The Act of Musical Composition: Studies in the Creative Process

309 Pages·2012·2.67 MB·English

by  Dave Collins

The AcT of MusicAl coMposiTion
seMpRe studies in
the psychology of Music
series editors
Graham Welch, Institute of Education, University of London, UK
Adam ockelford, Roehampton University, UK
ian cross, University of Cambridge, UK
The theme for the series is the psychology of music, broadly defined. Topics
will include: (i) musical development at different ages, (ii) exceptional musical
development in the context of special educational needs, (iii) musical cognition
and context, (iv) culture, mind and music, (v) micro to macro perspectives on
the impact of music on the individual (such as from neurological studies through
to social psychology), (vi) the development of advanced performance skills and
(vii) affective perspectives on musical learning. The series will present the
implications of research findings for a wide readership, including user-groups
(music teachers, policy makers, parents), as well as the international academic
and research communities. The distinguishing features of the series will be this
broad focus (drawing on basic and applied research from across the globe) under
the umbrella of seMpRe's distinctive mission, which is to promote and ensure
coherent and symbiotic links between education, music and psychology research.
other titles in the series
Musical Creativity: Insights from Music Education Research
oscar odena
Advances in Social-Psychology and Music Education Research
Edited by Patrice Madura Ward-Steinman
The Musical Ear: Oral Tradition in the USA
Anne Dhu Mclucas
The Act of Musical composition
studies in the creative process
Edited by
DAve collins
University Centre, Doncaster College, UK
© Dave collins 2012
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
Dave collins has asserted his right under the copyright, Designs and patents Act, 1988, to
be identified as the editor of this work.
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
The act of musical composition : studies in the creative process. – (SEMPRE studies in
the psychology of music)
1. Composition (Music) – Psychological aspects. I. Series. II. Collins, Dave.
III. Society for Education, Music and Psychology Research.
781.3'111-dc23
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The act of musical composition : studies in the creative process / edited by Dave Collins.
p. cm. – (SEMPRE studies in the psychology of music)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4094-3425-2 (hardcover)
1. Composition (Music) – Psychological aspects. I. Collins, Dave, 1952–
ML3838.A27 2013
781.3'111–dc23
2012018275
ISBN 9781409434252 (hbk)
ISBN 9781409434269 (ebk – PDF)
ISBN 9781409471318 (ebk – ePUB)
V
printed and bound in Great Britain by the
MPG Books Group, UK.
Contents
List of Figures vii
List of Tables ix
List of Music Examples xi
Notes on Contributors xiii
Series Editors’ Preface xvii
Preface xix
1 Empirical and Historical Musicologies of Compositional
Processes: Towards a Cross-fertilisation 1
Nicolas Donin
2 Process, Self-evaluation and Lifespan Creativity Trajectories
in Eminent Composers 27
Aaron Kozbelt
3 Musical Imagery in the Creative Process 53
Freya Bailes and Laura Bishop
4 Meaningful Engagement with Music Composition 79
Andrew R. Brown and Steve Dillon
5 The Practice of Diverse Compositional Creativities 111
Pamela Burnard
6 Constraint, Collaboration and Creativity in
Popular Songwriting Teams 139
Joe Bennett
7 The Influence of the Extra-musical on the Composing Process 171
Shira Lee Katz
8 Improvisation as Real-time Composition 187
Simon Rose and Raymond MacDonald
vi THE ACT OF MUSICAL COMPOSITION
9 On Computer-aided Composition, Musical Creativity
and Brain Asymmetry 215
Eduardo Reck Miranda
10 Defining Inspiration? Modelling the Non-conscious
Creative Process 233
Geraint A. Wiggins
11 Rules, Tactics and Strategies for Composing Music 255
David Cope
Index 281
List of Figures
4.1 The meaningful engagement matrix (MEM) 84
5.1 The self and the social realms that foster each
composer’s creativity 135
6.1 ‘Stimulus evaluation’ model for collaborative songwriting 156
9.1 A pattern sequence generated by Game of Life is shown at
the top. Given a reference note, Camus generates a set of
three notes for each live cell. 221
9.2 Top: temporal morphology starting with MBU and ending
with B[MU]. Bottom: possible rendering of this morphology
into musical notation. 223
9.3 Standard music notation of a rhythmic sequence and
its corresponding inter-onset representation 226
10.1 The Wundt curve (solid) is formed by the multiplication of
two linear functions: the likelihood of a generated item (dashed)
and the number of generators likely to agree on an item,
according to its likelihood (dotted). 247
11.1 A tactic in Tactic-Toe 261
11.2 The board (X X nil nil O nil O nil nil) in Tactic-Toe 262
11.3 Eight board positions representing the eight ways in which
X can win a game in tic-tac-toe (three across, three top to
bottom and two diagonal) 263
11.4 Eight boards without Os in Tactic-Toe 264
11.5 Six strategies drawn from several thousand simple tactics
in Tactic-Toe 264
11.6 A fork in graphic and Tactic-Toe formats 265
11.7 The payoff matrix for player A for a simultaneous-move game 266
11.8 Two chess games in both visual (a and c) and computational
(b and d) notation with White indicated by ‘+’ and Black by ‘*’ 268
11.9 Slimmed down version of Figure 11.8a and c along with
computational notations (b and d) 269
11.10 Sliding pieces down to the edge of the board to create an
eight-piece mirror of the board in Figure 11.9c 270
viii THE ACT OF MUSICAL COMPOSITION
11.11 Inverting the board in Figure 11.10 to make its relationship to
Figure 11.9a clearer 270
11.12 The pitches for each instrument in the music of Example 11.2
without registers 273
11.13 A matrix in computational rule terms 273
List of Tables
1.1 Overview of the MuTeC project 16
3.1 Orders of imagery in the ‘Stage Development Model’ of creativity 58