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[soundofjw]

Hey everyone! I just started my school year at the College-Conservatory of Music (CCM). I am studying for my BM in Composition (one of two undergrads accepted this year) - and I'm learning a LOT of new stuff. Throughout the year, I'll post about what I'm doing on my blog: http://blog.jwmusic.org/tagged/CCM (CCM is the tag for these posts).

Anyway, I'd like to keep this thread open for you to ask me any questions you might have about anything in this regard. Obviously I've been doing composition for a while now, but this should give everyone an insight to some of the OTHER things that go on in this field, including (and not, of course, limited to) Score Reading, Orchestration, Timbre Studies, and of course theory.

Ask away (:

[hyperduck]

Congrats and welcome to the world of BMus :D I'm in my final year myself, you're gonna love it. (I say this only because I do, but I really hope you find the same joy in studying through this course)

Also this is a great idea, and very generous of your time! Kudos to you for doing so


P.S. Actually, i just realised you're doing a BMus in Composition alone! That's highly impressive work my friend! I am doing a BMus in Jazz, Contemporary and Popular Music, we do have a major composition module but I'm fairly positive yours covers a lot more ground. Good luck!

[Mipe]

Got a question, albeit different from your expectations! Please don't shoot the messenger. 

So, given that there is quite a bit of noise around sound and music in gaming, that with mood setting and all that, do you give any thought to potential hearing impaired players?

Just curious.

[John Nesky]

How was that spectrum photography thing generated? I know ARSS can do that (and is free and awesome if you can wrap your mind around the command line, if not use Photosounder), but the image you linked doesn't look digital.

[soundofjw]

Congrats and welcome to the world of BMus :D I'm in my final year myself, you're gonna love it. (I say this only because I do, but I really hope you find the same joy in studying through this course)

Also this is a great idea, and very generous of your time! Kudos to you for doing so


P.S. Actually, i just realised you're doing a BMus in Composition alone! That's highly impressive work my friend! I am doing a BMus in Jazz, Contemporary and Popular Music, we do have a major composition module but I'm fairly positive yours covers a lot more ground. Good luck!

Thanks! It's a tough program (only two undergrads were accepted, of which I am one) so I can't tell you HOW excited I was to get in.

So, given that there is quite a bit of noise around sound and music in gaming, that with mood setting and all that, do you give any thought to potential hearing impaired players?

That's an interesting thought, definitely. It's something that stricts me as something a producer might have to consider - because you'd replace the effect of sonic vibrations (in explosions and such) with camera-shake and any other tactile or graphical response. As a sound designer myself though, I think it would be feasible to include an alternate soundtrack (used loosely here, mind you, I'm speaking of the library of sounds) that would be less reliant on higher frequencies. Presbycusis, the natural loss of hearing through age, results in the loss of our ability to hear those higher frequencies. This is why the "mosquito test" is popular among teenagers - the high frequency pitch of a mosquito twirp (around 20khz) is at the peak of our freq. range, and it's the first to go.

When your ear encounters loud amplitudes, regardless of frequency, your high frequencies are the first to go because those hairs are at the front of your cochlea. WHAT THIS MEANS FOR SOUND DESIGNING is essentially that I would rely more on the core frequency range, around 1.5khz - 2.2khz. Our ears are most sensitive to this range because this is where human speech lies.

Now, have I considered this before for my work? Consciously, not really - but in effect the answer is actually yes. When we master music (the post-processing of sound, if you will) we pay close attention to the spectral response and those sensitive frequencies (1.5khz-2.2khz) are often the "meat" of the mix. Anything we put there (generally, for me, the voice (instrument) with the main melody often resonates primarily in this range) has to be not TOO loud NOR too soft, because our ears pick up on that the most easily (I'd bet that this also explains why amateur musicians and producers will often have extremely loud melodies compared to the rest of the mix - they don't realize actively that those frequencies which our ears hear best do not need additionally amplification/gain).

I hope this provides SOME insight into your question - it's certainly a question worth asking.

How was that spectrum photography thing generated? I know ARSS can do that (and is free and awesome if you can wrap your mind around the command line, if not use Photosounder), but the image you linked doesn't look digital.

That particular image I provided is a scan from a book I actually recently returned to the library, otherwise I'd hurry to tell you where he got his images. For my part of the assignment I used WAVESURFER http://www.speech.kth.se/wavesurfer/ to make images like:



(Turns out spectrographic analysis is a secret weapon in timbre analysis, and it's an interesting way to tackle composition as well!)

Keep 'em coming (;

[Havok]

Congrats and welcome to the world of BMus :D I'm in my final year myself, you're gonna love it. (I say this only because I do, but I really hope you find the same joy in studying through this course)

I would like to also extend my congratulations! I too am a fellow BM in composition and theory and think this thread is quite nifty of you to do. Perhaps I'll think up some of my own questions to toss your way.

