you. Art is subjective, so you should not feel constrained by the expectations of others, or by pressures from outside institutions and ensembles; you are free to make what you want to make.
Be prepared to fail.
Take risks and follow your intuition to explore the intimidating ideas that will stretch and challenge you. Take care and delight over each new idea and listen with excitement.
Times can get tough.
For musicians, life can be difficult, both emotionally and practically. Every composer faces rejection, criticism and hardship at points in their careers, but this does not make them any less of an artist. Be honest with yourself about finding ways to meet your needs and support yourself, prioritising your mental and physical well-being over your work. Monitor your inner critic: self-doubt can destroy even the greatest and most original ideas before they have a chance to blossom.
Take your art seriously.
Be professional and reliable in the preparation of scores and parts, submit to deadlines, and allocate regular time and effort for admin, whether that be formatting and printing, setting up a website, or contacting potential collaborators.
Don’t take your art too seriously.
It can be easy to feel intimidated as an artist, weighed down by the potential of a blank page and the pressure of the existing canon, but remember that not everything has to be your magnum opus. First ideas are often rubbish, no matter how experienced you are. Re-writing is so much easier than generating new material and being able to be irreverent and destructive with material is often just as valuable as treating it with love and care.
Don’t compare yourself to others.
This can be a real confidence killer. There is no one path to achieving your goals: it takes time to learn how to compose well, and even longer to grow your reputation and build contacts to the point where you are regularly in work. Patience and humility are key.
Finally, remember that you are part of a community. Always ask for help and support when you need it, and do not be afraid to reach out to people for guidance and feedback.
