I haven't posted a finished electronic piece for a while, so here's a newly polished one.
Because They Fear the Groove
This tune started with a bluesy bass-line in E-flat minor. I added layers to it while consciously avoiding giving much concern to the usual rules of harmony. The result was quite cool but a little too simple for my taste, so I added a coda in B-flat phrygian dominant to spice up the overall experience. A neat trick that results is that when the "B" section reoccurs at the end, you hear it in the context of the new tonality. This ambiguity isn't fully resolved until the final chord(B-flat).
Irrational Planet - a blog with an eccentric orbit
Showing posts with label music theory. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music theory. Show all posts
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Devonian
My girlfriend had been saying for some time that "Devonian: The Age of Fishes" would be a good title for a piece of music. After composing the basic melody for this piece, it seemed quite old and fishy, so I used the name.
Devonian
This piece is in the Phrygian mode, which can be found by playing the natural notes from E to E. The trick to composing for modes is to find alternative ways of expressing tension and drama, because they lack the dominant function chords that most western music is based on. Here, I've used tone clusters that contrast with the sparse harmony of the rest of the piece. The hardest part was coming up with a drum part that provided the right amount of structure and syncopation without calling too much attention to itself.
Composing this was pretty quick and easy, as it's a relatively simple piece - it can be played on piano using only the white keys. I tend to be suspicious of pieces like that. I can't help thinking that people have been writing tunes like this for thousands of years, and surely someone has used "E-B,C-F" as a melody before. Then I remind myself that if I really cared about total originality, I would have to do something crazy like throw out all my instruments and design new ones around weird tuning systems. I have to believe that the things coming out of my brain have a certain flavor to them that's original even if the ideas aren't entirely new.
Devonian
This piece is in the Phrygian mode, which can be found by playing the natural notes from E to E. The trick to composing for modes is to find alternative ways of expressing tension and drama, because they lack the dominant function chords that most western music is based on. Here, I've used tone clusters that contrast with the sparse harmony of the rest of the piece. The hardest part was coming up with a drum part that provided the right amount of structure and syncopation without calling too much attention to itself.
Composing this was pretty quick and easy, as it's a relatively simple piece - it can be played on piano using only the white keys. I tend to be suspicious of pieces like that. I can't help thinking that people have been writing tunes like this for thousands of years, and surely someone has used "E-B,C-F" as a melody before. Then I remind myself that if I really cared about total originality, I would have to do something crazy like throw out all my instruments and design new ones around weird tuning systems. I have to believe that the things coming out of my brain have a certain flavor to them that's original even if the ideas aren't entirely new.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
The Convenience of Twelve
One thing that I find fascinating about steelpans is the arrangement of notes on the various types of instrument. Since most steelpan instruments consist of multiple drums, it's very convenient that the tuning system used by most of the world has twelve notes. You can take the factors of twelve and relate them directly to the pans and their tonalities.
2 x 6 = 12 ; Double second divides twelve notes into two whole-tone scales of six notes each.
3 x 4 = 12 ; Cello/guitar pan divides twelve notes into three diminished seven chords of four notes each.
4 x 3 = 12 ; Tenor bass and quadraphonic pans divide twelve notes into four augmented triads of three notes each.
6 x 2 = 12 ; Six-bass pan divides twelve notes into six pairs of fourths and fifths.
If there were thirteen notes in an octave, all this would be a complete mess.
The only pan that uses a single drum is the lead or tenor, which is arranged in a circle of fifths. The interesting result of this is that any melodic contour can be easily remapped into a different key by shifting the physical pattern of notes around the circle.
The Mannette Steel Drums website has pictures of the drums and their layouts here.
2 x 6 = 12 ; Double second divides twelve notes into two whole-tone scales of six notes each.
3 x 4 = 12 ; Cello/guitar pan divides twelve notes into three diminished seven chords of four notes each.
4 x 3 = 12 ; Tenor bass and quadraphonic pans divide twelve notes into four augmented triads of three notes each.
6 x 2 = 12 ; Six-bass pan divides twelve notes into six pairs of fourths and fifths.
If there were thirteen notes in an octave, all this would be a complete mess.
The only pan that uses a single drum is the lead or tenor, which is arranged in a circle of fifths. The interesting result of this is that any melodic contour can be easily remapped into a different key by shifting the physical pattern of notes around the circle.
The Mannette Steel Drums website has pictures of the drums and their layouts here.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Arpeggioland
More noodling. If I'd thought of it, I probably would have put the album name in the ID3 tags as "noodles" when I started this project. Oh well.
Arpeggioland
With this one I've used reverb to simulate an effect like the sustain pedal on a vibraphone. This is another effect that I'd like to explore further in real-time if I can figure out how to do it. I'm imagining a plugged-in pan setup that would have effects pedals for stuff like this. Could be fun.
There was an audio glitch in this one that I had to delete, along with a very small patch of music. Hopefully it isn't too noticeable. I almost left it in, but I knew I'd be bothered by it later if I didn't fix it.
Sorry I haven't been posting in the past week, but I have an excuse: Rehearsals with Ray Holman.
Arpeggioland
With this one I've used reverb to simulate an effect like the sustain pedal on a vibraphone. This is another effect that I'd like to explore further in real-time if I can figure out how to do it. I'm imagining a plugged-in pan setup that would have effects pedals for stuff like this. Could be fun.
