Developing your minimalist composition

Hello and welcome to the fourth and final lesson in the unit Minimalist composition. This lesson is called Developing your minimalist composition. So without further ado, let's jump right into it. In this lesson, you will develop a complete minimalist composition through the use of dynamics, texture, and structure. For this lesson, you have four key words. The first key word is structure, and the structure is the order of the different sections in a piece of music. This can also be called form. Dynamics, the dynamics of a sound are its volume. Binary form, a piece of music with only two sections, such as an A section and a B section is in binary form and ternary form a piece of music with a structure ABA is in ternary form. This lesson is in three parts, and the first part we will look at developing the dynamics in your composition. Minimalist composers develop their compositions by making subtle changes to the way that the ostinati are used. We're going to listen to three examples in just a moment, and I want you to listen now for how the dynamics or the volume vary between loud and quiet. To listen to these examples, you're going to need to pause the video here, head over to the slides and click on each individual listen button. By doing this, you will open up three new tabs and you'll be able to listen to the pieces as many times as you want. I'd recommend just listening to each of these clips, just the once. Once you finish listening to them, you can close the tabs and come back to this video and press play. I will note that depending on if you're using headphones or the quality of your sound speed, your sound system in your computer, you might find that these differences are quite subtle. Once you're ready, come back and press play. So we're going to look at how we can develop the dynamics in our minimalist composition by adjusting the volume automation. So we've got two videos to watch. The first video will explain the basics of automation, which is the manipulation of volume within a DAW, and we can control the changes of volume through automation, which we'll do it automatically through playback. The second video, which I will play, shows you how you can actually use it in your piece. So I'll play these videos for you now, back to back. Let's have a look at how we can develop our dynamics by using automation in our minimalist composition. Dynamics, as we know means the volume, and we've already looked at changing the volume of our tracks using the master dynamics controls at the left-hand side over here. However, automation allows us to vary the dynamics through a track to open up automation on Garage Band I press the A key. On different software, it'll be slightly different, but most doors have this feature. On this track here you can see that I have a yellow line, and this represents the dynamics, the volume of that line. If I click on it and make a dot and drag that up or drag it down, that will take the dynamics up and then down, let's have a listen to what that sounds like just on this track on its own. (bright music) So you can hear that when the line is going uphill as it were, it gets louder and when it goes downhill it gets quieter. So using that, we can create some really interesting effects in our minimalist composition. And this is a tool that minimalist composers use quite often actually to create some variety while they're repeating their ostinati. So the first thing I think I might do is have a think about at the start of my first section, how can I use automation to feed in a track? And what that means is that the track will start silent and then gradually appear as the dynamics increase. Now I was thinking I might do this with this string track here. So what I'm going to do is make a dot, drag that right down to the bottom, which means it'll be silent and then decide where I want it to be it's normal volume. I think I might go for the start of bar five. So this track now will start silent and gradually appear. I think I might do the same with this one here with the high rise pluck track. So I'm going to pop that there, drag that dot down to zero. So again, it gradually appears, and then above five, that's where it's going to be, its original volume. Let's have a listen to what that sounds like. (bright music) I quite like that it means the sort of gentlest start to my composition and it sort of builds into bar five. Now I could do the same but in reverse. So if we've done a fade in, we could also do a fade out, which is where the tracks gradually fade out as the volume decreases, as the dynamics decrease. So I think what I might do is maybe at bar five I'm going to take one of my other tracks and I'm going to gradually decrease the volume maybe between bar five and bar nine. I could do the same with this one. And with all these things it's about experimenting and trying things and seeing what works. It might be that I do this and then realise actually it doesn't work very well, so I'll get rid of it. And then maybe what I'll do with these tracks is have another fade in. So I'll increase the volume again. So they fade out up to bar nine and then they come back in back to their original volume at bar 13. Let's have a listen, then let's see what this sounds like. (bright music) (bright music) (bright music) (bright music) So that's created a really interesting effect and it means that although these ostinati are repeating constantly for 16 bars, by varying the automation and the dynamics there, I've managed to create quite an interesting section. So go into your first section, which is bar one to 16, and have a go at adjusting the automation to see if you can create some interesting effects with the dynamics like I've done here. So let's do a few check for understanding questions. The first one is, what is the definition of dynamics? Is it A, the type of a sound, B, the quality of a sound, C, the volume of a sound, or D, the length of a sound. Well done if you said C, the volume. Remember when we're talking about dynamics, we're talking about the sound is loud or quiet. What about this question? Which of these is a word that could describe the