Donna
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Posts posted by Donna
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Hey all, I've a number of is-shoes (issues) below and am looking for the most effective and labor saving methods.
So I finally did a scratch of a couple sections last night just to see if I can get a workable groove with a bigger-parts tune. The keyboard I have stores enough to lay down several lines (eg chords, bass, strings) for a full song.
1) I "could" lay down the drums, then record the keyboard stuff by pressing the "start song" button on the keyboard EXACTLY at the right time. This is what I did last eve - it wouldn't be impossible to hone my button pressing chops to the exact millisecond...or think you I should bite the bullet and lay down the programmed stuff first (reprehensible in my drummer philosophy, but willing to change). Also: what's the best way y'all deal with actual space in your programmed parts, when there is no discernable rythym, or in the case of pausing for actul beats, there is NO sound at all?
2) The midiverb is up and running, woo-hoo! In mixing the snippet above, I found myself wondering how others deal with programming effects during mixdown. The unit is right next to the mixing board...but if I want chorus in one section and flange in other, is manually pressing different buttons during mixdown the way to go and just hope I can catch up with all the panning and stuff going on? Is mine a specific recording enviornment where recording WITH effects is the way to go?
3) The effects unit itself, exploring its options. In the past I just cranked everything til I "heard" the amt of effect desired. But that just means every mix sounds the same and I'd such a good result doing "Last Train" in noting WHAT k/htz and stuff is. Want to do the same re: effects. On my portastudio there are pans and eq tiers for the effects as well! So it's like quilting, endless options. Any specific idea on how to approach FINDING OUT what my unit can do?
4) Lastly...and I'm glad Lazz is on vacation or whatever, any ideas on how to get a click track (laying down drums) for me? It really would help.
Again, mine is an analog 4-track set up, no pc stuff per se.
Mucho gratsios!
PS: any ideas why going direct from my keyboard to the 4-track is yielding no signal? It's not my cord, either.
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WHAT is a trance refill?
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Good thread!
Had a toy drumset when I was 6 or 7 and before teenage years a couple years plying string bass and sax. I used to tune my toms (and snare w/ the snares off) to make a chord. I'd play melodies on them and build...something, anyway. I was never a solo-er with drums. Too hard to do!
I think I was 12 when I wrote my first song. As I wrote the lyrics, the melody came, but also 3 vocal harmonies, horns, big sound.
They didn't want me to sing lead as a teenager. Suddenly a few years later I could sing. By then a lot of experience playing and listening, it was so wide. In my early 20's I had a feeling I could write but was afraid of not following through so I sold my drums and used the $ to buy a synth which stored several thousand notes. I did sound-on-sound, too, but w/ ghetto blasters (big step up from the really cheap tape recorders).
I didn't get a drumset again til like 15 years after I'd sold it. That was the way to go for me. A good friend (biker who wrote gentle, sad love songs) left his ovation w/ me many moons ago. Haven't heard from him since
. But I learned some chords, so now can compose doing simple lines either keys/guitar.Cannot remember when the 4-track came into my life - but so glad it did.
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ATom, yah (midwestern scandanavian "yes" for all you others), I may've wanted a textbook answer. Thought there was a formula.
But I like your answer - even better along w/ examples from John and John B
.Hari, what is an udu - you'd think a drummer would know. The tune sounds really interesting, will watch for it.
I'm in some serious February funk right now. Keep trying to exercise and all, but just deeply tired or bored or something. It'll turn around, though I trust.
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Ha ha.
I would be interested in hearing that one chord song. Sounds like a profitable approach. Been chasing simplicityfor awhile now, albeit in a different way.
S & J > Mud Swirl: That's not really a drink, is it?
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Yes, I remember you (John) mentioning the Behringer.
After the bass!
Maybe
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(Atom, you are a wisconsin beast! I complained to Loo yesterday that the keyboardists here were being naughty and not replying - and you have sadly proved me right).
John, yes! This will help a lot, the little diagram you wrote up...I just need something to start on.
I did "bother" him about all this since last post. He remembers nothing of the tune. However, he offered to listen to it, so I think a road trip to his babyhouse is in order.
Yes, I can read simple notation. Your diagram ain't wasted even if Mike ("Loo" - I go by either name) gives me the whole rundown "for I will surely face this situation again." The rythym is not a big problem, I'll just practice.
Ta-ta. Have a good one!
PS: Hari thanks for the "trust your ears" part...
PPS: It'd be fantastic if Mike came here. He'd mix in really well, I think. The guy is a monster writer; great affinity between us because of mutual musical admiration/understanding. It's a rare friendship - am realizing this more, with the passing of years.
And ain't it funny? I was all set to record with him last Fall. But we could not mesh our schedules, and then the family just needing to nest together the last weeks of the pregnancy...that sorta thing can come up out of the blue, as it were, you just have to stop the world and get off NOW...
