I've written a few blog entries about recording technology which I will start posting soon. I'm trying to finish my last two entries about rap/hip-hop music (I promised to do 5 entries but only finished 3...I hate empty promises). I've been working on two arrangements for my bands to play at their final concert. I've never done band arrangements before, but it's been fun and relatively easy for me (albeit time consuming). I've had time to read. I find this makes me a more well-rounded creative person. Getting outside the music world for a bit is refreshing and helps give me new perspectives once I return back. I've had time to take long walks and listen to music (yes, I would actually check the "I like long walks on the beach" box on match.com and actually mean it). I find that listening to music engages my creative process just as much as the other things I do. I believe that part of creativity is the absorption of new ideas in order to deepen the well of knowledge you can pull from. The more things you know, the more options or paths you have to choose from when you are in the moment of creation.
I've been working on songwriting and have 2 songs that have all the instrumental tracks down (they have been done since the summer). I just have to do the singing parts now. I've been working on my singing (it really sucks...the way I articulate words is weird) by recording myself and listening back. While it is painful, it is helpful. I have also found a new process to record my singing: do 5 takes, and then stitch together the best parts...even down to using this syllable from take 3 and the next syllable from take 1. I realize this is kind of cheating, but I figure I'm working on my voice nonetheless. Plus, I'm sick of practicing the vocal parts to the songs I have written. I am ready to record a half-way decent version of them and then move on to the next songs.
While working on all this, two things have struck me about the creative process:
1. Creativity truly does come in flashes. There are long periods of dredging through with no results. Throughout 2010 and 2011, I feel that I was very creative. I hit a rut in 2012. I can tell because I had two soundcloud playlists entitled "Summer 2010" and "Summer 2011". None for "Summer 2012". It was strange that summer. I did not create as much music or do as many blog posts. I think I was still reeling from my first year of teaching and trying to make sense of it all. Also, searching for a new job put a crimp on the creative time. But to be fair, I was still doing some other things. I ran every morning, which I had never done for an entire summer before. And I was also working on my songwriting. Since this was my first foray into it, the process was painfully slow and still is. But man have I learned a lot from it.
But then there are moments of perfect clarity and brilliance. Besides the brass quintet piece I wrote, I think one of the best things I've made was this short little ambient guitar piece called "The Sun Always Sets on the Dead". I was messing around with some reverb effects on my computer and I started playing guitar with it on. I started this one chord progression, but in a matter of minutes I had 5 more progressions that spun off the first. I recorded these in less than an hour. 2 days later I had a completed piece of music. It completely came out of the blue and felt so natural and easy to play. I still don't know how that happened.
2. Working on many things at once is sometimes a good thing. Even though it is taking me longer to finish all the things I mentioned above (blog posts, arranging, composing, singing), it is fun to have variety. I can work on a blog post for 20 minutes, and then when I get stuck or get bored I can move to arranging music. This keeps things fresh and allows me to have some options. When I come home from a long day at work, it is sometimes hard to muster up the energy to compose a piece of music or write a blog entry. Arranging music for me is much more straight forward (I hear the notes in the original song and then just copy it down in Sibelius...the only creative part is deciding which instrument gets the notes). So it is good to have that flexibility.
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