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Composing tracks in Gadget
Korg's Gadget is (in my view) an excellent tool for creating tracks. Great though it is, it's not brilliant when it comes to the arranging side of things. Any kind of creating sections / copying sections (verse / chorus etc.) doesn't exist, you're stuck with working with scenes. While you can copy these scenes and re-order and name them it becomes tricky to 'follow' what follows what in a track - especially when there are a lot of scenes involved.
I'm not using it as an excuse, but my stuff has been described as structurally 'dis-jointed' (and the like !) in the SOTMC feedback and one of the reasons for that, is having to work within Gadget's limitations. It really doesn't lend itself well (currently) to employing a more structured approach to arrangement, everything has to be done pretty much scene by scene.
Any other Gadget users with any thoughts / tips / better ideas of how to arrange / compose ?
Comments
I've been using ModStep to drive Gadget and some hardware with moderate success.
Though MS takes some time to learn its quirks and methods, it's a bit deeper than Gadget's sequencer.
I agree, I've been so used to working on a horizontal grid, where in the movement of the music goes from left to right (like what most DAWs do). Unlike in Gadget, the grid is vertical and the actual music scenes move from top to bottom, which most of us are not oriented into IMHO.
If only Korg devs could add an Orientation Selection for the movement of the music, where we could choose if we want to employ the vertical grid that they have right now - music moving from top to bottom, or a horizontal grid - music moving from left to right.
Best way to visualize this would be the orientation used by Medly.
Not perfect but you could lock your rotation in portrait and then turn your device landscape....
The thing that i find throw me off is having different length scenes, or scenes that repeat, this then means that regardless of the orientation, the scenes do not give a visual representation of their length.
This could also be a positive thing rather than negative by forcing you to listen and not look
If you could move the individual track clips around the same way you do the scenes this wouldn't be a problem.
Yeah, drag and drop for a part, instead on Function, Copy, Paste, Clear and that is the simplified version....i left out the hunt for the scene you want to move it to, get unsure if you copied the right part, go back start again LOL
I hit the function button more times than the actual keyboard I'm sure
I've been going through these and found them useful. Check them out. He does a good job clarifying a process for me. Good luck!!
Thanks Scadet, looks useful.
Maybe you have outgrown Gadget
Perhaps I should have also said, just thoughts / tips etc. on using Gadget alone regarding the construction of tracks.
@Suboidua
Yes, I hadn't thought of the vertical versus horizontal thing, but the same limitations would still apply (?)
@scadet
It looks to me that that guy is just doing a live thing rather than any kind of arranging (not to belittle what he's doing, mind)
@Jocphone
In lots of ways, I feel I've just scratched the surface of what Gadget can do, but I do feel the limitation in the scene arranging side of things.
@Igneous1
I suggest you download Medly (it's free in the app store) and play around with it so you would see what we are missing in Gadget. When it comes to creating a track or scene, this is the app that I found that has features you wish Gadget would have. Imagine, you could simply drag and move a scene where ever you want, even to a different synth without pressing any function button. That goes the same with copying, pasting and deleting. I hope in the next Gadget update it would have the same interface as Medly when it comes to creating tracks/scene... arranging would be a breeze.
I agree and share your frustrations on this ,a more generic kind of sequencer option would be a great addition to the gadget app. Although the current arranger does have it's uses and is very immediate it can be a bit limited especially when you are working with automation and you have to make sure all clips are of equal lengths .
Having said that it is an amazing tool.
I did do some experiments using Auria Pro as the sequencer, it works great but the whole setup time can be a bit of an inspiration killjoy ..
It's also the thing that stops me creating anything other than loops. Starting out originallly from cubase on the Atari I've always sequenced and arranged in the usual horizontal timeline, so getting used to Gadget's way of doing things is a creativity killer for me.
Love Gadget, but must say the shout out to Medley (not instead of, but as well as) is entirely merited. Very easy to noodle and doodle and then off with the midi notes and into something else altogether...
Medly is a breeze arrangement wise but sadly doesn't have live input of any kind, which is an absolute crime in my opinion.
Gadget scenes lend well to part based arrangements (i.e. Intro hook breakdown bridge etc.) I like how you can set different lengths on each channel in a scene and go from one part to another in tempo sync. Gadget Audiobus and Cubasis is a very solid setup, particularly now that you can tempo stretch audio clips in Cubasis. I suggest you try multitrack recording in Cubasis. The only thing Gadget desperately needs in my view is the export open in feature. AudioCopy is really a burden now with the other options to open audio directly in other apps. I really like how Launchpad handles how audio can be imported and exported. Hope Gadget developers follow their lead.
I'm the complete opposite - Gadgets timeline and sequencing fit almost perfectly with the way my brain works for some reason. My first foray into music sequencing of any kind was Rebirth (then Reason, Acid, Ableton) so maybe that has something to do with it? I can make tracks with a horizontal timeline yes, but Gadget just clicks with me on so many levels.
