This is actually the final version of “An Epic Ran” that I posted a sketch of before. In that entry, I talked about how Jordan came in and recorded the beats, and since then I’ve been chopping them up and adding instrumentation / arrangements over them. Here is the result.
This composition basically sets up a kind of riff, with an abstract kind of melody and syncopated arpeggiation, and them proceeds to modulate through the circle of fifths (this happens every time the slides change in the presentation it was designed to complement). There is probably no need for you to listen to the whole thing - its practically a soundscape in that it doesn’t really go anywhere - it just keeps modulating.
The instruments are: Mr. J. Siegel on the rented Mapex kit and an old Ludwig Snare - which we mic’d with an APEX DP-2 mic kit. Software instruments: sampled upright bass, Spectrasonics Omnisphere, sampled 12 string guitar.
This is just a work-in-progress clip of something I am working on for a multimedia presentation. I think it’s going to be some sort of presentation at an electronics tradeshow.
For this project I wanted to try something different. An old friend of mine was in town: Jordan Siegel, formerly the drummer of the fantastic pop band Fooled By April, and currently the frontman for Boston’s premeir classic rock cover group French Lick. I figured it was a good opportunity to track some live drums instead of sequencing / playing drum samples on a MIDI kit, like I might normally do.
So I got a drum kit together and bought a set of APEX drum mics. I’ve been skeptical of these “drum mic kits” in the past, but actually this kit worked pretty damn well. Jordan rolled in and played his ass off - and bam! I had myself a custom drum beat library. I went through and tweaked / spliced / hacked the beats all up, and now I am in the process of composing some music to go along with these grooves.
For this particular project, I can’t do anything too complex - imagine being one of the poor salesman standing next to this kiosk while the music loops every 3 minutes. Pretty much anything would drive you insane if you have to listen to it all day, so I try to keep the whole thing pretty minimal - its going to have a couple bursts of music at some key moments in the animation, but the majority of the piece will be pretty quiet and chill.
Anyway, I am still working on it. Once I get the whole thing done I will post it here. Stay tuned…
Client: “Oh, and we need a music bed for this presentation by tomorrow morning.”
Me: “….”.
Client: “Since its for a tradeshow, and will be looping the entire time, something simple and non-intrusive would be best.”
So I whipped this together and went straight to bed (I’d already been up 24 hours). It’s extremely simple. Stylus RMX + Omnisphere + EXS24 = percolating noises. Apparently I’ll get the chance to expand on this soundtrack once the presentation is converted into a stand-alone piece, complete with audio narrator, at some point in the future. At that point maybe I will post the whole presentation with the actual soundtrack, etc. Until then, this was a “fire and forget” project.
This is a sketch that was one of several options presented to a client. I think this track would work great behind underwater footage, like an ocean documentary or some sort of travel-channel scubafest.
Speaking of underwater - why don’t they rerun more of the old Jacques Cousteau specials on TV these days? Especially considering the popularity of movies like The Life Aquatic, which are obviously riffing on the JQ legend. Sidenote: can you believe that movie came out in 2004 - 5 years ago? How time flies…
Tools used on this track: Logic, EXS24, Spectrasonics Omnisphere & Stylus RMX.
This is a proof-of-concept / idea I submitted a while back, to a friend who is working on a very exciting video project. Since the piece I am posting here was recorded, we have improved on it, but I wanted to keep the original version around for posterity.
Bonus points to anyone who can guess what late 70’s TV show inspired parts of this music and melody.
When the project is finished, I will embed it on this site, along with all the info, credits, etc.
Recently he posted a video to Vimeo that he made using the new Canon 5SD MkII camera - a new camera that can shoot high-definition video as well as still photography. Since it was released under a Creative Commons Attribution license, I took the liberty of creating a score for the sequence. Read the rest of this entry »
This is somewhere between a soundtrack and a soundscape, with little percussion / beats, and a sort of wandering structure that unfurls towards the end. I am no Brian Eno (although I am a fan of his), but I do like the ambient genre now and then. There is something psychologically liberating about working on a track once I’ve decided that it is evolving into an ambient thing, like at that point I can basically do anything I can think of.
In this case, that included appropriating a bit of Carl Sagan. The end result is something you might be able to listen to as you fall asleep.
