Andrew Rostas - All Things Musical

Session with Lesle Lewis

2012-01-25T11:22:00.001+11:00

Wow! Almost a whole year has gone by with out a single post on my poor music blog! Rest assured that I have not been doing nothing. 2011 was a huge year full of wonderful things, just not a lot of them musically oriented.

Now where was I??..

Last week I had the pleasure of doing a session at The Base studios in South Melbourne. It was a two day session with Indian producer/composer/musician Lesle Lewis. Others involved were local musicians Luke Hodgson (bass), Leigh Fisher (drums) and Marcel Yammouni (guitar). First of all, it was an absolute pleasure to play with these musos. I think the thing that I appreciate the most about good musicians when they play is the communication through physical gesture, aural interaction and just nutting out an arrangement on the fly. Big shout out to Phil Threlfall at The Base for being an all round legend!

Musically, the session was quite interesting because Lezz was trying to weave a delicate blend of western influence into his music. The result was like a western accompaniment to an Indian melody. I found it really interesting listening to how subtle some of the differences were between western melody and Indian melody, yet the differences give distinctly different flavors of melody and phrasing.

Lezz running us through one of his songs at The Base

I'm not yet sure exactly what Lezz has planned for these songs that we recorded last week, but I'm really curious to hear the finished product. He was taking them back to his studio in India to record vocals and mix.

I'll keep you posted.

- Andrew

Timothy Cannon Album Finally Available

2011-02-02T00:51:00.000+11:00

Well it's been about a year since we started working on Timothy Cannon's first solo album and I'm happy to say that it's now available for listening and purchasing on iTunes, Amazon and a number of other online music retailers.
We are all super happy with how it all came out and can't wait for you all to hear it.

To help you get a bit of a feel for the album and how it progressed, we put together some little video snippets throughout the recording process.

Last but not least, here is a sneak-peak at one of the tracks off the album. The song, "Coming Home" gives you a good snapshot of what the album is like arrangement and sentiment wise. Hope you like it.

Preview track: Coming Home by Timothy Cannon

We hope to start playing gigs around Melbourne and hopefully make it to other cities around Australia to promote the album and eventually get some physical copies of the album out too.

Till that time though, you can buy the album digitally from the link below. Thanks for reading.

- Andrew

Back Back Forward Punch EP Launch

2010-05-25T00:24:00.000+10:00

A few months ago now I helped out a great electro band called "Back Back Forward Punch". I recorded vocals for their single "What Do We Do" and assisted with some of the structural elements of the song. You can hear the finished product in the link below.

What Do We Do? by Theory Works

Also on the topic of Back Back Forward Punch was their actual EP launch which they did in conjuncture with Kiss FM. It was a great launch sitting in a nice little courtyard with the afternoon sun streaming in with cold beer and warm pizza in hand listening to a live broadcast set from the electro three piece. You can watch highlights from the launch in the video below, which includes a great cover of the John Farnham song, "Age of Reason" to which I also recorded the backup vocals for! =)

If you get the chance, I'd recommend getting along to see these guys!

- Andrew

Some Interesting Things

2010-05-02T12:58:00.000+10:00

Hi All,

It's been a while since I've posted anything here but that doesn't mean that I've been sitting on my proverbial, doing nothing. We are getting very close to finally mixing the Tim Cannon album which is very exciting. I've been involved with a little demo session for an artist called Michelle Payne which turned rather well, and I have started playing with a Melbourne based band called Goodbye Motel. So, all in all, I've been rather busy.

Though, rather than go into the details of any of those projects, I thought I would share a few interesting things that I've found on the interwebs.

The first thing I want to share with you is a podcast from CDBABY, called the DIY MUSICIAN PODCAST. I'm pretty sure that I have mentioned this before in one of my posts but it's such a wealth of knowledge and ideas for the DIY musician, I can't recommend it enough. They are up to episode 90 right now and it's well worth listening to all the back episodes. I've gone to the trouble of making an iTunes link (below) so you can go and download all the episodes so you can listen to them on the way to work.