[John Nesky]

Okay, the million dollar question: How do you learn how to design a melody to evoke a particular mood? I mean, we know that major = happy and minor = sad and fast = tense and slow = relaxed, but of course it's more complicated than that, and I'm wondering if you have any tips.  So far, everything I've read has focused learning what NOT to do, i.e. creating so much dissonance that it doesn't sound musical, but I've seen little advice about what I SHOULD do to create a particular mood.

"Practice" is roughly the answer I expect, but how should I practice? Are there particular illustrative example songs I should examine?

[Aquin]

I can think of one song in C Major that is wistful and sad.  I'm more inclined to suggest that minor = scary/thrashy (depending on the genre obviously.)  But you know, I'm sure there are counter-examples against that too.

Honestly, I would suggest humming a tune whenever you're bored.  However, don't just do something at random.  Pick like 3 or 4 notes and see what you can do with them.  Shift into a different chord, see what happens.

I dunno, I got dozens of little hummed tunes sitting on my maybe pile.

[Mipe]

Thank you for the answer, Mr. Composition Major! 

I just went through Tranquility Lane place in Fallout 3, man that failsafe stuff was frustrating until I realized the only clue was within sound reaction. Error and pass, that stuff, find the right sequence. In the end I ended up googling for a walkthrough. 

I find games that rely on sounds for clues frustrating. Especially games with speech and no subtitles whatsoever.

Glad to see a thoughtful composer!

[Bod]

Brilliant, well done and good luck! Just about to finish my degree, not sure what to move onto next!

[soundofjw]

I actually think that's quite an insightful answer - everyone has different answers. This week when some time free's up for me I'm going to tackle all the new questions! :D

[FranticPandaKev]

Hey just while we are talkin about frequency spectrums, check this out, really awsum frequency chart, this could help many ppl me thinks, I use it as a great reference when I eq.
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn/resources/freqchart/main_display.htm 

[John Nesky]

That is awesome and relevant to my interests. 

...I don't suppose you have any charts like that breaking down the amplitude of each overtone of instruments at various pitches, do you? 

[hyperduck]

I know for a fact, he does not. 

[soundofjw]

To answer the age old question how do I write a particular melody for a particular mood:

Experience.

Listen to a LOT of examples of various moods, soak them in, and even try to play along - you'll see the things that make certain melodies fit certain feelings.

For example, in a Major key, if you stick to using lots of semitones (half steps, like the one found between C and B, or, E and F, in the C major scale (that's 7->1 and 3->4)) then you can get, often times, a more solemn or sorrowful melody.

Another example, and this is one of my favorite things, using a lowered second in a minor key to create tension. If you're in A minor then that means swapping B with Bb. This will REALLY want to resolve up to the fifth (E), but if you confidently do otherwise you're going to make hairs rise.

I'd also say, often times, it's not always the melody that makes the difference rather than the orchestration (this term applies even when you're not using an orchestra) or arrangement. The instruments you pick make a HUGE difference in the end result (obviously), but can also make or break a mood. For example, I find xylophones very cartoony when used too much, so I will use them if I'm scoring something playful. Or, for example, as I did with Skull Pogo, I used xylophones because they have a cultural inference of skeletons! Neat.

Back for more later (:

[Havok]

Another example, and this is one of my favorite things, using a lowered second in a minor key to create tension. If you're in A minor then that means swapping B with Bb. This will REALLY want to resolve up to the fifth (E), but if you confidently do otherwise you're going to make hairs rise.

Sooo...Phyrgian mode. I've been finding out that you can create really interesting melodies and chord progressions by exploiting the modes. We covered it fairly in-depth in my 20th century harmony class recently and it is fascinating.

Though I am interested how that wants to resolve up to the fifth (a tritone away) instead of tonic. Unless you are referring to a Neopolitan progression?

[soundofjw]

Another example, and this is one of my favorite things, using a lowered second in a minor key to create tension. If you're in A minor then that means swapping B with Bb. This will REALLY want to resolve up to the fifth (E), but if you confidently do otherwise you're going to make hairs rise.

Sooo...Phyrgian mode. I've been finding out that you can create really interesting melodies and chord progressions by exploiting the modes. We covered it fairly in-depth in my 20th century harmony class recently and it is fascinating.

Though I am interested how that wants to resolve up to the fifth (a tritone away) instead of tonic. Unless you are referring to a Neopolitan progression?

I love using the modes, by I was in fact referring to the lovely Neopolitan sixth. (:

[Havok]

I love using the modes, by I was in fact referring to the lovely Neopolitan sixth. (:

Yes, it is quite lovely and can be quite striking also. Lately I find myself getting in trouble in my counterpoint class because I constantly use tritones, many time by mistake. I love the way they sound and it just comes natural to me.