@@diabl2master Obviously. For those of us who are older it’s just kind of a little reminder to how much time has passed, it’s shocking to think of how much older I am now which is what basically everyone goes through. Obviously people are being born and growing up at all times, no need to be a smartass about it.
funny :D but also... who cares? If the meistro gives you a note, you figure out how to play it, even if you have to nail a string onto that viola banjo-style 🤣🤣🤣
"My first composition at age 13" Bro you harmonically understood the half diminished chord. Something I'm still like- Hmmm..... This chord is made of chord but it's... hmmm. I am enthused about this upkeep of a development phase you are going through.
Any tips on how to learn these things? It feels like I get the whole dominant -> tonic cadence, and maybe the function of a subdominant, but beyond these most basic ideas I'm just lost
... that's not complicated. The problem is you're over-thinking it. No, a half diminished chord, is not a chord mode of chord, it's just a chord with a diminished fifth, minor third, and minor 7th, it's no different from I7, or V7, or ii7, it just depends on context when you *should* use it. it's especially common in minor keys as ii°7 with subdominant function.
5 year old mozart was also a musical prodigy good sir. I don’t understand why your being so hostile towards this man, let the man make his music. He does not pay you to teach him or give him advice so it is not really your place to do so. Composing should be something anyone can be allowed to enjoy doing, no reason to gatekeep it like this- its super childish man.@@Whatismusic123
If you gave these pieces some strange, "random" title and claimed it was an avant garde piece to "capture youthful innocence," or something, it would probably win awards...
I don't write much for harp, but there are 2 things I realized was a must know. How many notes a harpist can play in a chord and pedal changes. As a pianist. Hum, we have pedal. What's the problem? Oh, that's right, they have 7 and we have 3. Their pedals are for accidentals, ours are just for fun😅. I think I'm getting the hang of it.
@@eddygonzalez2328 It's pretty cool you write for harp at all! Lots of pieces don't have a harp part, so it's safe to say that I sat out a lot during orchestra in school. Keep doing what you do! ❤
As a composer, this is actually fire af, when I was 13 I didn't even come close to what you did and here I am at 16, with my thesis for graduation being a composition. You're incredible!
funny how that works, since I'm likely not close to either of you at 19 on the other hand I started way later and am going to college for linguistics, so that might be the problem
I am not a musician, but let me tell you about the number of "bad" sketches in attic-locked sketchbooks. Thank you for sharing this. It's akin to seeing somebody's sketchbook, and all of the discarded half-drawings. We learn, grow, and master from "play".
You gotta make a hundred bad sketches before you make something you like. And then once you're done with that one, you look at it again, realize it's actually trash, then start the whole process again. Tis the curse of being an artist.
@@greatstorm3805 tis the gift of being an artist FTFY ;) I'd say the developing that growth mindset and keeping it up is a really powerful thing. And yep that's the beauty of it
One thing you touched on that I fully relate to is how much easier it felt to compose back when we started. I’d just sit down and write (crap) music to my hearts content but now that I’ve grown in my ability’s it’s harder to just put stuff down without being critical and judgmental. I still love writing but man I wish those days sometimes.
One thing I found that doesn't completely solve the issue but sort of helped was switching instruments. I played piano for a long time (and still do but not as much) and switching to guitar helped me come up with new ideas since it's a totally different way of playing and naturally caused me to come up with music in a different way. I know it's not for everyone but it's definitely worth picking up a new instrument if you have an interest!
Oh man this is so true. I used to fiddle around in Finale so much right up until I started to know what I was actually doing and I haven't written anything for over 10 years.
honestly i love them all! they're expressive, emotional, or just plain fun at times. you're rather hard on yourself my guy. getting caught up in "can't do parallel fifths" or "this isn't technically playable" or punishing yourself for not adhering to various classical principles will only hold you back. keep on writing and keep that passion going
@@TimCizej137 coming from someone who knows nothing about composing music, you underestimate how absolutely dumb most of us are. There are beginner composers like this guy used to be, dumping out pieces that, from what he says, are absolutely aimless and go no where, or are the most generic thing ever heard to mankind, and at least 1 out of 10 listeners will praise it like its the next coming of mozart. I am one of those people, because i hear some of these and really cant tell what bro is criticizing. Look at half the comments here. Its all praise.
i've always wondered if famous classical musicians looked at their music that we consider masterpiece today like you look at the music you made when you were 13. imagine if they hated some of their stuff years after writing it but couldnt do anything about it because, well, its already out there
"My first composition at 13" is literally better than any music I will ever make in my entire life time. That whole song Largo took me back to when my dad would always have really old classical orchestral music playing in the house when I was just a small child.
Oh man, that crappy midi piano sound brings me back to when I was 13 and writing everything on noteflight. Some of those pieces reminded me of some of my stuff too, I too was obbsessed with writing hyper virtuoso works. Great video!
Ah, Noteflight. The notation software is fine, but I have to upload everything onto Musescore just to get even mediocre free samples. And, of course, Musescore has a more intuitive UI, in my completely uneducated opinion.
As someone who's tried (and failed) to compose their own music, the fact you did this at 13 is actually really impressive. I'm a percussionist, so music theory isn't exactly my strong suit, but still.
It's interesting because I actually found myself vastly preferring your first theme when you were 13 to the ones closer to the middle you aptly described as "dry as a grain of rice." If anything else, I think within specifically the 1st half of the piece where you weren't so hyperfixated on impossible sounds, you had a good natural sense (probably from music you had heard) of interesting chord progressions. Maybe not by the books, and often missing a lot, but it did remind me of something you'd hear in a videogame like the Hollow Knight soundtrack by Christopher Larkin, which is a high praise. I would actually really like to hear a readapted form of that first half, because I found some of the direction very tasteful, if not just woefully unrefined, and leading nowhere. I am a huge fan of dissonance and subverting expectations to come back to some fulfilling closure though, so it might just be scratching a very specific niche itch for me personally.