The other thing that I wanted to share with you is an interview with Dave Allen on 'Music Business - Musicians on the Internet: Strategy Vs Tactics'. I was put onto it via the DIY Musician Blog which is run in tandem with the podcast mentioned above. It's another great source of information and inspiration. Anyway, the interview below is in 4 parts so be sure to watch them all. And a little note about the videos, the sound is very quiet so be sure to listen with headphones.

Hope you found this information interesting and I look forward to telling you more about what I am doing in music.

- Andrew

Creating an Album on a Budget

2010-01-16T01:01:00.000+11:00

During the second half of 2009, I was involved with co-producing and recording an album of singer/song-writter Tim Cannon. I have written about various stages of the process in previous posts on my blog (here, here, here & here). This was the first time that I had been involved with recording an album in this way and I have found it to be a very effective way to maximise creativity in arrangements whilst also keeping budget constraints in check.

There were a number of steps in our approach which I will outline below. While this process may not be possible or practical for everybody, I certainly found it a very rewarding way to create/record an album.

To take this approach you need a small amount of additional gear, however most musicians own, (or have access to) this gear already. Items and skills that you will need include:

- Basic DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) in the form of a computer running an audio recording program (such as Logic, Pro Tools, CuBase etc). The program you have isn't THAT important. Sure, it's nice if you have the same program as the studio has but your knowledge of the software you use is much more important. More on this later.

- A decent microphone (condenser usually), to capture the sound

- A decent audio interface (sound card), to convert the audio into digital information.

- Time, &

- Imagination

This equipment can be purchased for under $5000AUD. While that may sound like a lot of money, think of how far that would stretch if you were in a cheaper studio paying $400-600 per day, let alone a professional studio (upwards of $800 per day). You can see that it doesn’t take long before your equipment has paid for itself.

So anyway, where was I?

Ah yes, the first step was to get a basic demo of the material to be recorded. For this process, I got Tim to come around to my place (my home studio is our second bedroom) and basically got him to play a gig for me. I set up my two microphones (Rode NT3 on the guitar and the Rode NT2-A for his voice) to capture the sound clearly, but without making too much fuss about it. After all, these were just going to be the demos for the band. As Tim was quite used to performing solo gigs, this process was very easy to do and went without a hitch.

After listening to the demos over the rest of the week, we started to get an idea of most of the songs. Which ones were going to be straight forward to arrange in a band ensemble, and which ones were going to need a little more work. My good friend Stew, whom I’ve played in bands with for nearly 10 years and I, got together to ‘nut out’ some of these songs. I wrote a blog entry back in September about one of these songs (High Hopes) and put a number of audio examples up so that you can hear the song progressing through the different stages of production. Workshopping song ideas in an environment where you are not paying by the minute (i.e. a recording studio) is a huge bonus. It allows you to really relax into trying ideas and it also gives you the freedom to scrap them if after a week, you don’t like them. Once we were happy with the overall arrangement ideas of the songs, we workshopped them with the band. Now, this may seem like an unnecessary step, but it’s one that will save you a lot of time in the studio. You should only go into the studio once the whole band (or everyone who will be recording) has a clear idea of what they are playing. So much time is wasted in recording studios debating song structures, which chords to play, what guitar tone to use etc etc. If you can go in to the recording studio with a clear idea of what you want to play and how you want it to sound, you’re more than halfway there. A good practice to get into is to record each band session as much as possible and listen back to the recordings while making notes. It doesn’t have to be a great recording, just good enough so that you can hear the song. There are plenty of portable stereo recorders out there which you can buy for a few hundred dollars which are fantastic. Just remember that you might have to do a test recording to make sure that the band/ensemble is balanced in the recording. Play around with amp levels and placement of the recorder till you get something that you’re happy with. You might just find that magical drum fill or melody which may have been played by accident which you think, ‘that’s it! That has just made the song complete!‘ It’s amazing how often you find the really good things in an otherwise ordinary rehearsal recording.