Well, because of Loo not available, that's why I ended up searching online for...I didn't know what, just knew I was on my own for awhile. I searched one night and found the link to Songstuff...and couldn't believe my good fortune. So that's how I got here.
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Tracking down the adapter as we speak...and the cost will not break me.
woo hoo!
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James, this is so cool...I know how ya feel. Congrats on getting things moving, and quickly!
(Do you have a tuner? Mic stand? Are there effects in your pc stuff I assume?)
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Hee hee.
No you didn't, it's a good starting point.
Glad you mention inversions, which I almost always use. Maybe try a straight triad first and progress to inversion?
Sigh. ...ya know those 70's rock jams (esp. live) where the guitarist is soloing and "Viv Savage" is hanging on the hammond B3, punching percussive things. But he's changing chords at the same time. I know, I said "vamp/comp". 4 beats is a long time if you only hit the "one!"
So...to comp, but also to change quickly (I think I can figure out the latter).
So I do wish to comp on this. I am trying to learn a part, actually, and it's very difficult to hear what's being done. My buddy Loo did it and he won't remember what he'd done since that was years ago. And his baby being new and all, I cannot bother him hardly at all!
Wouldn't it be easier to get a keyboard player? Yes - the problem is Loo has spolied me rotten and I don't know any pianists who play in his style (which, for every song he's played on of mine is PERFECT, arggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhh)
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Hari, thanks, it does help. Just to clarify then, the example you gave, you're playing that with your right hand?
I listened to "Don't Know How To Reach You" and thus heard what you're talking about. That is a sophisticated melody and song. All your stuff strikes me that way...and "Splinter In My Mind" is all that, plus a major hoot.
See ya.
(PS: you were right, shoulda got a bass first - I am pining for one! Gonna see what I can possibly round up...actually an upright would be fantastic. I'm certain some part of the 12 yr old me remembers how to work that fretboard)
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Hey!
How do I comp on one chord (or vamp)? Don't say do like you would on a guitar, cause I don't really know how to do that either, other than varying the rythym of strumming the chord.
Just...priciples, should I be hanging for the 3rd or fifth of the chord? Or what? We are talking one hand, gentlemen - just how to vary the triad or whatever so I'm not stuck just playing the chord.
Thanks much.
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I picked up a Yamaha. I did look at the Alesis (no QS8.2 tho) and even some kind of sound box or something like that, w/ keyboard bought separately to be able to get one's own sounds - big bucko's for that situation.
This sounds crazy, but my biggest bumout is where to keep it. The little ones can't be expected to not be little. I think for now, I shall have to tear down and stash it every time.
With my old synth, I only needed like 5 good sounds. I've already found five on this one which has over 400. The bass sounds are pretty bad, but a couple guitar sounds are alright. I'm sure I can work w/ it via eq. and/or doubling. Also some reverb/chorus built in and manipulatable.
The canned beats sound good but don't swing. However, I may use the keyboard to make my own, at least on some tunes. It'd be great to have the recording feature on the keys take care of everything but vocals, so I can stretch out w/ 3 tracks of harmonies (I have a horror of bouncing suddenly on the 4 track).
All in all, Woo-hoo!
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ROTFL! You'd make a great cartoon strip, Prometheus.
Plus I knew you'd chime in - thanks for that. btw, someone in the Christmas Song Thread (songwriting baord) wants to know what it is you're holding in your pic.
Atom, I'd love that Alesis - but this time I'll be settling for less.
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Hey - I remember that Apollo thing you're talking about! It was exciting, yes I remember. It's like cowboys for a child only it's spacemen.
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ah well, I always try to sing in my best American accent... I think maybe because Americans tend to speak more clearly and ennunciate syllables more than us... I was listening to some footage of the Apollo astronauts descending to the Moon in the LEM, a great American achievement by the way, and I was wondering if it was two Scottish men doing the same job if they might have trouble hearing what they were saying at mission control...
There were a couple of things I found it very hard to make out... Like on Apollo 17, The Lunar Module pilot says "AGS Data's good" like so "Aygs Dahda's Good" where a Scottish man from where I live (Ayrshire) would say "Ahgs Day'uh's Good", the apostrophe representing the glottal stop, but apart from the fact that you lot proncounce everything backwards over the pond I think you generally speak much more well than we do...
But wouldn't the Scot sound more like "DIE uh's"? It's not quite right that, either. The children and I (even the cynical teen) actually sit around sometimes and analyze the...dipthong I think it's called: is the Celt saying "ai" or "au" or what! Better than playing cribbage.
On this subject have you seen the movie My Fair Lady?
