Community Composer Challenge – SPITFIRE’S GREAT MUNICIPAL BAND! – May ‘22

{EXAMPLE] Suggestion for June 2022’s theme…

[please use the bold heading above if you want your suggestion to be counted]

We could maybe do something around the theme ‘quintet – the idea being that you can only use 5 (or fewer) voices in making your composition. One can be a polyphonic instrument (e.g. like a piano, guitar or synth), but doesn’t have to be, the rest have to all be monophonic instruments, or patches played monophonically (so you could, e.g., finally write that adagio for string orchestra and make some big bucks; )

[Note from me – this is only a suggestion, and a deliberately slightly obscure one to encourage better ideas! please don’t dislike this if you don’t want to run with it – hopefully you or someone else will make a great suggestion for June soon and so could you please like that one instead]. 

Hey Jason - very nice work -thought your pace and mood were bang on. Great subtle use of voices to highlight important points in the video. Thanks for sharing!

If this thing gets going in any way we are going to have made one hell of a diverse mosaic on youtube for people who search our hashtag - might make a good T-shirt: )

One thing I always find slightly troubling about scoring competitions proper is that it suggests that there is an objectively "best" way to score a film when that clearly can't be the case - there can only be the score that hits the right subjective buttons for the judging panel - but then I suppose that is the case if you are pitching for a director in real life so one can't complain too much!

That also, I think, means that there can't really be an objectively "wrong" way to score a film, you can only really, as listener, say whether it felt right for you and what you would have done differently. E.g. - the general rule I think is that you shouldn't try and hit every cut because that makes the editing look jarring, but if you happen to hit most of them in a way that feels natural then that probably won't matter.

I might try and have a go at this film by the end of the month - Trying my best to put your amazing work to the back of my mind I just made a couple of notes with it muted which may be interesting to read. To emphasise that these are not notes on your work, or necessarily things that would show up in the end product - they are just "the big things" that I thought about when watching the film.

Overall Mood/pace

Obvious fit is floaty "Irish" feel - world instruments, or orchestra aping same, maybe dorian mode, parallel fifths in left hand (etc). Less obvious fit - should we be afraid of the lady at the end (is it a horror?)

Tempi needs to flow but not drive - query whether tempo should start to drive at 1.40?? Perhaps have percussion but for hits only - don't deploy any kind of groove with it until 1.40 - treat 1.40 like EDM "drop"??

Cuts/things to hit(??)

Start - stillness

0.07 - movement starts

0.12- pace increases

0.15 - title - fades in - needs gentle/warm emphasis. not bit hit

0.26 - BIRD! - swoops down, hovers, then slowly flies off and up to right (copy this shape for a melody?)

0.46 - swirls (arpeggios/delay ??)

0.59 - pace more stately and moving towards...

1.09 - long cut to black and then return in and white - entrance of "lady" should texture/tonality of music change here?

1.09- 1.35 - moves back to colour - do we want slow build here - climaxing in big cut at:

1.41 - should tempo drive here? swirl of lady to be emphasised

2.02 - "thanks for watching" - this should be "resolute" - she's running, so faster than start, but slower than 1.40

2.12 - out

Thanks Keith - great to have you on board!!

I've always kind of liked the idea that there are no failures in music, only early drafts: ) There's a brilliant Leonard Bernstein lecture out there somewhere where he has an orchestra play through all Beethoven's drafts for the ending of the first movement of the 5th symphony - they are all fine, but you do see why the one he ultimately picked was perfect (but he of course, and nonetheless, still wrote all the other ones - and so believed in them enough to write them down).

Incidentally, @Taron - if you have a moment would be interested in (and grateful for) your thoughts on my LABS only "municipality noir" effort - see above (third post in the thread). Hyper-minimalist but I feel (more or less!) like I was treading on the right side of the fine line involved in such things.

Thanks @Taron - it was inspired by your recent LABS/Glass piece - glad you like it! Also - on the side chaining - because LABS Strings doesn't have legato, my thinking was to have the ducking happening as a sort of "misdirection" when the strings transition notes so that the lack of legato is a bit less obvious.

I think you have been investigating ways to get legato out of Discover and I wonder if there is something in this - e.g. if you had BBCSO Discover Violins sidechaining themselves, possibly in two tracks with the notes alternating, could it reduce the attack a little and smooth the transitions (very half baked idea but thought would float it).

I did try sidechaining to the actual kick but I got a bit seasick😉 There's actually a four to the floor kick track that I wrote, but the audio from that is going only into the compressor (I use the velocity on the Kick midi notes to control the side-chaining - one of my favourite tricks!

Don't do it just on my account! Not least because if you cracked it that might spoil some of my fun: ) I sort of see LABS Strings as the "chamber" alternative to the "symphonic" BBCSO Discover strings and so it definitely has its uses when one is engaged in trying to make free stuff sound as beautiful as possible - And also, because it is a chamber ensemble, it possibly has uses even for owners of Core (although I think I may soon be seduced by originals intimate strings on that front as I have a voucher that needs using). I should disclose though that I have a deeply soft spot for LABS strings because it was the very first Spitfire sound I made with my own two paws 😍

That said, it would be wonderful to see how you approached the problem (but more wonderful to get some of your music on this thread!). Hope the important work (that you mentioned above) releases you soon!