During this task we researched lots of different harmonic structures. Examples of this included pachelbel’s Canon, 1-4-5s, as well as different pop song structures. This gave me a much better understanding of how to begin to create a piece of music as well as to change it over time in order to create a different mood or message.
Band Composition
A song I looked at whilst trying to figure out a drum pattern for our group composition was boys don’t cry by the cure.
As it was a very similar genre that we were aiming to imitate it was very useful to look at the drum part. The band for this song consisted of Vocals an electric guitar, a bass guitar and a drumkit. Although this was a lot more scaled back than our band which consisted of 2 vocalists, 2 guitarists, a bassist , a keyboardist and a drummer, the drums serve the same purpose in offering a driving drum beat and keeping the piece moving forward . Both our and the cure’s compositions were in 4/4 and in major keys ( ours in C major and theirs in A major). Therefore looking at this piece allowed me to get the feeling of a very upbeat indi rock piece. In ‘ Boy’s don’t cry’ , there is very little dynamic contrast throughout and the drum kit mainly keeps the same beat ( other than a few drum fills). Seeing this allowed me to simplify my approach to our composition and focus mainly on the rhythm and keeping time. Another technique I picked up from listening to this was really locking in with the bassist and finding out what is best for each member of band and how I could play an effective role.
Award Composition
A song that really helped me with ideas for my award composition was prelude in C major by Bach. I used multiple ideas from it including an arpeggiating piano at the beginning as well as choosing C major to write in. The pieces very much differed in harmonic structure and tempo however which makes them sound very different , however the build up of feeling over time with this piece is definitely something I tried to imitate in the first part of my composition. They are aslo both in the time signature of 4/4. This piece by Bach written in arguably the most simple of time and key signatures is still incredibly beautiful which helped me understand that simplicity is often quite effective.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSU0MaGbkh8&t=166s – Prelude in c major
Sonnet Composition
For my sonnet composition I really wanted to create an atmospheric piece that wouldn’t take away from the sonnet but instead emphasise the message. Therefore I looked at quite a lot of rap music and one song stood out called My Story – Krept and Konan. The backing music to this song is incredibly simple and repeats every 4 bars , however because the story of the song is incredibly deep and intimate this creates a really nice backdrop and increases the feeling of the song. With my composition I tried to do a similar thing. I created a 4 bar loop that played for the entire minute of the video. Like the music in Krept and Konans piece it was very minimalistic but also quite dark with the constant synth drone creating a feeling of tension in the background.