Oh wow you're so young Listen I don't know the slightest bit about music theory, I can barely pass most games in Rhythm Heaven. I didn't develop an understanding for basic beats 4/4 time until I was 20. I have no idea how to tell notes in a scale apart, am still unsure of what a chord is, and couldn't even dream of playing an instrument, let alone composing. You're leaps and bounds ahead of a lot of people. Your humility is commendable, but so is your work.
While some of the pieces are totally incoherent and, as you say, completely unplayable, I think you have some excellent ideas embedded in here that, in a good piece, could be fleshed out and become elements of a greater coherent form. I wish you the best of luck on your journey.
Honestly, as a 24 year old composition student, this was very inspiring musically. I like that you just went F it and hammered those parallel sixths in Etude No. 6. And don't listen to people saying you haven't improved or this is too cursed. Random compositions like this keep you out of a "Classical or contemporary"-mindset and will create your own style even if it will be more classical later. I mean you're still young and can get "proper" arrangement and composition lessons later on. Addition: Your newer "Melodie Op. 7 No. 3" sounds really great.
I agree that this music is pretty spooky, and thank you for sharing. Overall pretty impressive, I don't think the computer generated sound gives it justice.
Thank you for sharing your old pieces! Your newer compositions are lovely and if you dislike the old ones, that just shows how much you've improved. Some of them may not be playable, but they have a sense of childlike exploration and adventure that's hard to replicate. They're much better than the cringeworthy, pretentious piano "compositions" I always tried to impress my teacher with at the same age. XD
I applaud your bravery to put your early pieces out on the internet for everyone to witness. Truth be told, I would never have the guts to show even close friends my first "track" that I finished when I was young using GarageBand XD Kudos to you and happy (late) birthday to your dad.
I mean this largely unhinged and unplayable-ish but honestly there is real artistic expression here. It reminds me of 6th grade when i would just sit at my dads computer on our pirated version of crescendo notation software and go bananas.
I found your first work, the harp "concerto" quite inspiring. It reminds me of when I began composing without knowledge of theory, only basic orchestration, and a general idea of how pieces are supposed to be structured. I had no idea that brass instruments and certain woodwind instruments were transposition instruments, yet these early compositions ended up sounding ok, at least to my ears. That harp concerto, it is amazing, and although I may not be anywhere near becoming a great composer, I can still see that that harp concerto holds amazing potential. Perhaps sometime in the future, or even right now, you should return to it and flesh it out. Something tells me, that it will be beautiful.
I actually really like Requiem. I think it's lovely. I'm also not horribly "educated" so that might correlate. Regardless, this was a fun video to watch. Thanks for the bravery in posting it.
bro what… the first one was so gorgeous… obviously if it was performed live it would be a lot more rich instead of a computer just playing the notes. this is amazing!!
Genuinely, as someone who knows nothing about music, has never really listened to clqssical music, and has no idea how they got here, i am in love with 'idea 1.5' and will be listening to it again.
@@bean2365 well, even though the composition is not of a high standard, music is defined by the ones who enjoy it. You seem like a lovely, decent person, so that is a compliment to my composition! I'm glad you enjoy.
I can't say I like all of these compositions but daaaaaaamn!!!! For something made by a 13 year old, this is pretty impressive. Like I really like the Largo, the Requiem and especially the Study number 3 (which reminds me a bit of the kind of stuff I write in my spare time... Except way better because you actually finished writing yours and you're probably not just transcribing songs you heard in your dreams like me).
As a writer, I have to say I love your style of narration and ironic / dry sense of humor in this. Also it's a good thing you can't see what I composed in my first music theory and composition class because if these pieces are considered "cursed" I shudder to think what mine would be classified as.
Man when you mentioned that there's an acount with even older music and said "great effort is being made!", I got scared for my life for at least 3 breaths.
So if you were 13 in 2019, you are just barely 18 today. You are still extremely young, so this is not 'going way back'!! Kidding aside, what matters is the passion and that you were experimenting, and I can hear the talent.
@@RachManJohn Haha gotcha. It's cute. It reminds me of once on the kids tournament on Jeopardy when the 11 year old contestant said "When I was young...". Keep doing what you are doing and following your heart! BTW the fact that you could mimic the sounds you heard in Bond or in video games indicates that you do have a natural ear for harmony. It's much easier to mimic melody than harmony.
cursed? i'd say magical, specially considering you didnt had any teachers and stuff. i wish i could write songs like that... well, i can barely play kindergarten songs, so it's not big surprise, but it's still frustrating. anyways, good job. please continue to improve every day! :3
Dude honestly I think you have a bright future in front of you. When I was 13 I could barely play the drums and knew nothing about harmony, counterpoint or form. Now I am 30 and I'm still trying to improve my writing, which is far from good. Just keep studying and you'll become a respectable composer. Good luck!
I started composing when I was 18, it has been seven years since. The stuff you're writing now is better than what I wrote when I was 18, even though I had been playing music since 12 (though it was pop). Yes, they don't sound "good" - one can hear the very obvious, yet charming, naivete in your pieces - but one can also hear glimpses of inspired music asking to come out. Another good thing is that you have something that I miss so much from my early years which is the sheer volume of output; you still don't put too many filters on your creativity and that is something I implore you to keep. Given your age I am sure that in some years time, with the right guidance and effort, you will evolve greatly and reach your aspirations. Your way of composing is also very different compared to the way I approached it back then. I used to focus on layers (the bass, the melody, the harmony) which gave it a very blocky sound, while in your case you seem to imitate the gestures of the music you love. It kind of sounds like an AI trying to make sense of the noise, by which I do not mean that it sounds artificial, but that it does stand out compared to other amateur pieces. I wish you good luck and don't give up, we need good music these days more than ever!