It's funny, that Apollo stuff - them talking, I think it's a part of everyone's subconscious. Interesting you like the moon landing so much you used it in a recording and wrote quite a bit about that on your page.
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...and the song ends with the middle eight. That's a nice part, btw. And needed, it's a heavy deal - still chuckling re: yours and john's comments in the Chritmas song thread about this one:
]john: I was listening carefully for something to do with Christmas. i was thinking "Shit! Thats the heaviest, most depressing Christmas song ever!"
Prometheus: Yes, I don't think that Jennifer May, the lyric writer, is exactly brimming with joi de vivre...
If you go to the site http://www.geocities.com/thetrueprometheus/ you should get a link to the song (Night) on there...
I'm listening to it as I write, and went over the lyric, etc; Ya know, I can hear the harmony on the choruses, esp. the one right before the bass-bridge. Sounds good to me, will you be singing on any stuff in the future? Hey, it is such a good description you gave that I have no questions at all, except how and why were 30 tracks done.
The lyric sounds like a TERRIBLE experience. Probably in the wiriter's head? Maybe like that Laura Nyro song: It's not love I'm a running from/Just the heartbreak I know will come/ Cause I know you're no good for me/ But you've become a part of me .
Once I wondered if she really meant God: God, don't make me love YOU - even with the imagery about a flesh-person. Maybe it's about both...Great line: I'd free myself and cure your want.
On an older note about losing innosense in even listening to music: It reminds me of, one day I was studying a face closely. Well, the eyes had bags under them; and there was stuff imperfect on each part of the face - but taken together, when I stopped intensly analyzing/focusing on little parts, the face was beautiful. Really beautiful! The whole was also reality - the little parts such as eyes, were not the whole, not reality if you know what I mean. I would've missed REALITY if I hadn't stopped looking at the specks. Some of us may appear incapable of seeing the whole. But I think ppl can be re-trained.
Er - a disjointed post tonight, all over the map mea culpa.
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Hari, spoken like a true guitarist
Maybe also you saw somewhere else I'd been thinking lately how great it'd be to have a bass (and electric guitar)? What has happened! I used to have ALL of them.Atom, I'm going to that link as soon as I shut up! Johnny B. thanks for your opinion. I know you guys are right.
Hey - I'm touched at all the feedback + it helps.
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That's right, John Nightwolf - music first.
It's keyboard I'm pretty sure , john, on both respects. But it is a bit trickier, when we must think about engineering as well.
I guess I'll need a stand then, too.
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Plus, I LOVE basslines, they make me swoon. I wish a had an upright, like I used to play as a child - German bow, the whole thing. With the keyboard, I can have bass which sounds like bass, and play it better than basslines-on-guitar, unless I stand the axe upright.
Shutting up now...
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I'd like opinions from any who've heard Last Train: should I next get: a keyboard? Or monitors? All's we need to do is for me to decide, then go to the store! The reason I ask opinions from ppl who've heard my mp3 is that they'd have some idea of how much I'm hurting re: mixing - like do they think it's crucial I get monitors first? I do want them - but I'm dang bored writing on just guitar - I want to do keyboard songs again.
Been thinking about this whole thing in conjunction w/ an artist page where it asks "description of music". For the life of me, I've no idea on how to answer that. Seems to me, I'm at least two different writers (or players??). The keyboard songs to me sound quite different than the guitar-written ones - the recordings anyway. I get bored VERY easily, it is one thing I cannot stand re: sounds and recordings of songs.
Y'all haven't heard the keyboard songs, but there's a fair amt in the archives. It lets one orchestrate even they cannot play keys. Anyway - I really miss doing keyboard songs, it's been 10 years and I was doing alright writing/recording-wise on that instrument. So there's my bias.
I appreciate your thoughts.
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Thanks you guys.
As you can see I'm edit-ed and the 2nd thing I did was crop down a picture for the avatar.
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OK - will do, thank ye!
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Hey -
So I'm trying to get a couple photos re-sized for my artist page, but apparently what I need is an editor.
Need extremely cheap easy editing program, any help? We have Windows.
Thanks from Donna the sea hag
. But I learned some chords, so now can compose doing simple lines either keys/guitar.
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Synchronizing "live" and programmed parts (FX, too)
in Music Production and Recording
Posted · Edited by Donna
John, thanks for your detailed responses.
I did get the direct signal...don't know what I did differently today.
Er, is there a beginner's thread re: midi so that I will be able to make sense of your replies? I will refer back to them. But you've already given me another way for synching + click.
So it looks like for guitar I'd have to program the effects manually...dunno how that would work if the patch thing is going on w/ keys. The acoustic sounds so nice with some chorus on it.
Tomorrow I get time off and "told" myself I'd best be happy if I even get levels.
The 4 track (I don't think) has the midi time capability, but I'll look.