Today, one of my Facebook friends set up a group called "Tapping Our Creative Energies," with the aim of exploring and sharing our insights and experiences about being "in the zone" where creative inspirations happen. This is a great topic, as I've arranged my life so that I can have creative experiences every day. It's the only way I can consistently enter the Zone, where I can feel fully present in the moment for more than a couple of seconds at a time.
I posted this as the first discussion.
Ever since I can remember, I've always associated specific colors with pitches (A is red, D is green, etc.). It's not as vivid as it was when I was a child, but whenever I play a piece of music, I see in my mind's eye a combination of colors, shapes, images,and musical notation.
The colors are always coordinated with the tonality of what I'm playing, and the shade changes depending on the harmonic context. For example, D major is a bright, primary green, while D minor is is more pine or sage green, and a D in a diminished chord would be more olive. It's a sort of visual shorthand.
When I'm playing for a modern dance class, where I have to make up everything on the spot, sometimes I'll look at what color someone is wearing to help me pick a key. I'll see a shape or sculpture that reflects the meter(s), structure, or accents of the exercise--for example, if it's in 7, is it 2-2-3, 2-3-2, or 3-2-2? If it's the first one, I'll see two squares and a triangle--then all I have to do is "color in" the picture with notes, and not get bogged down in concentrating on each individual count.
These "little" patterns become parts of bigger structural elements. Say there are 9 7's. I'll maybe divide it up into 3 sets of 3 7's. Or the overall pattern might be 4+5. Whatever it is, that's what I'll use to phrase it.
I use this same process when playing things I did not make up. Memorizing just sort of happens automatically, unless I haven't spent much time on it.
If I didn't see these visuals, playing/composing music wouldn't be half as fun or interesting. How about you? Anybody else have sensory overlap experiences during the creative process?
3 comments:
Really cool post, especially the part about the shapes. That's such an interesting way to visualize that I had never thought of. While I see colors, I really tend to visualize textures and patterns that are based in the harmonic and timbric context, which would probably explain my interest in guitar effects and synthesizers. I see pianos as long, sweeping curves, acoustic guitars as little dots lighting up for different notes, noise as little bumps, etc...
Thanks for your comment! It is so interesting how different minds can have totally different sensory experiences. I've heard that many people have color associations for the timbres of different instruments. A flute tone may be a cool blue, while the same pitch on a trumpet might be red because it is bright and brassy. For me, if it's the note F, it's blue no matter what is making the sound, whether it's a violin, a singer, or a door squeaking. It will just have a different image or texture (shiny, matte, bumpy, etc.)
What about noise? There is a threshold where modern music crosses into noise, with distorted amplified guitars and screaming lyrics.
For me, distortion forfeits the claim to be music.
Yaaaaaaaaaaa!
Dad
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