Most of these sound like old videogame music (Runescape for example). My favourite are: Largo, Humoresque (which with some tweaks would sound quite good played on harpsichord), and Rat on LSD (that one's a banger).
Making any composition is hard af. You actually did pretty good at the time. It's pretty awkward but most people's early compositions are either 100% trash or on the same level as hot cross buns. The fact that you could make something so complex and actually make some of it coherent and occasionally beautiful is incredible at that age.
Reminds me a bit of myself, but only a bit (I tended toward minimalism rather than this type of complexity). I started when I was 11. My earliest stuff sounded like practice bits from the band textbook. Every instrument in an entire orchestra honking out the same quarter notes in unison. But you gotta start somewhere right? Actually still working on a piece I started when I was 14. It's good that I put off finishing it because I recognized I had almost no idea what I was doing back then. 😅
Honestly, as a 24 year old composition student, this was very inspiring musically. I like that you just went F it and hammered those parallel sixths in Etude No. 6. And don't listen to people saying you haven't improved or this is too cursed. Random compositions like this keep you out of a "Classical or contemporary"-mindset and will create your own style even if it will be more classical later. I mean you're still young and can get "proper" arrangement and composition lessons later on. Addition: Your newer "Melodie Op. 7 No. 3" sounds really great.
The second part of largo sounds like something from a video game that just plays in the background. Or is in a movie with a montage of a couple running around together and then shortly cuts to something tragic to one of them, which leaves the other sad and depressed. Kinda like the scene from frozen when the parents had to leave and they died.
RachManJohn: "Let me show you my old cringy music" Some asshole: "Still cringe" RachManJohn: Pins their intolerant comment. The balls on both of these guys, I swear. I don't know enough about classical music to offer any proper feedback, but I wanted to say that I admire your willingness to provide others insight into what the learning process is like. That sort of insight could be incredibly encouraging to new composers. I, for one, found it fascinating just how much it parallels my own experience trying to learn about music without having access to any formal training. I know my writing style often comes across as pretentious; that's something I'm still working on, and it feels very out of place on the internet, but I hope that it doesn't take too much away from the message. Additionally, I would hardly call this cursed. I also lack the knowledge to properly articulate why, but I found it quite impressive, especially given your young age. Reading through the other comments, I've seen others pointing out evidence of an intuitive understanding of harmony. Never underestimate how powerful such good intuition can be (but also respect its power to completely undermine reason and moderation. My good intuitions have completely overtaken a bunch of my own projects, turning them into chaotic, eldritch abominations.)
This really makes me wish I could go back and listen to my first-time Finale Notepad "compositions" from when I was 13. Just a spam of unplayable piano, timpani, bassoon, zero clue wtf I was doing.
About the Largo (first piece). First, whatever program or plug-in you got to play those strings needs to be taken out back and shot. Or at least overwritten a dozen times on you hard drive by videos of adorable kittens as an act of exorcism. And as I'm sure you realize by now, it would probably require 4 of each violins, violas and cellos to render those chords. From what little I understand of the harp your music is probably even more impossible there, and anyway the harp would be completely overshadowed by that overlarge string section. And I still enjoyed it :)
This is actually great! You know who else wasn't listening to or trying to emulate Beethoven or particularly concerned with the many "shoulds" of the classical canon? BETTHOVEN! My point is great sounds come in all shapes, styles, ilks, and inspirations. When doubt, trust your 13-year-old instinct just to create and enjoy the pure wild act of creating!
The first piece kinda gives off Slime Rancher vibes ngl, and when the second one started, I was immediately reminded of half of the music in the Touhou series.
I am truly sorry that this valuable video for me contains English, which I understand worse than Russian or Ukrainian. Undoubtedly, I would like to delve deeper into the history of each piece, but I just can't. Nevertheless, I even wanted to learn a couple of these pieces, for example, section A of the Requiem. Thank you for sharing these pieces with us. Happy birthday to your dad!
As I am currently getting into arranging symphonic movements for concert band, I have this huge “placeholders” Musescore file with a bunch of ideas I haven’t done anything with. How common is this for y’all?
I know you may think that "sad attempt at atonal music" is not a good piece, but It was honestly my favorite of the bunch. I love the dark and foreboding tone of it, and the chromatic melodies fit in nicely. While it's true that the peice is far from atonal, it's also far from being the bad peice you think it is. It may just fail to fit your tastes as much as some of your other songs. That is to say I want a finished version of "sad attempt at atonal music". I would certainly listen to it.
I wish I could show you my early compositions also. They are remarkably similar to these in many ways. I did a lot of synth music in college. Some good stuff, some not so good. Actually, there are a couple of them I made videos of on my channel.
I have found music I wrote years ago that I completely forgot about and I thought it was pretty amazing at the time... but with the benefit of many years passed and some fresh perspective I realised that my early 'masterpieces' were indeed cursed too lol
I have a similar collection of cursed music from a similar age! I remember this feeling of trying to reverse engineer the magic of other composers. I had some interesting ideas and started developing a sense of what appealed to me musically, but no sense of harmonic progression, how to develop an idea, etc. One day I will revisit them and maybe there's a few salvageable snippets in there! Or maybe I'll just follow your lead and publish them on my current channel as is :)
Maaaaaan, I wish I had all my old Finale files from 20-year-old hard drives. I used to write crazy impossible stuff like this all the time! Thanks for this, really takes me back. :)
5:08 The crap are you talkin about!! This is a fantastic way to psychologically experiment with and make sense of a new concept! And i bet you had fun doing it too. That’s about as far from a failure as I can think of
I'm a music ed major, and the creativity at work here is probably better than that found in any of my compositions for at least many more years. Thank you for documenting your interesting compositions.
