Mickey’s very serious reflective blog!

In the space of the twelve weeks I have bought a laptop, learnt to use it efficiently, set up and operate three new music software programs to a reasonable standard, create two pieces of completed music within a group and produce graphic scores for them both. I feel I have learnt a lot about myself as a person as well as a musician. Some things that I now feel more confident to do are critically analyse pieces and performances by breaking them down structurally and I have discovered successful ways in which to go about approaching compositional tasks. I have answered all of my questions and followed up my ideas from the first post and have a list of areas I am currently exploring. I am not a confident performer and I have found myself feeling more comfortable in expressing my ideas. I’ve learnt to think more about how to write a balanced musical piece for a target audience rather than simply for my own listening pleasure. I am now aware of a much broader spectrum of music, compositional techniques and existing organisations throughout the world. It has encouraged me to experiment more in new areas, follow up ideas and communicate with people in my quest for exciting new sound experiences. 

Now for the necessary formalities. It is quite difficult to give exact crediting as everything was very much a team effort. Ideas were discussed, developed and finalised by each individual member and we all played an active part in their realisation. For example, the initial idea for making a piece of music about elements was mine, Kevin looked up the historical theories and obtained a basic structure, Tom designed a more developed structure which formed the way we eventually performed the piece and Chris developed overall performance ideas including our positioning and audience perspective. All individual contributions came about from team discussion and influence.

The Elements

The Music – We were all responsible for and wrote our individual parts. We each helped find possible samples for the different sections and talked through each others part so any amendments could be made.

The Score – Basic initial idea by Kevin, All drawing, colouring and notational concepts, Tom, Chris and myself.

The Mixing – The individual recordings were placed into Logic and mixed by Kevin 

We all attended every practice session decided upon and met fairly frequently.

ECHO

The Music - Initial idea by Tom and developed by all of us. As above all parts were discussed but individually written.

The Score – Designed by Tom, Myself and Chris and put together by all of us.

The Mix – After doing such a fantastic job of the first piece, Kevin took our recording and corrected the leveling the best he could from the recording. 

We all attended every practice session decided upon and met fairly frequently.

There were no arguments or punch-ups during the creation of either piece.

The Elements Piece

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f134/MickeyPease87/elements.jpg

Our score has been hand-drawn onto a sheet of A2 paper for clarity and then given a colour code and key to separate the parts into more obvious sections. The score was adapted from the Chinese philosophical elemental table, the main difference being that we have made it easier to follow for performance purposes by removing the connecting links from within its centre. As our arrows direct, we start from an introductory depiction of where the piece intends to take the listener before making the journey around the circle, returning to the point of origin before following the final phase towards the conclusion. The part outside of the circle represents the four elements within a transitional period until they reach one place and play together, resulting in Earth. We have tried to convey this outside section of question and answers by using the arrow as a timeline and placing the parts in their own individual lines. We have used a lot of existing musical notation as well as developing some of our own symbols and directions. The hairpins indicate increases/decreases in volume such as can be seen in Metal and the shapes in the ending section. Any continuation of hairpins means that the material is played at that volume for the duration of time shown. Other devices include repetition which is indicated by anything placed within brackets. The piece was performed using IXI Quarks and some symbols represent the instruments used, for example in Wood, my first individual symbol represents using a worm device to play the sound. A bit further along the Polymachine is indicated by using four horizontal lines incased in brackets to show that there is an instrument playing in all four instrument lanes of the device and it is repeating or looping. Linking picture symbols have been used in the cross over of parts which indicate the identical sounds being played by both performers. 

I feel that our score is good as a general overview and visual aid of our piece. It is colourful,  raw and fundamental, like its subject but it would need to include many more instructions for anyone to attempt to recreate it at all accurately. The key would require all of the sounds, their sources and instruments used as well as a form of timeline such as minutes or seconds around the outside to establish structure. Electronic music poses as a particular problem to portray when the piece is devised entirely from samples, some of which are obtained from other sources, or personal recordings and all having been manipulated by a variety of instruments. Other things we could have thought about were indications of speaker positioning and performance such as writing ‘audience’ in the centre of the circle. But it does work as a rough guide and general overview and I shall look forward to learning how successful we were next semester attending Dr Paul Rhys’s lectures on graphical scoring. 

