Composing music for an extended story

Hello, I'm Dr. Southorn, and this is a unit called Atmospheric Music. Join me for our learning today and we'll see how we get on. In this lesson, you're going to be able to use a range of musical instruments and techniques to depict actions in a story. Let's begin. There's three key words for this lesson. The first is silence, meaning a moment in the music where nothing is played. It can be used to create suspense. The second is trill. Two alternating notes played quickly, and the third is glissando, a continuous slide between two notes, either up or downwards. There's two parts to this lesson. The first is using musical techniques to create an atmosphere. To start off, we're going to match up musical techniques with the most appropriate action. So, I'm going to be playing four different sounds and each sound can be identified as any of the following four things, a pedal, a trill, glissando, or a note cluster. So, we'll start with the first one and I want you to see if you can match it. Here we go. (note cluster music) So, with that lovely sound, a pedal, a trill, a glissando, or a note cluster? All right, let's move on to the second sound. (glissando music) Let's try it one more time. (glissando music) So, was that sound a pedal, a trill, glissando, or a note cluster? Now for the third one. (pedal music) Was that a pedal, trill, glissando or a note cluster? Fourth and final one. (trill music) I promise you that's not your phone ringing. We'll play it one more time, see if you can match it. (trill music) Okay. The first sound you heard was a note cluster, that kind of discord of notes that are really close together and we've mentioned it before, it sounds quite jarring and it's very suitable for atmospheric music or sinister music. The second one is glissando. This is our new key term that we're going to be using today. The third one was use of a pedal. So, we had those sustained notes. And the fourth one is trill. Again, a new term for this lesson. The use of the following can be effective to create tension. We've already seen a couple of these from before. So, using a pedal, using trill, using glissando, and using a note cluster. These are techniques we can use to create tension. You can also use a chromatic movement. There is no fixed way of using these, and you as a composer can choose how and when they are suitable. Trills and glissando can often work well for showing actions and movement. So, listen to the sounds and think what might be happening as actions when this sort of music is being played. We'll start with the trill. (trill music) And now we'll try the glissando. (glissando music) That was quite short, so we'll do it one more time. (glissando music) Well, for me, they kind of evoke an idea of balance, mild sort of peril of balancing and worrying about falling over. And then the glissando sounded more like you've actually fallen over. It's like a tumbling sound. Let's listen again and see what happens in this example to heighten the tension towards the end. (glissando music) I played that twice for you there just to get a good feel for it. So, have a think. What sort of vocabulary can you use to describe what happens in the example? What techniques are used in the music? What features are there in the music that heighten the tension towards the end? Well, there's a short gap of silence if you listen again between the two sections of music. So, there was almost like a pause where nothing's happening and you are waiting for something to happen. And because the buildup is creating this sort of suspense, the pause just adds to that feeling. Silence can be used to heighten suspense in music, it can be exaggerated by getting louder and then having a sudden silence, which is what we had. This is the same example, but without use of the silence. So, let's listen to it without that silence and see if you can notice a different effect. It should be lessened. (glissando music) It's all over a bit quick, isn't it? So, that's without the silence. Let's compare it quickly with the one with the silence. (glissando music) It's much more effective, isn't it? Let's do a quick check for understanding what is a glissando? Is it A, two alternating notes played quickly? B, sliding between two notes? Or C, a continuous and usually low pitched note? Well done. The answer is B, it's sliding between two notes. So, if you hear any music where you have that feature, you can describe it verbally by calling it a glissando. What's the musical technique when two notes go back and forth quickly? Is it A, trill, B, chromatic movement or C, note cluster? Excellent, the answer was A, a trill. Time for some practice. Listen to these two different excerpts, which depict a strange small gnome which moves in an unsteady and uneven manner, like a broken puppet coming to life. When you listen to the track, I want you to think about these three questions. The first is, which two of the following best describe the opening motif? Out of legato, chromatic movement, trill and glissando? Second question is, which other musical features are used to make the music sound creepy? And try and use that technical vocabulary, that key vocabulary when thinking of those features. And three, how does the music create an accurate impression of the gnomes movement? Now that's lots to think about three different questions. So, what I recommend is you download clip, you listen to this clip in your own time and at your own pace, and listen to it a few times and each time you listen, focus on a different question, so that you are just thinking about one thing at a time and answering it to the best of your ability. Good luck. Okay, for part two of this task, we're gonna listen to a second piece of music, and we have two questions this time. What musical technique opens this extract? So, what's the first technique that you're going to hear. And describe how the music builds tension towards the end of the piece? Consider things like dynamics, tempo and texture, and all the while think of using that key vocabulary so that your descriptions are really accurate and clear. Listen to the clip, download it if you need to. And just like before, I would recommend you listen to it at least twice, the first time just focus on the first question, the second time the other question. Good luck. Okay, so going back to that first clip, you will have picked hopefully the same as me here, the two following motifs are legato and a chromatic movement. I hope you heard those and they were easy for you to identify. The second question was, which other musical features are used to make the music sound creepy? Glissando was evident. Note clusters were evident and pitched percussion like a glock and spiel and a xylophone. When answering, how does the music create an accurate impression