Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Stuck with half-finished game music ideas? Download the free 6-Level Game Music Composer Roadmap here: bestmusiccoach.com/roadmap?htrafficsource=yt&el=stuck-composers-use-rhythmic-displacement-to-escape-writer-s
If you feel like you're hitting writer's block or you get to the point where you compose a small idea but just don't know what to do next, use these two tools to unblock yourself. Number one, rhythmic displacement. Take the motifs in the melody that you just made before, copy and paste it, but don't copy and paste it exactly where it was. Copy and paste it an eighth note earlier, an eighth note later, a quarter note earlier, a quarter note later, and then maybe change some of the notes. Boom, you're gonna have a brand new melody and you just copy, paste it, and change stuff. Tip number two is you can go ahead and copy and paste, but then just change the notes. Same rhythm, different notes, which is, by the way, a fantastic way of composing video game music that you can see many of the best composers for video games throughout history have used, including Koji Kondo, Nobuo Uematsu, Gareth Coker, Ark Survival. There's so much copy-paste all over the place. It's so obvious it's in your face if you go look for it. I did go looking for it, and I put all that distilled knowledge that I found in a book called Compose Legendary Video Game Music. It's out now on Amazon. Check it out.
Stuck with half-finished game music ideas? Download the free 6-Level Game Music Composer Roadmap here: bestmusiccoach.com/roadmap?htrafficsource=yt&el=stuck-composers-use-rhythmic-displacement-to-escape-writer-s
If you feel like you're hitting writer's block or you get to the point where you compose a small idea but just don't know what to do next, use these two tools to unblock yourself. Number one, rhythmic displacement. Take the motifs in the melody that you just made before, copy and paste it, but don't copy and paste it exactly where it was. Copy and paste it an eighth note earlier, an eighth note later, a quarter note earlier, a quarter note later, and then maybe change some of the notes. Boom, you're gonna have a brand new melody and you just copy, paste it, and change stuff. Tip number two is you can go ahead and copy and paste, but then just change the notes. Same rhythm, different notes, which is, by the way, a fantastic way of composing video game music that you can see many of the best composers for video games throughout history have used, including Koji Kondo, Nobuo Uematsu, Gareth Coker, Ark Survival. There's so much copy-paste all over the place. It's so obvious it's in your face if you go look for it. I did go looking for it, and I put all that distilled knowledge that I found in a book called Compose Legendary Video Game Music. It's out now on Amazon. Check it out.