ECHO

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f134/MickeyPease87/echo.jpg

ECHO, like our first piece was scored onto a sheet of A2 paper in a minimalist style and some basic colours applied to give it an abstract feel. In fact the layout is actually also very simple. As we built up our creations we used to keep notes in a pad by dividing it up into four columns for each member of the group and work down the page filling in the ideas next to each other, already in a basic score but with written description. It could have worked horizontally but we liked the idea of starting at the top and working downwards. That way we got to add the outside imagery of Echo and give it more character as opposed to simply presenting a traditional score with imagery instead of notation. This score was certainly easier in that a lot of the material is improvised although we perform it with already determined instruments and key structure. The columns were labelled with our names but if they don’t correspond with your name, then the parts could be labelled one to four. We have separated each of the three parts out and as you can see from the more densely populated second section this had the thickest texture and was loudest. The sharp angles and shapes show intensity and angry sounds. This is the section in which Echo is torn apart. Tom had a particularly good idea in demonstrating the use of resampling and fading in section three. As you can see from the colours the image and sound begins in my section clearly defined. This is then replicated in the other two parts linked by arrows showing its path. It gradually gets smaller and lighter in colour representing its physical presence to the listener. Chris’s howling wind sample is demonstrated by the large gently modulating arrow flowing alongside everything throughout the section.

I quite liked the overall affect of this design. The colours are brighter and ideas catch the eye as opposed to subtly existing within blended, smooth colours and transitions. Of course aesthetics are probably the least important aspect of a musical score but with something which is very difficult to show accurately, clear ideas that represent the physicality of the sound or of our perceptions such as sharp angles in the colour red strike up thoughts of anger or danger, they could be loud or harsh and whatever those sounds exactly are, it is suggestive that they stand out.

The class have now heard a performance of both pieces. Our second differs to the first in several ways. The Elements idea was a chance to express ourselves individually. Each person needed a large enough time slot in which to develop their interpretations and then further time for an introduction and the bringing together of parts in a conclusion. It was almost four different pieces of music within one and had enough varying material to keep interest. However, when working together as a group, our ideas were all of similar texture and timbre and so we needed to interpret a developed story within a comfortable timescale, hopefully keeping the audience’s interest and making sure they got everything they needed from each section for an understanding of it.

Our structure was made of three different sections, A, B and C, with obvious but subtle change over points, keeping the music flowing. We needed to keep the sections connected with distinctive synth voices or phrases so that there would be a contrast of atmosphere and ideas but so as to not seem like three separate pieces of music held together with sticky tape. I feel that the second and third sections were possibly more successful than the first but were so because they relied upon the sweet and slightly ‘wishy washy’ harmonies of the first section. The seemingly noisy second part demanded attention because of its build up in amplitude and because no other group’s music, at least none that I heard performed in class, contained key clashes and thick muddy aggressive textures as opposed to very clear and definite musical ideas. After building up to an apex, just before it gets to a point of purely noise, we completely cut the sound, leaving just a few seconds of silence to let the audience take in what they have heard and to leave them wondering what is about to follow. The third section is where we demonstrate the idea of sending sounds around the room via live recording and sampling each other’s speakers. I feel that sat at the front of the audience around them in a semi circle was the best way we could perform with the equipment that we had. If our speakers had longer cables it would have been fun for one person to send a sound around the entire room. I wasn’t sure at first how obvious it was to the audience that we were demonstrating this technique because we turned the lights out and it was not so easy to see behind the open screens who was actually physically playing keys. Nick noticed beforehand that some of our speakers were set up next to the following person’s laptop and not the audience and asked us about it at the end of the performance but I think it should be fairly apparent from the feedback noises and the smooth traveling of my sound across the room. Due to the improvised nature of the phrases it would be difficult to replicate them at all accurately and exactly as well as adjusting volume.

Overall I feel that we performed this piece as well as we could within the limitations that we had. It would be fun in future performances to use different equipment and make more of the sound travel. Perhaps more time could be spent experimenting with different sound properties and looking at the way and reasons for feedback and how to have better control of it. Maybe some projected visuals could be incorporated depicting ‘Echo’ the Nymph or other aspects. I think in future classes and performances of music I shall spend more time in creating an overall performance to express my ideas more clearly and to satisfy an audience who are on different levels of understanding and of different tastes so that there is something for everybody. 

