tony69

Just curious... name one real composer that composes using a computer. or has turned 100% to composing with a computer, and not with PnP. I don't think i can think of any. I know sometimes film composers do that, but that's usually because of time constraints (that way its much faster for orchestrators to notate, and make parts, when the midi is keyed in). example of this occurence would be the king kong score which had to be written very fast. so jnh was writing on the computer. For people taht turned to the comp, it was primarily usef for several things. Either, a) fractional computer composition (as in using randomn numbers and making the comp play that in Hz). I know a few serious composers that do this. And it works. B) different sounds. To get synth lead, pads, etc. to use fake bass strings (ex. Zimmer). or the comp is used to achieve microtones and other tones not achievable with actual instruments. c) Notation. See you said composers write the score on the computer and this is true for ALL composers, because it is much neater than handwriting. But it is writing, not composing. The composition stage takes place at a keyboard and with a writing medium (can be paper or monitor). BUT they dont use the computer to compose. There's a distinction between composing with a computer, and composing but notating on the computer. Steve reich doesn't compose on a computer for instance. nor does glass, williams, or for pop musicians, diane warren, sting, etc.

sorry for the confusion. In order to use an orchestra you have to be comfortable with not having the faintest idea of what the final result will be or you have to possess a complete instinctive understanding of it in order to think of something and write it, then perform it. The problem is that i don't posess this ability. so rather than not bother ever writing music like some of you would like, i write solely for the computer. If someone else would like to take the score and perform it exactly as i wish, then they are welcome to do so, i have no quarrel with that. I just can't write straight to standard notation like a pencil and paper composer can. I know, it's pretty difficult for someone who finds one system easier to understand someone who doesn't, and even more so if they posess a knack at what they do, but that is the way these things have to be. Some people find one way easier and some find the other way superior. Having your score open to interpretation is known as "the composer's bane" the thing that surprises me most about some of the people on this board, is the fact that they continually push the old methods as the only true methods, yet they pratically worship film composers who, although posessing full knowledge of how to do things that way, abandoned them for the computer and digitised samples as soon as they came along. Now there's an interesting fact. wow. several things to say. first synthesized sounds can never be as good as it live. period. half of the beauty of live recordings is resonance between the instruments and resonance between the instruments and the concert hall. there is no possible way to dublicate the resonance between the instruments effect on a computer. secondly, the main reason why many film composers use synthesized stuff is because the real thing is so damn expensive. period. you probably never thought about how much a jw score costs to record. but it is alot. for musicians, its 100 people x10 weeks x 500 (depends on thier skill). you also have to rent the hall which often costs 10000. then the stuff you have to rent for the recording. around 5000 (but could be more if its better stuff). orchestratorts, music copyists, librarians, conductors need to be paid. etc. so a film score can cost around 400k to record. synthesizing is so much more cheaper, so many composers use them. course some composers also use them for novelty effects, say to create new strange sounds, but they never use them to completely replace the orchestra. even hans zimmer uses a real orchestra coupled with his famous MV synths for his more recent recordings. thirdly, if you dont possess the ability to hear each instrument, then learn. it's pretty simple. go to a library and borrow scores (or you can do what i did, and dover ). so much things in the classical repertoire, on form, on motivic development on orchestration. there's a reason it lives beyond its time. also, many composers don't know what they're stuff will sound like in its final form. we do have inklings of it, but very few are gifted enough to know exactly how it will sound. so part of the novelty of composing is the hearing it performed live phenomenon. lastly, the composer's bane is not interpretation. 75% of music is composition, 25% is interpretation (imo). for me, to have someone else interpret my piece is an honour, though i can get miffed when they ignore my dynamics. being a composer, we know that we cannot conduct every performance in history. so if we want our piece to live on, we have to accept that other people will interpret our stuff.