dynamics of a sound? A, fast, B, loud, C, breathy or D, low pitched? Yeah, just as we've just said, B, loud would be a word to describe the dynamics. For our first task in this lesson, we are going to develop the dynamics in our first section of the minimalist composition by using automation. Let's have a quick look at our success criteria before we get started. So we must use automation to fade in or fade out at least one region. The dynamics should change during the first section and all the tracks should be able to be heard at some point during that first section. So we have our instructions, we have our success criteria. Now that all is left to do is for you to complete this task. So you should pause this video now so you can look at this slide for reference. And once you finished the work, save it and come back to this video and press play. For the second part of this task, have a look at the image on the right-hand side of the screen. What do you think could be improved about this automation? I'll give you some time to study it before we look at the answers. So some of the things you may have seen, in that fourth track, we have this jagged automation, which would sound really messy and quite uncomfortable to listen to as it goes from really, really loud to really, really quiet quite quickly. So we would suggest perhaps that this student could use less dramatic automation. In the two tracks, the automation has made the dynamics silent. So if you bring that yellow bar all the way down in Garage Band, then there isn't going to be any volume at all, so we won't be able to hear it at all. So that needs to be changed. And finally, in two of the tracks, the dynamics are really loud, so that will drown out the other tracks. So when we are using automation, which is an incredibly powerful tool, we want to try and be subtle and intentional. If we want to fade, then we just focus on that fade and we want to try and make things that are not so dramatic. So not always using the loudest possible volume, the quietest possible volume, or going in between those really, really quickly. And remembering that when the number says 0. 0, that is a nice balanced level that we can try to aim for when we're doing automation. Great, so let's move on. The second part of this lesson we're going to look at developing texture in your composition. So composers can also develop their composition by changing the texture. From a previous lesson you might remember that texture refers to the layers and the different layers at any one time during a piece of music. We're going to listen to a piece of music now, and I want you to describe how the texture changes throughout this clip of minimalism. I want you to use the words thick and thin to describe it. So if you think there are lots of layers, you'll say that the texture is thick. If you think that there are not very many layers, then you would say that the texture is thin. Again, to listen to this clip, please pause the video now head to the slides, press the listen button and once you're finished, close the tab, come back to the video and press play. So you might have said that the texture in that piece got thicker and then thinner at the end. There are various possibilities to changing the texture in your composition, and we're going to watch a video that shows some of those possibilities. Now let's look at how we can develop the texture in the second section of our composition. We know that texture means how many layers of sound are heard at one time. And in our first lesson we had a good at developing the texture of our percussion instruments up here where we created some contrast between thin textures, like where we have only two parts playing here, and thick textures where like about seven we have six different tracks playing at the same time. So now we're just going to do the exact same thing, but using rather than a percussion untuned instruments, we're going to use our tuned instruments with the ostinati that we've created from bar 17 to 32. So my first thought is when I get to bar 17, what do I want to happen there? Do I want a thin texture or a thick texture? Now 'cause my ostinati change here, I think what I want to do is to create some contrast with the thick texture at the end of bar 16. So instead I'm going to have a thin texture here I'm going to choose a couple of ostinati that I'm going to have playing on their own to begin with. So I might start with my harp and my toy glockenspiel at first. Then what I can do is I'm going to gradually introduce some of my other ostinati. So maybe next up I will bring in just about brass. Then two bars later I can bring in future strings. And then at bar 23, I think I'll bring in my base part, my agile synth base. So we've got a gradually thickening texture and then it becomes quite thick in this section here. I could also do some copy and paste like I did between bar nine and bar 17 up here where I have alternating bars of some of my ostinati with the gaps in between with rests in between. So I might for example, decide, okay, at bar 25, let's take out future strings. Let's maybe keep just about brass playing. Then I'm going to do some right click copy, right click paste to alternate these for a few bars. So now right click copy that one, right click and paste, and then I can keep that pattern going and then maybe at the end I'll have them playing together. I could also do this something similar with these. So maybe I decide that I take out the toy glockenspiel about 25, but then bring it in at 29 so that at the end we have this nice thick texture. Let's have a quick listen to what these sound like. (bright music) (bright music) (bright music) I am happy with the text I created there. I've got some sections of thin texture and some thicker sections and lots of contrast and variety in there as well, which means that although I'm just using the same ostinati over and over, it makes it sound interesting and engaging. One thing to check when you do this is that for each region you make sure that if you move it or copy it starts on a bar line like this one here, not after or before a bar line like that. And that way it'll make sure that all