Ahh! This brings back fond memories of when I first started writing music. It was a late night in the second semester of my freshmen year in High School back in 2021 during distance learning. My orchetra teacher had us use this software called Smartmusic so that we could sightread music. Lo-and-behold, I found the "compose" tool and thought "Ah, what the heck". I couldn't get to sleep so I just started typing away. Like you mentioned at the beginning of the video, there is this originality in my earlier music that I just cannot replicate today. As bad as my earlier music sounded, there is still nostalgia. I started to get the hang of it right around my third and fourth pieces. I submitted one of my more recent pieces in fall of 2022 and got my school orchestra to perform it at one of the concerts. I just finished a complete overhaul of one of my earlier works. Bravo to you by the way! I still did not come close to the level of skill you had though, even today! Congrats!
Wait, you got your school to play one of YOUR pieces??? That is an accomplishment!!! You should be proud!! If that were me, my heart would be leaping out of my chest I’d be so excited that a school orchestra was playing one of my songs, specifically one from my Spyro fan album Spyrorchestra 😃
You would have been the best adventure game soundtrack composer when I was 13. 😊 Seriously though I couldn't even read sheet music properly at that age.
Honestly with me starting out I was quite the opposite, I still had shitty marching band compositions, but most of the time I was too scared to write anything too crazy. Also what was the debussy piece in the beginning? I remember playing it in high school and was trying to find the source music for like 3 years lol.
Mate, you think your music is weird and not good? Wait until I release all 233 Pieces that I wrote that are either: Unplayable, Broken, Not Possible, Weird, Strange, and Annoying to play.
You haven't improved much
I'm a slow learner!
I don't understand why anybody would make a comment like this.
@@jakubedwardschiffauermedraj because they need to recognize the fact that their current method of learning is terrible.
@@Whatismusic123 that is a brave thing to say, when you have your own compositions publicly available for all to see!
@@RachManJohn not really, when said compositions are good pieces of music, unlike literally everyone else's alive on the planet
Video starts, music is playing
Me: "wow that's really good actually"
Video: "this Debussy is the last good music for the next 36 minutes"
SAME LITERALLY, SAME
SAME omg 😭
what song?
@@tigglesbruhl’isle joyeuse
Saaaame😭
The idea of someone being 13 in the year 2019 just actually snapped my brain in half
So you're old?
Nah I'm just messing lmao
yeah… they’re 17 this year so not that young
There are people of all ages alive at every moment......
@@so_phster I miss when 17 meant “not young”
@@diabl2master Obviously. For those of us who are older it’s just kind of a little reminder to how much time has passed, it’s shocking to think of how much older I am now which is what basically everyone goes through.
Obviously people are being born and growing up at all times, no need to be a smartass about it.
Barely a minute in and the viola has an unplayable note😭 it's truly art
As a viola player I laughed at that note
I’m a cello player and like 30% of the notes that I’ve seen so far are unplayable 💀
Well he said that he didn't listen to music that much, and he don't play viola wtf were you expecting lmfao
funny :D but also... who cares? If the meistro gives you a note, you figure out how to play it, even if you have to nail a string onto that viola banjo-style 🤣🤣🤣
enter thimble
"My first composition at age 13" Bro you harmonically understood the half diminished chord. Something I'm still like- Hmmm..... This chord is made of chord but it's... hmmm. I am enthused about this upkeep of a development phase you are going through.
Any tips on how to learn these things? It feels like I get the whole dominant -> tonic cadence, and maybe the function of a subdominant, but beyond these most basic ideas I'm just lost
@@alexryder4872 listen to a LOT of music while reading the score. If you hear a part you like, play it on the instrument of your choice!
@@alexryder4872think of it as a minor 7 chord with a flat 5: B D F# A turns into B D F A
minor third, minor third, major third
... that's not complicated. The problem is you're over-thinking it. No, a half diminished chord, is not a chord mode of chord, it's just a chord with a diminished fifth, minor third, and minor 7th, it's no different from I7, or V7, or ii7, it just depends on context when you *should* use it. it's especially common in minor keys as ii°7 with subdominant function.
this isn't cursed, it's rather very impressive. Compared to what I've attempted to make these are masterpieces.
of course it's impressive. This video is a humble-brag.
@@beastinthesky6774 man y'all are just incompetent rather. 5 year old mozart composed better, how can it be a humble brag?
5 year old mozart was also a musical prodigy good sir. I don’t understand why your being so hostile towards this man, let the man make his music. He does not pay you to teach him or give him advice so it is not really your place to do so. Composing should be something anyone can be allowed to enjoy doing, no reason to gatekeep it like this- its super childish man.@@Whatismusic123
@@Whatismusic123 Stop.
@@Whatismusic123Trust me. You aren't that guy pal. You're narcissistic.
If you gave these pieces some strange, "random" title and claimed it was an avant garde piece to "capture youthful innocence," or something, it would probably win awards...
Straight up
I was thinking that. It would have to be played electronically though. Nearly half those notes are unplayable
@@leo1308813that's prolly why OP called it cursed tbh
why do you say they would be unplayable? you can use multiple players and alternative tunings for the instruments @@leo1308813
Definitely, I feel like these compositions have potential!
As a harpist, if I had to play the harp part I might actually cry.
Also... it's literally impossible..... but it sounds good!
Happiness or despair?
@@lowochi Despair... or bleeding fingers
I don't write much for harp, but there are 2 things I realized was a must know. How many notes a harpist can play in a chord and pedal changes. As a pianist. Hum, we have pedal. What's the problem? Oh, that's right, they have 7 and we have 3. Their pedals are for accidentals, ours are just for fun😅. I think I'm getting the hang of it.
@@eddygonzalez2328 It's pretty cool you write for harp at all! Lots of pieces don't have a harp part, so it's safe to say that I sat out a lot during orchestra in school. Keep doing what you do! ❤
As a composer, this is actually fire af, when I was 13 I didn't even come close to what you did and here I am at 16, with my thesis for graduation being a composition. You're incredible!
funny how that works, since I'm likely not close to either of you at 19
on the other hand I started way later and am going to college for linguistics, so that might be the problem
wait so you are graduating at 16? and thesis' are for graduate school... so you are like 8 years ahead of your time.
