LooneyTunes / Elmer chases Daffy Chases Bugs Chases Elmer

LinearLineman

Finally answering the eternal question: is a Marimba funny?

Classic peripatetic cartoon chase music, slightly twisted. First go using an app fretboard to make a foundation track. In this case iFretless Guitar. Frankly, I was stunned the midi track generated was so detailed.

Adding a shitload of instruments including the Bowed Sarod (another funny one, but only to folks from Mumbai). No mixing required, just three repetitions which never seem to sound the same.

Daveypoo

Raymond Scott would be proud.

And the answer is yes - the marimba is ALWAYS funny. Why do you think Frank Zappa liked/used it so much and to great effect?

Very nice, BTW - I admire that you can think through something this dense to "compose it". Anytime I go atonal or try to get "outside" it just ends up sounding like gobbledygook. It's what I get for being a rocker rather than a jazzer, I suppose.

LinearLineman

Haha, @daveypoo! No composing involved, just some furious finger tapping! The instruments are amazing to me, a 20th century man. Honestly don’t know how it happens.

I remember Zappa’s usage now. Yes, confirmed. Always funny, especially compared to crotales, or frijoles.

panthera

@Daveypoo said:
Raymond Scott would be proud.

And the answer is yes - the marimba is ALWAYS funny. Why do you think Frank Zappa liked/used it so much and to great effect?

THIS comment is so smooth 🙌🏾

audiblevideo

@LinearLineman said:
Finally answering the eternal question: is a Marimba funny?

Classic peripatetic cartoon chase music, slightly twisted. First go using an app fretboard to make a foundation track. In this case iFretless Guitar. Frankly, I was stunned the midi track generated was so detailed.

Adding a shitload of instruments including the Bowed Sarod (another funny one, but only to folks from Mumbai). No mixing required, just three repetitions which never seem to sound the same.

iFretless Guitar was driving all of this live or did you tap away and record the MIDI and add the rest of the instruments later with the same MIDI routed to each? Routed in Cubasis or ...

Itsa fun gobbledygook

McD

Xylophones are the ones Looney Toons used the most and usually showed a character playing the notes on a skeleton's ribs. Xylophones use a harder wood (teak?) than Marimbas (mahogany?) and have a really short envelope.

This track is a marimba with a hard rubber mallet in use. Xylophone woods can be hit with hard plastic and not show and dents but Marimbas need careful mallet selection to avoid denting the woods and ruining the pitch. Mallets wrapped in yarn are best like the ones a Vibraphone player would use to get a nice smooth attack.

Bass Marimbas have a lot of sustain and when used with soft mallets you can get long pure tones.

I like this track as an example of IOS orchestration capability.

How are the pitch warpings happening? Is that sliding on the iFretless strings to slide between pitches?

marcuspresident

I show my son named Elmer this. He looked like an question mark
But I understod it and liked it.

MrSmileZ

It becomes even more interesting when it all bends...
Cool usage!

McD

What are you using to create the bends?

LinearLineman

thanks @marcuspresident, interesting about your boy. Does he watch cartoons like Roadrunner... or just new stuff? Maybe the recipe has changed,

@MrSmileZ and @McD, thanks and the bends are simply done on the iFretless fretboard with simple slides. And, yes, xylophone, not marimba in cartoons of yore.

Paul16

@panthera said:

@Daveypoo said:
Raymond Scott would be proud.

And the answer is yes - the marimba is ALWAYS funny. Why do you think Frank Zappa liked/used it so much and to great effect?

THIS comment is so smooth 🙌🏾

Both beat me to those essential hat tips 😊

Moderndaycompiler

I quite enjoyed that @LinearLineman. Really captured that looney tunes feel. The bowed sarod worked quite well in this context.

I suspect Zappa was influenced by cartoon music. Thanks for the Ruth Underwood link @Paul16.

Here’s a little homage to Ruth I did on the iPad a number of years ago.
TC-Data controlling ThumbJam,DrumJam,IFretlessSax.

LinearLineman

I really like this type of music @moderndaycompiler, and your creation of it. Drumjam... must take another look. Great clarity. And yeah.... the bowed sarod. Can't get funnier than that. Thanks for posting!

oat_phipps

Evoked that awful, awful creature that Daffy Duck would turn into every now and then...terrified me as a child.

oat_phipps

That's the one. For some reason it terrified me as a child.

Daveypoo

@oat_phipps said:

That's the one. For some reason it terrified me as a child.

Duck Amuck, one of the greatest cartoons ever made and a favorite of mine.