TimothyTayMusic

Love, Drama, Fate

Link to Score: Love Drama Fate

Dear Father

Link to Lyric Sheet: Dear Father Lyric Sheet

Link to Lead Sheet (Vocals): Dear Father Lead Sheet

Creative and Technical Processes

Love, Drama, Fate

For the refinements made, I felt that they were more pertaining to the technical side of the song. For example, making changes to the pauses between each sections, adding certain notes to the piano to emphasise the 5/4 feel, etc. It was less of the creative part (i.e. solos) since those were already recorded, and more on what I can do to make the song sound tighter.

Dear Father

The same could be said for Dear Father as well. Most of the final changes (or lack thereof) were technical changes, as creative processes were implemented during mid term.

Challenges and Solutions

For both of the songs, I feel that at this last league of POD, the challenge was more on making sure I don’t burn out before the final presentation. As we had many months to work on only 2 songs, it became very easy to run out of motivation to continue working on the song, especially nearing the end of the production process.

I felt that the only viable solution was to just pace things out, and do things a little by little, and understand that there are certain days where you just don’t want to do anything, and certain days that the motivation is flowing. It’s important to prioritise those days where motivation is flowing, to do the most out of that day.

Discoveries and things learnt

At the end of the production process, the one thing that I felt I took away most was how important is was to make sure that the song was produced the way you want it. It was very easy to alter the song to the likings of others constantly throughout the process, for example during consultations with multiple lecturers or when I was letting my friends listen to the song. Opinions vary per person, and hence it was critical that I took the advices that would help to improve the song, but keeping to the roots and making sure that the song is about me and what I want out of it.

Thought process and decision process towards final improvements

For Dear Father, although there were quite a bit of pointers that I’ve recorded down during the CA2 presentation, I felt that it was better to just keep things the way it is, and not make too much drastic changes to it.

I had experimented although with changing the layering of strings in the Chorus after Bridge, making it die down before bringing it up again, but that 16 bars was too short for me to do that, and it sounded better to just stick to the original method.

One of the touch-and-go change I did was the adaptive limiter, basically making the song louder. I felt that the project was at this point whereby any changes would just become destructive to the song, instead of constructive.

For Dear Father, I’ve made some changes to the piece. Here’s detailing the changes:

The start of the song was shortened by 4 bars, so that the Electric Piano doesn’t sound repetitive playing the same 4 chords progression at the start.

Drums were cut down a bit as well, especially for the 1st verse.

Before

After

There was a comment as well that the 5/4 section lacks support at the start, and only becomes obvious after a while. Certain notes were added to the piano to help highlight the 4th and 5th beat.

Lastly, gaps between the sections were shortened as well.

This post is several weeks late, but here’s a recap of the points taken from the CA1 & CA2 presentation.

POD CA1 & CA2 Presentation Remarks

CA1

EP seems a bit stiff, rigid. More improvisation type? (Sounds quite flat)

5/4 section lacks a lot of support, not really obvious until a while. Either work on the piano line at sporadic moments. Sometimes have the piano line to highlight the 4 & 5th beat occasionally.

Too much drum feels throughout (Cut down on drums a lot more)

Transition between the gaps, maybe too lengthy. Abrupt changes?

CA2

Ending of the song.

1st Verse built up too fast. Delay the build-up maybe?

After Bridge, not having to bring it down too quickly. Stripping it down gradually just before the build-up to the Chorus Repeat.

These are the stuff that I will be working on my last 2 weeks before the final presentation. I believe that there isn’t much to work on, and thus should be relatively easy to implement all the changes!

For the Presentation that I had for CA1 & 2, I felt that I did quite well for the presentation, making my points across and having a meaningful discussion with the panel of lecturers.

For my POD HBL, I decided to research on Taylor Swift’s Artiste Website, http://taylorswift.com/.

What is your very first impression of the portal?

I feel that the website has a simplistic design, but the contents in the home page are striking and catches out to the viewers. For example, this is the home page when I first open the website.

The website shows the newest music video that was released, “Out of the Woods”, along with announcements about Taylor’s recent tour, 1989. This is appealing as most of the website’s viewers will be looking for either of these two materials.

What element takes up the most prominence on the portal?

It would be the “Out of the Woods” official music video. However, it’s a slideshow, and shows two other announcements rotating as well, the 1989 World Tour and 1989 Album.

Why do you think this element is made the most prominent for the artiste?

I feel that the slideshow is the most prominent space on the home page as it showcases everything that Taylor Swift is involved in at the moment, including promoting her newest song/music video. This will help to capture the audiences’ attention and help bring in the viewer counts.