We now had the basic band ‘beds’ (the basic drums, bass, piano and acoustic guitar arrangements) ready to roll and had booked a weekend in our favorite studio to lay down the beds of the ten album tracks.

After we had recorded the beds of the ten album tracks, I loaded the files onto an external HDD so that we could continue working on additional tracks or layers back at my home studio where we weren’t paying by the minute. This is the part where you need a little bit of “technical know-how”. You need to make sure that you are able to open or import the song sessions from the studio, onto your home studio setup. You should also talk to your engineer about what settings he would like you to record with (things like sample rate and BIT depth). While there are obvious benefits from recording things at the professional recording studio, rather than at your home studio, there is still a lot that can be done in your home studio. Having this time and freedom to explore all the creative potentials of the song arrangements while saving up money for the professional studio is a great use of time and a really good way to keep the momentum of the project up. We recorded all the keyboard and organ parts at home as they were straight from my keyboard with no microphone required. Most other additional layers were recorded, or demoed at home with the knowledge that they would be re-recorded later in the real studio. Again, knowing exactly what you are going to record going into a recording session saves HEAPS of time. Preparation is key! As a musician, I can’t remember how many times I have read that in magazine articles, on studios websites etc but I never really paid too much attention to it. So with the hope that it helps even one person have a better, more productive recording session, get organised!

We booked another weekend at the recording studio and went in armed with an external HDD of audio files and a check list of ‘to dos’ (see example below).

From Blogger Pictures

Having completed all but a few main vocals, the project just needs to be mixed. I hope that this has given you an insight into a slightly different way to create an album. As you can see, we have had many months of pre-production and production and to my knowledge, have paid for approximately 6 days in the studio. I encourage you to sit down and talk about how you are going to attack your next recording session. Be it an EP or an album. Discuss it amongst your band mates and your engineer (once you have decided where you want to record). Most engineers are happy to help out independent musicians when they can, especially if they can see that you are going to be easy to work with and organised during the recording sessions. Remember, recording an album should be an exciting time, a creative time and an enjoyable process. Don’t cheat yourself out of it by wasting time unnecessarily and therefore stressing about not completing the recording or worrying that you’ll have to book another day and that will put you over budget etc. It’s not worth it.

- Andrew

Discussion Topic

2009-11-15T00:01:00.004+11:00

An interesting article (right-click title and open link in a new tab/window to read the article). I've read a little bit about the whole loudness war and am a fan of the movement "TurnMeUp". I strongly believe that the essence of music is not only sound, but also the absence of sound. It's the absence of sound which makes sound [when present] special, just as in without darkness, there would be nothing special about light (and vice versa). My own experience in listening to music, is that I prefer uncompressed, or less compressed music. If I want to hear it loud, I turn up the volume. There is a lot of talk about the loudness war being another attempt to literally "rise above the noise level" of the radio station, as no one wants to be the quiet artist on the radio.

I think that if your prime target audience is people listening to the radio as they are doing something else (i.e. background listening) then this makes sense to a degree. BUT, a song still has to be good right? Being loud is not a trait that people associate as a positive for a song on its own.

This brings me to the second part of the discussion which is the current trend of 'capturing' the impossibly perfect performance. Consumers (yes people who listen to music are also consumers) today demand high quality products. The same way that advertising and marketing bend the truth as far as they can without actually lying to put the product in the best possible light against the competition.

