BALANSGÅNGEN MELLAN FRIHET OCH BEGRÄNSNING Att komponera musik till ungdomskör

Abstract

How can one compose a song for a youth choir and make it relevant and interesting to its young members? This essay is dealing with the challenges you meet when composing a song for young voices, hearts and minds. The report describes the whole journey from finding a poem to a complete composition for SSA and piano. The composition was done with the support of a focus group, a youth choir, who tried singing the music in rehearsals and evaluated on the experience of singing it. The group was also part of interpreting the chosen poem. The challenges in the process was to find a relevant text for young people, make it singable and interesting, adding a piano part that would support, consider the possibilities and limits with young voices and also be true to yourself as a composer and artist. The reports also deals with the issue of popular music, the genre that young people mostly relate to, and if one can merge some of its core elements in to a choir piece. The conclusion states that the outer factors; the focus group, the text and the characteristics of popular music have inflected on the composing. They have provided both energy and frustration to the process, and also frame and focus in the composition. The most important things learned are staying true to the text and to your original idea.