What content are available on the portal?

The Contents available includes a biography about Taylor, recent news, events, medias such as videos and photos about recent tours, official releases, community page for fans to sign up and discuss on the forum, and store page.

Are the content engaging? If yes, why?

The contents are engaging as each of the individual content are designed differently and does not look similar to each other in terms of style. For example, the design for the Biography page and Events page are different from each other.

Observe how the content are organised on the page.

Why do you think the content are organised in that manner?

I believe that the header of the website was designed in this way, as the contents at the side will strike out more the viewers than the content at the middle. For example, as a viewer, I’ll be more likely to notice about Taylor’s Biography, News, Community, and Store page. I believe that this is what the web designer had intended in the first place. Events, Media and Music holds lesser importance, as they can easily be found on other websites and news articles.

Dear Lecturers,

If you would prefer, here’s a shortcut to access my journal entries for CA1 & CA2 separately. 

CA1 (Instrumental): http://timothytaymusic.tumblr.com/tagged/CA1

Dear Father

Pop

Revolves around a guy as he ‘recalls’ 3 major moments of his life, and the increasing difficulty that he had to deal with in those moments.

Skill Sets

Song Writing

Arranging

Sections

Intro

Piano introduces the song via repetition of riff.

Verse 1

Vocal comes in with the story of his struggles in school. 

Pre Chorus & Chorus

He wants to go home to his dad, and end his frustrations with being in school.

Interlude

Piano Riff re-enters, with the addition of Drums and Violin solo.

Verse 2

Vocal comes in with the story of national service in Singapore, and how he was tested to his limits in physical endurance.

Pre Chorus & Chorus

On his bookout, he talks about how he wants to stay at home and not having to go back to the military camp.

Bridge

Many years passed and the guy’s an adult now. He talks about the moment when he realised that he has cancer, and how deep it has grown. It was at the point of no return, and no treatment/cure could help him.

Chorus

The main character talks about his final dying moments as he’s about to pass away, and to ask those that will grieve over him to move on eventually after overcoming the loss.

Chorus (Repeated)

The main character has passed away and is now rejoining his “father” in heaven, to live an eternal life.

Song ends with the piano rift repeated with a slower tempo and modulated, accompanied with the strings.

Creative & Technical Processes

Experimented with using string sections to carry the piece

Experimented with modulation and usage of odd bars. (Just before and during Chorus Repeat)

Challenges & solutions

The main challenge I had would be to keep the flow of the arrangement, to bring out the feeling of the piece’s intention to the listeners. I attempted to solve this by dedicating a lot of time to arranging the strings, along with raising the octave of Violin 1 at the last Chorus to bring the effect of ‘crying’.

Another challenge as well was fixing the drums post-recording, with the ribbon error due to error in consolidation, and also having lecturer’s recommendation after to add hihats into certain sections, such as Interlude before Verse 2. My solution was to extract several hihat audio, and then copy & pasted them into those desired locations.

Discoveries & Things learnt

Never worry about how long the song last. Worry about what you’re gonna do to make the song last.

The key of your piece can drastically affect how your singer sings the song, and the feeling portrayed.

Link to Lyric Sheet: Dear Father Lyric Sheet

Link to Lead Sheet (Vocals): Dear Father Lead Sheet

Love Drama Fate

Jazz Fusion Instrumental

Revolves around a guy “2 day” start-till-end relationship with a girl he met at a piano lounge.

Skill Sets

Composition

Arranging

Sections

Section 1:

Starts with the Electric Piano to depict a location consisting of a Jazz Lounge.

Piano introduces the Main Guy via Motif, and suggests the location to be a Piano Lounge.

Motif represents the guy’s desire for affection and company.

Section 2:

Guy (Piano) meets a Lady (Violin) at the Piano Lounge, and chats her up. Violin’s Solo and Piano’s accompaniment shows how they can’t do without the other, as both “parts” have to support each other to complement the “piece”.

Section 3:

Electric Piano comes in to suggest a new location for the scene, the main character’s home. Soprano Sax and Tenor Sax engage in a double solo & counterpoint to suggest a one night stand between the main character and the lady.

Section 4:

Story transitions to the next day, where the main character (Piano) wakes up in a drowsy state, and gradually realising that the lady was nowhere to be seen. 

Later that night, the main character decides to walk to the piano lounge, in hopes of being able to find the lady. However, as he was walking towards to the piano lounge, he saw the lady (Soprano Sax) and a new guy (Tenor Sax) intimately chatting outside, and was about to take a cab together to somewhere discreet. 

