Music discussion

[mac1]

Ah how vigilant of me - only just noticed these are the same tracks as before

Once again nice use Strauss-esque Timp at the start of the track "Empire", remember liking it in "On The Wing Of A Night Thunderstorm" before. Been messing around with some medieval themes on my guitar actually. Started writing (messing about with) a piece using a dropped D base as an underlying route note to every note I play (in a D Minor scale in that particular instance). If you wanted to toy about with the concept yourself, as the vast majority of your stuff is in A Minor, you would need an A note of a low to chime with every note in your melody line (play each "A" route note at exactly the same time as the notes in your melody to make up 2 note chords). For added effect you could also try taking your melody line and playing it at two different octaves simultaneously to get chords also made up of 2 notes (one being an octave higher than the other). The would imagine whole thing would sound good using a synth lute or some other string based instument. A few of those epic horns you use might go nicley too. Using this technique I have come up with some quite nice medieval music. Glad to see your still doing the music anyway, even with all the major changes that are coming. Look foward to the new CD.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Re:Free CD offer II

Same tracks as I uploaded before, but not on the previous CD. On 56k, unloading even mp3 files can take a darn age!

Btw - I'm afraid I have no idea what you're talking about at the moment! I really do get lost with the technicalities of music. If I heard an example I'm sure it would suddenly make sense - sure we'll sort something out there soon enough. Anyway, I'll try to read what you wrote later - if I read it slowly enough it may click. Got a lot of driving to do today (about 6-7 hours across England and back).

 

[mac1]

Re:Free CD offer II

I will try to explain in (hopefully) simple terms, and break it up a little too. I do apologise if any of this sounds patronising, it's not meant to, just explaining it as simply as I can, so that all can (hopefully) understand. Please bare in mind that my knowledge of music theorey is somewhat limited too, but hopefully it will be broad enough to explain this.

You have your melody (the actual main tune), which I think your program automatically sets up as being in the key of A minor. I worked out the key for a number of your songs and all the ones I looked at were in A minor, so I will assume for now that thats what they are all in.

Having a key of A minor simply means that you can only use the notes in the A minor scale. When you play a note and instantly think to yourself "urrgghh - that's wrong" then this is simply a note that is not in the scale. By trial and error, or otherwise, the notes that you use for the songs are all part of the A minor scale - hence a key of a minor.

Having a deep route note, or underlying bassline playing in the background of a song or piece of music adds depth and atmosphere to the piece. It is something that you already use regularly (particularly with brass and percusion instruments). In a traditional band, the deep route notes are usually played by the bass guitar.

If you look back to what you had exactly 31 seconds into Imperiatrix Majestica. That was an "a" route note you had playing in the background. The medieval sounding technique I suggested, simply entails playing one of those "a" route notes at exactly the same time as every note in your melody line. Its a really simply concept just hard to explain in text.

Imagine a really simply melody of say any 4 notes. Simply play the melody consisting of four notes, but every time you play one of those notes in the melody play that "a" route note at exactly the same time so that you are always playing 2 notes simultaneously. Like I said before this would probably sound really nice on a lute or other stringed instrument.

If you can follow what I have said up to here (if you can't, then its probably just been badly explained - my fault,) then the next bit should be simple enough.

Any note can be played in a number of different octaves. Octaves are simply how high or low a note is. For example, take the note "a" again. A bass guitar and a flute can both play the note "a", but the "a" note on the bass is a lot deeper. It is still "a" but it is played a few octaves lower than on the flute.

On your keyboard, every 8 white keys, there is a new octave. If you play any white note, and then play a note 7 white keys either side of it, you wll notice that it looks physically similar to the first note (in terms of looking at the keys), but also sounds very similar. This is because they are actually just the same note, one an octave higher than the other. If you play the two notes together you will notice that they chime. This is because, although one is higher than the other, they are actually the same note - this is the simplest kind of chord - making one note chime with itself. If you take any of your melody lines and make every note chime with the one 7 notes up, you will have a melody made up of 2 note chords, all of which are made up of pairs of notes which are the same.