After the long thought out design process of our first group piece, we were much quicker in settling upon a definite second concept. In fact no sooner had we began to discuss new ideas, Tom put forward an ancient myth telling the story of the musical phenomenon we refer to as an ’Echo’. Echo the Nymph was desired by many men but she scorned their love. One of the Gods named Pan became angered by her antics and ordered his followers to kill her. She was torn to pieces and these were scattered about the Earth. Gaia, a Titan Earth Goddess, revived the pieces of Echo and it is these remains we hear repeating the voice of others. There are various versions of the Echo myth but we chose to settle on this particular version. More information can be found at  

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echo_(mythology)

After looking at ways in which to depict the story it seemed evident to us that it could be divided nicely into three sections.  

Part One – Admirers scorned by Echo

Our opening section needed to demonstrate Echo’s beauty, musically enchanting singing voice and men’s desire for her. We decided that Logic would be our main compositional tool as playing the synths via the laptop keyboard would express our musical theory abilities as well as giving us a more precise control of the notes as opposed to using loops within IXI. Tom-Chris (that’s Chris to most of us] begins with a lovely melodic choral opening using a choir voice sample. Tom joins in with a soft complimentary choral based synth. This sets a nice ambience and helps establish the idea of myth and magical being such as Gods or legendary creatures and keeps in the theme of song. Kevin uses a frequency modulation which he developed on SuperCollider to represent various males attempting to woo Echo. Each time it completes a cycle, my first part is to act as her replying voice. I sing back disinterested and improvised speech like phrases using a harp synth in the Dorian Mode in answer to Kevin. After a certain number of cycles, once everybody is ready to move on, Kevin uses a particularly nasty, unrelenting sounding wave which represents Pan becoming angered by her. I respond to him by repeating the same phrase to him, becoming faster and more agitated, in an attempt to warn off the seemingly angry attack. This signifies the end of the first section.

Part Two – The Tearing Apart Of Echo 

We wanted to make this section intense and aggressive. We achieve this by using a thick texture with lots of different timbres including thunderous timpani drums and screeching synths. We build up the volume and chord clashes while Tom keeps the choral synth playing over the top keeping Echo’s essence within the chaos but building up the tempo and distorting the once sweet melody. Then on the signal of Chris, the tension is released and all falls silent before the third and final section.

The Fate Of Echo

This section begins with the fading aftermath of the carnage before an ominous wind is left howling quietly. The rest of the piece is an erie soundscape of repeating phrases which we wanted to float around the audience. We had already previously discovered the StratoSampler and it was decided that we could make use of it to manipulate the echos rather than each having to learn the same phrase and copying each other at different volumes. Chris plays a little melody of a few notes using an atmospheric bell sound on a Logic synth which I then replicate in a higher octave using the same synth. We had fun playing a private game between us in which Chris improvised within our chosen key and I had to try to either match his phrase exactly using my ear or replicate his sound by transformation, such as retrograde or emphasizing certain notes. As I play back this phrase, one of my speakers was positioned close to Tom’s microphone and my sound is picked up and repeated in the StratoSampler until it gradually dies down. The repeated melody now sounding in Tom’s speaker is in turn picked up by Kevin’s microphone and there are now two lots of the phrase repeating over each other at different volumes and in different places. This created a surround effect which I felt was more interesting because the sound had moved over to a different performer but the individual notes were obviously not being physically played by them. After four rounds of this we let the sound continue until it feeds back and erie wall of high pitched tone is heard before both the wind and feedback are brought down to silence and the piece concludes.     

I just wanted to share with you a piece of music made by one of my good friends. I have huge respect for this guy and he is one of the biggest contributing factors as to why I am here doing this degree so this post is in honour of a very talented bloke. 