Pressing the enter key vs. dragging pencil accross for note head and stem. At least it's easier to change on a computer. And you can hear it straight away. i agree with that. much easier to hear, which could arguably pose a problem for newbies when orchestrating because now you expect the flutes to play forte below F which is impossible. or trumpets to play above F5 or horns above G4 without much difficulty, which when you do not have professionals, is quite difficult. In terms of entering it on the computer, it takes soooooo long. I'm using finale, maybe Sibelius is faster. I have it hooked up to the midikeyboard etc when i enter. but then to change from quarter to whole notes, or create triplets, quintuplets, etc requires more time than i can afford. and usually, my final draft is so different from my initial conception, so then i have erase it all and re-enter it. Plus you do not get the luxury of making notes (on orchestration, or highlighting potential motifs) as you compose assuming you're composing on the computer. I am also oldschool since i like pencilling. Its like writing an essay or a novel; I prefer to handwrite it. It makes it more intimate. so thats just my shpeal. haha. i know some of you disagree.

oliver stone= jfk, bot4j and nixon=john williams. maybe 9/11 = john williams? *crossing fingers*

interesting. i usually sit at the piano to work out what possible snippets i can use as motifs (i'm a very beethoven type composer in that regards). then i actually do the composing with a pencil, a table and manuscript. i find its better than using a computer. then i head on over to the piano to play it through, work out details. then back to the drawing board as i work out more stuff. easier for me to plan out form, potential modulations and 10 different expositioins on paper than on a comp. comp takes too long to notate. its interesting that you said ewql and equating it to writing some really amazing music. good music comes from practice and talent, not the samples:p. i hope you meant decent sounding music instead of writing music.

hm where is it?

i hook up the sennheisers E835 for vox and MD421II and the ME64 for instrumental. I find they work the best for my purposes while remaining the least expensive microphones. i usually hook up 4 mikes for instrumental recordings. For my recording, i had 4 tracks as always. The version you guys heard is the MD421II from far away so it gives it a more resonating,ambient but much more balanced sound (that song i sent you is not yet mixed properly; i can only do that after finals). Then i position the shotgun-mike ME64 to face the violins, the violas and the basses. i find the viola and bass ones pick up the cello so if i play with the two, it gets me a decent cello sound. After hooking it up, then i XLR it to the 16track Fostex VF160 and record onto there. I did 3 takes. Then after, i upload it to the comp and use protools to edit, remove sounds if they are excessively obvious, etc. though i hate the editing process because i dont have good enough software to remove a click without removing a few important upper frequencies, so often it sounds a bit off after you do edits. thats why on some professional recordings you'll find you can still hear the sounds of hitting stands, etc. its just not possible to remove the sound clean enough. how about other people? how do you do it?

haha thanks for the compliment. i dont think its that good, tho my craft is getting better. i dont think i will be getting better samples cuz i detest samples. they lack resonance and musicality. though musicality can be programmed, do i want to spend 60 hrs programming sequencers instead of composing? on the other hand, i will be getting better groups. i am graduating to semi-professional groups this year, AND possibly a famous, professional one. we'll see if that works out. oscars in 5 years? haha... we'll see lol. doubt i'd get there. plus i'm more concentrating on being a concert composer rather than a film composer. it gives me more freedom on my project choices, though i do want to do a film score sometime in the future. maybe pull an aaron copland and win an oscar haha.

hi, i know i've mentioned this piece before. but now its recorded live and so i would like some comments on it. two notes. first it's recorded by an amateur group. secondly, the conductor did not follow all of my tempos so its too fast at the beginning and too slow in some other parts. but anyways, here it is, live with a string orchestra. http://www.acidplanet.com/artist.asp?PID=785845&t=2714

wow u never knew the word pwned?!?!?! well i'm assuming you are above the age of 25 then haha. either that or you live in a box:P. cuz its very commonly used.

1492. enough said.

omg whoever said it was a blatant rip-off of planets needs to be more careful with what they're saying. it IS NOT. its simply a very common melodic idea in modal music. 5-b7-1-b3 is so commonly used in jazz improvisations, and in many other cases. i agree horner sometimes pays homage to past music but i honestly think the braveheart quotation is a genuine coincidence.

i'm surprised no one has mentioned copland. his influence is EXTREMELY enormous on williams. copland began the whole americana sound. look at these for example: fanfare for the common man or rodeo. the one i think that influenced williams the most is appalachian spring. it spells nobel williams sound (or horner too). it also has sections that remind me of williams's sad sound. i'm just pointing out the influence. williams didnt copy but the sound is coplands.

