For me, when I have a good idea is a pleasure to sit in a chair for 4-5 hours at a time writing and record music.
But when lack inspiration and motivation is a pain even just the thought of being seated in a chair for 4-5 hours at a time writing and record music.
At this point I'm in serious conflict with myself: I want and I do not want this at the same time ... and it's a real torture!!
If something similar happens to you, how you behave?

 

No point forcing yourself to do something.Everyone faces it one time or another. Best advice I can give- Take a break, Do something else-take a walk, read a book, watch a film ,take a nap whatever and come back to it with a fresh perspective.
P.S- Get this book http://www.dennisdesantis.com/2015/04/24/making-music-the-book . Fantastic content and has a ton of good advice.

 

I saw a tutorial a while back that said something like "promise yourself 5 minutes a day to write music. If you do it for 5 minutes and nothing comes out of it - it's fine. But those "forced" 5 minutes usually gets your creativity going and you end up sitting working for a longer period than that."
I've been doing that lately and it works like a charm.

Also, it's nice to start off where you left off last time you "sat down to work on music". Perhaps with a digital recorder, smartphone, pen and paper or whatever.

 

A thing that works for me is to make this 4-5 hour sit in on the computer a comfortable as possible.
This includes:

-Getting some hot chocolate / cafe / tea
-having a comfortable seat
-something to snack here and there
- if its cold I would even get a hot-water bottle :D

Also, I do not recommend watching other producers produce on Youtube / Twitch etc.
Its often demotivating for me aswell as it makes my music sound exactly like those people I watched before hand.
But thats obviously just me, maybe it works wonders for you, here and there its just try and error.

 

The problem is not while I have a recording in progress ... Is between one song and another, in those intermediate spaces unless I force myself risk of being "stand-by" for months. Thanks for the book tip, I already wrote to Dennis, I love to read books about music (also because in addition to the music I write books also...)
Baxter is right: writing music is a discipline that should be followed on a daily basis, like brushing your teeth or face. It should be done even when you have no ideas.
And of course also LZ Jaydon is right: you need to pamper yourself a little 'while doing this hard work ...

 

10-15-20 minutes of quiet. No tv, no music, just ambient noise - sometimes I hear kids screaming outside, sometimes a car is passing by and I can hear the music that drives is listening to. The whole point for me is this way I am "targeted" by small bits of sounds (not continuous like the tv, or talking to someone, or listening to other tracks for "inspiration"). I am not good at meditation, so my brain kinda tries to build a track from those tiny bits of sound and I can't stop it. Eventually, something usable is emerging, I only need that one bar loop

 

What I do is trying to find other people to make music with, that almost always brings inspiration. Just sitting in front of my DAW trying to force myself to make music, I can't imagine that this would work.

If I try to force myself I always make mediocre stuff, that I don't like in the end or most likely never finish. But if I do sit down with other people there almost always is a spark of inspiration.

 

Find a chicky chick to dance to your musics. Then you can feel the inspiration for your new track at least for controlling her moves.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/kahyqjkyv2r8cor/BG.mp4

 

I used to get this a lot when I sat looking at the screen, with that big blank template sat in front of me. I found the best solution for me was to get rid of the screen and template. Got myself a groove box and just sit chilled out jamming. It's funny how one thing (like learning the how to use an aspect of my hardware) can lead to another ( the idea for a new track ). Or sometimes I just jam and let the track manifest itself, and then I'm just the controller.

 

All mood. If I'm in the right mod Either I'll wake up get blazed and write a song from scratch for 10 hours to damn near completation. However Same at night. Personally I find the best of me comes when I go to bed super early and wake up at like 3am blaze up and then start something. that way my brain is still lucid enough to let it flow and using the programs for so long just let muscle memory take over the production while I work out everything from each instrument note to arrangement to all of that.

At heart I'm a muse artist. Sometimes you meet a woman that it just doesn't stop. The second you pause on one song another one is at your door and so on. Unfortunately not always the safest approach for one's sanity.

 

Also put a crowd track behind everything your writing. That way while your writing you feel like you have a crowd of thousands. That way you can imagine the perfectness of the moment and how your music would set into that. But I have a vivid imagination also

 

But at the same time. When I go to work at the studio I make my living off of. I get dabbed out the second I get there. Because my boss knows he could set any random bpm on a metronome leave and in 30 minutes I'll have a whole song arrangement and all already in the halfway there phase. But I also apply things I learned from techno when it comes to feeling music. I always remember regardless of genre I'm creating a world for the listener. So regardless of lyrics the music itself will tell you the same story as the words.

 

Everyone's relation with their own creativity is different. To me, it's like a relationship with a lifelong friend, with similar dynamics, periods of intense engagement, stretches of disengagement, and so forth – but always being able to pick up where we'd left off in relating to one another.

For me, coming up with music isn't necessarily something that I can sit down and do, like an assignment or a chore.
There are times when I feel as though I "should be" applying myself or producing something, but forcing myself usually leads to one of two things: a) I just do "whatever," and something interesting or inspiring will occur; b) I know that it's time to let the field lie fallow and gather nutrients (or to let my batteries re-charge), so to speak.
Sometimes, I'm just not feelin' it, so I don't taint the activity with my bad mood, preoccupation or despondency.
Other times, something inside me will prod me, saying, "It's time – just get to it," and cool stuff will result.
Still other times, I'll get so sick of being inactive or inefficacious, so I'll just say, "Screw it - I'm goin' in," and from only one "seed" idea will sprout several good songs which I'd hardly suspected were in me.
Often, however, I'll be doing something around the house, and something I mutter to myself will become a musical phrase, and then more and more will come. I might be walking around town or running an errand or riding my bike, and melodies will enter my mind, with or without verbal phrases attached to them. Verbal phrases turn into musical phrases; the verbal phrases might be entirely replaced by others eventually.

Although I appreciate the principle behind committing to a certain amount of time per day, and at a particular time of day, to trying to create music, for some people (such as myself), everything in or about life is music; it's a matter of interpreting one's own experience musically. I'm hardly a genius, I've just become habituated to thinking this way. My main principle is to just let "whatever" come to the fore, to let the music become what it wants to be, rather than imposing some narcissistic idea of what I "should be" producing.

 

I've been doing this for ages, usually shortly after I wake up in the morning, and in the evening when I feel relaxed with nothing else to do. Sometimes I lose interest after 5 minutes, and other times it goes on until the next morning! I never knew this was some kind of strategy, but I do have my own system for generating seed ideas within 5 minutes. Actually you can do this sort of activity throughout the day, whenever you have a few minutes to spare. I am also looking into implementing a suitable workflow on a tablet, so that I can also have the option to be location independent. I totally recommend this 5 minute trick, it will probably be the most creative 5 minutes of your day or session

PS my system is highly optimized to start churning out melodies/progressions within seconds of switching on my laptop. I also try to keep it genre neutral, focusing on the interactions between the rhythm, bass, melody and harmony.

 

Last edited: Apr 2, 2016