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=fWMkVNAvzQ4

He has invited me to start up a project with him in similar vain exploring the world of synths, voice boxes, theremins (both of the latter he has built himself from raw materials) and general oldskool tech. An area which I’m rapidly falling in love with so watch this space… More stupidly catchy, happy happy music could be coming your way…(He wants to express positivity and establish light and happiness. I want to wear makeup and pretend to be Gary Numan so it’ll be a well balanced partnership with any luck)…

I came across this link to an interview whilst trying to rewrite an old essay on the influence of Stockhausen and Aphex Twin. No wonder the guy is so influential. He owns a freaking submarine! Anyway, I thought this post might offer some answers regarding some of the questions we were discussing in laptop class a week or two back.

http://www.aphextwin.nu/learn/100261068661634.shtml

Also, if you haven’t already, check out the two separate parts of his MTV interview on youtube. “It’s a doss.”

My section within our first group composition is the representation of the element Wood. One of the great aspects of this piece is that although we discussed a rough outline of each person’s role, we each had creative freedom of our own parts and no constraints of having to compliment sounds happening elsewhere. Collectively we decided that I may consider Wood at one with nature, perhaps very primitive, calm and void of human needs or technologies and unspoiled natural beauty. Musically i could explore use of very basic and natural sounding percussion or harmony and sounds of nature within a forest or woodlands. We’d previous expressed a wish for the piece to be made from only sounds which represented our elements to give a clarity to our ideas but also to show how ordinary recognisable sounds can become something completely new.

Before my individual section comes in we begin the piece with the low rumbling sounds of the Earth and each section uses a voice sample stating the name of their element. I found by using the Soundscratcher and the Warp manipulation I could bring the pitch of my voice down for maximum volume and power. By increasing the grain density and duration I could create the effect of a choir of monks chanting sustained bass notes like magical guardians of the Earth. It sets quite a mystical and powerful opening.  

After this I change the manipulation to Linear grains and turn the volume down. The grains I have drawn will repeat my voice sample in a loop and later in the question and answering section I merely have to bring the volume up in response to the other sounds.

At the end of ‘Water’, my next step was to link my section into Kevin’s. While exploring sound banks we noticed that bird song played over the sound of a river or gurgling brook is particularly pleasant. Kevin brings us up from the depth of the ocean and a wash of sound towards the surface until we gain the sense of clear sparkling waters of a river or stream. I up-fade the birdsong which helps to set the idea of the river flowing through a landscape or wood. I placed the sample into Soundscratcher and used Worm to add some variation. I then manipulated the grain duration and density to add some colour to the sound and to make it sound slightly unnatural which adds more interest to an ordinary, recognisable object. I keep the birds singing throughout and lowered the volume slightly to give everything a thicker texture. To establish my environment more definitely, I then used a snapping twig sample on a loop which was also gently brought up in volume. The sample was recorded quietly so i used an amplifier utility to make it more audible. Originally I intended to manipulate it by looping the snap but much to our delight we realised that recorded very quietly in the background of the sample was a xylophone melody, presumably coming from another source played back whilst they made the recording. After playing this through a few times until I feel people are in the right mindset, I fade in a melody put together using the Polymachine. We liked the sound of the xylophone recording but were unable to change the pitch or control it and so we took our own recording of Tom playing some notes on a xylophone using a laptop. We choose the pentatonic scale for simplicity and so the notes would be in key with each other. To make them play dead on the beat I used Logic to cut out the silence from around them.

The bottom two lines are changed between Glock samples three to five. To avoid an obvious routine as the pattern doesn’t vary, I change the lines randomly and get quite a nice ethnic melody. It’s best not to play two lines of the same sample because if any notes fall at the same time within the lines it doubles the volume of those particular notes and particularly with lower pitched notes, the sounds blur together. I’ve used another Polymachine in a similar way with some different wood chopping samples and branch snaps placed in similar rhythm pattern. These fade in and out over the other Polymachine. I wanted to demonstrate some harsher natural snaps to give the contrast of softer melody, texture and sharp percussive sounds. Now that they are all playing together I have a short period of maybe ten or fifteen seconds to mix and match and bring them in and out. I leave in the sound of the looped twig snapping with background xylophone melody and bring the others out. Finally my linking sound is a sample of a match being struck twice and sparking to life. From this louder cue sound, Tom is ready for his section and answers my match strike with an identical sample which is looped, making up the underlying texture of ‘Fire’. I leave in the looped twig sample just for a short while which works well with burning and crackling wood before fading to silence. I’m now free to minimise the windows that I haven’t already and call up my voice sample that I made earlier in Soundscratcher. Now it’s simply a case of listening for cues and responding to them by playing with volume and grain densities. Finally our piece is finished off by playing our voice samples in unison over the top of a loud ‘Earth’ rumble before dying away, all built up to become one.