There was an audio glitch in this one that I had to delete, along with a very small patch of music. Hopefully it isn't too noticeable. I almost left it in, but I knew I'd be bothered by it later if I didn't fix it.
Sorry I haven't been posting in the past week, but I have an excuse: Rehearsals with Ray Holman.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Summer
New steelpan noodling.
Summer
One of my favorite things to do when playing pan solo is to run up and down giant chords, as you can hear in this recording. The tonality is ambiguous; rather than use the diminished chord that normally occurs in major/minor keys, the chords here tend to escape into foreign areas of the circle of fifths. There's a sense of alternate major-minor-ness going on into infinity. The occasional emphasis of the Lydian #4 tonality adds further mystery.
For some reason, the images that came into my mind while I was editing this noodle were of hot summer days outside in the sun when I was young. A feeling of innocence and passing time.
Summer
One of my favorite things to do when playing pan solo is to run up and down giant chords, as you can hear in this recording. The tonality is ambiguous; rather than use the diminished chord that normally occurs in major/minor keys, the chords here tend to escape into foreign areas of the circle of fifths. There's a sense of alternate major-minor-ness going on into infinity. The occasional emphasis of the Lydian #4 tonality adds further mystery.
For some reason, the images that came into my mind while I was editing this noodle were of hot summer days outside in the sun when I was young. A feeling of innocence and passing time.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
The Pentatonic Scale
Pentatonic scales are fun, pure, simple, quick to learn and easy to remember. Their blessing is also their curse - the lack of dissonance in these scales can make them bland. They're very sweet and pleasant. They don't have the attitude of blues scales or extended chords. But they're a great tool for soloing and composing.
One handy cheat is playing the pentatonic scale of the dominant over every chord in a major key - For instance, G A B D E over C major chords. This almost always works, and avoiding the tonic note makes the scale more interesting.
If you want to get clever, you can throw chord changes back in and modulate to the pentatonic scale a fifth up from every chord that occurs. It's a tactic for going "outside" that I've been playing with recently. After playing G over C, for example, you could play D over G, bringing in the foreign note F#.
When I fool around at the piano I love to play pentatonics with big stacks of fifths for harmony. The pentatonic can be seen as five consecutive perfect fifths. The G pentatonic scale, for instance, can be organized as G D A E B. Fifths played like this on the piano create a towering open space of harmonic layers. There's a sense not of chord-ness but of ancient, natural polyphony.
One handy cheat is playing the pentatonic scale of the dominant over every chord in a major key - For instance, G A B D E over C major chords. This almost always works, and avoiding the tonic note makes the scale more interesting.
If you want to get clever, you can throw chord changes back in and modulate to the pentatonic scale a fifth up from every chord that occurs. It's a tactic for going "outside" that I've been playing with recently. After playing G over C, for example, you could play D over G, bringing in the foreign note F#.
When I fool around at the piano I love to play pentatonics with big stacks of fifths for harmony. The pentatonic can be seen as five consecutive perfect fifths. The G pentatonic scale, for instance, can be organized as G D A E B. Fifths played like this on the piano create a towering open space of harmonic layers. There's a sense not of chord-ness but of ancient, natural polyphony.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Reverb = Genius
Koto-Scale Improv
I've been experimenting with recording recently, and this is the first thing that I've liked enough to put online. This is about %95 improvised. The simple theme at the beginning was planned, as was the key change, but that's it. I probably wouldn't have uploaded it, except that it sounds so spooky with the reverb.
The scale used for the first half originates with a Japanese string instrument, the koto. This scale, called In-Sen, arises from the way the koto is tuned. Interestingly, this five-note scale can be found within the seven-note scales of western music, but its attitude is quite different.
One of the most pleasant scales is the pentatonic, which can be described as a stack of five perfect fifths, for example F-C-G-D-A. Add two more notes to that stack and you get the seven-note scale of the western world, F-C-G-D-A-E-B. The first and last notes are a diminished fifth apart, and form a harmonic boundary between scale tones and the five other "outside" tones on the circle of fifths. Now, cut out the second and third notes, leaving F-D-A-E-B, and there's the In-Sen scale. It shares a sense of purity with the pentatonic, but the diminished fifth drastically changes its character.
I've been experimenting with recording recently, and this is the first thing that I've liked enough to put online. This is about %95 improvised. The simple theme at the beginning was planned, as was the key change, but that's it. I probably wouldn't have uploaded it, except that it sounds so spooky with the reverb.
The scale used for the first half originates with a Japanese string instrument, the koto. This scale, called In-Sen, arises from the way the koto is tuned. Interestingly, this five-note scale can be found within the seven-note scales of western music, but its attitude is quite different.
One of the most pleasant scales is the pentatonic, which can be described as a stack of five perfect fifths, for example F-C-G-D-A. Add two more notes to that stack and you get the seven-note scale of the western world, F-C-G-D-A-E-B. The first and last notes are a diminished fifth apart, and form a harmonic boundary between scale tones and the five other "outside" tones on the circle of fifths. Now, cut out the second and third notes, leaving F-D-A-E-B, and there's the In-Sen scale. It shares a sense of purity with the pentatonic, but the diminished fifth drastically changes its character.
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