for the young composer-percussionist September 22nd, 2025 · 7 min read
When I was very young and starting to compose (especially for percussion), most of the resources I used were from the internet, because I didn't actually know any composers in real life.
I remember quite literally asking every single musician I knew if they could give me feedback on my compositions or give me advice on composing. Once I ran out of musicians, I started searching online, but I struggled to find anything as a fourteen-year-old kid.
This is my way of giving back, because I remember being that kid. I hope this will help you.
Explore the music that you love.
Try transcribing it (making sheet music for it), or simply playing by ear (listening to the piece and figuring out how to play it through listening). It doesn't have to be classical music (it could be a marimba solo, it could be a pop song, it could be a video game track).
Even if you don’t know any composers, you might know people who are strong in music theory. Bring music that you love and ask someone to help you understand how the theory behind the piece works.
Music theory describes what you hear, it doesn't define what you hear.
A lot of young composers tell me that they are afraid to compose because they don't know enough music theory.
I feel like that's a bit like saying "I'm afraid to write down words because I don’t know enough about grammar." Native speakers/writers of any language will intrinsically know the rules of grammar without having them codified into clear rules. Through listening to and playing music, you likely have some idea of what combinations of notes or rhythms sounds good, even if you don't know how to describe it yet.
So compose, even if you don't know music theory.
Learning music theory will only help you (it's like learning some new tools), but you can start composing through writing some music, and then trying to analyze it. This can help you discover why you like certain types of music (e.g. you like certain chords or chord progressions).
Improvise on your instrument. Improvise through singing. Improvise on anything.
I used to improvise on marimba all the time, trying to find ideas and melodies. My first experiments were really bad, but as time went on, I was able to refine what I had into a marimba solo.
Even though Zephyr is listed as my earliest marimba solo, I had written two marimba solos before then (pieces that I'm not sure will ever see the light of day again).
My ideas also come from singing or humming ideas, finding them though improvising with my voice. (I'm not a trained singer.)
Sometimes I would take riffs from music that I loved (such as video game music) and learn them, then improvise based off of those ideas—trying to see if I could come up with an "answer" to the original riff, as if it was a "question". I could then take these new ideas and turn them into new pieces.
(And of course, sometimes I didn't understand precisely the theory behind what I did, or how I found a cool chord—that was okay! I learned after, and then I knew how to do it consistently.)
Write for your friends.
I wrote a lot of music when I was younger for my friends to play together. It was really fun, and they can give you feedback on the parts themselves, whether or not the sheet music is easy to read, etc.
Opportunities can be created simply through asking.
My music was played at my high school's yearly percussion concerts. I wasn't the first to compose (we had a tradition of writing a "snare ensemble" or "bass ensemble" every year, and I wanted a "marimba ensemble" so I wrote a marimba trio), but I wasn't sure if doing a "marimba ensemble" was allowed, so I asked if I could play my music on the concert, and I was fortunate that my directors at the time supported me in doing so.
Listen to music!
This seems silly, but I rarely listened to music for fun as a kid. Growing up, there was never music playing in the background or in the car, and listening to music was a manual task for me.
Explore music. If you don't know how (and that's okay!), search for your favorite composers that you've played. Maybe they have influences that you can explore, and you can keep branching out from there.
For example, a lot of my music is influenced by math and prog rock, by bands like covet and Elephant Gym.
Have fun. Be human.
Starting to compose is like starting to learn a new instrument—progress takes time.
Remember why music matters to you—maybe it's the memories you get to share with friends, maybe it's the way you can express yourself, maybe you just like making cool sounds—and cherish that. Hold on to that as you compose and struggle and persevere and create.
Concrete resources that you can use.*
MuseScore is a free notation software. Notation software is what allows you to create sheet music.
REAPER is a cheap digital audio workstation that I also use. A digital audio workstation is essentially what people use to create popular music, through recording and layering recordings together.
IMSLP is a free resource for sheet music that is old enough so that it isn't under copyright. You can study these scores, and take inspiration from them.
Puget Sounds' Music Theory for the 21st-Century Classroom is a free online music theory textbook.
musictheory.net is a website with free music theory exercises that you can use to practice skills useful in composing (being able to identify intervals by ear, or chords on sight).
*No type of warranty or endorsement is expressed or implied for these resources, these are simply what I have used now or in the past.