This gets the product through stage one, which is the purchase by the consumer. However, like music, if the product is no good, the consumer will usually figure this out and look for something else which better meets their needs. Perhaps this is why pop music is such a consumable thing in our world today. My personal opinion about the impossibly perfect performance being captured is this: On one hand, I feel that as a documentation process, a recording should be what is intended and nothing less. If a wrong note is played or a beat is dropped then, if it is consequential or detrimental to the song/art, you should try your best to fix this. There does come a point though when (if you are fixing all the mistakes) a recording does start to loose that human feel about it. It's a very intangible, but there is definitely a point when a recording stops being human and starts sounding computerised and cold. I guess you have to decide whether you are creating music/art for the sake of the art or if you are trying to create it to fit in a pre-determined place in which to do so you must follow standard practices.

As the development of modern recording and editing techniques progress, it might seem that REAL musicians are less and less needed. You have programs like Fruity Loops, Logic, Pro Tools and hundreds of other plugins/software instruments etc which make it easy to approximate what a real musician would do. But what they will never be able to do is create, synthesise or simulate that "x" factor and that "vibe" that happens when a group of musicians get together and create music. Warts and all.

I hope that there is a back-lash of people demanding the return of 'real' musicians/artists. Already, there is a movement stirring in the Australian Government which would require artists who plan to lip-sync during a concert to put a disclaimer on their tickets. I think that this would be a great thing as it would really highlight the difference between a musician and a pop-star, pro-tools entertainer to the general public.

I wonder, where can we go from here? Music seems to be reaching the limit of loudness and compression and pop music is so 'perfect' that it all starts to sound the same. I think the real beauty in all art forms is not what is normal or expected, it's the surprise of the unexpected which really gets that "wow" reaction. No human is perfect, why should we demand that anything that we create is.

What's your opinion on the topic? Please leave your comments.

- Andrew

Tim Cannon Producing In a Little More Detail

2009-09-22T14:29:00.013+10:00

I thought I might talk in a little more detail about one of the songs on Tim Cannon's album and the changes that have been made to the song during the production process. The song which I think has undergone considerable change is 'High Hopes'. Originally, I considered this song to be a bit of an adult trapped in a childs body with refined melody and lyrics, with harmony that to me, didn't do them justice.
Below is a sample of the original recording made as a demo of the song.

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First thing we set about doing was removing the acoustic guitar and reharmonising the melody to emphasize the emotional rise and fall of the lyrics and melody. We separated the verse and chorus harmonically by making the verses quite static, removing the dominant chords from the demo and creating a rocking harmonic movement (backwards and forwards). The release comes with the chorus. Moving to the key of the relative major the chords have much more movement. We altered a few of the chords to give it more of a dramatic feel. For example, instead of repeating the first two chords of the chorus, we went to the minor iv chord (f minor) and then back to the relative major (c major). To me, this makes the chorus sound like it's heaving like someone taking deep breaths.
Below is a sample of the original band arrangement. It's worth noting that we used the vocals from the original acoustic guitar demo. Because this was not recorded with a click, I had to cut up each phrase and place it on the grid so that I could use sampled drum kits and midi instruments and edit sections much easier. The playing on the demo is very rough but it illustrates some of the changes that I have been talking about.

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Tim was pretty happy with the transformation at this stage, so we decided to workshop "High Hopes" as a band, using this as a reference point. If you listen to the recording below you'll hear the result of the band workshop. Players were: Tim Cannon: Bass, Stewart Taylor: Acoustic Guitar, Mark Leahy: Drums & myself on Piano.

Straight away you can hear that we have done away with the brushes idea from the demo above to give it more of a drive/groove. The tempo of the song is also slightly faster to make sure that it doesn't plod along too much.

Another arrangement change that was made is to this version was the rhythms in the chorus. In the previous version (above), the guitar was strumming in 1/8 notes (quavers), strings were playing 1/4 notes (crotchets) and the piano was playing ever 2 bars. This was re-arranged into the following: Piano to play in 1/8 notes (quavers) and guitar to play in 1/4 notes (crotchets) and no strings. We decided that the aesthetics of the album didn't allow for string ensembles and so arranged the other two instruments (piano and guitar) so that each part would contrast to the verse part. However, this creates an interesting effect because throughout the entire piece, you always have the 1/8th note pulse weather it's in the hi-hats, guitar or piano. This helps to both move the song along and to create intensity.