@@JwellsuhhuhMusic I wish, haha, we write a senior honours thesis in my curriculum of high school to graduate
@@barbutahelmet8966 oooooh, I love linguistics
@@barbutahelmet8966 dude that just means you're worse than bad
I love how largo went from an orchestra to just a harp solo lol😂
Man, the orchestra music I play doesn’t even have a harp part. I'll gladly take a harp solo, even if it's impossible🤪
That's pretty typical for a concerto opening. Orchestra hypes up the crowd, then drops out and lets the soloist rip.
The harp is an absolute unit on that largo
My god i love the first one its just so harsh on the ears and goes nowhere breath of fresh air.Not ironicly.
The butterfly etude had some really beautiful moments. I would love to hear a revised version without all the awkwardness lol.
Maybe I'll come back to it someday! Although it's far from my style these days.
The start sounded like a Pokémon theme lol
I mean, it's coherent! Which is way more than I can say about my early compositions which are (thankfully) lost to time
Don't patronize him!
no it isn't coherent... ?
it is far from coherent
no your comments aren't "objective fact"... ?@@Whatismusic123
@@Whatismusic123bro is obsessed
I am not a musician, but let me tell you about the number of "bad" sketches in attic-locked sketchbooks. Thank you for sharing this. It's akin to seeing somebody's sketchbook, and all of the discarded half-drawings. We learn, grow, and master from "play".
You gotta make a hundred bad sketches before you make something you like. And then once you're done with that one, you look at it again, realize it's actually trash, then start the whole process again. Tis the curse of being an artist.
@@greatstorm3805 tis the gift of being an artist FTFY ;) I'd say the developing that growth mindset and keeping it up is a really powerful thing. And yep that's the beauty of it
@@greatstorm3805 Tis the curse of being alive at all.
This is the equivalent of looking back at a one-year-old drawing notebook. Sometimes you just outright cringe like “I MADE THIS??”
The only difference being these were actually pretty good
One thing you touched on that I fully relate to is how much easier it felt to compose back when we started. I’d just sit down and write (crap) music to my hearts content but now that I’ve grown in my ability’s it’s harder to just put stuff down without being critical and judgmental. I still love writing but man I wish those days sometimes.
I can relate so much
yess I've almost stopped composing because of this
Same
One thing I found that doesn't completely solve the issue but sort of helped was switching instruments. I played piano for a long time (and still do but not as much) and switching to guitar helped me come up with new ideas since it's a totally different way of playing and naturally caused me to come up with music in a different way. I know it's not for everyone but it's definitely worth picking up a new instrument if you have an interest!
Oh man this is so true. I used to fiddle around in Finale so much right up until I started to know what I was actually doing and I haven't written anything for over 10 years.
The first song was actually pretty good. These aren’t bad or cursed. They’re awesome.
Some of this stuff doesn't sound too bad. Some of these melodies and even baselines could be reworked into something new.
I especially liked the first humoresque. it may lack refinement but there are some really good ideas in there.
for sure, maybe an electric guitar with a lil distorted tone
honestly i love them all! they're expressive, emotional, or just plain fun at times. you're rather hard on yourself my guy. getting caught up in "can't do parallel fifths" or "this isn't technically playable" or punishing yourself for not adhering to various classical principles will only hold you back. keep on writing and keep that passion going
Would you actually listen to this?
@@TimCizej137 coming from someone who knows nothing about composing music, you underestimate how absolutely dumb most of us are. There are beginner composers like this guy used to be, dumping out pieces that, from what he says, are absolutely aimless and go no where, or are the most generic thing ever heard to mankind, and at least 1 out of 10 listeners will praise it like its the next coming of mozart.
I am one of those people, because i hear some of these and really cant tell what bro is criticizing. Look at half the comments here. Its all praise.
@@TimCizej137 im pretty sure jazz people who are also into classical would love this shit. i like it. its good
i've always wondered if famous classical musicians looked at their music that we consider masterpiece today like you look at the music you made when you were 13. imagine if they hated some of their stuff years after writing it but couldnt do anything about it because, well, its already out there
I think Scriabin had this thought
@@Jetthew Scriabin's early music was dog ass 😂😂😂😂😂😂
asrdtfyguhij why@@Whatismusic123
Tchaikovsky hated the popularity of the 1812 overture because he thought it was “lacking artistic merit” and didn’t want to be known for that lol
Chopin hated Fantaisie Impromptu apparently
"My first composition at 13" is literally better than any music I will ever make in my entire life time. That whole song Largo took me back to when my dad would always have really old classical orchestral music playing in the house when I was just a small child.
Oh man, that crappy midi piano sound brings me back to when I was 13 and writing everything on noteflight. Some of those pieces reminded me of some of my stuff too, I too was obbsessed with writing hyper virtuoso works.
Great video!
Ah, Noteflight. The notation software is fine, but I have to upload everything onto Musescore just to get even mediocre free samples. And, of course, Musescore has a more intuitive UI, in my completely uneducated opinion.
@@aarongreer7621 yeah, musescore is a good one to use, they got a good free sound font too. I'm just using sibelius now
Not me still sometimes using noteflight bc it's the most intuitive scoring platform I've found LOL
I've always struggled with Musescore, tbh. It's nowhere near as bad as Finale tho.@@aarongreer7621
I swear, this music isn't bad. If anything, it's far better than anything I could even dream of.
Rat on LSD is underrated bro, you are so ahead of your time
Personally I'm partial to Battle Hymn of the Deranged Bluebird (especially the second theme), but Rat on LSD is a good one
As someone who's tried (and failed) to compose their own music, the fact you did this at 13 is actually really impressive. I'm a percussionist, so music theory isn't exactly my strong suit, but still.
