Andrew Bird

Ultimately, I think that writing about music is a deliberate act and has nothing to do with creating music. The latter is mostly an involuntary response to being alive.

He also writes:

I think we’ve all got a well that can be tapped and there follows the sort of sequencing or curating of one’s own ideas.

There’s some truth to this. I mull it over when I write about music. I deliberate over each word.

I do this when I write music, too, but my first instinct when composing is to just get it out. You should curate your ideas and collect them. It’s better not to edit yourself as as you go along. (As opposed to writing words, where I do edit as I go along.) The idea when writing music is to let the inspiration carry you, involuntarily, to where you need to go! Besides, you can always edit later, after all!

You can read Andrew Bird’s comments, along with several other songwriters, at this New York Times blog for songwirters.

The post Creating music | Writing about music appeared first on Richard D. Russell.