About
For my final track, I challenged myself to use several parts from several different past tracks. The main track I based the piece on was the track I enjoyed making and listening to the most. I tend to be a bit of a self-critic so finding a track that I made that I was rather fond of made the whole idea of stretching it out and adding to it all the more enticing. The general vibe of this track is bringing positivity to the listener, the listener could perhaps hear this track in a coming-of-age story.
I chose the meter of 6/8 due to the joyful sound I was able to produce in a previous track, on which I based this entire final track. While many listeners will hear it and be unaware of this, it may be something they unconsciously notice. As for drums, I kept a simple sound of a SoCal kit, as the goal was to keep a fairly acoustic sound, which is my preferred type of sound when it comes to both making and listening to music. The bass track was similar in that way.
The key of Bb Major is the key that I went with for this piece. I used every chord in the Bb Major scale in this piece. In the first sixteen measures it went in a pattern, Bb (I), Ebm (vi), C (IV), and Bb Major 7th (V7). This to me, gave a sort of lighthearted and friendly tone to the piece. The rest of the unused chords (D, A, G, F) came in during the last sixteen bars when the drumbeat shifts as well. There are a few inverted chords amongst these as well, but the overall lighthearted feeling doesn’t leave the piece.
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For the harmony, I chose a Yamaha Grand Piano to fit the acoustic feel, and for the melody, I went with a classic acoustic guitar. The melody shape switches between arch and interval throughout the entire piece. I wanted the piece to feel like the listener was there the moment the music was made, listening in, almost like sitting around a campfire with a group of friends. That type of connectivity with a group you get when playing music.
The audio portions of this piece are where I had to think. Being that I was aiming for a homey acoustic feel, I didn’t know what I was going to record or create to fit that mold. For the recorded element I decided to go with something more simplistic, I used a chopstick and struck a glass cup, it almost sounds as if it were a bell or a triangle. As for the synthesized tracks, I went ahead and made two different sounds, one that was more instrumental sounding (Track 8), while the other was a little heavier on the synth sound (Track 9). I used both of these to add some variation to the tracks, like accenting the harmony in some areas or accentuating the melody in others. When it came down to the sampler track (Track 10) I wanted to try something a little darker and muted in sound. Something present enough the listener could hear it, but they wouldn’t notice that it was a whole different track put there to add a little something more to the piece. I used some of the melodies and adjusted the sound of the sampler to make it lower, more of a muted bass-type sound, and came out with something I quite enjoyed.