It's interesting because I actually found myself vastly preferring your first theme when you were 13 to the ones closer to the middle you aptly described as "dry as a grain of rice." If anything else, I think within specifically the 1st half of the piece where you weren't so hyperfixated on impossible sounds, you had a good natural sense (probably from music you had heard) of interesting chord progressions. Maybe not by the books, and often missing a lot, but it did remind me of something you'd hear in a videogame like the Hollow Knight soundtrack by Christopher Larkin, which is a high praise. I would actually really like to hear a readapted form of that first half, because I found some of the direction very tasteful, if not just woefully unrefined, and leading nowhere. I am a huge fan of dissonance and subverting expectations to come back to some fulfilling closure though, so it might just be scratching a very specific niche itch for me personally.
Oh wow you're so young
Listen I don't know the slightest bit about music theory, I can barely pass most games in Rhythm Heaven. I didn't develop an understanding for basic beats 4/4 time until I was 20. I have no idea how to tell notes in a scale apart, am still unsure of what a chord is, and couldn't even dream of playing an instrument, let alone composing. You're leaps and bounds ahead of a lot of people. Your humility is commendable, but so is your work.
A chord is usually a few notes that sound good together played at the same time.
While some of the pieces are totally incoherent and, as you say, completely unplayable, I think you have some excellent ideas embedded in here that, in a good piece, could be fleshed out and become elements of a greater coherent form. I wish you the best of luck on your journey.
ok but 'a rat on LSD' actually sounds rlly good
Honestly, as a 24 year old composition student, this was very inspiring musically. I like that you just went F it and hammered those parallel sixths in Etude No. 6. And don't listen to people saying you haven't improved or this is too cursed. Random compositions like this keep you out of a "Classical or contemporary"-mindset and will create your own style even if it will be more classical later. I mean you're still young and can get "proper" arrangement and composition lessons later on. Addition: Your newer "Melodie Op. 7 No. 3" sounds really great.
I love the way you approach your ideas. I don’t think it’s unplayable and so much enjoyed listening! I’m VERY impressed actually. At 13! Wow!
I agree that this music is pretty spooky, and thank you for sharing. Overall pretty impressive, I don't think the computer generated sound gives it justice.
The abrupt endings are so so so real
Lol your "attempt of atonal music" is actually more tonal than several other pieces in your list 😂
Thank you for sharing your old pieces! Your newer compositions are lovely and if you dislike the old ones, that just shows how much you've improved. Some of them may not be playable, but they have a sense of childlike exploration and adventure that's hard to replicate. They're much better than the cringeworthy, pretentious piano "compositions" I always tried to impress my teacher with at the same age. XD
I applaud your bravery to put your early pieces out on the internet for everyone to witness. Truth be told, I would never have the guts to show even close friends my first "track" that I finished when I was young using GarageBand XD
Kudos to you and happy (late) birthday to your dad.
I mean this largely unhinged and unplayable-ish but honestly there is real artistic expression here.
It reminds me of 6th grade when i would just sit at my dads computer on our pirated version of crescendo notation software and go bananas.
I found your first work, the harp "concerto" quite inspiring. It reminds me of when I began composing without knowledge of theory, only basic orchestration, and a general idea of how pieces are supposed to be structured. I had no idea that brass instruments and certain woodwind instruments were transposition instruments, yet these early compositions ended up sounding ok, at least to my ears. That harp concerto, it is amazing, and although I may not be anywhere near becoming a great composer, I can still see that that harp concerto holds amazing potential. Perhaps sometime in the future, or even right now, you should return to it and flesh it out. Something tells me, that it will be beautiful.
I tried to find the harp "concerto". I also tried searching on Rachman's channel, to no avail. What piece do you refer to?
@@donaldaxelit’s the first piece in this video
I actually really like Requiem. I think it's lovely. I'm also not horribly "educated" so that might correlate. Regardless, this was a fun video to watch. Thanks for the bravery in posting it.
Music is music - if you enjoy it, then I won't stop you! Appreciate your kind remarks.
bro what… the first one was so gorgeous… obviously if it was performed live it would be a lot more rich instead of a computer just playing the notes. this is amazing!!
Genuinely, as someone who knows nothing about music, has never really listened to clqssical music, and has no idea how they got here, i am in love with 'idea 1.5' and will be listening to it again.
If there was one song that would describe me, I actually think it would be that one
@@bean2365 well, even though the composition is not of a high standard, music is defined by the ones who enjoy it. You seem like a lovely, decent person, so that is a compliment to my composition! I'm glad you enjoy.
I can't say I like all of these compositions but daaaaaaamn!!!! For something made by a 13 year old, this is pretty impressive. Like I really like the Largo, the Requiem and especially the Study number 3 (which reminds me a bit of the kind of stuff I write in my spare time... Except way better because you actually finished writing yours and you're probably not just transcribing songs you heard in your dreams like me).
Love all of the pieces that you composed! The butterfly etude is very remeniscent of Schumann! :)
As a writer, I have to say I love your style of narration and ironic / dry sense of humor in this. Also it's a good thing you can't see what I composed in my first music theory and composition class because if these pieces are considered "cursed" I shudder to think what mine would be classified as.
Its lovely to hear 13 year old RMJ!!!! Thank you for sharing these compositions with us!!! 🎵🎹🎵🎹🎵🎹🎵🎹🎵🙂🙂🙂🤗
It's absolutely my pleasure!
Man when you mentioned that there's an acount with even older music and said "great effort is being made!", I got scared for my life for at least 3 breaths.
So if you were 13 in 2019, you are just barely 18 today. You are still extremely young, so this is not 'going way back'!! Kidding aside, what matters is the passion and that you were experimenting, and I can hear the talent.
Turned this month... for me it was a long time. Thankyou for your kind words and I hope I can ratify them with actuality.
