I have made three tracks for this film project. It didn’t go as planned due to the breakdown of communication.
Proof of Collaboration:
Here is proof there was communication, however, it was quite one sided, I never got the playlist of inspirations I was asking for. I could’ve made more effort to communicate. Due to this, my plan went out of the window. I was going to get involved in all the filmmaking process. However, none of this went to plan. I ended up not getting involved in any of it, I didn’t go to any of the filming or make any music to the finished product. If the communication between me and the filmmakers was better, this would’ve been possible. I ended up just working off the finished script.
I was added to a website called Celtx, which is a filmmaking tool where you can put the ideas, script, timetable and everything else you need for filmmaking. This is where I got the script from.
The first track I made was Opening No.1. The description of the track from the script is “As OPENING NO.1 starts, CADE begins to walk slowly, in sync with the flow of the music. Each step is dictated by the beat of the music. As it speeds up and shifts into a different style, CADE begins to step in tune with the new style and adjusting walking style to it.”
This is Section A of my track. I decided to go with a pop sound, as it is a genre I am comfortable with. The chord progression is: D Major, F Sharp Minor 7th, G Major, F Major, then the first 2 notes of F Major then G major. This is a simple yet effective chord progression, apart from the F Sharp Minor 7th not being diatonic, yet it fits well. The bass plays the root notes of each chord. The drum beat is also simple yet effective.
This is the bridge part of my song. I used this as a way to bridge between Section A and B. I switch to a muted electric guitar. The guitar plays the root notes of the same chord progression, without any other instrument playing. The blue line at the top with the number 120, represents the tempo changing, As stated in the script the track needs to get faster, so in the bridge the track increasingly gets faster from 120 bpm to 140bpm.
This is the Section B of the song which starts straight after the bridge. I changed it to more of a rock style, as the script wants a different style as well as the tempo change. Therefore I switched to more heavier instruments. The chords are the same, however, the guitar has a different rhythm. Instead of playing root notes, the bass has a more complicated rhythm, but is just playing the notes of the chord. The drum kit has a different beat, however is still relatively simple. Another difference is the trashy Hi Hat compared to the closed in Section A. The ending is just how I end the chord progression in Section B, repeated three time. Then followed by a D chord on the guitar, root note on the bass and a crash and kick drum hit on the drums.
These are the MIDI instruments I used. Classic Electric Piano, Roots Upright Bass and Bright Bass House Drum Kit are from the first half. Eighties Power Chords Guitar, Eighties Electric, Fretless Solo Bass and Studio Heavy kit are from the second half of the track including the bridge.
As I don’t know the length of the scene in the film, I made the track to the length that I think is good.
DO EVALUATION ON EVALUATION SLIDE
My second track is the song that is being played in the cafe, “The music playing in the background is café music”, then a bit later in the script, “CADE puts their phone down on the table, and decides to take out their earphone and put it away in order to listen to the surrounding noises and music.” This is when the music becomes prominent and not in the background.
I chose a jazz style for my track because of my research on cafe music. The chord progression is an E major then an A Major. The piano repeats that throughout. The drum beat is called a swing beat, common in jazz music, with a simple kick and snare pattern over the ride cymbal. The bass follows the same chords as the piano, as it only plays the notes that are in the chords, just with a different melody as the bass is the melody of this song. I then used a guitar sound that emulated a slider, which played the three notes of the chords. This was the lead guitar of the song. The bridge is just a stripped back version of the rest of the song. The bass only plays root notes, and the drum are cut, the rest is the same. Everything comes back in the same as before after the bridge, it repeats three times through the chords, same as before the bridge. The ending is all the instruments playing in unison: a D major chord on the piano and guitar, one D note on the bass, and a kick drum and crash cymbal hit on the drums.
I used a Concert Grand piano, as I wanted an authentic piano sound, a drum kit named “Slow Jam” as I once again wanted an authentic sound, a bass named “Roots Upright”, as I wanted the classic jazz feel so I used an upright bass, and a guitar called “Swamp Dobro” that emulated a slide guitar which I think fit nicely.
As I don’t know the length of the scene in the film, I made the track to the length that I think is good.
DO EVALUATION ON EVALUATION SLIDE
My third and final track I called the “Orchestral Track.” This script describes this track like this, “The music begins to speed up, as they both write quicker and with more fervour. This continues for a minute going between different shots and speeds in time with the music.”
I chose to go for a more commonly used film style, with an orchestral sound. This is due to the description of the track, it sounds like this is what the filmmakers want. It starts with a loud cymbal hit, as I think it sounds good. I chose a fairly simple chord progression, which was: C major, D major, E Major then F Major. The organ plays this throughout, changing chords every 2 bars. The strings play the chords, but in the second bar, switch between the third note and of the chord and to a different note. The way I played it was by playing the next white key, which was a a tone up every time apart from on the E Major chord, where it was a semitone. It plays this throughout. The bass plays root notes of the chords throughout. As stated in the description from the script, this track should speed up. I did a similar thing to what I did in the first track, the speed gradually goes up from 100 bpm to 152 bpm. I thought a slow increase in tempo sounded good. It stays at 152 bpm for 2 chord progressions, then it starts to slow down to 100bpm. It is still a gradual decrease, however it happens faster than the increase in tempo earlier in the track. It then ends once the track reaches 100bpm again, which is after another 2 chord progressions.
For this track I used: Orchestral Arco Strings which emulate the sound of a string ensemble, which is used for the mid frequencies, a Gospel Organ which I used for the high frequencies of the track, an organ usually isn’t in an orchestra, however, I think it fits really nicely here, I then used the Orchestra Deep Bass synthesiser, I was going to use an Upright or a double bass to get a more authentic sound, however, they didn’t have the same punch that this synthesiser has, I used the Orchestra Percussion Kit for the cymbal hit at the start, I was thinking of adding more percussion or drums, but I didn’t think it fit.
As I don’t know the length of the scene in the film, I made the track to the length that I think is okay. However, the crescendo of the song where it is 152 bpm could’ve gone on for longer as it doesn’t last for long.