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So, now that you have had a little insight to some of the decision making process from initial idea/demo to pre-production, you can have a listen to the current album version of "High Hopes". This is unfinished, un-mixed and un-mastered but I hope you can see the progression of the song.

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- Andrew

Thanks to Mindy McAdams for her very helpful tutorial on how to use this flash audio player.

Co-Producing with Elodie Adams

2009-09-17T23:51:00.006+10:00

I was recently in the studio co-producing with singer/songwriter Elodie Adams. We recorded three tracks in total to form her first EP. The first track (Staring Game) has an interesting blend of jazz and pop. Instrumentation is Piano, Drums, Bass and Voice. We ended up really going for a sort of swing big band vibe but with only a 4 piece band. I’m pretty happy with the way things turned out and the feel that we were able to achieve.
The second track (If You'd Let Me Love You) is just Piano and Voice. Its quite a long track with quite a free flowing waltz feel. This was quite tricky to record as there was no tempo grid so the right take had to be pretty much perfect. It has a bit of a free section in it where the piano and voice are interacting with each other in a sort of simultaneous call and response fashion.
The third song (Angel) is a slow lilting song which we had to rush due to time restraints.
You can hear the songs at Elodie Adam’s MySpace page or on iTunes.

- Andrew

Old News? Battle of the Choirs - Battle Cry

2009-09-15T12:04:00.004+10:00

Back in 2008 Channel 7 was running a choir competition called, "Battle of the Choirs". If you search YouTube for "Battle of the Choirs" you should find lots of videos of the weekly competition.

The choir who won the competition was the University of Newcastle Chamber Choir which coincidently I used to sing in back when I was living in Newcastle studying at the Newcastle University Conservatorium.

Through some of my studio contacts, I was asked if I could record the piano/keyboard parts for the album of the winning choir to be co-released with the announcement of the winner of the competition. We recorded the album with PLW in South Melbourne as instruments only with the intent that the choir would record their parts later in Sydney.

It was an interesting experience as I think there were only 2 musicians playing in the studio at any one time because of different availability. It was pretty high pressure stuff with almost no time to record. You can see a snippet of footage of me recording "Playing to Win" with Phil as the engineer below in this YouTube video.

Enjoy!

- Andrew

Shero

2009-09-13T17:42:00.004+10:00

For a number of months I've been playing with a new band called Shero. We have had a number of gigs at the Espy and Revolver at which we have been well received. Adam Shero Baluch (songwriter and front man) has his debut album under his sleeve and is continuing to write new material for album number two.

I'll be sure to post more info on Shero as it happens, but in the meantime check the Myspace and Facebook pages for upcoming show dates. You can also follow news updates about Shero by clicking on the link to the Shero Facebook page on the left of this site.

- Andrew

The Roaring Years (for now)

2009-09-13T17:27:00.007+10:00

Well, Friday 14th August saw The Roaring Years play their final gig in their hometown of Newcastle, NSW. There were over 400+ friends, family and fans who turned up for an emotional farewell.

I've been playing with The Roaring Years (formally Dirty Pink Jeans) for the last two years and before that, I was involved as a session player on their EP "Dance".

Since James and his wife have moved over to Italy to further their respective artistic careers, the band is on an unknown path. We may get together again sometime in the future, we may not. One thing that is certain though is that I have a lot of fond memories with this band and look forward to any time where we can get together again.

- Andrew

Kingbayler

2009-09-13T17:06:00.008+10:00

A little while ago I recorded some keyboard/piano parts for Kingbayler's up and coming EP, "Bleary Eyed Girls and Boys". They were recording it at one of my favourite little studios (Supersonic Recordings).

The EP is a mixture of styles from Motown inspired pop songs to brooding emotional, almost progressive songs as well as Kingbayler's well established groove/pop songs.

