IMHO--- I personally think that you should listen to EA music. Buy CD's (or how
ever you get them) and listen to them. Go to concerts of EA music. I think you
will learn more from one good CD or concert than a library full of books on this
subject.
I also believe that this applies to all forms of composition.

Michael





tolve wrote:

> music theory and composition? don't pay much attention to that myself these
> days. just like to make noise. but maybe you might want to read a book or
> two. hated most of those studied in school. but am sure there are good
> books on just about every style and topic.
>
> know a few (and hundreds of awful ones) on jazz and, at the risk of flame,
> would suggest that they could even be useful to jump start a classical
> student. real utilitarian approach. perhaps because, in music geared
> towards improvisation, there is no time to debate for an entire class
> session exactly where the key changes. the first two quick reads will get
> your feet plenty wet. and for those of you interested in jazz, you might
> want to just stop there and listen to music. -perhaps the most important
> study technique for all styles.
>
> Improvising Jazz by Jerry Coker pub Prentice Hall (115 pgs)
>
> Composing for the Jazz Orchestra by William Russo pub University Chicago
> Press (a Phoenix Book) (90 pgs) -some of the notation a bit archaic but
> better in...
>
> Jazz Composition and Orchestration by William Russo  pub University of
> Chicago Press 825 pgs
> great for that 4 tone line thickening progressive big band stuff.
>
> and since i hate all the other books i know, here are a few recommended to
> me long ago by a theory major with sloppy handwriting.
>
> Perspectives on Schoenberg & Stravinsky by Lowe & Buretz
>
> textbooks by Aldwell, Schacter (sp?)
> Voiceleading and Harmony, or maybe harmony and voiceleading vol 1 & 2.
>
> Beyond Orpheus by David Epstein MIT Press
>
> _?__ Theory by Peter Westercaard
>
> The Classic Style by Charles Rosen
>
> Counterpoint in Composition by Schacter - Joros?
>
> Perspectives in Music Theory edited by Ben Boretz and Edward Lowe.
>
> (would welcome corrected spellings, or additional info on any of the above)
>
> ok, i did use the following basic text in school. not too bad, though it
> seems the professor was always correcting it...
>
> Harmony by Walter Piston  WW Norton & Company, New York.
>
> you could also obtain scores of actual compositions to look at.
>
> The Norton Scores an anthology for listening  pub by Norton
>
> or call Carl Fisher in New York and request score of something that
> interests you:
> 212 677-1148 band orchestra chorus
> 212 677-0821 piano vocal instrumental
>
> just be sure not to actually follow any of the rules you learn.
>
> so you see, it has been clearly stated by some of the programmers on this
> list that studying programming is useless for understanding csound, from
> mathematicians that studying math is useless, and from musicians that music
> is useless.
>
> hmmm. anybody know any good books on french cooking?
>
> tolve
>
> >Hans Mikelson wrote:
> >>
> >> Hello,
> >>
> >> I think I'm beginning to move from the realm of sound experiments to the
> >> realm of sound composition so I suppose that it wouldn't hurt for me to
> >> learn something about composing.  There is a good web site with composing
> >> information at:
> >>
> >> http://www-personal.umich.edu/~fields/gems/0.htm
> >>
> >> I thought the section on dramatic shape of a composition was good since with
> >> Csound you are often working with collections of sound rather than just
> >> musical notes.
> >>
> >> Can anyone reccomend some other sites?
> >>
> >> Bye,
> >> Hans Mikelson
> >
> >I don't think you should be looking for web sites at this stage; rather,
> >look for a conventional (human) music composition or  theory tutor.
> >You're not going to learn about music theory and composition from a web
> >site!  Try calling some local music stores, etc, for recomendations.
> >
> >Larry
> >
> >--  Larry Troxler --  lt@westnet.com  --  Patterson, NY USA  --

Trevor Wishart put out a book called "Audible Design" that might be
applicable. It was reviewed in the Computer Music Journal (vol. 20, no. 1).
I have not read it, and the two reviews in CMJ offer differing opinions on
the book's value (Miller Puckette's review gave it a general thumbs up).

Robert Morris' Composing with Pitch Classes does an admirable job of
including more than just pitch and rhythm parameters in an approach to
compositional design, but might be too tied to set-class/twelve-tone pitch
ideas for some tastes.

At 2:33 PM -0500 5/17/98, Michael A. Thompson wrote:
>IMHO--- I personally think that you should listen to EA music. Buy CD's
>(or how
>ever you get them) and listen to them. Go to concerts of EA music. I think you
>will learn more from one good CD or concert than a library full of books
>on this
>subject.
>I also believe that this applies to all forms of composition.

IMHO,
I agree that listening to existing works is extremely important to the
process of learning to compose (for EA works, check out the Electronic
Music Foundation for selections http://www.cdemusic.org/electronic.html).
However, I think that the optimal approach is to study examples in the
context of some pedagogical framework---in other words, a
book/tutor/college curriculum. The notion that listening is all you have to
do assumes that we have some innate mechanism for assimilating the
techniques (micro and macro) that we hear. While this is romantic (and
trendily anti-academic) I think it shortchanges the intellectual component
of art and leaves one without a strong conceptual base from which to make
compositional decisions. A pedagogical framework might seem limiting, but I
think that most good artists transcend their frameworks to some degree as
they mature. On the other hand, having no explicit framework means that
you're just relying on assumptions you've already unconsciously made, and
hence have no control over. Just my couple o' cents.

--Dan Hosken