Making Music, how do YOU do it? Options

[tacoboy]

There seems to be a lot of o topics about the technical side of music production. I'd like to know more about the methods.

How did you start out?

What effects has it had on your life and way of thinking?

How have you progressed and where you would like to see yourself in the future?

[manexmachina]

Ignoring the technicalities... this is my process...

I generally start with a mood and then play around on the piano for a while until I hear some sort of representation of that mood in what I'm playing. It could be a chord or a melody. I realize though that while I hear it in this moment, in order to make other people hear it, it has to be juxtaposed to other chords and melodies which will set the scene and reflect or expand the original chord or melody. lyrically i almost always write lyrics after the melody (except for two operettas that I wrote where the lyrics came first).

The technology simply allows for a greater access to sounds which could represent that mood. More unusual options, but the process is the same.

As for the other questions. I started playing as a child because it created a protective shell for me to escape into and I would play for hours everyday. I suppose I continue to do so because it's like returning home. I've been a professional musician now and then, but I generally find that the difference of composing for someone else takes away the pleasure of composing for myself.

I hope that was something of what you were inquiring.