All 3 instruments then gradually crescendo towards the end, as the main character became furious over jealousy, and got a little bit physical.

Section 5:

The piece slows down at the final section as the Violin comes in to signal the main character walking off in a deserted street, to contemplate and cool down. As he walks, he comes to the conclusion that it was all just fate that resulted in those two days, and begins his solemn walk home, where he will then enjoy the company of solitude for that night. (Piece fades off)

Creative & Technical Processes

Researching on Jazz Fusion Pieces

Cyclic repetition of several instrument tracks.

Challenges & Solutions

I would say that the more challenging parts of this piece would be getting the piece to fit the story (and vice versa), yet retaining the feel for the piece. My piece had an identity crisis at the start as I had picked another story to begin with, but with multiple consultations with Michael Tan, the piece eventually had a foundation to follow from.

Another challenge was arranging the Violin solos, which were a compilation of multiple recorded audio tracks. This took a while to take the jigsaw puzzles and fit them together. Another solo challenge would be for the Soprano & Tenor Sax, in terms of getting the right lines to blend well with each other and the other accompanying instruments.

Discoveries & Things learnt

Even though there were quite little instruments in this piece, it took quite a while to get the right feel and notes coming out from each instruments. Particularly for the Piano, Violin, and Saxophones.

Actual recorded Saxophone tracks are generally better than MIDI Saxophone tracks, as the recording will capture their fluttering, breath, touch of the notes, which are things that MIDI Samples have a hard time emulating.

After another consultation that I had with Pearly with regards to my arrangement for Dear Father, Pearly suggested to make the rhythm instruments tighter. Along with prior consultations with Erica that has made suggestions to the Strings (Particularly last Chorus), here’s what I worked on as the finale before presentation.

For strings, Erica said that I tend to arrange my song vertically instead of horizontally. This meant that my arrangement wouldn’t flow as well as it did. As such, I had to make certain changes to the string lines. One of the major changes that I made was to raise the 1st Violin by an octave higher for the last chorus.

The effect that this created was to provide the “crying” effect from the Violin, which was kind of surprising to me when I heard the change for the first time.

For the rhythm section groove-ness, I focused primarily on the Bass and Drums. Based on the transcribed Drum groove pattern, I made certain changes to the Bass line to ‘kick’ in better with the Kick drum. 

Before

After

When listening to my piece, I realised that the main vocal lines and harmony lines aren’t in sync sometimes. This can be the breathing in, or words cutting off in the end. As such, what I did for the most part was to flex the harmony vox. However, on certain occasions, I had to flex the main vox. 

There was a bug with my project though, that leads to the whole main vox track shifting to the left once flex is turned on for the track. As such, I had to create a new audio track just for quantising certain phrases.

For flexing, I made sure to match the words so that it sounds better. 

After working on my piece, I decided to consult with Erica with regards to my Dear Father piece. She told me to work on the ending strings line, as well as a suggestion to add HiHat into Verse 2 and Chorus after Bridge. As I have already recorded Drums, I decided instead to isolate a few recorded hihat audio files, and then placed them into those regions. Here’s how it looks like:

I made some changes to the strings arrangement as well. Erica suggested for me to make the strings line more spaced, to utilize the full range of the ‘keyboard’. 

For example, I decided to redo some Violin 1 lines, moving them up to the C5 range.

Before

After

For the last Chorus, I decided to transpose it an octave up as well. This made a shrill to it, which sort of sounds like “crying strings”.

As mentioned in previous posts, after my first few consultations that I had with Michael Tan with regards to my Instrumental Piece, there was a change in story. With that, signals a change in Name. As such, here’s the change in details for the piece, along with the story guidelines.

New Title: Love Drama Fate

Story Guideline

Intro - Introduction of the main male character via Introduction of Main Motif on Piano, 1st Solo - Guy meets a Lady at the Piano Lounge, proceeds to chat her up. Represented by the Piano and Violin. Interlude - Basically, the two of them have a one night stand. Note that the Soprano Sax is supposed to represent the Female, whilst the Tenor Sax is supposed to represent the Male. 2nd Solo - 1st half, Guy wakes up to realise that the lady was gone. 2nd half, he walks to the piano lounge that night, and then finds the girl with a new guy outside of the Piano Lounge, as they start to walk off. Main Character gets angry and started to get physical. (Climax near the end, increase dynamics to pause) In this case, the Soprano Sax remains as the Lady, but the Tenor Sax represents the new guy. The Piano will represent the main character. Outro - Main Character walks off to contemplate and cool down, reflecting on life, and coming to a conclusion that maybe it was fate that resulted in whatever had happened those past 2 days..

