adam’s music blog

On the day of the performance, we were going on last. We had the opportunity to do a brief soundcheck, which went without error, and we then performed the song (now named “Sleepless”) to the rest of the group. Listening back, I think it was a success, as there were no noticeable slip ups in playing, singing or drumming. If I had to perform the same song again, I would probably consider extending the length of the solo by a few bars, but other than that I wouldn’t change much else. I thought the general atmosphere and stage presence was good, even though Zara was off to the side whilst singing, although I’m still not sure whether I would personally have the drum kit in the middle of the band or not.

For our recorded version, we were originally going to use the studio, as we had been inducted, but we were unable to work the desk properly. Because of this, we opted to record guitar into Logic instead, which I did the next day along with Zara in order to record her vocals, which could then be added together and mixed at a later date along with drums, which Zara completed:

https://soundcloud.com/zara-709682080/sleepless-studio-recording

For our remix, I was originally planning to work on it, however I kept throwing out ideas each time I went to work on a full length version. I think this was mainly because I kept switching between different styles, which led to me disliking the version I was currently working on. I also did not have access to a keyboard due to the lockdown, which further impeded my ability to rewrite the song, as I am more used to using a keyboard when I write music into DAW’s. In the end, Zara produced a “dark lo-fi” version, which she achieved though adding different eerie sound/vocal effects and instruments:

https://soundcloud.com/zara-709682080/sleepless-dark-lo-fi-remix

After coming up with a 4 chord progression on BandLab with my guitar, we decided to use this progression as the base for our assessment song (Ebmaj7, Emin7b5, Fmin7b5, Bb67). I believed that we should write all of the music for song before the lyrics, so I then came up with a second chord progression for a potential chorus. I also wanted to have a section that would lead us back into the verse, so I wrote out a descending chromatic line for the keys and bass to play which would then lead us back in.

Because I wanted the music to be written first, I gave Zara my drumsticks to play a simple backing beat for the time being. This recording can be heard below:

https://soundcloud.com/zara-709682080/jazzman

In our next rehearsal, we decided to throw out some of the chord progressions, specifically the “chorus” progression as it was proving tricky to work with, as well as the descending chromatic line. Instead, we opted for a stripped back version of the verse progression, with myself only playing block chords with the occasional embellishment. I thought this would work better for the chill/relaxed theme we were aiming for. Zara continued to play on drums and we began to consider the possibility of having her play drums and sing at the same time:

In the rehearsal after that, we were able to hear how the song sounded with lyrics, as Zara had been writing them in-between rehearsals. We also decided to have her play drums and sing at the same time, which is something she hadn’t previously tried before, so I suggested that she start with a simple kick-on-the-1 snare-on-the-3 pattern:

This seemed to work well with the rest of our instruments, and I also suggested that we place a mic next to the snare with a little reverb (which can be seen in the video above) in order to give the song a bit more body. Due to playing this song several times throughout our rehearsals, I was starting to worry about whether it had enough content, as I often do when writing instrumental music. However, when Zara was able to sing some lyrics, it helped to bring the song together, which helped to remind me that you don’t need to have a lot of musical elements going on in a song if there’s a singer on top of it (at least, in my opinion).

Our last rehearsal before the performance gave us the chance to practice and review the entire song with a complete set of lyrics. We also decided to incorporate a solo for the keys, in order to extend the length, and to also include some variety in the structure. I also positioned my other wooden drumstick on the snare in order to create a more woody sounding rimshot:

Overall, I am happy with the final result of our song. Although I was admittedly sceptical of the drum/vocal combo, Zara seemed to handle it well. Saffron was able to come up with her own bass line, with my suggestion to keep it fairly limited to root notes in order to keep the main focus on the vocals. Kara was also able to learn the guitar part I had written, which was impressive considering she had not looked at barre chords in detail before.