@@RachManJohn Haha gotcha. It's cute. It reminds me of once on the kids tournament on Jeopardy when the 11 year old contestant said "When I was young...". Keep doing what you are doing and following your heart! BTW the fact that you could mimic the sounds you heard in Bond or in video games indicates that you do have a natural ear for harmony. It's much easier to mimic melody than harmony.
@@RachManJohnjust keep going
cursed? i'd say magical, specially considering you didnt had any teachers and stuff. i wish i could write songs like that... well, i can barely play kindergarten songs, so it's not big surprise, but it's still frustrating. anyways, good job. please continue to improve every day! :3
i love this videos, as a composer i love to see my early works to it is so nutritive to the mind
This music actually makes me really nostalgic for older video game music.
37:04 yoooo! I love the inclusion of "Dies Irae"
The accursed noteflight sound font is everything
Dude honestly I think you have a bright future in front of you. When I was 13 I could barely play the drums and knew nothing about harmony, counterpoint or form.
Now I am 30 and I'm still trying to improve my writing, which is far from good.
Just keep studying and you'll become a respectable composer. Good luck!
I started composing when I was 18, it has been seven years since. The stuff you're writing now is better than what I wrote when I was 18, even though I had been playing music since 12 (though it was pop). Yes, they don't sound "good" - one can hear the very obvious, yet charming, naivete in your pieces - but one can also hear glimpses of inspired music asking to come out. Another good thing is that you have something that I miss so much from my early years which is the sheer volume of output; you still don't put too many filters on your creativity and that is something I implore you to keep. Given your age I am sure that in some years time, with the right guidance and effort, you will evolve greatly and reach your aspirations.
Your way of composing is also very different compared to the way I approached it back then. I used to focus on layers (the bass, the melody, the harmony) which gave it a very blocky sound, while in your case you seem to imitate the gestures of the music you love. It kind of sounds like an AI trying to make sense of the noise, by which I do not mean that it sounds artificial, but that it does stand out compared to other amateur pieces. I wish you good luck and don't give up, we need good music these days more than ever!
Thankyou my friend... I am 18 now and I take inspiration from your words. I appreciate your kindness!
Most of these sound like old videogame music (Runescape for example). My favourite are: Largo, Humoresque (which with some tweaks would sound quite good played on harpsichord), and Rat on LSD (that one's a banger).
someone out there should organize a concert where an orchestra attempts to play these
Making any composition is hard af. You actually did pretty good at the time. It's pretty awkward but most people's early compositions are either 100% trash or on the same level as hot cross buns. The fact that you could make something so complex and actually make some of it coherent and occasionally beautiful is incredible at that age.
put this into the new MuseScore, i'd love to hear how its instrument engine would make it sound
"Good? Bad? I cannot tell. But I thank God with all my heart that I am my own."
Reminds me a bit of myself, but only a bit (I tended toward minimalism rather than this type of complexity). I started when I was 11. My earliest stuff sounded like practice bits from the band textbook. Every instrument in an entire orchestra honking out the same quarter notes in unison. But you gotta start somewhere right? Actually still working on a piece I started when I was 14. It's good that I put off finishing it because I recognized I had almost no idea what I was doing back then. 😅
Honestly, as a 24 year old composition student, this was very inspiring musically. I like that you just went F it and hammered those parallel sixths in Etude No. 6. And don't listen to people saying you haven't improved or this is too cursed. Random compositions like this keep you out of a "Classical or contemporary"-mindset and will create your own style even if it will be more classical later. I mean you're still young and can get "proper" arrangement and composition lessons later on. Addition: Your newer "Melodie Op. 7 No. 3" sounds really great.
The second part of largo sounds like something from a video game that just plays in the background. Or is in a movie with a montage of a couple running around together and then shortly cuts to something tragic to one of them, which leaves the other sad and depressed. Kinda like the scene from frozen when the parents had to leave and they died.
Why cursed? This is amazing. I´d love to hear someone in real life attempting to play these.
RachManJohn: "Let me show you my old cringy music"
Some asshole: "Still cringe"
RachManJohn: Pins their intolerant comment.
The balls on both of these guys, I swear.
I don't know enough about classical music to offer any proper feedback, but I wanted to say that I admire your willingness to provide others insight into what the learning process is like. That sort of insight could be incredibly encouraging to new composers. I, for one, found it fascinating just how much it parallels my own experience trying to learn about music without having access to any formal training. I know my writing style often comes across as pretentious; that's something I'm still working on, and it feels very out of place on the internet, but I hope that it doesn't take too much away from the message.
Additionally, I would hardly call this cursed. I also lack the knowledge to properly articulate why, but I found it quite impressive, especially given your young age. Reading through the other comments, I've seen others pointing out evidence of an intuitive understanding of harmony. Never underestimate how powerful such good intuition can be (but also respect its power to completely undermine reason and moderation. My good intuitions have completely overtaken a bunch of my own projects, turning them into chaotic, eldritch abominations.)
Largo reminds me of a soundtrack that easily can be on Hollow Knight, so beautifull
Brings me back to my anvil studio days, you did really good.
Thankyou oh somnolent canine!
This really makes me wish I could go back and listen to my first-time Finale Notepad "compositions" from when I was 13. Just a spam of unplayable piano, timpani, bassoon, zero clue wtf I was doing.
As a harpist thanks for appreciating my instrument ❤❤
That little metal section at 8:22 has me absolutely rolling it's perfect 😂
It's the breakdown
As a violist, some of the notes I saw were physically not possible but surprisingly it's happened before on my music 😭
I liked what you were doing for awhile at 2:36 . That bit sounded like it could have gone in Made in Abyss.
About the Largo (first piece). First, whatever program or plug-in you got to play those strings needs to be taken out back and shot. Or at least overwritten a dozen times on you hard drive by videos of adorable kittens as an act of exorcism. And as I'm sure you realize by now, it would probably require 4 of each violins, violas and cellos to render those chords.
