Making Music

This forum is for discussing Reason. Questions, answers, ideas, and opinions... all apply.
wils
Posts: 44
Joined: 04 Dec 2017

03 Jan 2018

33db wrote:
02 Jan 2018
wils wrote:
02 Jan 2018
Oh I don't know about that - someone could spend an hour listening to various degrees of the sustain/damp pedals :P
OK now i have to ask, are acoustic piano pedals incremental or "on and off" set ups?
I always pushed pedals all the way down when using them but then I learned what little keyboarding skills I have on a synth.
Next time I see one I'll check the back for CV routing.

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splangie
Posts: 236
Joined: 21 Dec 2017
Location: Park County, Colorado
Contact:

03 Jan 2018

I usually hum or whistle something while I am driving or walking or peeing or eating or pottying or where ever, try to remember it and then tinkle with it on the ivorys or guitar when I can to figure out a hook or something. Then I like to play the hook or basic melody to my wife or kid or a friend and see what they think. Of course their reaction is not always the factor that determines whether I complete it or not, but it can help. A little recorder used to be nice to carry around, now I just use a cell phone.

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Reasonable man
Posts: 589
Joined: 14 Jul 2016

04 Jan 2018

Im not making any music at all these last few months with moving address and a host of other crap. Im not going to either until i can get some kind of a grip of the production side of things and organising sounds , templates and learning these new devices and instruments in R10 . When i've finished that i have to get to grips with my new Necktar Panorama and its manual. I was just reading the scope list thread there and i have no clue what any of that is ..none.. I'm guessing that it involves programming on my mac which is way above my head!
Last few tacks i wrote it was just the mixing/ production side that was gash , that and the fact it was mixed on £20 headphones :roll:

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TritoneAddiction
Competition Winner
Posts: 4219
Joined: 29 Aug 2015
Location: Sweden

04 Jan 2018

I think different methods yields very different results. If you start out with writing a strong melody then the song will take that direction and the sounds aren't as important. In those cases tweaking/mixing afterwords makes more sense to me.
But if you on the other hand start out with depending on very characteristic/tweaked sounds you'll get a much more sound oriented tune and melodies/song writing comes second. The character becomes more important than the note choices almost.

Here's two examples of my own music where the two methods have gotten me very different results.

The first one is a chiptune where the sounds really doesn't matter much. The song is all about the melodies and actual songwriting. Btw if anyone wants to practise song writing without relying on production I highly recommend trying to write chiptunes because note choices and arrangement is all you have to work with :)


The second tune I wrote as a demo song for Lithium and this track is very much dependent on the sounds, picking characteristic sounds, distortion, reverbs and so on. Sure there's a certain amount of note choices going on but they are nowhere near as important as the first tune. In fact the main part (0:22) is in fact just one note being played without any trace of melody, but because the sound itself takes up so much space and demands your attention it doesn't need a melody in order to work.


As I mentioned earlier I tend to do everything at once, song writing and tweaking/mixing which is why my songs usually equally depend on melodies and the character of the sounds.

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CardCheat
Posts: 3
Joined: 05 Jan 2018

05 Jan 2018

CaliforniaBurrito wrote:
01 Jan 2018
33db wrote:
31 Dec 2017
Anyone else find this is the case?
Like having a whole rack for a kick drum? :lol: Yes I know what you mean.



Finished track 8 hours later. :D

Nice song man! That whole rack for the bass drum was worth the sound! :thumbs_up:

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TheGodOfRainbows
Posts: 640
Joined: 31 Mar 2015

19 Mar 2018

TritoneAddiction wrote:
04 Jan 2018
I think different methods yields very different results. If you start out with writing a strong melody then the song will take that direction and the sounds aren't as important. In those cases tweaking/mixing afterwords makes more sense to me.
But if you on the other hand start out with depending on very characteristic/tweaked sounds you'll get a much more sound oriented tune and melodies/song writing comes second. The character becomes more important than the note choices almost.

Here's two examples of my own music where the two methods have gotten me very different results.

The first one is a chiptune where the sounds really doesn't matter much. The song is all about the melodies and actual songwriting. Btw if anyone wants to practise song writing without relying on production I highly recommend trying to write chiptunes because note choices and arrangement is all you have to work with :)


The second tune I wrote as a demo song for Lithium and this track is very much dependent on the sounds, picking characteristic sounds, distortion, reverbs and so on. Sure there's a certain amount of note choices going on but they are nowhere near as important as the first tune. In fact the main part (0:22) is in fact just one note being played without any trace of melody, but because the sound itself takes up so much space and demands your attention it doesn't need a melody in order to work.


As I mentioned earlier I tend to do everything at once, song writing and tweaking/mixing which is why my songs usually equally depend on melodies and the character of the sounds.
I love everything you just said. Is there a way to add this post to a favorites list? You really clarify the crossover between a 'sound oriented' piece and a 'proper song'. I totally agree about chiptune songs forcing you to concentrate on and prioritize song structure, over sound design and exploration, and that's why nanoBots was so fun! But that's not to say that particular synth is a typical chiptune synth, because I find it to be very expressive, versus say the Chip 64 Rack Extension which emulates the more primitive beeps and blips sound.

All of this reminds me of my personal rule of thumb for songs, and that is: Can it be played unplugged, acoustic, with minimal production and still be interesting and fun to listen to. In this case, the acoustic guitar is the original Gameboy sound chip.

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TheNoog
Posts: 38
Joined: 06 Mar 2018

19 Mar 2018


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