Productions
Blind Man Driving.wavBlind Man Driving - Remix
In this Project, I learned a lot about a famous blind musician, named Joey Stuckey. His song which we focused on is called "Blind man Driving" which pokes fun at the idea of a blind man driving as that idea is insane. I was given an unedited version of the song to edit in which I had to pan different instruments, move them back and fort, and make some other edits to improve the quality of the song.
The major new element of production which I learned about during this is the use of compression. I used comression on bass and drums to make the sound pop, improving the listening experience.
beats.wavDilla style beats
In this project, I learned about the legacy of a famous producer, J Dilla. I learned about his liking for unique sounds to create amazing beats, and after that, I crafted my own beats.
To make this project, I began with the beats. I created three sets of beats; one of the sections was comprised of traditional beats, the other was made up of funkier Dilla style beats, and the third was made up of a mix of the two. After, selecting all of my beats, I created two bass lines. These give a consistent beat to hold the whole song together. After this, I looked for side effects to put an interesting twist onto my song.
Doctor who remix.wavDoctor Who Remix
In this project, I learned about a producer who has unfortuneately been forgotten by many. Her name is Delia Derbyshire, and she was the the creator of the doctor who theme song. She utilized many new techniques in music production to get funky sounds that were unheard of at the time.
So, I tried to replicate that by making a remix. In my remix, I aimed for a song that would portray doctor time traveling back to when rock and roll was popular. I used an electric guitar, drums and firecracker sounds to achieve a different version of what Derbyshire originally created.
remix 2.wavFirst Ableton Project
For this project, I learned the basics of using Ableton live and the Ableton push. I utilized them to create a remix of a sample of different instruments and vocals.
From this, I learned a lot about these new systems that I will be using for music produciton from now on. I learned how to play music, adjust volume, pan, and speed all on the push. I also learned how to utilize the two arrangement style view in ableton.
Fix_The_Mix__C_minor__76_bpm.wavFix the Mix
In this project, I drastically altered what was a horrible song into something much nicer for a game company. I created a song for slower-paced adventure games. These are games where the character would just be exploring places and doing tasks and think that it would go better with slower-paced games since the song itself is pretty slow. I could see a piece like this being used in a game like Forza when the character is just driving around the map rather than racing.
Through this project, I learned a few big things. First, I learned that it is much harder to fix a mix rather than to just create your own. It may be more difficult to fix a mix because the producer is trying to preserve the original idea of the song while trying to make it actually sound good. I also learned more about fx and reverb, and I learned how to change instruments in a mix. This could be changing an instrument's octave, or it could even be a complete change of insturments. For example, I learned that I can change a honky tonky piano into a bass which sounds much better.
pan_pod.mp3Pan Pot project
In this project, I created a new song by utilizing 5 instruments, panning left and right, adjusting the volume, and using the eq. I used a synth, drums, piano, guitar, and flute to create a pretty chill song that I think sounds fairly relaxing. I also made sure to separate all of the sounds so that nothing would overlap as I noticed that without any panning, the song felt very congested and the sound was flooded.
Over the course of the past week or so, I learned three new techniques for making music. I learned the importance of panning, adjusting volume, and boosting certain sounds in instruments as this can make the song much richer. Doing these three improves the overall quality of the music as it allows for the listener to feel more attuned with the music as if they were front seat at a concert. This helped me prevent the song from sounding congested or from instruments from overlapping so that I could bring out as much sound as possible from each instrument.
this_is_me.mp3