The Approach

My working group consists of Kevin, Tom and Chris. Having come together after previous weeks of performances, musical analysis and learning compositional techniques, we were armed with everything we needed to produce some interesting new music. We approached the task by sitting down in a circle and brainstorming. Our previous method of composition consisted of each person creating, acquiring or experimenting with sounds and then presenting them to each other. The best of these, or ones which complimented another, could then be fitted into the jigsaw, as it were. Although it meant everyone could explore their own tastes and many exciting noises were being generated, nobody knew what anyone else was doing or feeling and ideas rarely connected. Up until now, the music had been for music’s sake. We had a task that required us to demonstrate certain knowledge and abilities and a definable academic undercurrent, although we were enjoying what were doing, was present within our work. Our music needed a story, or an intention of expression to help us all to connect and focus together as a group. We were quick to decide that programme music was something which had not yet been explored within class and the opportunity was there to work in all of the successful musical elements discussed as well as a story not confining us to the same restraints of mere theme.

The Idea

Our next course of action was to sit together, individually contemplating until someone expressed a wish to put forward an idea. We listened while it was explained and then each in turn suggested our own initial reactions and whether it should be considered as a final idea. After having collected three or four definite potentials, we had more in depth discussions regarding each. The elements idea seemed to have a lot of potential and we began discussing how to develop a story or structure. Kevin searched the internet to do some research into the points of origin and came across a diagram which became the basis of our composition and performance. The diagram represents the five Chinese Elements. 

It was decided amongst us that we’d each choose one of the five to represent leaving one to either begin the piece or conclude with. ‘Earth’ seemed the most obvious of the five to bring the others together and of which they were spawned. This meant that not only could we create our own individual sections, but we could also all come together or begin as one and expand out. To make our ideas as clear as possible we represent our element using the sounds of it’s source i.e Tom’s ‘Fire’ uses samples of burning wood and a match being struck amongst many others. Most of our material was acquired from ‘www.freesound.org/’, (the others were our own voice recordings speaking the name of our Element and the melodic passages within ‘Wood’ use a sampled xylophone) and then put into IXI Quarks and manipulated. Each of the elements must be linked and musically, with four very different concepts, we needed a way of transformation from one section to the next. This is done by playing sounds which can represent the current element and the following one which also acts as a handy performance device to let the next person know it is time for their part within the music. An example of this is within ‘Wood’, I play the sound of a match being struck to which Tom responds imitating the sound which develops as a layer of his section. Each section is about one minute to one minute and a half long and has a fairly definite order of key sounds but enough freedom to improvise and work freely with no danger of missing cues or clashing with other parts.

Performing The Piece 

Brilliantly, what first appeared to be a simple diagram that Kevin had stumbled upon became everything we needed. A basic score, a way of performing and a theory driving our piece. We positioned ourselves as the diagram indicates, but only being a posse of four, we formed a square around our audience, each taking a corner. Earth is presented when we all play our sounds into the centre of the ring in which the audience are seated. Moving from a short opening in which each element plays together presenting Earth, the ring moves around in order as depicted by the arrows. The first element playing the key linking sound to which the next element echos and it continues it’s journey. Once Tom has performed ‘Fire’ a quick succession of question and answering works it’s way around the room with a subtle use of sampled voice, simply stating our names to reinforce our presence before coming together to form a wall of sound made up of an earthquake which ends the piece. Fairly simple and yet marvelously effective. Particularly in the dark for some reason. Maybe as sight is reduced the ears become more curious as sound dominates from different unexpected places.

Speaker Positioning

Placing them in one place  - 

Alex, Ben, Chris and Brownie God created a wall of sound quite effectively by positioning their speakers together, bass in the centre with the other smaller speakers on top and surrounding it to balance the levels out almost like a club or disco setup. This worked with their original concept of their first piece because it had a section which built up and then there was a big ‘drop’ or a main loud section of activity like a piece of music designed for a club. Although it was an effective and powerful sound it did make it harder to distinguish certain individual sounds and phrases.

