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Are you Sound -> Musical Structure or Musical Structure -> Sound?
I just noticed the other day that song ideas formulate in my head by inspiration taken from sound. I can't just start building song structure then add the sounds I want later. I think it's a left brain/right brain thing. Which brings up the idea of how music making apps could cater to the differences in how one might approach music creation, by either song or structure first.
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Or as you said, by sound. There's a lot of chaos type apps, and some of them are really creative. Musyc comes to mind. It's interesting and quite amazing how you can make simple shapes interact with each other in a random way, but with rules of action/reaction and gravity , it gets some strange events going on.
Yes. :-)
And both together sometimes.
And also lyrics if applicable.
I find this too:
"I can't just start building song structure then add the sounds I want later." @Holiday.
I even struggle thinking, I'll add an effect to this later in the mixing stage. I find I have a need to perfect, and hear, all the exact sounds as I compose.
I expect different people are different though.
I can't just start building song structure then add the sounds I want later.
I'm not sure if that is absolutely true. But I agree that certain sounds inspire to music and structure.
I see something, I say something, I hum something.
Yeah I'll hear a sound and that grows in my mind to a track. Can be problematic as I often use too much processing in the creation phase because I have to kinda hear what it sounds like as an end production.
I'm not sure though. A little of both. Depends on whether I'm playing piano or at the computer.
For me, everything from a vibe to a sound to a riff to floaty lyrics that appear randomly in my head with accompanying chord progressions pre-installed
Cut from the same cloth.
Sounds first but sounds that arise in notes or in hits, as phrases, sometimes in melodies first sometimes in beats first.
Other times I play exquisite corpse, and assemble as randomly as possible a roster of samples (from instrument multis, field recordings, percussion) and fuck around and layer performance passes over it till it sounds good.
The Beat comes first for me, even though I try to mix it up.
I find I create around ideas too sometimes - esp. with classical pieces - thinking of harmony, melody, timing etc. based on mental imagery and seeking to convey that imagery by scoring those combinations to instruments quite apart from hearing the result first - e.g. violin, viola, cello, woodwinds etc. although that presupposes that I already know the sounds of the instruments that I am scoring to. I do that a fair bit when using Notion. So, that's more structure first, but, with the sounds in mind.
As a long time guitar tormentor I always worked with chord progressions and/or riffs although rhythm has always played a strong part in what I do. Having settled on Gadget as a notebook for creating new tunes I find myself expanding in both directions, at the detail level playing with different textures and timings and at the song level wanting to try and stretch myself by trying to make songs that have a purpose or a journey almost. I'm struggling with the latter in Gadget as it gets quite hard to follow when the number of scenes multiplies as they all look the same. I do think there is an opportunity for someone to create some kind of software that works at the overall song structure level rather than always grubbing around with notes and beats etc..
This is what I use B-Step for. It's tricky to get your head around, but if you "tune" the 4 strings across a chordset, you can do the heavy lifting with just a few knobs. And if you tune it across multiple chordsets, the modulation possibilities really open up.
I am no good at structure so I rationalize by saying each 'song' is just a moment or emotion-segment & after an hour I'm done with it forever anyway. Maybe my next of kin will put it all into proper structures after my tragic death.
I'd been working on a track last night and when my girlfriend woke up I ask if she would have a listen and tell me what she thought, I was sitting next to her and could hear parts of the track through the headphones, it sounded really good and very different, so I tried to remember what I heard and started something new before I went to sleep.
So I mainly start with sounds or ideas I have which end up sounding nothing like what I imagined, sometimes though I'll hear something when I'm out, like the sound of heavy equipment bouncing off taller buildings or once I was at an old mine on top of a hill and the wind in one place in particular made this musical noise, so I tried to recreate it.
From the lyrics, the sound of the words and syllables are repeatedly paced into place in different configurations and fit, all in monotone. I have to remember to vary the monotone later to come up with what people like to refer to as a tune. Then the instruments come in, asd I'draft saved can't see what I'm typing
There will come a time, perhaps, when one of us will type their last words here before keeling over in mid-etc., but I trust those were not yours.
Yes, that last sentence is a bit concerning.
Thanks @solador78 I had a quick play with the lite version. Not exactly what I was talking about but still fun to doodle with. Managed to get some interesting sequences going with a Laplace brass preset very quickly. The bar copy feature is a bit dangerous though. Tried to copy a bar to the end and managed to overwrite all the intermediates bars with no warning and I couldn't find an undo!
Probably typing it on a phone and getting the text covered by the extremely annoying 'draft saved' message.
I used to write proper songs on the guitar, and find that the easiest way to write a normal tune. For the iPad stuff, as they're usually bent-up noise fests they used to come from 'mucking about' with an app and accidentally discovering a nice thing. I'll then record it and it'll sit there until I stumble upon another nice thing that works with it. More recently though I'll deliberately single out a range of apps for use on a track - I guess I know what they can do so things are getting a bit more structured. And boring.
I always write the tune on guitar (and lately piano app) first, then think in terms of arrangements, sounds, and textures afterwards. That's not to say that sounds, and also tone, aren't important - I think they are fundamental, but music comes first.
It's never really any one thing for me that defines the song or when the song starts to take shape. Sometimes it can be just a sound i hear or am creating from scratch that triggers the idea for a song. Other times I'll just wake up with some interesting song structure I want to try and I'll use any old sounds as filler to try it out first.
More than anything I've learned that no matter what triggers the idea for a song, 9 times out of 10 I'll radically change it halfway through anyway. I can't count the number of times I wanted a certain sound structure for a song, but once I got more into creating the sounds to fit that, it no longer worked and I wanted to do something totally different. Or the opposite, I find a sound that's really inspiring and build up a track around it, only to then delete it at the very end when I realize the other sounds I created to compliment it actually work better on their own.
Just be flexible, learn to roll with it
@JohnnyGoodyear - you're still with us right???? :-O
I just listen to a song on YT tweak it a little, then release it as mine
@supadom - ha, ha... Think a lot of us do that.
To be honest currently i'm spending a lot of time listening to one particular sub-genre of music (about 200 different 'Liquid Drum & Bass' type tracks that I like) and trying to listen for, and deconstruct, things that I like... so obviously the drums and the bass lines, but also the use of real instruments, the jazz influences, the use of effected vocal samples, subtle weird sound effects, piano chords, risers, percussion etc... etc...
Then i'm trying to get good (or reasonable) at creating these things in the apps I have (Gadget and various sound making apps). So right now it's led by 'can I get that sound?' and can I master those types of rhythms.
Then of course theres the melody / hook - which i'm hoping comes from jamming over rhythms with the right instruments.
And then finally structure/narrative - which I always leave until last. (Probably my problem!)
So... I guess sound first...
I agree with @Tarekith "Just be flexible, learn to roll with it"
It depends, with my desktop i try to have a clear idea of what i'm doing before i sit down to write so i can work either way but i usually design the sounds before i start arranging as i mix as i go and try and keep in mind the frequencies that each sound will occupy but with with ioS i kinda go with the flow especially with apps like Soundcaper and Different Drummer.
Are you writing all of this down in a "Catalog of Attributes", as recommended in the other thread?
If so, can we please see your page on Brown Paper Bag? Thanks!