Music: Notations

How to write music in the future

(if we even want to?)

Sheet music and hip-hop For a very long time I have never seen the importance of learning the theory of music or sheet music. Sheet music as in having written it all down with all those symbols on five-line paper. I realise that for others to play a song, exactly as the composer (like me) did the first time, it is needed to write it down in a way that anybody can access. That is sheet music.

However, that is not the way I and other hip-hop artists work! I am a self-taught artist and what I have learned this far is I can do it without the rules.

The thing is: how will another person be able to play my music without knowing? Without having written it down, it must be by listening. But then it will never be the same as the next person will ‘interpret’ my music. Putting their own twist on it.

The discussion for next time can be whether that is good or bad. My normal routine of writing is simple: I listen to the beat I have designed, I come up with a concept for the song, then I start writing and while I write I will be refining the melody and tune for the song and when I am done I jump in the booth and start recording.

Next step is for the sound engineers, taking care of the mixing and mastering of the song.

Can it be written down? Maybe, but traditional notation does not lend itself to the instruments we use (guitar, synthesizers, etc).

New ways of notations are graphic representations. It is all based on software now.

Though one of my dreams is to perform with an orchestra, it puts me in a position where I really feel I need to know how to read and write sheet music and to also have a better understanding of the process.

Maybe that can be fulfilled by the cooperation between myself and one who is classically trained. Then the orchestra part is sheet music and my part is graphic representations?

That way my music can be conserved and will never go away and others can perform my music hundred years from now. Learning this skill is not a bad idea at all. Though I don’t like the rules behind it I still have a lot of respect for musicians who have acquired this skill. Lezy de Yong