History Of Electric Music

Who Is My Focus?

My focus is Mathew Bellamy well known for his rock band 'Muse'. More importantly the Kaoss pad FX unit that he has built into his guitar to control midi controllers. This is a very interesting way in which he uses tech in performance and because its been revolutionary in his sound its made me want to study it. This is a good focus because Matt Bellamy uses this in his performances to create so many different sounds as well as being a show off toy its make for a great performance as well as a great sound.

Why Have I chosen them?
I have chosen this as my focus because I am a huge fan of his band 'Muse'. I find the sounds that he creates incredible and would love to know more about how he makes them. I also love the way he manages to incorporate these sounds into the music and also performs this in a spontaneous way.


Matt's Background as a musician

Matt Bellamy was born into a very musical family. His father was George Bellamy who was part of the British instrumental band 'The Tornadoes' in the 60's who were the first British band to have a number 1 in america with the song 'Telstar'.
Bellamy moved to Teignmouth, Devon in the mid 80's where he did his first musical performance at the age of 12 on the piano.



A fews year later Matt Bellamy learned the electric guitar and got into the punk scene that was going on at the time. He got together with Dominic Howard and played in a few bands called Carnage Mayhem and Gothic Plague. After these bands broke up they asked Christopher Walstenhome to join their new band, Rocket Baby Dolls. When they won the school Battle of the Bands they decided to make new more professional band which is where Muse was created. Matt Bellamy also spent a few of his early years in Muse learning to play Spanish guitar which can be heard in Muse's track 'Map of Your Head'. This has a slight Spanish style.

Early Muse


Matt Bellamy
















Matt Bellamy has invented a very cool set up for controlling midi inside his guitar and uses this to create incredible sounds and enhance his live performance.
He uses whats called a kaoss pad to control midi parameters that are set up in his rig. The Kaoss pad had a X and Y axis and these are assigned to the parameters of effects such as filters and even feedback control. This gives him such versatility to add strange effects and play around and improvise live to make the performance more interesting.



Feedback Control -

You can see in this video below where Bellamy uses the controlled feedback on his guitar as a part of his performance to entertain the crowd.



Matt started using Manson electric guitars which was where he could start collaborating with Hugh Mason to create the perfect guitar for him. Hugh Manson owns a guitar factory/store in Exeter. He and Matt Bellamy have been working together for year to enables Matts creative ideas excel through a costume guitar that enables him to do so.
This style has enabled him to create a new sound that have revolutionised Muse and Matt as a guitarist. He is considered as one of the best guitarists of him time yet he continues to create new and exciting way to bring technology into performance.

I have seen Muse play live a couple of times and Mr. Bellamy is always using this technology and turning into an entertaining performance. The band have always been on top of the latest technology when putting on stadium tours and large arena shows such as the first 4K concert film released in 2013. Matt Bellamy uses the kaoss pad to control the effects to add an extra element to the live show that make them so exciting to watch.

In interviews he has said that he hugely influenced by the band rage against the machine who are another 90's punk rock band. Matt also takes huge influences from Jimmy Hendrix and his playing style has had a massive impact of matt to create these new and iconic sounds as well as the original playing style. I think that Matt Bellamy has taken the way these older songs were played and how Hendrix used to create such incredible tones and effects with pedals and he's has taken this and placed it in the modern world of technology and then given it his own burst of life.

Individual Practise Strategy

What is your primary instrument?

My primary instrument is the drums.

What is your current practice routine? [i.e how often and for how long?  Do you warm up?  Do you practise scales/modes or any specific techniques?  Do you work on a particular piece or just jam?

My current practise routine consists of a varied palette of exercises and practises. I try to warm up as much as I can starting with slow movements building up and slowing down to get my feet and arms working. Its important to warm up when playing the drums as it really is possible to harm yourself if you don't especially if you are playing for hours at a time. I find that practising technique and having 'jam time' is all important. Like having a balanced diet you need to have a balanced practised routine including the jam time where you can just let loose and play to your iPod and have fun because I find it important to play along with the styles that you like as well as playing to the music that you have loved that got you playing from the beginning.

What skills to you specifically want to improve? 

Specific skills I want to is of course all the basics which can always be improved such as stick control and rudiments which will always make you a better player but something I am quite keen to improve would be my palette. By this I mean how versatile I am and how I can use the drums in ways thats other people would necessarily always think of. I think it's important to be able to use what you have in te most creative ways and this is something specific I want to improve.

Devise an effective practice strategy that will improve technical ability, explaining how this will help you and why. 

I have been using a rehearsal plan which enables me to practise all parts to practising from genre building to rudiments. This is a plan for each day you rehearse giving you specific things to work on. This is very effective because it allows you to find what works for you and which part of practising you enjoy more and you can adapt it anyway you like. I like to try and practise all areas including stick technique and building speed but there's also time for jamming to song and playing with other musicians.