There are six tracks in total and it's obvious to anyone familiar with Kingbayler's earlier material that the boys are definitely broadening their musical scope and experimenting with new ideas.

They tell me that the release date will be late September/October but other than that, I don't have any more details. At the time of writing, Kingbayler's website did not have any of the new songs from "Bleary Eyed Girls and Boys" but I imagine that it will be soon.

UPDATE: The Kingbayler boys have just announced that "Bleary Eyed Girls and Boys" and their 2004 release "Sections" are up on iTunes. Below is a ling to the iTunes store where you can check 'em out.

- Andrew

Nadene Satch

2009-06-30T00:02:00.004+10:00

I've just finished mixing a little EP for good friend of mine, Nadene Satch.

It is mainly guitar and vocals but during the mixing process, organ, synth bass and backing vocals were added.

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

Check it out on her Myspace page for yourselves!

- Andrew

Composition - At The End of Our Exploring

2009-06-29T22:52:00.010+10:00

I've decided to put up an old composition for string ensemble called At The End of All Our Exploring.

I wrote this work during my final year at University when I heard that my Grandfather had been diagnosed with cancer. I didn't really know what to say at the time but this six bar choral idea (the first 6 bars of music) just came out of me while sitting at the piano one afternoon.

After the choral idea is stated initially, I start playing with the function of all four voices getting different harmonic changes by altering the function of each part. For example, in the first variation of the choral idea (starting at bar 7), the melody (Violin I) and the bass line (Cello) swap so that the original bass line is now the new melody and vice versa.

I continued experimenting with all different combinations of ideas until I had written out all the possible variations. I then placed them in an order that would give an overall structure to the mood of the piece, focusing particularly on the melody line (Violin I). Once I was satisfied with the structure, I decided that a different idea was needed to momentarily break up the continual repetition (even though it was through variations) of the original 6 bar choral idea. Bar 31 was where I decided it should go which was about half way. It starts off the same as the original theme but then momentarily goes off in another harmonic direction. This then leads into more variations until the last variation of the piece which is the original choral idea in reverse.

The title for this piece is actually taken from a poem by T.S. Eliot:
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

T.S. Eliot -- "Little Gidding" (the last of his Four Quartets)

I was reading through some short poems (I can't really remember why to be honest) and thought that this sentiment was really nice. Then I made the connection that it could also be used to describe the structure of the composition I had just completed, so I decided to title the work with the starting line of the relevant section of the poem.

If you would like to have a look at the score for this piece, please click here.

- Andrew

Timothy Cannon Updates

2009-06-03T01:32:00.007+10:00

Hi All,

Just a quick note to let you know that Tim and I have organized to meet weekly to continue production on the album. We'll be looking at all the fine details of the arrangements, including orchestration, backing vocals, counter melodies etc.

I will add info and hopefully some audio samples as they are available.

- Andrew

Timothy Cannon Album - May 2009

2009-06-03T01:18:00.012+10:00

Below are some issues we encountered, considerations we had to make and some of the solutions we found while working on the Tim Cannon album.

There were 10 original tracks chosen for this album and demoed as a band. Over the course of this work-shopping session with the band, some of the songs changes quite substantially in feel, arrangement, chord progressions and keys. Now that we had an idea of how we wanted each track to sound on it's own, the challenge was to somehow marry them together in a cohesive collection of songs and come up with a track order which made sense for the album. After much thought on how to overcome this problem Tim decided on the idea of telling a story with the songs (using the thematic material in the lyrics) gave a solid basis in which to structure the album and allowed us a little more freedom and flexibility when it came to differences between song arrangements. This album structure meant that we needed to add a few new songs to fill in the gaps of the story being told, so Dumping Season was added (denoted by the asterisk being a late addition to the album).