As I’m doing Arranging for my CA2, it was required for me to prepare a full fledge score by Week 8 during my presentation. I decided to start work early, in case of sections that requires changing later nearer to the deadline.

Here is an example of how I conduct my work. As my arrangements are already written into Logic Pro, I would then put both Logic Pro & Sibelius ‘side-by-side”, and transcribe it into Sibelius. I’m choosing not to do a direct copy & paste from Logic Pro, as the scoring system for Logic Pro isn’t optimal, and most of the rhythm aren’t the best.

One good thing about this method is that I get to make on-the-spot changes to the MIDI tracks if needed. For example, during the original piano track, I realised that for the Bmin9 chord, my piano didn’t really play on the 9th note (C#). After such, after realising this, I decided to add that note in, and hear how it sounds. 

As said in previous posts, as both Daniel and Joash were rather pitchy during the recording process, there was a need for some tuning for both tracks. Here’s how I did it.

All the tunings that I’ve done were conducted on Melodyne. This means that the tracks were individually imported into Melodyne, and then exported out into Logic Pro. I like Melodyne a lot as it’s easy to use, and gets the job done. It even features rhythm changing of the notes if such issues happen.

For the main vocals, it was a pretty straight-forward tuning. However, for the harmony vocals, I decided to transcribe the lines onto the score first. (As the harmony vocals were decided in the studio recording session itself). This helped to provide a reference for me to follow when tuning the harmony vocals. Here’s how it looks like:

Here’s an example of a main melody line that I tuned for the piece. Note the slight change in the pitch for the last note.

Before Tune

https://soundcloud.com/timothytaymusic/dear-father-main-vox-3-tune/s-01bfm

After Tune

https://soundcloud.com/timothytaymusic/dear-father-main-vox-3-tuned/s-7hggH

This is basically a short post that talks about an error that I’ve made during the drum recording, that I didn’t really notice until the next day when I was about to record vocals in Studio C.

Essentially, as the drums were recorded in separate takes, there were a lot of punch ins and punch outs. For one of the section, after doing the punch in, as I had punch in slightly earlier than when drums come in, there was a brief silence of 5 seconds in the track.

Supposingly, I should’ve then went back to the start of the punch-in track, and pull the start further to allow more gap for the previous track. However, I forgot to do that! This resulted in the previous bar not having a clean cut off before going into the Chorus.

My solution to this was by going into the Studio again, and finding a auto-backup protools file that would hopefully contain the drums track before the punch-in was made. Luckily for me, it was the latest backup that contained it! All I had to do was then export that file, and take that bar of the audio, and bringing it to the original tracks. Here’s how it would look like on Logic Pro.

On the evening of 17 November was the Vocals recording for Dear Father! It took place at Studio C from 6-9pm. For my Vocals, I had the help of Daniel and Joash, who sang lead and backing vocals respectively.

For the recording, we just used a Charter Oak SA538, clean and simple.

During the recording, we started off with the Main vocals for Verse 1, followed with PreChorus, and then Verse 2, followed with Bridge. We then took a small break before completing all the Choruses. The main issue we had for the recording were for the feelings of the melody line, and especially at the last chorus, where Daniel had a lot of trouble with coming in on the 2nd beat. I had the help of Joash who helped to coach Daniel as we go along, and we did punch ins whenever we could for a better take.

For the last 1 hour or so, we recorded Joash for the accompany vocals. Everything went rather well, with a few punch ins here and there, but Joash was really pitchy during the recording, and so I will have to make certain tune adjustments in melodyne!

There were some last minute changes that we made for the melody line as well, as we were discussing in the studio. After importing the tracks into Logic, I listened to both of the tracks individually, and then noted down the changes in the score. This is gonna help during the tuning process, which I’ll most likely be doing on Friday!

On Monday, I had the opportunity to record Gabriel for my drums for my Dear Father piece. At the studio booking started from 8am till 10am, I came earlier to check in and prepare the microphones!

I ended up taking about 30 minutes to finish setting up the microphones. The Microphones that I used are:

Kick - D112

Snare - SM57

HiHat - AT4021

Rack Tom - Audix D2

Floor Tom - Audix D4

Overheads - 2 Audix ADX51 Overheads

There were some issue with the SSL Board as well, which took a while to fix. I had an issue of not being able to hear the reference as well, and I panicked as time was running out. (Turns out I just forgot to press a button)