I am an Assistant Chair of the Department named “Jazz & American Music” in the college. There, along with running the department, I teach Jazz Theory, Arranging, Ear Training, Ensemble and Master Degree classes. Among them is Composition.
There certainly are some methodical ways to teach composition, but we intentionally putting those theories and methods away and focus on how to musically materialize what we feel.
Recently, we focused on chord progression. I assigned one student to give class a title first (before students write something), then I asked them to try to come up with the chord progression (no melody) that can interpret that particular title.
The title was “Memory”, so they had to write a progression that sound like “Memory”.
‘Memory” can obviously means different to each person.
Some thought of “Memory” as something that they want to forget or to go passed. Others imagine “Memory” being something that always come back against their intention of forget those.
I played and examined each chord progression and asked students to think which harmonic movement most represents their feelings and why.
At the end I guided them to understand what exactly is going on within those chord progression, musically, theoretically.
After checking all those assignments, I wrote on the white board the chord progression that they are not familiar with and asked them to comment on this progression.
Some noticed the bass motion going down, some pointed out a certain chord gives them a bright feeling…etc.
When we were done with the discussion, I asked them to come up with their own title for the chord progression I wrote.
Those titles were:
“Hope for the future”
“Dark and Bright (Bright being one dominating)”
“A white pigeon (a symbol of peace)”
The chord progression I wrote on the board was from “Tears in Heaven” by Eric Clapton.
That is a tune he wrote when he lost his young son in tragic accident.
Now those title students came up, though they are not directly related to what this tune is actually all about,
are not too far off the course, or rather they almost match this tune!!
What this means is:
The students who are almost 60 years younger than Eric Clapton, who grown up in completely different culture from the U.S. and who are too young to know Eric Clapton or the tune “Tears In Heaven” could feel for this tune without melody or lyrics.
Since those students don’t know, I did not say too much in the class but inside of me, I was almost crying and said,
“Eric Clapton is a true genius!!”
How great the music is!!