your parts stay in time and they sound good together. You might also decide to have a go varying the texture in your percussion instruments, which I've not done in this video, but that would add another layer of interest to what's going on in this second section from our 17 to 32. What is texture? How loud or quiet the different parts are altogether, how different instruments are playing together, or how many layers of sound can be heard together? A, B, or C? Well done if you said C. Remember the texture refers to the different layers of sound that could be heard together. And remember crucially, it's not the amount of instruments, it's the amount of different layers being heard at the same time. We've got a quick true or false question here as well. The texture of this clip is thick. To listen to this, please pause the video and press the listen button in the slides and then come back to this video and press play and we'll go through the possible answers. So true or false, well done if you said false. Now let's justify our answer. A, I can hear many layers of sound together, or B, I can hear only a few layers of sound together. Well done if you said B. I can hear only a few layers of sound together and that's why we said that it was false. What about this one? The texture of this clip gets thicker. Again, to listen to the clip, you should pause the video here and enter to the slides and press the listen button and then return to this video and press play when you're ready to go through the answers. For this one well done if you said true. Again, let's justify our answer. Was it true because A, more players gradually joined in, or B, because players gradually stopped playing? Well, if we said it was true, then we would expect the there to be more players gradually joining in, hence the texture getting thicker as more layers were added. Well done if you got that right. That brings us onto the second task of this lesson where we will develop the texture in the second section of your composition. The success criteria should is as follows, you will create some contrast between thicker and thinner textures. All the regions will start on beat one of a bar and you have two clear sections. The first section, one to 16 where we've vary the dynamics and bar 17 to 32 where we've buried the texture. Every sound should still be heard clearly throughout the piece. You have your success criteria and instructions. You might want to flip back to the first video I showed you. If not, you can pause the video here on this slide to refer to the success criteria. Once you've finished, as before, save your work, come back to this video and press play when you're ready to move on. With the second part of task two, I want you to study the image below. Based on the image, how could this composer use texture more effectively? Well done if you said something similar to they should have some areas of thick texture because they're mostly thin at the moment. As I scan through, usually it's only one layer being heard at the same time and there's a moment in the middle where there are two layers heard at the same time and a moment at the end where there are three layers at the same time, they could also make sure that all of the regions start at the start of the bar at the moment, some start in the middle of a bar. I'm looking at that second toy glockenspiel sound in on the second track. Now this isn't to say that this texture is wrong, it absolutely isn't. But there's definitely more areas where we could vary the texture a little bit more in this example. So well done, if you were able to identify that. For the third part of this lesson, we are going to look at developing the structure of your composition. Structure or form is a really important part of music as it gives order to your composition. In pop songs, the structure is usually based on a verse and a chorus. For example, a song might have this structure, intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, outro. This is a very typical pop song structure and it's quite familiar and safe for a listener. We know what to expect, we know that the choruses will repeat. And it's part of the reason why pop songs are easy to remember, because it is easy for our brains to think of the different sections and know that there's lots of repetition in the rhyming schemes, the chords that are used, the instrumentations, it's all very in a nice neat package. However, in other styles, we often describe the structure or the form using letters. So we might have, instead of intro, verse, chorus, we might have section A and section B. Our composition has two sections. The first section we could call section A, and that would be from bar one to 16. And the second section or section B would be 17 to 32. We know that these are different sections because they are contrasting, they're quite different. A composition with an AB structure as our one does is called a binary form. And binary form has two sections. The way I like to think of the word binary and how it connects to two sections is that at the beginning of that word we have bi. You think of a bicycle that has two wheels. A binary form piece has two sections. If we repeated the A section after the B section, our structure would then become ABA, because we've repeated section A after section B. And to give us that, that third section. So an ABA structure is called ternary form, ternary. That beginning almost sounds like try, but one way I like to think about it is that we go from a section B section and then we turn around and we have that a section again. So turner form turnaround is another way that you can remember it. So binary, bi, AB. Ternary form is three sections, ABA. These are really common. But it's also worth noting that just because a piece has three sections, doesn't automatically make it ternary. Ternary doesn't mean three sections. It means the ABA structure where the first section repeats at the end. So just try hard to remember that distinction. So we're going to watch two videos now. The first video will show us how to create a ternary form. You might be able to guess how we do that considering the definitions that we've just