This week, we were tasked with setting up a presentation in our assessment groups in order to give some idea of who we were and what kind of music we would be performing. I agreed to form a group with Saffron, Kara and Zara, who I had previously been working with for the other tasks, and we put together a presentation outside the lesson via Google Slides, which can be viewed below:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1-JS6t8KTZ15fyapa7w095cXzvkWpj0ixp8N6tX1YiTk/edit?usp=sharing

This week, we discussed the idea of “local” music, and how different styles of music have become the mainstream. We had a class padlet to put forward our thoughts:

https://padlet.com/gmraydio/ri4sf1gavnt7eepc

One main point that stands out to me is the idea of cultural appropriation. This has been a topic that we have discussed previously in other lectures, and I personally feel that in regards to music genres, cultural appropriation has lost its weight. I believe that a lot of modern songs and songwriters can be accused of cultural appropriation even though nothing will come of it, even if these songs are simply incorporating elements of traditional, local music.

In what I consider my “local” area of Cornwall, I cannot say that I know much of the musical culture in the area. I have had glimpses at traditional Cornish folk musical at festivals and the occasional gig, although based on my experience, it does not differ much from what you would expect folk music to sound like (aside from the lyrics, which are all very much patriotic Cornish).

The session also consisted of us using the software “BandLab”. I had previously used this software for a brief amount of time, although this minimal experience did nothing to help me in the session. I worked with my group (from the prosody song) in order to try and make some sort of short song. However, we were unable to come up with anything that stood out, due to a mix of technical issues and general frustration with the software. I was able to plug my guitar into my interface to connect it to BandLab, and I came up with a simple 4 chord progression consisting of Ebmaj7, Emin7b5, Fmin7b5 and Bb7, accompanied by a simple snare/kick pattern.

This week, our session was centred around the idea of “camp”, specifically the “notes of camp” by Susan Sontag. (https://monoskop.org/images/5/59/Sontag_Susan_1964_Notes_on_Camp.pdf).

Before we began the main part of the session, we were asked what our “guilty pleasures” were in regards to music. As I mainly consider myself to be a jazz inspired musician, my personal musical “guilty pleasure” would be classical music, specifically from the romantic era of classical music. Here’s an example of one of my favourites:

As I mentioned before, the main part of the session was based around the idea of “camp”, and what it is. From my own basic understanding, camp is a style that is meant to stand out, to be extravagant, to challenge norms. In doing so, it also helps someone to express themselves in great artistic detail, without caring too much about how others may feel about it.

Admittedly, I am not a connoisseur of camp. The only musicians who “fit” this style that come to mind are more mainstream (yet famed) artists such as Freddie Mercury or David Bowie. Bowie in particular was on my mind throughout this session, which of course was thanks to his famed alter ego, Ziggy Stardust. Bowie himself was no stranger to standing out, with one example being in the “Life on Mars?” music video:

This week, we continued to rehearse and work on our prosody song, as well as looking at lyric writing. As someone who doesn’t normally write lyrics, this session helped me explore methods of writing lyrics that I had not previously considered. One example of this was the use of haikus, a traditional style of poem which consists of 3 lines, with the first line containing 5 syllables in total, the second containing 7 syllables in total and the third line containing 5 syllables again, the same as the first line. Being someone who does not consider themselves a poet, let alone a lyricist, I thought I would have trouble with this task. I came up with the following haiku:

Whilst not exactly a work of art, this haiku was formed off a recent memory in which, as the poem suggests, I struggled to fall asleep on a sofa. I personally would not consider this to be an appropriate set of lyrics for a song that I would write, although I would most likely find it easier if I set myself a theme of some sort beforehand. I would also note that I mainly write instrumental music, although I should consider being more open to the idea of writing lyrics, especially as we had several lyric writing exercises shown to us in the previous year.

We also attempted to write lyrics in a “free” type of style. This meant that I would continue to write random thoughts in a my mind, except this time, as individual words:

Again, I would most likely not use most of these for lyrics, as only a couple stand out to me (mountain, broken, bottle?). This session may have shown me new, quick methods for lyric writing, but I personally feel that if I was to write lyrics, I would spend more time thinking about the meaning or the overall theme of a song first.