So, we now had a basic over-arching structure for the album, but I had an idea which would allow us to have a little more control over the overall feel of the album. I'd heard one of Tim's songs on his MySpace page. I thought it had a nice floating/dreaming quality which could be used as a segue between different song ideas. Rather than just having the song placed somewhere on the album, I had the vision of making it a re-occuring theme, using it to either transform the mood between songs or make harmonic shifts between 2 songs more interesting, thus, hopefully, marrying the album together. In the above track listing, you can see where we plan to have the inserted in the album as little fragments rather than the whole song.

Once we had this concept in mind, we had to decide where these fragments were going to go in the album. We made the decision to start with a simple fragment of the Tree Song in the key of the first track to set up a melancholy tone. The next time Tree Song comes back is between track 4 (Sleeping Out) & 5 (Satellite). The tracks are in different keys, C major and Eb major respectively. Rather than just jump from C major to Eb major without preparation, we thought we would make the transition with some clever use of harmonic relations. As Sleeping Out (track 4)finishes on a C chord, Tree Song starts in the key of Eb. However, the melody of Tree Song starts on the major 3rd of the key (in this case, a G). G is also the 5th of the last chord of Sleeping Out, thus hopefully making a smooth and interesting harmonic transition between the two keys.It's interesting comparing the harmonic movement of the whole album compared to the musical feel of the album. In terms of song keys, the tonic progression is: G - C - C - C - Eb - Am - A - A - F# - C - F# - D

or written another way:

Album Tracks and their order:

0.5. Pre Song - Tree Song fragment in G
1. Keep It Together [G major]
2. Dumping Season* (Acoustic) [ C major]
3. Feeling [C major]
4. Sleeping Out [C major]
4.5. Tree Song fragment in Eb (main melody starts on a G which is the 5th of the final chord of Sleeping Out)
5. Satellite [Eb major]
----- Common tone of C. Ending to finish on combination of chords like Eb13 / Ab / F / F-, to set up smooth transition to the key of A minor. -----
6. High Hopes [A minor]
7. Coming Home [A major]
8. Tell Me Dan [A major]
9. Finish Line [F# major]
------ At the end of the song, the final harmonic resolution is interrupted by the entry of the drums in the next song. ------
10. Friend of Mine [C major]
11. Silver Lining [F# major]
12. Tree Song* (Hidden Track) in the key of D, melody starts on the F# which is held from the end of Silver Lining.

So we can see a very static a smooth harmonic movement at the beginning of the album which becomes more erratic as the album progresses. In contrast to this, most of the feel change happens at the beginning of the album. Our intent of this was to always having something tying everything together, be it feel, key, or instrumentation.
Another harmonic consideration which I would like to mention is the key of the final (complete) version of Tree Song. I thought it would be very effective to have a subtle link between the end of the album and the beginning of the album, giving the feeling that you (the listener) had departed on a journey and arrived somewhere at the end. Originally, the album started in G major and ended in F# major. If the listener would listen to the album on repeat, i.e. once they finish the album, they start again (as commonly done in car CD players etc) they would get an awkward semi-tone movement (F#-G). To give it a "complete" feel, I added in Tree Song in the key of D major, thus giving a V - I (or perfect cadence) at the conclusion of the album which really gives a harmonic representation of both the end of something, and the start of something. Making this more interesting is that (as mentioned above) the melody of Tree Song starts on the major 3rd, so in the key of D major, the melody starts on an F# which happens to be the tonic note of the previous track (Silver Lining).

Tracking Issues

Finish Line posed a big problem for us when we were tracking as a band. The song had dramatically different tempos for the verses and choruses and also had a tempo ramp up in the bridge section. We had to make some big decisions and live with the consequences as time was against us. Our options were:
1. spend an hour or two creating a tempo map,
2. work out a compromise tempo and adjust the song to remove the tempo changes,
3. forget the click track and rely on each other to make the tempo changes ourselves.