gone through. And the second video will show us how to further develop our structure. I'm going to play these videos for you now back to back. Now I'm going to have a go at creating a ternary form in my composition. We know that a ternary form is when we have an A section, a B section, and then the A section again. So far in our composition we have an A section which is from one 16. Then we have something different, which is our B section from 17 to 32. In order to create a ternary form, all we need to do is put our A section after our B section as well. So we need to copy and paste it. So in order to do that, I'm going to select my A section, all my tracks and regions right click and copy. I'm going to put the playhead at 33. Make sure I set the top track 'cause that's where the top one will copy into. And then write click and paste. And now we have a clear A section, B section, and then back to our A section again. So that is our ternary form. There are a few ways we can now go on to further develop our minimalist composition and the structure in particular. So far we have a ternary form. We have A section, B section, and then A section again. If you were to extend your composition, we could add a new section starting above 49. A simple thing to do would be to copy our B section. So we then have A B, A, B. However, we could do some more interesting things. For example, we could create some new ostinati for this section here, following the same process that we use for our A and B section, improvising on the D minor pentatonic scale, create some ostinati, or looping them for 16 bars up to about 65. Create some variety in the texture and in the dynamics as well. That's one thing we could do. We could also choose some of the ostinati that we've already used in our A and B section and mix them together in this new section. So for example, I might decide to take, let's say these two ostinati from my B section, copy them in into this new section. And maybe I'll decide to take these two here from my A section and copy them in as well. I can maybe take some of my percussion patterns, copy them in as well, and I could just see what that sounds like. It might work, it might not work at all. I might need to change one or two of them. I might need to swap one of them out for another one. But by mixing and matching there, we can create something new by just combining the ostinati that we've already created in our A and B sections. So if you've created your ternary form, you've got some nice variety and texture and you've done some variety in your dynamics as well, go ahead and have a go at creating a new section. You can create some new ostinati, you can reuse some of your old ones. Develop the texture, develop the dynamics, choose some interesting instruments, and see how you can finish your composition. So let's go through some questions now. What is the structure? Is it's A, the quality of a sound, B, how many layers are heard at the same time, C, the length of a piece of music, or D, the order of the different sections. Well done if you said D, the order of the different sections, the quality of the sound we might call timbre or seniority. The layers we've been talking about that being referring to a word, texture. So the order of the different sections refers to the structure. So well done for getting that. Which of these is a binary form? Is it A, A, B, AB, C, ABC, or D, ABA. Lots of letters there. It might just be easier to look at that if you can. Which of these is a binary form? Well done if you said B, AB. We've got those two sections and they are different sections, hence the A and the B. Well done. What is the name of an ABA structure? Is it A, binary B, trinary, C, threenary, or D, ternary? Well done if you said D, ternary. And remembering that the ABA structure after the B section, we turn around and hear that a section again, so well done if you remembered that. That brings us on to task C where we're going to create a ternary form or an ABA structure piece and explore ways to develop your structure further. So for our success criteria, we're going to make sure that you have three clear sections, bar one to 16, A 17 to 32 B, and then a repetition of the first section, the A section between bars 33 and 48. Your first and third sections should be the same. They're both A sections and we need to think about further development of our structure. So with the additional section from bar 49, you could create some new ostinati. We've looked at lots of ways to do that. You could use some of your ostinati from the A and B sections and you can develop the texture and dynamics using automation or layering in different ways. This task is a long one and I hope you do enjoy it. Pause this video to complete it. Once you've finished, save your work, come back here and press play for the second part of this task. So I hope you enjoyed doing that. And you are ready for the second part of this task. Look at the project below. What does this student still need to do to create a ternary form? Remember a ternary form, it's three sections, A, B, and A, where the the first and the third sections are the same. So looking at this project, where can we see what the pupil needs to do? Well done if you said that they need to copy all of the tracks into the new A section. At the moment they've only copied the upper track, not the lower tracks. So the marimba, high risk plot, classical guitar, string ensemble, and glitter noises need copy and pasting at bar 33. So well done if you spotted that. That brings us to the end of this lesson. So let's do a quick recap. Minimalist composers develop their compositions by varying different aspects, including the dynamics and the texture. That's the volume and the layers within the piece. This allows them to create some contrast and keeps the music engaging while still using their repeating ostinati. We describe texture, using the words thick or thin. Binary form, AB, and ternary form, ABA, are very common structures in music. So that's all from me in this unit, minimalist composition. Hope you enjoyed it and that you are proud of the piece that you have created. And I'll see you in the next one.