Jazz Gig Preparation - Grant

Equipment List



Microphones:

2 x Shure SM58

I have gone for the Shure SM57 dynamic microphones for the vocals as I am aware of their capabilities and reliability as a live vocal microphone. As they are dynamic this reduces the amount of bleed from other instruments. They also provide a very directional polar pattern called cardioid which means it only captures sound that in made into the top of the microphone and stop anything from other sides. This is great for live sound when you want to isolate each sound as much as you can.

1 x Sennheiser e609
I am micing up the guitar am because I would like to have some guitar coming through the PA so I can have a more balanced mix. Also with jazz everyone tends to play quite soft especially a clean guitar sound. If the amp alone doesn't quite give enough by micing it I can put it through the PA and help get a more rounded mix. I have gone for the e609 on the guitar amp as this microphone is a dynamic microphone designed especially for guitar amps and cabs due to the shape of the diaphragm. This microphone has a square body with flat sides meaning it can sit right up against a guitar cab flat. This also mean you don't need to use a stand because you can just hang it over the top of the guitar amp hanging infant of the speaker.


1 x Shure SM57
I have gone for the Shure SM57 for the double bass. I am not sure yet whether the Upright Bass is needed but I thought I would plan for it. The SM57 is great for any music and instrument recording and capturing. I thought I would use this on the upright because it will capture a great amount of the low end and cut through the mix fantastically because of the dynamic cardio pattern. Other options for this would be a bud microphone to clip onto the upright bass or in some cases the bass does have a pick up.


2 x Blue DI
1 x Green DI

The DI Boxes are for the electric and acoustic guitar and the keyboard. The reason I have chosen to use the Di box is to be able to match all my signals coming into the desk. These instruments are all giving an instrument or line level which is not what we wan. With a DI we can change the signal from instrument or line level to microphone level which matches the microphone signals coming in. It also means all the connections coming into the desk are all XLR and makes it much easier to visualise if you have a problem.


2 x Loud Speaker
2 x Sub

These are the main FOH PA speakers and subs. These will be used for the audience so they can hear the all the musicians. This is very important because the balance need to b right other wise you audience is not going to be able to hear everything which could weaken the performance.

4 x Floor Monitor
I have chosen to use 4 floor wedges. This is so that the band can all hear themselves. This is also very important because when you're performing without these its very hard to play properly when you can't hear the other musicians I think this is very important in jazz. I'm an using the 2 outputs from the amp to power  2 sets of 2 monitors. Each pair will be linked with a speakon cable.

7 x Power Sockets

I need 7 on stage plugs for this set up which means I need to make sure that thats available before the show starts. Power points are a massively important feature thats easily forgotten about. 

1 x Mixer
The mixer will be there to receive all the incoming signal and be used to send single back out in a controlled way. We can also use the mixer to balance levels on the audio signal in several speakers.

2 x Amp
We have 2 amps in place for this gig. One is to power the FOH speakers and subs, the other is to power the fold back monitors. These are very important. This does mean that our speakers and monitors are all passive as they are being powered from an external amplifier.



9 x XLR - XLR
5 x Balanced Jack - Jack


I will be needing at least 9 XLR cables on stage, maybe more  just in case. These are for the microphones and the DI boxes. I will also need 5 jack to jack cables for the instrument.

Project Plans - Phil

Introduction

I am an producer as well as a musician. My goals as a musician are to forward the work of my band creating new music. I have used some of our work for this project. My goals as a producer are to sharpen my skills and have a good understand of producing good records and know a good amount about it as in the career of a musician you are always going to be spending time a studio so it would be really good to understand the process well and be able to give educated opinions at any circumstance in my career. I would like to be able to happily know that I can work any console I come across and know the main feature and know that I can produce a great record. This is a great skill to have as it can earn you money in the future. 

Realistically I see myself holding a few roles in the music industry as I think that these days its key. I don't think I will go full time into producing band are artists in a recording studio but I would like to get a good amount of experience in venues doing live sound as I have a greater interest in this at the moment and maybe working with a band pull time would be a really great way to get amazing at live sound. 

I also see myself as a musician for a while playing drums in bands and recording and playing live gig is especially what I want to do. 

I also have a massive passion for recording live performances which is the best of both worlds really. I think as a musician I will probably avoid a few genres as I think it can be hard to express yourself through an instrument when you are performing music you don't like. I am always open to new things so it really depends what it is at the time. 

Content

The content of my EP will include some rock tracks that I have recorded with my band but also a folk track that I have started recording. I quite like the idea of recording folk as its very organic and acoustic and you can almost be very lazy when recording and mixing because you want the sound to be as fresh as possible.

