What Are You Practising / Composing Now?

[Dave2002]

Just finished a composition, although 'finished' isn't quite the right word, in a way: I mean, it has a form, a set of chords and a melody (which is quite heavily based around the set of chords) and I have figured out what scale would fit over each chord in order to improvise over it; but I reckon the work involved in learning to improvise over it fluently will be quite a bit longer than it actually took to write this, cause I wrote most of it a couple of months ago and have returned to it once or twice since.

It's in 3/4 and there's a scale-change for almost every bar, hence it will be tricky. But to really practise this, it's the perfect excuse to buy a loop pedal.

Sounds good. Do you really need an excuse to buy the pedal - you've been itching to get one for a while now? Have you decided whcih one will work for you - I think there are some which are better for your purposes than others.

There are some very cheap looper apps available for iPhones - not sure if they'd suit you at all. You already know that I use DAWs for this purpose, but your needs are different, so I understand that a looper pedal might indeed be the way to go.

Re some of your composition work, this video might be of interest - https://youtu.be/l1OO7-aicY8 - though you might hate it - but it's not too long.

We're looking forward to hearing it in a while, when you've got the piece and your playing sorted. Good luck.

[Joseph K]

'Itching' isn't quite the right word. It's just I wouldn't have had much use for it until now that I've actually finished my own composition; and, also, I wouldn't fancy faffing around with a new piece of equipment when I could use that time practising etc. I will buy a loop pedal soon though.

Thanks for the video - I'll check it out shortly.

[Joseph K]

Ok - in my piece, the tune is blatantly derived from the chords. Chords first in my case. (apropos the video).

[Dave2002]

Thanks for the glimpse of your working. That's interesting - and I'll look at it some more.

Re hardware and faffing - I agree absolutely, but sometimes it is necessary. I may have had a breakthrough with hardware and Midi, sorting out some seemingly obscure features of drivers, and interactions with DAWs - not helped by various manufacturers and computer companies (making no reference to fruit) making changes which seem to require a degree of ESP in order to get things installed and working. I've spent days and days trying to overcome such issues - and I hope the latest "breakthrough" doesn't turn out to be a false dawn.

[Joseph K]

Incidentally, I realise that, regarding the accidentals, some notes are not 'spelt' like they should be - the piece is basically in E, so at some points I should have used sharps rather than flats.

[Joseph K]

Incidentally, I realise that, regarding the accidentals, some notes are not 'spelt' like they should be - the piece is basically in E, so at some points I should have used sharps rather than flats.

I have decided that, after all, the piece is not finished. I mean, those last two chords at the bottom form the basis of the B section, which will be based on those two chords, and then the same chords transposed down, so like a little sequence. Then I'll compose another A section - which will be obviously like the first A section but modified in some way. So it will be based on the traditional standard ABA form, though it is based on five-bar phrases in triple time, so that's a bit different.

[BBMmk2]

I can now announce that my projects of Mahler First Movement of Symphony No.6 and Wagner’s Overture Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg have been accepted by the Royal Marines Band Service.

[Joseph K]

I can now announce that my projects of Mahler First Movement of Symphony No.6 and Wagner’s Overture Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg have been accepted by the Royal Marines Band Service.

Congratulations...

[Dave2002]

I can now announce that my projects of Mahler First Movement of Symphony No.6 and Wagner’s Overture Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg have been accepted by the Royal Marines Band Service.

That’s really good to hear. Will these be performed soon - well after most of the lockdown has passed?

[BBMmk2]

That’s really good to hear. Will these be performed soon - well after most of the lockdown has passed?

Hopefully! Everyone seems to like them. The Mahler was an early project, so I excpect some changes will be needed.

Thank you guys!

[Dave2002]

I have been experimenting, as anyone who has followed some of my recent posts will have observed. This is still ongoing.

Here is a Scherzo for strings (fragment) which was worked in LMMS - https://soundcloud.com/user-97747343...zo-1-lmms-copy
It's not too refined - I was simply trying to establish feasibility. The piece here is incomplete (apart from the fact that I might want to rework it, or scrap it altogether) because currently it seems that on my system LMMS truncates the final output to a .wav file to a one minute limit.

You can read about the process in the notes associated with the track. I will try to get over some of the difficulties and repost it if I succeed.
Otherwise I'll have to rework it in Logic or Reaper, which should be able to render the whole piece.

In order to get it done I went back to the original MuseScore file, then unrolled it to expand the repeats, then exported to Midi ready for input to any DAW.

If you let it run, you'll discover that somehow a piece by Rachmaninov has crept into my list - I don't know how that happened. I take no credit for Sergei's work!

[Joseph K]

Here's Bluesette… Funny, I did two takes and the second one felt better, but listening back, the first sounds better...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_IkoGzGCbc

[Joseph K]

Here's Bluesette… Funny, I did two takes and the second one felt better, but listening back, the first sounds better...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_IkoGzGCbc

Sorry about all those extraneous clacking sounds of my pick against the guitar.

Here's Stella once again. No chances of the pick hitting the body of this guitar... oh yeah and my phone dies as the end!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6xdSJl8b4M

I keep promising myself that I'll wait several months or longer to do another video - "Wait until you're palpably a better player" I think to myself. But here I am again... truth is, my picking speed has jumped up a few notches over the past few days, so now the tempo of this Stella by Starlight backing track feels much more comfortable. Plus I feel I know the fretboard better. Whether this all translates into better improv well - not so sure - but whatever. It's not fantastically listenable, but I wanted to record myself so I figure I may as well share it.

[Dave2002]

I tried to get the string quartet (that is what I wanted it to be ..) fragment rendered. LMMS wasn't doing too badly, except that one version truncated it to 1 minute. Another version didn't have the right instruments in the build I tried. I reverted to using Logic Pro X, and produced a new version - here - https://soundcloud.com/user-977473438/scherzo-out101 At least it's all there - such as it is. The first part is unsettling - and probably too long, while the ending ought to sound calmer. The effects I wanted don't really come out in this rendition.

It's still not right. Now it sounds like a small string orchestra - and Apple in its usual wisdom has messed with things after I upgraded to Catalina. Whereas before the upgrade I could load many instruments easily, even ones which were not from Apple, now LPX objects to anything which is not "Apple approved", which means that to get each one in, one has to go into the Preferences and override the settings for each one. This is a complete pain!

Apple - at times you are a disgraceful disaster!

[Suffolkcoastal]

Having completed a Motet, Violin Sonata, a short piece for Strings, a 3rd String Quartet, Flute Concerto and some Preludes for piano so far this year, am currently composing a Double Bass concerto, an interesting challenge. Think I'd better slow down a bit!