To get the full effect simply combine the 2 melodies (one of which is an octave (7 piano keys) higher than the other) with your "a" route note. Basically instead of playing your 1-note-at-a-time melody, every note has become a 3-note chord consisting of:-
1/ That deep "a" route note.
2/ The original note from your melody line.
3/ The original note from your melody line played an octave higher.

Using this technique I managed to come up with some really nice medieval guitar stuff. Feel free to use it, or not at your own discretion. I just thought you might appreciate the opportunity to at least experiment with it. Hope you understood (or could at least follow) most of the above. Like I said if any of it sounds at all patronising, then I do apologise, I just decided explaining everything was probably best. Anyway, hope this helps explain my previous post a little. If you have any technical music related questions, feel free to ask me, I will try my best to answer them, but like I said my knowledge of music theorey is quite limited too.

P.S. 6-7 hours! Where were you going today?

 

[Brian G Turner]

Re:Free CD offer II

No problem - feel free to patronise me about music!

And your suggestion was to play one melody at three different octaves?

Or play two melodies across 3 octaves?

Crikey - how about 3 melodies over three octaves?

Actually, I think I could play around with some of those ideas. Chords are an utter weakness with myself - I know the notes for a few (A and Am, C...maybe a couple of others which I forgotten the names of) but all the Chronicles is pretty much 1 and two fingered stuff. There's never any conscious intention to use chords - just bring sounds together until they sound "right".

Yes - A minor it is for the Chronicles music - I figured if I break into a different key it would create a serious inconsistency. At least, my reasoning is that if I keep with the same notes I can move more easily between different themes, and keep a generally signature constancy in the Chronicles music.

If you listen to "Valley of the Havens" in the music link, I think (but am not too sure) that there's a key change in there. But I figure that a work generally sticks to a main key, and therefore everything Chronicles has lots of A and E note in them, as everything Chronicles (and "Emperor") is single broad concept.

As for the driving - the family went to say with relatves in the Isle of Man - I've got 8 full days to myself to try and finish writing "Emperor". They usually go over every few months or so, but the last couple of times I went with them. The drive was from here in Hull in East Yorskhire to drop them off at Heysham in Lancashire - and then drive back again. I managed to find an old tape with some music from the Star Trek films and listened to that most of the way there and back, and a little classical compilation. I tried listening out to some of the patterns and felt like doing music.

Maybe not tonight - and just enough internet to check all running fine - very tired.

Oh - but I will try the "split thread" function to stop this blocking up the free CD offer, though. No problem though - good suggestion - really feel like exploring some pieces, and see if I can get some done for "Emperor", to include on the new CD before I start sending out.

 

[mac1]

I have actually used the 3 melodies at 3 octaves in one of the Prog Rock songs I did. I used a piece of multitrack editing software called Nuendo to overlay several audio tracks (28!), sounded really nice actually. Tryed overlaying two identical guitar solos as well (as pioneered by Black Sabbath) but didn't have much luck with it - far too hard to get right with my limited equipment (computer/instrument/mic) and personel (just me). Trying to work on a minimilist Tubular bells-esque piece at the moment, though I haven't had time to record any of it - too busy at the moment - I'm sure your more than aware of the obscene amount of time recording takes up!

[And your suggestion was to play one melody at three different octaves?

Or play two melodies across 3 octaves?

Two melodies across two octaves, with a very deep "A" note played at the same time as every note in your dual melody - making a 3 note chord.

Btw - Good luck finishing Emperor. Have you had any promising discussions with any publishers yet?

 

[Brian G Turner]

No - haven't even offered it yet. Intending to around June, so I need to complete it soon.

Ah - now I see exactly what you meant about the music. Sounds complicated but fun - I'll try to have a play later today.

 

[mac1]

Tell me how it goes

 

[mac1]

Did you ever get a chance to try it?

If so, how did you get on?