Collaboration / Studio roles

I plan to work with a few of my class peers that can help me produce and engineer each session. I think they can bring music ideas to my project as well as engineering techniques they could enhance the track. I plan to use my band to record the parts for the song I have for them but I will probably record my brother for the folk track. I plan to use a few class peers to help the sessions run smoothly and make sure things are sounding on track.

Production teams

When recording the music performance students, depending on the size of the band, having around 3 people in the studio working as engineer and producer and spare pair of hands are always helpful when running large sessions. Making sure everything is ready to go and prepared as much as possible before the artists arrive this will help to make the session run smoothly. Possibly having Shai in the studio could be helpful to make sure everyone has what they need, the musicians are comfortable and ready to perform their best. Shai can also help with making sire the studio is well equipped and ready to have a large session run in it before the musicians arrive.

Equipment list

The equipment that we use will depend on the session, on who is playing, what genre and what you want the end result to sound like. its important to have a great equipment list before your start because then you know what you need and you already know who is using what and any engineer that is working that day will be able to see from plans made my the engineer and producer what microphones he wants and exactly how this record is going to be made. 

Future plans

I will use the finish product as a very good demo CD that I can use as promotion and put on a list of experience that people are going to want to see if you are looking for studio work or engineering work. This will be a great tool for me as a musician as well as a producer. This will give you a strong sense of purpose when working on the music.

Beginners Guide To Synthesis

Waves

Waves Types

In the basic form of synthesis you will start with a pure sound wave. This is called a sine wave. A sine wave is a sound wave that only consists of 1 frequency. This wave can only be produced by man.

Sine Wave

Sine waves can be very useful in synthesis as they give a very precise frequency and tone. People will not normally use this on its own but they will use it to create some great sounds once putting it through different processes to create the sounds that they want. Here we have an image of the frequencies that a sine wave if producing. Although Logic is showing that a few frequencies are playing here, a sine wave is just a single frequency with no harmonics. Logic is a little inaccurate here but I shows the basic principals.

Square Wave

Sawtooth Wave

Square waves. A square wave is another pure wave form but this time its made from several harmonics to make up its tone. This is a bit more crunchy and distorted then a sine wave. It can be more useful to start with depending on what sound you are looking for. This wave looks like like a square rather than a regular curved sine wave. This is what gives it a massively different tone to a sine wave. All these waves have different tones because of their shape and that gives you different starting points to shape and modify your sounds.

The third sound wave type is a saw or sawtooth wave. This again is made up of many harmonics that create an even more fuzzy sound which is another way to start off a sound. A saw wave is very similar to a square wave its just more fuzzy and crunchy in tone. This wave is made up of sharp jaggy lines like a saw which gives this wave its tone.  You would use this if you wanted to make something quite distorted maybe a bass line as this tone can be good for distorted bass.

Triangle Wave

Finally you have triangle waves which look like
little triangles. This one is not at all as fuzzy and crunchy as the square or sawtooth but its still not as plain as the sine. As you can see from the multimeter there are a few harmonics in this wave and it gives a less and more of a tones for maybe a lead. What is great about each of these waves is they all have a different character to them which can hep you pick depending on what sound you are trying to make. They all sound very different and I like how versatile you can get with them using different methods in synthesis.

Acoustic Theory (Frequency)

Sine Wave

In the drawing below it shows a sine wave and the basic parts to it.
The wavelength is determined by the length of one peak and trough of a wave. This is a called an oscillation. The bigger the wave length the lower the pitch is and the biggest the wave will be

The amplitude is the height of the wave from the centre line in which the wave oscillates above and below. The bigger the amplitude the louder the sound is.

The frequency measured in Hertz (Hz) can be calculated by the amount of times a full wave lengths happens in 1 second. For example 400Hz would mean the wave oscillates 400 times in 1 second.
When the frequency gets very low the wavelengths can get extremely long being meters long so sometimes you might not even have enough space in a room to physically produce a particular frequency without it being reflected off a wall before. Its really good to understand this when producing music, especially electronic music as it really help when putting tracks together. When you know a little science behind what you are making I think it can help make the product even better.

Filters


In synthesis you have what are called filters. These are designed to be able to literally filter out different frequencies of a bass line or any sound that you've created. There are three basic filters the first one is a 'Low Pass Filter' or (LPF). This will take away the high end of the sound allowing the high frequencies to pass through. In this video I have shown an example of the LPF on the multimeter. Low pass filter is really good if you want to just take a notch off the high end if it was getting in the way of something else in the track or if you wanted to just have more bass in your bass sound.

A high pass filter or HPF does the same things as a low pass filter but instead of cutting off the high frequencies it cuts off the low bass frequencies. This is really useful when you have a melody or a sound that had a lot of brightness but there are some frequencies that are a little to low and disruptive, its nice the just smooth them off. This is a really useful tool and I love using this even guitars as well as synths.

