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The Rule of Three and Music

on May 11th 2009 with 22 comments

The Rule of Three is a popular concept used in many art forms such as writing and photography to achieve a balance of elements and structure. There is little discussion of The Rule of Three being applied to music, however, though the same concept can be applied to just about every aspect of our craft. From the first sketches of a composition to the production of a final mix, we can use this simple device to achieve a balance of interest and clarity so that our ideas are clearly expressed and heard.

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The Process of Score Composition, Pt 2

on May 1st 2009 with 4 comments
This entry is part 2 of 4 in the series The Process of Score Composition

This tutorial is the second in a series of tutorials on composition – specifically composition that might be appropriate for film, television, etc. The intention with this series of tutorials is to walk you through the process of one of my compositions. It is intended to offer some new ideas and perspectives and hopefully give a bit of creative inspiration, but by no means should it be considered definitive – even for my own personal compositional process.

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The Process of Score Composition, Pt 1

on Apr 20th 2009 with 17 comments
This entry is part 1 of 4 in the series The Process of Score Composition

This tutorial marks the first in a series of tutorials on composition – specifically composition that might be appropriate for film and television. In this piece, we’ll talk a bit about the philosophy behind this particular series of tutorials, and get into the process of composition itself.

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Play Chords with One Finger Using Logic Pro’s Chord Memorizer

on Jan 4th 2009 with 27 comments

Really bad at playing keyboards? Lost that creative spark? Here’s a tutorial showing you how to create some cool ideas using a little known object in Logic called the Chord Memorizer. Buried inside the dreaded Environment, this MIDI tool can help you build anything from new musical ideas to complex layered sounds — with one finger!

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How to Add the Experimental to Electronica, Part 1

on Nov 10th 2008 with 21 comments

It’s a bit of a shame that the abstract electronica genre isn’t thriving commercially the way it used to be. The heyday of labels like Warp Records and Planet Mu has long gone, and very few experimental electronica producers are making a living from their music.

That said, there’s a great wealth of absolutely amazing free electronica out there. I’d recommend any fan of electronic music to take a listen to the brilliant Bleepshow podcast for many fantastic examples. It’s a highly creative area, and one which needs a constant supply of fresh talent, so it’s a good time to get started!

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11 Totally Free VST Synthesizers That Sound Great

on Aug 22nd 2008 with 32 comments

It can be hard to find a good synth plug-in, and there are plenty on the market that will have you wondering why you ever parted with your money. Fortunately, this list offers no such disappointments, because everything on it is totally free!

These are all VST synths—while some developers may offer ports for other plug-in architectures, most don’t, so if your workstation of choice doesn’t support VST you might have a hard time finding something you can use here. That said, flick through the list and to each developer’s website and see if they have something that’ll work for you.

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This entry is part 10 of 12 in the Creative Session: All About Synths Session

Create Awesome Drum N’ Bass Fills With Livecut

on Aug 21st 2008 with 8 comments

Livecut by Smartelectronix is a VST beatslicer effect. It rearranges the incoming audio in real-time and is a great tool for generating drum n’ bass-style drum fills from existing audio or VST drum loops.

However, the output can seem a little unpredictable. In this tutorial we’re going to look at using Livecut to generate some fills from an audio drum loop. We’ll edit the results to create something a little more subtle.

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Create Generative Ambient Music in Ableton Live

on Aug 11th 2008 with 16 comments

In this tutorial we are going to use Ableton Live’s innovative follow actions to create generative music in the form of some electronic wind chimes. When writing generative music we look at composition from a different angle. Instead of composing melodies and writing arrangements, we define a number of fixed parameters and let the music write itself! Wind chimes are prehaps the most common example of generative music—a term coined by ambient pioneer Brain Eno.

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Make a Punchy Rock Drum Beat Using Reason’s Redrum

on Aug 1st 2008 with 17 comments

Reason is used by musicians across many genres; not just electronica artists, but rockers, folk artists and pop bands, too. I know one punk rock band that sold pretty well a few years back using completely programmed drums, and surprisingly nobody ever noticed—I’ll spare their reputation the damage and keep the band’s name to myself.

The point is that Reason is flexible and useful for all musicians. If you’ve got an itch to ditch your drummer, here’s how to program a rock beat using ReDrum, Reason’s resident drum machine.

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