How to Compose Music with Dice

Link to book composition lessons:
calendly.com/musicauniversalis
To get the most out of lessons, you should have a fairly basic knowledge of music theory. Basic meaning you can read treble and bass clef, know what a tonic and dominant are, time signatures, note values, and the circle of fifths. Literally the basics. It is not required that you know about figured bass or counterpoint. The ability to play a keyboard instrument is helpful, but not necessary.
(First Lesson is Free! Further Paid lessons cost 40€)
In this video I discuss a few methods for composing with dice, which I developed myself.
A special thanks as always to musopen.org and imslp.org for offering free public domain sheet music and recordings online.

[@welchomestudio]

There are dice with 12 faces (thus including the number 1), used for Dungeons&Dragons games for instance. You can even find 7-face dice to use when you only want to use the 7 notes in a scale (C D E F G A B in the C major scale, for instance). You may combine this with an additional dice, for example you roll a 2 with your 7-face dice, which corresponds to a D minor chord in the C major scale, and the other dice can tell you whether it's a Dm7 chord, or a Dm9 chord for instance, depending on what you decide each face of the other dice might be.

[@makytondr8607]

That final organ snippet actually sounded great! Thanks for the tips!

[@mohandesgrilj9896]

How can it be, that you dont have more subs??? Also brilliant video as per usual!!

[@masonjoesph8769]

Thank you ❤️ from one composer to another

[@thomasyoung8953]

this a great idea. Ive seen something similar on the gear gods channel for writing guitar riffs using dice but this an interesting way to go about it as well.

[@thomsontom3161]

love it... your channel is so underrated man... wish I could do more for you... I have literally fallen in love with your videos since Style of Chopin 4 years ago!! please don't stop making masterpieces like this, sr for my bad english :(

[@deliciousmrcheese]

Hey, just found your channel and I'm really enjoying it! I will check out more of your videos

[@lanceturner9471]

Very clever and fun...

[@darshanpatil7777]

Great stuff 👍🏻🙌

[@GabrielWilliamsOfficial]

love the vids. keep it up :)

[@accbcell]

Insightful, logical and interesting idea! It is much easier to compose something this way! Thanks a lot for sharing.

[@ApplestreamRuben]

Those are some really cool methods! Sometimes what I like to do is have my dice rolls determine the scale or form of my piece, a six sided dice is perfect for choosing one of the church modes for example, excluding locrian. And two dices can determine the tonic note.

[@MusicaUniversalis]

There are so many methods. I might try mixing your method with mine.

[@krzysztofq7420]

I guess it isn't super important, but the numbers you get rolling two dice and adding the values, don't follow uniform distribution. You would get 7 or 8 way more often than 2 or 12.

[@MusicaUniversalis]

Which is good to be honest. It’s especially nice if you roll a 6 and a 7 after each other. And keep in mind a 6 as in a 6th can be inverted to a 3rd if that’s more conducive to what came before. Same with a seventh to a second, same goes for the ninth, and so on.

[@caterscarrots3407]

Around the time that you uploaded this video, I started on an arrangement that’s pretty exciting for me. I am arranging a Mozart piece, but not just any sonata or string quartet, but rather a concerto. The concerto I am arranging? Horn Concerto no. 2 in Eb. Further motivation comes from the fact that I can’t find an arrangement of that piece for the piano, either duet or solo. It’s going very quickly as Mozart generally does. 3 days and I’m already a quarter of the way through the first movement.

[@FranzKaernBiederstedt]

Interesting video and generally a nice idea to take coincidence into the process of composition by rolling the dice. Just one thought, though: I really like your little waltz with these colorful harmonic changes, it is a wonderful example for coming up with more surprising and unique ideas. In my opinion that doesn't happen with your examples regarding intervals. Here you apply traditional rules of counterpoint like how to prepare or resolve dissonances, and the result sounds exactly like any example of classical counterpoint and not like you with your own voice as a creative person. I do think that counterpoint can be a part of very different musical styles, and every style creates its own rules, e.g. how to deal with and incorporate dissonances. I would suggest you make up your own rules for a certain piece and not strictly follow traditional rules when creating series of intervals by rolling the dice. It is your creative mind that figures out how to make it sound convincing what the dice are coming up with randomly, just like you were able to find ways to letting your waltz sound convincing. Great composers have often put some random point of conflict or puzzle challenge in the way of their composition process, and by solving the conflict or the puzzle they came up with ideas far more unique and inventive than without these stumbling blocks. For example, I'm often very astonished by the creative stimuli Chopin came up with in his smaller works like the Mazurkas. They often seem to be an exercise on how to deal with a certain problem Chopin came up with randomly, be it a seemingly wrong note in a tonal context that had to be justified in the course of the piece, or be it the idea to start a piece with its final ending-cadence, or be it the continuous reharmonization of a certain group of tones, or whatever. The idea to confront yourself with some obstacle that needs to be put aside, with something puzzling that needs to be solved and made logic through the process of composition should---in my opinion---lead to music that sounds different and personal. I don't quite see the use of coming up with something that sounds like every school book example of Fux species counterpoint. Let me end by assuring you that I don't mean this in any way offensive. I like your channel very much and---as I've said---the example of your waltz is wonderful! The counterpoint examples also sound smooth, but they are not unique and personal to the same extent as your waltz is. But I do think that your techniques of dicing intervals could also be varied in a way to lead to interesting, individual, surprising contrapuntal ideas out of the box of traditional counterpoint.

[@skaldlouiscyphre2453]

Finally, a guide to ripping off the Dillinger Escape Plan.

[@doc.g9497]

Man, I am definitely interested in those lessons, but I am not sure I know enough theory snd I don’t want to waste your precious time.

[@MusicaUniversalis]

Don't worry, I cater to everyone, and I highly doubt you'd be wasting my time.

[@GageSavageau]

Love the cup head reference

[@MusicaUniversalis]

I could barely get through the first level.....

[@agolooritte3057]

@@MusicaUniversalis my brother barely defeat King Dice, but when he got to the "mephisto" (nice liszt waltzes btw) he defeat him immediately. Plus: He made S grade on that. So... yeah. You picked up the greatest reference. If you want, I ll tell you when dlc releases! Btw: Your channel is better than that game, and that game is really good 😁

[@davidbuderim2395]

Using two six sided die is not random - it's what you might called biased random. Better to use a 12 sided die or a random number generator from the web. e.g. there is only one way of getting 12(6+6) or 2(1+1), but there are five ways of getting 6 (1+5, 5+1, 2+4, 4+2, 3+3)

[@MusicaUniversalis]

However the bias is not only useful but wanted when generating figured bass patterns, where the interval of the sixth is highly sought after. Yes 12 sided die introduce a higher degree of randomness but in a sense this creates more chaos and need for “cleaning up” what has been generated after the fact.

[@agolooritte3057]

Is not your channel the one which is underrated. Classical music is underrated itself. So we are lucky to know you for a greater understanding for this SaCrIlEgIoUs music. Gosh! I m still waiting that day when tiktok and pop music will fall and masters' souls will help us raise up and classical will be listened again and would be on top. It s good to dream, so I m going to listen my music in peace.