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Music Composition: Anyone Can Do It ! Developing Musical Skills in Non - Musicians

Music Composition: Anyone Can Do It ! Developing Musical Skills in Non - Musicians. Jenine Brown Oakland University June 8, 2012. Today’s Talk: Three Composition Projects. Project 1: Compose a song in Verse/Chorus form in GarageBand.

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Music Composition: Anyone Can Do It ! Developing Musical Skills in Non - Musicians

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  1. Music Composition: Anyone Can Do It!Developing Musical Skills in Non-Musicians Jenine Brown Oakland University June 8, 2012

  2. Today’s Talk: Three Composition Projects • Project 1: Compose a song in Verse/Chorus form in GarageBand. • Project 2: Take a vocal track that someone else made and compose a drumbeat for itat advanced.aviary.com • Project 3: Build a song around a recording of you making music with the every-day objects around you at advanced.aviary.com

  3. Project 1: Writing a song in verse/chorus form in GarageBand • GarageBand is a program that comes installed on every Mac. • Mixcraft is a similar, inexpensive program for PCs.

  4. Project 1: Writing a song in verse/chorus form in GarageBand • What do students learn about during this project? • Tempo: How fast/slow is their song? • Songs usually have a formal design, and students learn to analyze their favorite pop tunes and imitate verse/chorus form. • Students learn to combine drums, bass, and some melody instrument to create their desired mood. • Dynamics: Which parts should be louder/softer?

  5. Verse/Chorus Form • Popular music often is in Verse/Chorus form. • Intro: Usually very short (no more than 15 seconds) • Verse 1: • Chorus: Higher notes, more exciting. • Verse 2: Same melody as Verse 1 but uses different words • Chorus: Exactly the same as the previous chorus • Outro: A short ending

  6. Verse/Chorus Form • Elton John’s “Your Song”: • Intro • Verse 1: “It’s a little bit funny…” • Chorus: “And you can tell everybody…” • Verse 2: “I sat on the roof…” • Chorus: “And you can tell everybody…” • Outro

  7. Project 1: Writing a song in verse/chorus form in GarageBand • I’m first going to share with you a song that one of my students composed. • Then, I’ll compose a short piece in GarageBand for youso that you can understand the ease of the process.

  8. Project 2: Writing a drumbeat to go with a vocal track • 1. Students choose a vocal track from ccmixter.org • 2. They then compose a drumbeat at http://advanced.aviary.com. • 3. Finally, students combine their drumbeat, vocal track, and other loops together in advanced.aviary.com make a more polished, professional song.

  9. Project 3: We can make music with every-day objects • 1. In advanced.aviary.com, students record themselves hitting objects that make a rhythmic, percussive noise. • 2. They also record themselves playing an object that sounds like a musical note. • 3. They then import other loops and create a larger song.

  10. Conclusion • When composing, students consider the following elements of music: • Tempo • Dynamics • How to combine different instruments • Formal design • Emotional implications • Recording and manipulating their own sounds • Repetition and contrast • … • Most importantly, students feel empowered, creative, and more knowledgeable.

  11. Websites/programs that aid in music composition: • GarageBand (for Macs) • Mixcraft (a GarageBand-like program for PCs) • http://advanced.aviary.com • www.ccmixter.org • Other websites: • www.jamstudio.com • www.noteflight.com

  12. Thank you!Questions/comments?Jenine Brownbrown211@oakland.edu

  13. Project 3: Using music notation applications to compose music • Composing music at www.noteflight.com • Let’s study a piece of music that I have composed for a bass, piano, and vibraphone. I write my music in a software program called “Sibelius.” • If time: We’ll look at an example of a piece of music that a student composed for piano.

  14. Project 3: Using music notation applications to compose music • There are many decisions that guide my creative process while composing: • What instruments am I composing for? Vibraphone (melody), piano (accompaniment), and bass (accompaniment). • What is the tempo (speed) of the music? 180 beats per minute, which is pretty fast. • What is the mood of the music? How do I achieve this musically? The mood is hesitant, relaxed, anxious. The melody is slow and relaxed. The piano part is fast an anxious. • Will I be using chords as an accompaniment to my melody? I’ll be using chords in the piano part. • What is the form of the music? In what you’re about to hear, you simply hear one very long melody and then it is repeated.

  15. Project 2: Using the “loops” in GarageBand to write a song • There are many decisions that guide my creative process while composing: • Do you want a regular beat in the music? Like most pop songs, my compositions have a consistent drumbeat that lasts throughout the composition. So, I usually find a drumbeat first. • What is the tempo (speed) of the music? 120 BPM means that there are two pulses (beats) per second, and therefore 120 beats per minute. That’s a nice, upbeat speed for a composition. • What is the form of the music? You may want to write a song in verse/chorus form. • When I am finding loops for the verse and chorus, I try to have an accompanimental instrument (like a bass) and a melodic instrument (like a flute, piano, violin, singer…). • In my opinion, the verse should be different from the chorus to create variety in my composition. • When I use loops, I use them in groups of 4 because that’s common in popular music. • Throughout, I’m thinking about the mood of my composition and how I express this musically.

  16. Project 2: Writing a drumbeat • Students take a vocal track from ccmixter.org and write a drumbeat to accompany it. • Questions that guide our creative process when composing drumbeats: • Genre: What style is your drumbeat: Hip-hop, techno, rock, country… • Speed: How slow/fast do you want your drumbeat? This will determine the mood of the drumbeat. • When the drumbeat accompanies a vocal track, do you want it to occur during the verse, or the chorus, or both?

  17. Today’s Talk: Four Composition Projects • Project 1: Compose a song in Verse/Chorus form GarageBand. • Project 2: Take a vocal track that someone else made and compose a drumbeat for itat advanced.aviary.com • Project 3: Build a song around a recording of you making music with the every-day objects around you at advanced.aviary.com • Project 4: Choose chords for a short 4-chord verse in JamStudio.com

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