Spreading Them Out  - 

The same group after performing then separated their speakers out and played again to see how this effected their sound. To my ears it was certainly interesting to hear each separate part clearly. It made the sound much wider and more of a wave coming towards me rather than a powerful splash. I did feel the main section was spread thinner and less powerful but we were in a small space with small computer speakers and this probably could have been solved by increasing the main volume levels or by working out the frequencies or volumes of different parts, speaker qualities and placement.

Complete Surround Sound  - 

Our group’s first composition had the audience positioned in the centre of the room whilst we performed in a square around them, each of the four of us set up in a different corner. Everyone seemed to think that this set up was particularly effective for our piece and made the performance more interesting. Each of us performed a different part in turn and we worked round the ring and back to the point of origin including a question and answering section at the end. Issues which arose were that we could use the space more effectively. The sounds work round in a sequence exploring the different parts but move round in the same order and the last part was a quick succession of sounds moving still in the same direction. It could be more interesting to either randomly place them or fire them quickly or not within obvious patterns. The other main point to consider was the fact that each section was connected by linking sounds but the parts remained separate and perhaps integrating them could create nice harmonies, thicker texture or give the audience more to focus on. I’m not sure if positioning the speakers or musicians in a different order would really make any particular difference to the overall auditory experience.

Perhaps speaker positioning is something to research. I’d like to know more about how speakers work and what makes particular models or types highly regarded. Do certain types of music benefit from different speakers or is it mostly down to EQ levels and careful positioning? I need to think about how to get the best and clearest sound from my equipment and my compositions.

 Other Things To Consider When Performing

People come to hear musical performances to take something, whatever the something maybe, from them. Interestingly enough when i first typed that sentence I wrote ‘see musical performances’ which I have now replaced with ‘hear’. We talk about going to see gigs. Maybe this is simply a figure of speech or perhaps we expect a show or more than simply sound from a performance? Reflecting on performances I’ve been to, I’ve danced in clubs, sat in a cathedral listening to choirs, been blasted by wailing guitar solos and listened in class to people play laptops. Aphex Twin performs with a laptop, but if we took away the strobe lighting, the amazing stage shows with performers, smoke machines and visuals and turned the lights on would people still enjoy the show and appreciate the music as much? It’s silly to compare an Aphex Twin gig with a choir performance because the people expect and want to take different things from each but what am I wanting from my laptop performances and what are the audience expecting? So far our pieces are more academic in the sense that we are following guidelines, demonstrating skills in a shortish time duration. Obviously in class we don’t have the means for big performances and would they just distract from the music anyway? A costume could depict a story or present a message and a few spoken words from visuals could even serve as a narrative to a piece of music to express it more clearly. 

That was more in general terms obviously but for the circumstances of which we currently perform more relevant questions could perhaps be where do we place the speakers or the performers? Most groups so far have placed themselves together so that they can work together and it’s easier to communicate but does this make sense within the piece of music? Our group have spaced ourselves out evenly around the room. Is it more interesting to know which performer makes which sounds? Do we associate parts or character with the performers themselves as well as their sounds and representations? Do we need to go about ways of making the performance more exciting by perhaps sitting within the audience, the speakers positioned elsewhere, moving the speakers around. Getting the audience to move around. Perhaps walk round with portable speakers moving in an opposite direction to the audience? Allow the audience to participate with the music? One concept I’d love to explore is the use of remote control. Perhaps sitting in the audience and controlling laptops, turning sounds on and off. Self performed machine music. Maybe setting up different laptops with different sounds and remotes that can be passed around for the audience to control themselves? I like the idea of audience participation but something perhaps more interesting than ‘Scream for me Cambridge!’ Maybe even having an installation set up with remote sensors that play music when people pass by them or a sound? Maybe certain trigger cues that the audience member or trigger may be unaware of. I’ve played similar games before as a younger child, trying to spot what the trigger is for a particular event. This is just me thinking aloud and brainstorming ideas, but until this course I have considered laptops as a means to store vast amounts of pre-composed music to be accessed by DJ’s or perhaps using Ableton Live. Orchestras made up of laptops or laptops used in more experimental ways is a new concept to me, just something I considered existed but just never looked into. In conclusion I plan to look up various ways they have been used and artists who perform with laptops and external controllers for them.