 

[Brian G Turner]

Not yet. did start a track, but I don;t think I used the 1-2-3 thingy I'll have to wait until I hear music, then see if it makes sense to direct it to experimenting on the issue. If that makes sense?

 

[mac1]

"Acoustic Sound Production" is one of the modules on my Digital Media course. I am hoping to use some nice equipment to record some acoustic guitar tracks on that module. There is actually a huge new multi-million pound recording studio opened in Ipswich which (fingers crossed) we may get a chance to use. I may even apply for work experience there if we are not aloud to use it on the course. Coincidentally, I have been mostly writing acoustic songs recently, but I'm not sure about recording my voice (at least my guitar is in tune - LOL). I am hoping the module will help me learn some better recording techniques, which I will happily pass onto anyone who's interested (after next June), or maybe someone on the forum has some helpful tips for me.

 

[Brian G Turner]

You shouldn't need to be able to sing - heck, hasn't stopped plenty of other talents. Lou Reed, anyone?

Even if you're trying to sound like a singer, simply apply a liberal amount of reverb. Heck, I can't sing, but stick me in a resonent structure and my voice sounds great! Never tried to record myself and apply reverb - I've simply never seen myself as a singer.

Glad to see you've got some decent equipment to play with - be interesting to hear some of it.

 

[mac1]

I don't see myself as a singer either, but I honestly can't see any other bugger singing my stuff - LOL!

Reverb's not the easiest way to cheat either, the technology now exists to put your voice in tune post-production, even if the notes are completely wrong! Cheating, pure and simple, but then again how do you think so many ex-soap and film stars become singers? I can't sing at all, I'll be the first to hold up my hand and say that, but at least I admit it. Besides, I quite like Lou Reed's voice

 

[mac1]

Brian,
What is http://www.period-music.com/? Will that be developed into a new part of the chronicles-network?
Could be cool!

 

[Brian G Turner]

That was the idea - but, frankly, I'm stretched just keeping up with the two forums as it is. Completely run out of time for the moment, and none left to develop that concept. Which is a shame - but maybe one day.

 

[mac1]

That's a shame, I really like the idea. Were you planning to make it a site to host downloads of loads of period music, or was it just going to be a reference site? If your interested, I'd be happy to help develop the site for you around after July. I'm getting quite good with HTML now, and (assuming the unlikely doesn't occur - ie I get a temp job) I will have July to September completely free, I'd be more than happy to do something constructive in those 3 months if you want, but I realise that's still an awful long way off.

 

[Brian G Turner]

I had actually planned to do a downloads site as well - bringing in other musicians from mp3.com. Although I know I can generate some interest from some, it's a remarkably big project that shouldn't be underestimated. The webspace and bandwidth costs would build up very quickly indeed. I simply have no time to develop it for the moment - but maybe I'll look at it in future.

 

[Incognito]

I also forgot to mention - I'd also really need to have access to broadband, to upload all the music files (it takes me around 12 hours just to upload my first Chronicles album as mp3s on dial-up).

However, mp3.com is literally about to close - the services have been sold off to CNET. So I really ought to ensure that I collect the names and contact details for a lot of the period music artists there, so that one day, when I do set up period-music.com I can bring them on board. Consider the idea in preparation, just not yet implemented. One day...

 

[mac1]

You been working on any music recently. I haven't heard you mention the music thing in a long while.

I have been making a load of dark avant-garde synth recently, using a combination of Fruityloops, Audiomulch and Adobe Audition. I am now coming close to having a full albums worth of stuff, then I'll share it on Suprnova I think.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Not done any music for ages, though what I have I will be uploading to the new site after next week.

You'll have to make sure we have a link to your stuff when it's up.

 

[mac1]

I'll make sure and put the link on here, probably be a few weeks yet. If I'm lucky I might have it done by easter. Not sure if anyone here would actually even like it though, kinda Kieko Abe, John Cage, and Steve Roach influenced minimalist stuff, with perhaps a small touch of Future Sound of London. Not really most peoples cup of tea.