From what little I understand of the harp your music is probably even more impossible there, and anyway the harp would be completely overshadowed by that overlarge string section.
And I still enjoyed it :)
Largo sounds like it could be in a horror rpg game🔥
I happen to think it sounds quite good!
Who cares if you weren’t classical trained or anything at the time, be proud of what you made!
This is actually great! You know who else wasn't listening to or trying to emulate Beethoven or particularly concerned with the many "shoulds" of the classical canon? BETTHOVEN! My point is great sounds come in all shapes, styles, ilks, and inspirations. When doubt, trust your 13-year-old instinct just to create and enjoy the pure wild act of creating!
The first piece kinda gives off Slime Rancher vibes ngl, and when the second one started, I was immediately reminded of half of the music in the Touhou series.
Literally the first minute and its already unplayable lmao this is gonna be good
I am truly sorry that this valuable video for me contains English, which I understand worse than Russian or Ukrainian. Undoubtedly, I would like to delve deeper into the history of each piece, but I just can't. Nevertheless, I even wanted to learn a couple of these pieces, for example, section A of the Requiem. Thank you for sharing these pieces with us. Happy birthday to your dad!
Thankyou my friend! Your English is itself eloquent. Дуже дякую!
As I am currently getting into arranging symphonic movements for concert band, I have this huge “placeholders” Musescore file with a bunch of ideas I haven’t done anything with. How common is this for y’all?
I know you may think that "sad attempt at atonal music" is not a good piece, but It was honestly my favorite of the bunch. I love the dark and foreboding tone of it, and the chromatic melodies fit in nicely. While it's true that the peice is far from atonal, it's also far from being the bad peice you think it is. It may just fail to fit your tastes as much as some of your other songs. That is to say I want a finished version of "sad attempt at atonal music". I would certainly listen to it.
Your commentaries/ programme notes alone are incredible entertainment lol
It severely shocked me when you said "Back when I was young in 2019" because that's like,,, yesterday to me
Ok but some of these were straight fire tbh, they have lots of potential! I'm getting kind of a minecraft ost vibe from them.
I wish I could show you my early compositions also. They are remarkably similar to these in many ways. I did a lot of synth music in college. Some good stuff, some not so good. Actually, there are a couple of them I made videos of on my channel.
I'll make sure to check them out!
36:26 I really like this passage! I enjoyed this entire section with the triplets in the bottom actually. It goes off in the very next measure though.
I have found music I wrote years ago that I completely forgot about and I thought it was pretty amazing at the time... but with the benefit of many years passed and some fresh perspective I realised that my early 'masterpieces' were indeed cursed too lol
Okay this is often unplayable but I quite enjoyed how it sounded
I have a similar collection of cursed music from a similar age! I remember this feeling of trying to reverse engineer the magic of other composers. I had some interesting ideas and started developing a sense of what appealed to me musically, but no sense of harmonic progression, how to develop an idea, etc. One day I will revisit them and maybe there's a few salvageable snippets in there! Or maybe I'll just follow your lead and publish them on my current channel as is :)
Maaaaaan, I wish I had all my old Finale files from 20-year-old hard drives. I used to write crazy impossible stuff like this all the time! Thanks for this, really takes me back. :)
Waow, some quiet nice, clever and beautiful ideas here and there. It's like a pretty raw and electronical young Beethoven. Stunning.
5:08 The crap are you talkin about!! This is a fantastic way to psychologically experiment with and make sense of a new concept!
And i bet you had fun doing it too. That’s about as far from a failure as I can think of
iconic on how right now when im watching this, its my dad's birthday.
The butterfly etude... I genuinely enjoyed it, I would love to hear a revised version if you ever decide to go back to it!!
One day!
I'm a music ed major, and the creativity at work here is probably better than that found in any of my compositions for at least many more years. Thank you for documenting your interesting compositions.
Yikes.
@Whatismusic123 your compositions are nice! Everyone is learning, you should be less of an ass in these comments
Ahh! This brings back fond memories of when I first started writing music. It was a late night in the second semester of my freshmen year in High School back in 2021 during distance learning. My orchetra teacher had us use this software called Smartmusic so that we could sightread music. Lo-and-behold, I found the "compose" tool and thought "Ah, what the heck". I couldn't get to sleep so I just started typing away. Like you mentioned at the beginning of the video, there is this originality in my earlier music that I just cannot replicate today. As bad as my earlier music sounded, there is still nostalgia. I started to get the hang of it right around my third and fourth pieces. I submitted one of my more recent pieces in fall of 2022 and got my school orchestra to perform it at one of the concerts. I just finished a complete overhaul of one of my earlier works. Bravo to you by the way! I still did not come close to the level of skill you had though, even today! Congrats!
Wait, you got your school to play one of YOUR pieces??? That is an accomplishment!!! You should be proud!! If that were me, my heart would be leaping out of my chest I’d be so excited that a school orchestra was playing one of my songs, specifically one from my Spyro fan album Spyrorchestra 😃
the fact that these are acutally pretty good is making me want to fucking explode
Explode? In what way? I'm concerned.
You would have been the best adventure game soundtrack composer when I was 13. 😊 Seriously though I couldn't even read sheet music properly at that age.
Maybe one day I'll return to it, if I am hard up for money...
Honestly with me starting out I was quite the opposite, I still had shitty marching band compositions, but most of the time I was too scared to write anything too crazy.
Also what was the debussy piece in the beginning? I remember playing it in high school and was trying to find the source music for like 3 years lol.
ending of "L'isle Joyeuse"
Mate, you think your music is weird and not good? Wait until I release all 233 Pieces that I wrote that are either: Unplayable, Broken, Not Possible, Weird, Strange, and Annoying to play.
The humoresque is actually kinda funny (the opening especially). You could totally rework it into a very decent piece.
my favourites where: requiem, etude 6, etude 10, butterfly etude, theme and variations.... eh, you compose so fast!!!