The last filter is the 'Band Pass Filter' (BPF). This is a more specific filter as it allows to filter out more frequencies and boost a few specific ones. This would be really good if you wanted to boost one practical part of a synth that you felt wasn't sitting in the mix just right. As well as you can choose a very specific frequency to cut. This is a bit like EQ but you can filter out a specific frequency that might be getting in the way of a vocal. This is a very useful tool I have found.

Whats great about the filtering features is that they allow you to shape your sounds and create musical interest by automating the LPF, HPF and BPF. This is not just select to electronic and synths which is great. I have even used LPF in my band when I have cut off the high end and allowed it to build up for when the song builds up. This is what  I love about the filters is that it has so any uses and can be applied to so many genres and styles for music interest too as well from an engineers view when mixing. 
Envelopes

Envelopes

An envelope is another way of manipulating a sound. It is a feature that you will very often find on any synth. An envelope normally has 4 main things you can change and these will be effecting the lengths of the sound which I will explain now. You have 4 tools in and ADSR envelope. This stands for ATTACK, DECAY, SUSTAIN and RELEASE.

It is a way to automate different aspects of the synth sound. The attack, decay and release are all time parameters where as the sustain is an amount or level parameter.

Attack: This is the first bit of your sound. The attack parameter determines the speed the attack takes to reach the loudest part. The fader that adjusts this determines how quickly this happens. If you have a really short attack with the fader down at the bottom, as soon as you hit the ket your sound will shoot to max velocity. If you were to put it right at the top you would get an almost fade in and the attack would gradually build up. This is the firsts part of your sound and how quickly you want to be able to hear it is determined by the attack. 

Decay: Decay is the second part of your sound this is the point in which the sound is at its loudest and the decay its how long it takes to go from the loudest point to the start of the sustain. A short decay will have a sudden drop to the sustain level. A long decay will have a slow fade down the the sustain level. This is a really important part of the sound. 

Sustain: Sustain is not a time parameter but is a level parameter. The sustain is infinite time. The time of your sustain depends on how long you hold your note. The fader controls the volume of the sustain not the length of time it holds for, you do that with your finger. This happens after the attack and decay.

Release: This is the very end of the sound where your finger comes off the key and depending on how long you set the release to is how long the sound will last for. As soon as your finger comes off the key the sound will start to release, if you had the fader to the bottom it would cut off as soon as you remove your finger. If you were to put it right to the top the release would last for a very long time before fading out. if you were making a melody you probably wouldn't have the release for too long but you also might not want it to cut off immediately. This allows you to control how long the sound releases for which is a massive part in creating your synth sounds.

ADSR Wave

Envelope Settings

Here is the settings that I have put to create a clear wave form where you can see all four parts. The steep up at the start is the attack which was around middle. The decay is the down steep also at middl. The sustain is the song straight, this is how long I have held the key for. The release is the tail that fades to 0.

LFOs/Routing

The Low Frequency Oscillator or LFO is a way of controlling the sounds in the synth. The LFO doesn't actually make sounds on its own it has a set of controls that you can use to control different parts of the synth. 

The LFO is there to create a rhythmic pulse that you assign different tools that you want the pulse to effect such as volume, pan or filters. You can assign this LFO to synced which is in time with your tempo of the track. For example this would work really well if you wanted to have a siren sound that was in time with the track because you could have a LFO controlling the pitch to make the siren sound and then another one if wanted it to match the drum tempo. This feature is really good for that. You can also set it up the pan, which means you could have a synth sound that would be panning left and right in time with your track or not if you didn't want it to because its also can be set to free custom timing. This is good if you don't want it to match the tracks tempo.

As well as having these features the LFO in logic has a great routing system meaning you can link 10 things to the LFO at the same time on this particular synth

I have been using all of these features that I have spoken about in many different ways and they are all great. They can be used for so many different things and in so may different ways.

I have been using the filters myself outside of synthesis for a more mixing technique on guitars. I have used them to take out the high frequencies and slowly bring them in for a musical interest. The point is that although in synthesis these are important tools they can also be used outside of this but in very similar ways. This has really helped me come into the world on synthesis confident because I have used these tools in similar ways which in theory you are doing the same thing to it. 

By learning the basics to synthesis it has completely opened up possibilities in music production and also gives you wider knowledge of what is actually happening and how you can recreate sound that you hear. 

Having a good understanding of the basic scientific ways in which sound works is also a massive help because it enables you to visualise what is happening and give you a better understanding of what you are working with. 

Images from:
www.songsofthecosmos.com
classicalgaming.wordpress.com
http://en.wikipedia.org
people.ece.cornell.edu
www.allacronyms.com