As you may know, a click track enables for easy editing and over-dubbing after the recording phase, so this was a pretty big decision. After talking about it in the group for 5 minutes we decided to go with option number 3 because it's what the song needed. We decided on option 3 over option 1 for 2 reasons: 1) we didn't feel that we had the studio time to spare to do the click tracks, & 2) we were both confident in our ability to perform the tempo changes confidently and to obtain maximum emotional effect of the music. The way we managed to achieve confident tempo changes was assign a person responsible for leading the tempo for each section. After playing through the piece 10 or so time, each band member was both comfortable with following the tempo changes lead by different members of the band we managed to track it successfully with a very good end result.

- Andrew

Co-Producing Singer/Songwriter - Timothy Cannon

2009-05-11T23:38:00.013+10:00

This week has seen a fair bit of work going into co-producing the lovely songs of singer/songwriter Timothy Cannon. I've worked on a few of Cannon's songs before (including Silver Lining) but this time I am working with a few other musicians (Stewart Taylor - Bass & Mark Leahy - Drums) which makes for much more possibilities arrangement wise.
The band got together the weekend before going into the studio and sketched out some arrangements to maximize productivity once we get into the studio and time is money.

We are in the studio at the moment recording and it's coming up really well. I wouldn't say it's been smooth sailing all the way, but we are all very happy with how everything is progressing. I will post some interesting thoughts, observations and photos from the recording session soon.

- Andrew

And, last but not least, we couldn't resist a little bit of fun: Mark, the drummer, decided to show off his skills on the piano. Check it out, it's the first time he's ever played!

The Roaring Years - Album Being Printed

2009-03-26T11:42:00.005+11:00

Good news! The Roaring Years's latest release has gone in for physical production. We should have them within a few weeks.

Our album has been available for purchase through iTunes since December 2008 but we have finally gotten around to getting a physical package together.

We are really happy about the look of it. Thanks to Domenica for her excellent work.

If you want to have a listen to our music you can do so either on our MySpac e page or you can find us on

Shaun Wilson - Uber Memoria X

2009-03-26T11:29:00.001+11:00

Back in December 2008, I completed the next installment of the compositions done for video artist, Shaun Wilson. This set of compositions were all based on Beethoven's 7th Symphony, 2nd Movement. There were 10 pieces in total ranging from solo piano pieces to small ensembles. More information along with some stills of the video can be found at Shaun Wilson Research Blog: Uber Memoria X

Selected works were on display at the National Centre for Contemporary Art Moscow until late December.

Viva La Vida Arrangement

2009-03-26T10:07:00.007+11:00

I have been commissioned to do an arrangement of Coldplay's 'Viva La Vida' for a small ensemble. The instrumentation is: String ensemble, SA choir, mixed percussion & piano.

I have just heard from Music Sales that I will have the license very soon and hence can start selling the arrangement. The arrangement was intended to be playable by secondary school students so difficulty is intermediate.

UPDATE: I have now received the license. If you would like a sample of the score, send me an email and I'll get back to you ASAP.

If you are interested in purchasing this arrangement, please contact me.

- Andrew

Music Project 2009

2009-03-24T11:59:00.007+11:00

These photos were taken at a Mickyfin recording/workshopping session back in 2006 & 2008. The group still writes and records together occasionally but is now going by a new name, "MC Hotdogs".

Josh, the singer/songwriter is currently studying Medicine in Perth, WA so music is something that fits around everything else.

The workshop session was very much a DIY setup. We recorded it in a lovely open room to get that "Band in a room" sound.

From Mickyfin Test

We then went in to Supersonic Recordings to record the songs properly. A big thanks to Brad from Supersonic Recordings for all his hard work. It's a great little studio!

From Mickyfin Recording Jan 2008

Most recently, we got together (July, 08) to add another 10 or so tracks to the 7 we recorded in January 2008. I am currently going through the files and creating mixes. This is a big learning curve for me and it's going to take a while, but I am really looking forward to the challenge. Perhaps I'll post some samples of the songs up here once I'm happy with them.

Wish me luck!

- Andrew