Creativity Cache - From Sight to Sound

From Sight to Sound on finding inspiration for a composition in the visual world. Students work individually to explore images—either those provided or ones they find or create themselves—as material that can inspire sound in various ways. They then use an image as a jumping off point in order to create a satisfying composition.

Students may have difficulty getting started with a composition. This starter offers them some ideas about how to get going with some new ideas. On the other hand, some students are ready to try program music, but could benefit from using a single image (rather than, for example, a work of prose) as a starting point. Adaptations: You can adapt this project to a variety of contexts. Here are some ideas:

• In an instrumental or vocal class, you could ask small groups of students to choose an image and improv based on it.
• In a composition class for younger students, you could use a single image to demonstrate a musical point visually. The image of the treetops could be used to talk about melody contour. The meat market pricing placards (read left to right and top to bottom) could be used in teaching the contredanse form (AABBCC). Etc.
• In an upper-level composition class, you could team with an art class (drawing, painting, photography, sculpture) and invite pairs of students to co-create an artmusic pairing.
• Upper-level students could also create a composition that is inspired by several images, treated either as separate movements or combined in some other way.
• In all cases, you could change the worksheet text to fit your context, substitute other images, and/or encourage students to use the world around them to inspire their creativity.