In regards to our prosody song, we continued to practice it as a group, and I began to consider a next section in order to have more content that could be interpreted, rather than just a 4 chord pattern. I added some new chords in order to form this next section (pre-chorus), as well as a brief 2 bar rest where the vocals stop for a moment to allow the piano and bass to play a line each at the same time. I thought this helped to convey the rain theme in our song, as the piano is playing notes in a quicker succession for a moment, rather than just block chords. After this, I came up with the chords for a chorus, a simple ascending pattern, which helped to change the tone of the song slightly, although the lyrics continued the theme of being lost in thought:

In this first lecture of the term, we looked at the idea of prosody in music. In (fairly) simple terms, prosody is when a songwriter/composer uses musical techniques in order to express certain feelings or emotions, or even hint at a storyline through the music. Prosody can be implemented in a variety of different ways, and has been throughout the history of music.

For example, here is a recording of “Liebesleid” (translating to Love’s Sorrow) which was originally a piece written for violin by Fritz Kreisler in 1905, and was arranged for piano by Sergei Rachmaninoff:

Although you may have to listen to the entire recording in order to get a sense of the prosody being presented (as most romantic era classical pieces require), there are some obvious links to the title of the piece that are scattered throughout. One example is at the 2:35 timestamp, where you can hear a descending line accompanied by a crescendo which crashes into a rather loud, yet brief section of the piece before slowing back down. If this doesn’t indicate to the listener of the sorrow that the composer is intending to convey, then I can’t think of a better way (at least on a single piano with a single musician).

Prosody Song Task:

We were tasked with writing a short song with prosody in mind, so I formed a group with Saffron (bass) Zara (vocals) and Kara (guitar), with myself on the keyboard. I started off the song with a simple 4 chord progression:

As you can see, this chord progression led to the discuss of ideas behind how we would present prosody. Some themes were discussed, and the general idea ended up being a sense of lost in thought whilst sitting in a coffee shop with rainfall outside (very specific). From this, Zara then wrote a verse of lyrics, and the song progress so far can be heard in the video above.

Today was our assessment performance as a band, and it was also our first proper performance of a completed song, as we had previously been wavering between different ideas. I brought my own synthesizer for the performance as I had been using it for our past rehearsals. There weren’t any issues as we set up, and we were able to successfully perform our song. I was able to play my parts with no noticeable mistakes, although I realized during the performance that the sustain pedal wasn’t plugged into my keyboard. However, this did not hinder the performance in a major way as I was mainly playing chords throughout the song. This would have been more of an issue if I was playing melodies, although I do feel that the sustain pedal would have made my part sound better.

If we were to perform this song again, I would ensure that all my equipment is set up properly. I would also work on my own stage presence as I am mostly looking at the keyboard throughout the performance. I think this could be improved by looking up more either at the audience or at other members of the band.

Throughout the songwriting process for this song, I wrote my own parts and contributed to the chord progression. I based my parts off of the chord progression itself, which was fairly easy for me to do.

This week, we had our final rehearsal before our performance. This rehearsal was the most useful and productive because we were able to decide on chords, as well as adding a proper chorus and bridge section with different chord variations. I was easily able to figure out my own part, which was playing chords in the right hand and a bass note in the left hand. This was done in place of a bass player, although I personally believe that a bass player would be a useful addition to the band. This is because the bass note that I am playing is the same sound as the chord that I am playing, so a bass guitar would give the bass line a different sound.

Overall, I feel confident for our performance next week, as I believe that we all understand our parts well and our song is finalized. In future, I would have liked to have had more rehearsals, which would have allowed us to spend more time on different sections of the song, although I understand that this may be difficult to organize due to where people may live.

The focus of this lesson was to work on our final song as a band for the performance. Our band decided not to use the drum machine that we had previously used in rehearsal as we decided on an easier alternative: programming the drum beat into Logic on a laptop. We would then play this at the start of our performance in order to have percussion. While this sounded quite mechanical, it was our best alternative to not having a drummer, and it also meant that the timing was perfect which would help keep the rest of us in time.

We also decided to work on our song in this lesson as a band because we had previously been struggling to come up with a solid idea to work on. We opened a Logic session and began to program the percussion as well as track the guitar: