Complicated MIDI

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Complicated MIDI

Transcript of Complicated MIDI

Page 1: Complicated MIDI

Complicated MIDI

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TRACK 1 This track was a bit of a struggle to get my head around. My style of music is a mixture of hip-hop,

R’N’ B and Drum & Bass. With me, I am not good at creating a drum beat, as I struggle to compose it

and to give it a good BPM. It started off with me going onto the drum loops and basically playing

through them, until I came across Morden Rock Drum. So I dragged onto my track and play it on loop

so I can come up with some ideas to record.

Then I felt that it needed a bit of ambient sounds so I used the Mayday Generation instrument. I

started to just make a simple melody. Then I looped it.

Then I added strings sounds so I went with the Pop Cello Solo. So I doubled it up onto a new track

and took some notes out of the new track. Then I added some keys using Studio Pop Piano and

create some chords together and copied and paste it in designated areas. Then I added more string

called hip-hop from the EXS Strings 2 and quantised them to 1/16 of a note.

Then I felt it needed something to fill up the track a bit so I wanted to add some choir sounds using

the Church Choir instrument. Looped it until, I felt it wasn’t required.

Then I added some bass using the Megfat Superstrings sequence and changed it to bass instrument,

Upright Bass!

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With this track, I kept running out of ideas. So I did another track. By the time I had completed the

other track I realised that I had to complete this track in a short time.

Eventually, I had some ideas of how to make this track. The first thing I was to change the megafat

instrument to other instruments but kept the sequence. So I used the Beach Bells and quantised the

notes to 1/8.

Then I copied this sequence to a few new tracks and changed the instruments using Pop Cello twice

but different sequences and the Upright Bass. With the piano track, Yamaha Grand Piano, I created a

simple melody.

Then to save me thing of more and more melodies, I decided to use it on other instruments like the

Mayday Generation Synths and Upright Bass instrument.

With the Church Choir Instrument, I felt that it was used too much so I decided to change the

melody. This was only used twice in the track, as I wanted to make a change to the song.

The more I listened to the track, the more I realised, it wasn’t working and it felt dull. So to make it

easy for me, I decided to make a structure of intro, verse, chorus and outro.

As you can see, I decided to start with the intro, I decided to use the Megfat Strings sequence but

change the instrument to Beach Bells. Then with the Box Organ on two different instruments, the

first one, I used it for the Pop Cello Solo and the other for Cello (Arco). I kept the church Choir in the

same position as I felt that it worked in the track and for my bass line, I used Megfat again but used

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Upright Bass. Also, just before starting on my verse, I decided to use the Yamaha Grand Piano

sequence and copied on another track but using a different instrument of the Mayday Generation.

For the 1st verse, I didn’t want too much instruments to be playing through the track, so I used the

Yamaha Grand Piano sequence on the original piano, the Mayday Generation, Beach Bells and the

Upright Bass. But on the drums, I decided to make it play differently. As you can see, there is a gap

where, no drums play. With this, you could hear it cut off easily, so I decided to use the fader tool, so

that it flows through the track.

For the chorus, I kept the drum beat going but added the intro part with it. For the 2nd verse, drop

out some drums for the 1st bit and the bells, bass and the church choir instruments were cut out

completely.

End the track was the hardest part, as the track had to be 2mins, 30secs long. I made drums drop in

and out a few times. Added the beach bells, the Yamaha Grand Piano and the Upright Bass back to

the track until music was finished.

Then I concentrated on the automation and the channel faders. On the automation, there were

certain instruments that were over taken the song. Some that were too quiet that you didn’t hear

what was being played. So with the drums, I felt that it needed to be heard, so as you can see, I turn

them up, but I needed to use the fade tool because when it finishing playing, it clips so I fade them

through to reduce the clips but it plays smoothly. Then with the Beach Bells, I felt it over-powering

the track, so I turned them down on the automation and fade it out when it finishes. On the Pop

Cello Solo, I also made them play quietly in the background.

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As it comes to the end, the hard part for me was to ensure that it ends really well. I put a loop on

the part where it ends, then went on automation again, and went through each instrument and

started to fade them out. To more realistic, I have tremors in my hand and I had to keep my mind

focus on ensuring the fading out goes well. This took time to make this work. Kept play it over and

over agin to ensure it plays right.

Then to ensure I got a good mix, I went onto the mixer and start to sort out each instruments

volume and the overall sound. Them I remember how Andy taught us about using the panning. So

played through each instrument and seeing which needed to be panned either on the left or right

side or both of the speakers.

For both speakers I used it for the drums, Pop Cello 2, Church Choir. For the right speakers, I used it

for the Pop Cello 3 and the Upright Bass. For the left side of the speakers, I used it for both of Beach

Bells tracks, Yamaha Grand Piano and the Mayday Generation. Then I sorted out my overall mix and

my master mix.

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TRACK 2 This track was far most the best track that I produced. Similar to the 1st track, the genre created was

Hiphop. To make it easy for myself I created markers to show which part of the song was playing. It

starts off with the chorus, then verse 1, chorus, verse 2, chorus and outro. Usually, I’d work on my

first track as first but because it was a struggle, I decided to this track as a way to get some

inspiration for the first one.

This is the list of instruments that I used for my track.

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The trance chord as my synths, the hip hop beat loop as my drum beat, my fm synth brass as

another synth, my double bass as my strings, my sparkling organ as an organ, then choir sounds, the

beach bells and my bass as basement bass.

With this track, it starts off creating a chorus with the drums to start off with. As I said before, I am

not good at creating drums so I used a drum loop called Hip-Hop Beats. Then I thought of adding

some synths, so I went with trance chords. So I recorded some simple melody and copied it twice.

Then I wanted to use the same melody sequence but with a different instrument so I added another

instrument, copied the sequence onto another instrument called the fm synth brass. Then I went

onto another instrument called the sparkling organ. Copied all the instruments again but this time I

added bells sound using beach bells and I recorded another melody.

Then for the 1st and 2nd verse, I felt like it needed to be simple. So I decided to just have the drums,

organ, bells and bass playing. I did this because I imagined that if I was recording an artist and what

it needs.

For the chorus, again it was the same for the first play but the second play, I added an organ. With

the outro, all I did was have the organ, fm synth, trance organ and basement bass until song fades

out.

Quantising of instruments

The Trance Chords were quantised at 1/8. So it can play each note on time.

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The Basement Bass were also quantised at 1/8 note so it can sync in with the other instruments but

also stand out.

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The FM Synth Brass at 1/8 note. It was set to tempo time because it as it was playing at the

beginning of the track, it needed to sound on time but also give it an good intro the song.

The Beach Bells were quantised at 1/8 of a note.

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The Church Choir were quantised at 1/8 of a note.

The sparkling organ was quantised at 1/8 of a note.

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The Double Bass (Pizzicato) was quantized at 1/8 of a note.

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Automation of the track

With the double bass, I felt that it could make the song original. The sparkling organ was played

softly, as the instrument is very soft and it didn’t need to loud in the track but the Church choir had

to be heard because it wasn’t loud enough and I tried ways for it to be heard so the only options was

to turn it up. With the beach bell, it was too harsh and loud so I turned them down so that it you can

hear the other instruments playing.

The trance chords were turned down because it was too loud and also this sort of instrument is

known to play quiet loud. With the drums, I turned them up because, it was the main instrument

and also it helps to ensure that it plays the other instruments in time. The FM synth brass was play

also quietly because it was used as background music.

Mix down of the track

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As you can see, this is the mixer. With the trance chords, church choir and basement bass, I panned

them either to the left or right. I did because I remembered, how panning make a difference when

you mix down. Also I ensured that all the instruments were playing at the right level.