Here's another shout out to Medley. It is a fun little app for music without tears.
Yes, familiarity helps an awful lot in the music creation department. I'm guessing it was the switch to Ableton that got you used to that way of sequencing, I can't say I ever used Acid so not sure how that worked.
Horses for courses I guess!
Normally in pattern based apps I tend to just treat them all like they are all segments of a linear timeline anyway. IE, line up all my patterns so they are the length of a song in advance, then fill them in like it was linear.
In Gadget the 'Pattern/Scene' approach works pretty well for most parts except when there is a need to do edits/recordings that span over multiple scenes or trying to copy a selection from one pattern in one scene to another. There is no way to stay in the editor (to record automation) and let the song play over multiple scenes.
There is also no 'looping' for selected scenes, and no looping within a pattern which could be helpful when editing a longer pattern.
All these ideas have already been ventilated to Korg so it's all 'wait&pray' if they decide to listen and implement them. I seriously hope Korg is working in a 'linear mode', improved 'editing'(select, modify & copy) and 'post quantize' for Gadget and when those arrives I'm pretty certain we'll see audio-tracks too...
Gadget has improved a lot since initial release and I don't see any signs of Korg slowing down
My tips;
Never have scenes set to repeat (this will just confuse you). Duplicate instead.
I tend to end up with all scenes set to 8 bars (or sometimes 16). This actually makes it really easy to structure your track.
Rename your scenes to help with your structuring (eg intro, verse 1, etc...)
Record any track length automation right at the end by a complete pass through your whole song while continually twisting the knob. Then go back and repeat with another knob. (You can then tidy up the curve in the automation editor).
if recording automation accross your whole track be sure to keep the knob moving slightly during all scenes when recording (otherwise no automation at all gets written for that scene and the knob with suddenly jump back to its default position - which where you last manually left it)
it's a pain that a note can't overlap the end/beginning of a scene - you just have to work round that one!
try to go and create 'fuzzy overlaps' between scenes where possible, eg starting an instrument during the last bar of the previous scene or starting later in the new scene. Otherwise Gadget can end up sounding rather obviously split into 8 bars chunks.
And someone wise once said that music is about the right balance between variation and repetition.
that is a great way of describing it
I googled it and found this...it is from the perspective of visual art, but a lot if not all of what it says is directly transferable to music
http://www.johnchiappone.com/principles_of_art.html
Thanks for all the comments, Yes Medly's approach is one that I'd very much like to see something similiar employed in Gadget (but it's too limited otherwise - in my view)
I think the approach I will take is to have a go at exporting a track to Live and try out working on the arrangement there.
I wonder if one day we'll see a sort of 'grown up gadget', which might act a lot like gadget as it stands now, but has no 'built in' synths, relying on other stand-alone ones, and has proper interfacing with the rest of the world so that it can accurately slave to audio recording apps, etc. Sort of an 'empty' but stronger gadget that, from the start, requires hooking up to other normal compositional workflow apps. In fact, and I've never paid much attention to them as a genre, but Korg do a series of professional arranger keyboards (including the hilarious 'Liverpool' one). That kind of workflow of 'arranging' at the bulk level might be useful to add, too.
If KORG doesn't do that soon, someone else surely will. However, at their current pace (read: breakneck), I wouldn't be surprised if KORG gets on it sooner rather than later.
Out of interest, do we have a name for the difference between the 'built-in' gadgets that came with Gadget when it was released + additional gadgets that we could buy if we wanted, versus, the gadgets that are actually stand-alone apps that aren't necessarily only useful within Gadget.
Initially, with Gadget and the gadgets, I mostly suspected that they're all (with a few exceptions, like the drums, the sample players, and changmai) basically the same engine underneath with different knobs and controls and surfaces exposed. These new ones that are full stand-alone apps seem to me to be something quite different to those earlier and more simplistic gadgets.
I'll say this, miltipas really brings quite a lot of possibilities into gadget. Grooves galore. Random button plus copy track, change waveforms=win. Fx galore. A few tasty new drum kits. Great.
I really wish tracks were associated with only the scene they are in though. Like if I make a 5 track scene and duplicate it, the tracks are duplicated as well and I only view in he mixer, the tracks of the scene currently playing. Leaving me free to change presets from one scene to another while keeping everything nice and organized. So you're not scrolling through 10 tracks in a scene that only has two active.
So, V3 for all it's very welcome additions is still the same in terms of arranging. I'm currently working on a track (for this month's SOTMC) and copying 4 scenes to repeat is still as 'manual' as it was
Still dig the mighty Gadge mightily, but am surprised more changes weren't made in this area. Is this the same for the mac version ? I should also say that I think Korg have their own vision for developing Gadget and I don't think user feature requests make much headway with them. Nonetheless, I live in hope.