well we still have to ensure that complete recordings of his entire life's work are released so i guess this site will be up for another year or two until we categorically make a 140CD or watever is needed of John Williams Complete Works. I must say, i am terribly saddened by this loss. I was watching muchmusic where i quote devin: "We've had breaking news that legendary film composer john williams has died from a car accident. he wrote very many scores including those to Star Wars, Indiana jones, et, schindlers list, harry potter, and countless other famous pieces. this is a very sad day for all musicians."

um its still alot of work. u need to work out royalties for iTunes, for hte musicians, jw, for the toher people that worked on the album etc. that will take alot of time for each complete score. and also how many people really want complete scores? like really? most people want the one star wars theme or the one harry potter theme. they dont care about the rest (this applies to most of popular music as well). so the work that goes into uploading it, doing royalties, etc might not be worth it. star wars 4-6 and lotr were so well recieved that enough people wanted a complete score to do. but say, minority report? not many people want it.

when i first read this, i was like . another joke like the paying for jwfan two or one year ago? dont remember. but then i went to cnn... http://www.cnn.com/SHOWBIZ/ one of the best film composers ever. may you rest in peace.

i think the main reason why williams is number 1 and goldsmith number 2 is ENTIRELY due to 2 factors: a) the directors B) the way they choose their movies imo, they are both equally as good. i have complete respect for both of them. a) Spielberg played such a role for williams. because of him, he got to do Jaws and he would interoduce him to Star Wars. by that, they solidified williams's role as an brash orchestral action type of score. he made the john williams "signature sound" well known because of spielberg/lucas. in addition, spielberg is one director who loves to vary his material alot. i mean after minority report, we got catch me if u can? wtf? that was such a jump. or from jp to schindlers. because of his varyingness, he allows williams to do the best he can. for cronenberg for instance, he always does that dark moody thrilleresque type of movie. as a consequence, shore's music for those movies are always for that genre. who could have predicted lotr from shore? Goldsmith did not really have a spielberg for a director-composer relationship. so that is a major impairment. i've definately seen more than one paper that talks about this. B) in addition, i think goldsmith did not choose his movies well. i know he liked variety hence his randomn acceptances. but for many movies he did, you just look at the movie and are like "omg, the movie is soooooooooo bad. you musta went for the money." and when the movie is bad, people will not watch it more than once (or not even), and most likely not remember the music upon first listening cuz the movie was that bad. so no one will remmeber the music and thus he isnt #1. BUT goldsmith did choose some good movies. however, he definately chose crappy ones as well. with williams, he chooses his projects carefully. think botfj, that is a pretty good movie. or home alone. in additino, he chooses mainly blockbuster movies (there are a few non-blocks, like rosewood). so his music is definately heard, contributing to his #1 status.

an orchestrated theme for jwfan. where is the actual theme btw? someone has it.

damn violists. why are there so little? i love the viola after hearing them in faure's requiem. it has no violins until the end! amazing. the viola sound is just amazing.

JACkIE CHAN!11111 he was a convincing cowboy in shanghai noon.

true. i'm sure williams actually copied somewhat for my friend the brachiosaurus. the temp track for that scene WAS from falstaff so i dont doubt that he probably used it as a template. likewise maybe face of pan was a temp track for the george delerue? and as well, using other people's themes/progressions isnt bad. bach's opening for WTC Bk1 prelude 1, the chords have been used by Soooo many people. and as well, lots of classical composers reused material from older composers. bruckner used wagner themes. rachminonf used paganini. or more recently, larsen from handel. its not a bad thing. its a sign of acknowledgement as well as respect. but of course the ultimate question is how much gets copied. if it is direct lift then obviously it's not acceptable. but if there's edits, different ways of using the theme, then i think its valid. so i dont know much about horner but i'm sure his copying was completely intentional. same with williams's slight variation for my friend. sign of respect. as goldsmith said, everyone copies.

haha i dont need samples 8O i have a real string orchestra that will play it. unfortunately it lacks enough violas, which seems to be a problem.

when u say azn version, do u mean pirated ;D?

i believe its a conga:p. i believe the way to achieve it is to slide the stick as u hit it so it goes closer to the center. though it could be some other type of percussion instrument. timpani could do something like this but much lower. roto toms maybe? another possibility, large conch.

two songs i'd like to share with you all. wrote in the last 8 months. leavetakings and adagio. enjoy. http://www.acidplanet.com/artist.asp?songs...s=285685&T=5846