of the gnomes movement? You may have said something similar to this. The melodic motif is jumpy, which means it uses large intervals and the music stops and starts with moments of silence. The dynamics also change suddenly from loud to quiet and there are accents and symbol crashes. This creates an unpredictable feel in the music. Now I think that's quite a model answer and there's lots of really interesting and accurate vocabulary in there. So, if you didn't use those sorts of terms, it might be really useful to focus on them here and maybe make a few notes about what you could do to improve your own answer. If you've got something close, fantastic, well done. Let's move on to the next question. What musical technique opened the extract for the second piece of music? It was trills. And finally, describe how the music builds tension towards the end of the piece considering dynamics, tempo, rhythm, and texture. A model answer could be something like this. The pitch starts low and gets higher, the trills, key vocabulary, rise and fall. The dynamics change suddenly from quiet to loud and overall get louder towards the end. The tempo gets faster with a sudden stop and silence before the end. More instruments are used at the end with added percussion. I hope you got some of those points, if not all of those points. Let's keep going. Part two of this lesson is called completing the story. Listen to the final part of the scary story soundtrack. Which musical techniques can you hear in the following places? A cold breeze curled around his ankles, so he wants to be listening out for those words when we play the track in a moment. Into the library, scanning the dim rows of books. Again, listen for that phrase. Maybe listen to it on a repeated listen so that you're only focusing on one of these at a time. "Zara, he called, he staggered back gasping and "wait, who are you? No." Let's listen to it and I will try and signal on the video where these things are happening for you as well. Here we go. A cold breeze curled around his ankles as if something had opened behind him. He bolted forward convincing himself it was only the wind through one of the open classroom windows. He stepped into the library scanning the dim rows of books in the corner a figure stood. Zara, he called. It turned and moved forward. (staccato music) Not Zara. He staggered back gasping. Wait Zara, who you? No." His no is much better than my no. I tried to signal those for you. Do listen to it again so that you've got plenty of time to focus on each of those sentences, but as each one comes in, the idea is that you are going to pick a musical technique that you can hear behind the voice in the music. Good luck. Well, here are the answers. So, in the first sentence, there was a trill happening in the background. In the second you could hear that glissando effect. The third was sustained notes, a pedal. The fourth was that kind of discord feeling, note cluster, and the final one was a staccato sound. Hope you got those right, let's keep going. The final part of the story uses a range of the following musical techniques to create suspense or mimic the action in the story. Pedal, chromatic movement, note clusters, trills, glissando, and silence can also be used to heighten the tension or to emphasize the dialogue. We talked about silence right at the beginning of this lesson as well. We dunno exactly what happens at the end of the story, but we can suggest this by our musical choices. We can use the elements to create a buildup of tension by the tempo getting faster, the dynamics getting louder, the text are getting thicker, and using extremes of pitch either very high or very low. Listen to this part of the story and do you recognize the piece of music? The school is quiet now. (ostinato music) Almost too quiet. (ostinato music) As Jake finally left the classroom, the corridor was dark and the only sound was the faint hum of the drinks machine in the hall. He walked towards the library and stopped. Well, "It uses the same notes as the ostinato art at the beginning of the story, but in a different way." Using musical ideas you've used before but in a slightly different way helps you to create a sense of unity in the music. You have that recognition and familiarity of the first part of the music, but it sounds slightly different. The mood of it has changed. Which one of the following would you not expect to hear in a scary piece of music? A, chromatic movement. B, motif in a major key. C, pedal or D, note clusters. Well done, the answer is motif in a major key. Typically we hear minor keys in scary pieces of music. So, just three ways that you could use the elements to build tension towards the end of the story. We've talked about this a little bit already. Try and make sure you're using that key vocabulary in your response. Here's some ideas for you. The tempo can get faster, dynamics could get louder, texture could get thicker extremes of pitch, and those could get gradually higher, but also they could get gradually lower. Time for some independent practice again. Complete the first draft of your story soundtrack. The success criteria for this task are that you include a range of different musical techniques at appropriate points in the story. Second, I want you to choose elements which contribute to the growing unease of the story, including creating a suspenseful ending. And finally, use your opening ostinato or motif in some way throughout the story to create a sense of continuity. Good luck. Here's some feedback and some useful prompts to consider, like a reflection against what you've done. A bit of self-evaluation. Have you used things like a chromatic movement, the use of a pedal, note clusters, trills or a glissando? You don't have to have used all of those, but hopefully you've picked up that some of these would be useful and appropriate for this type of music. How have you used those elements of music to show the growing unease in the story? For example, you may have built some note clusters into a particular moment in the dialogue. How have you created a suspenseful ending? You may have used silence as part of it. Okay, I hope you really enjoyed that lesson. Let's do a quick summary of the key points that are really important. The first is that trill and glissando are two other musical techniques, which can be used to create a specific effect in music or to help to create tension. And silence can also be an effective way of adding tension when used at an appropriate time. So, we've now used a range of musical techniques and the elements to create an appropriate atmosphere for a scary story. You have in effect built a toolbox of ideas and techniques that you can roll out for use to create suspenseful music. Hope you enjoyed this lesson. I did. I'll see you next time. Goodbye.