I’d like to explain a little bit more about the gear that I use – and I mean the instruments and software I actually use (though I’m always in the market for another Music Maker XT4 if you can find me one). I’m including some technical music and technical pro-audio information, in case anyone is interested.
One of my most important tools is my metronome. Since the music accompanies whatever action is on screen, the timing of the music is critical. When I compose for the Happy Tree Friends, I isolate one small section of video where the music will remain the same – it could be a 10 second portion or less, or more. I watch the video while playing a keyboard-controller-piano-thing that’s in front of my computer monitor. I either play along with the picture, or more likely hum along with what’s happening. It's probably not too pretty to watch. Once I hum a theme or decide on a feel for that section, I check what I’m humming against the metronome, and find the closest tempo in the audio software that I’m using. Very often, my music will need to adapt slightly slower or faster, and the actual metronome marking will be something like 123.45 bpm rather than 120 bpm. Thankfully, I can use the audio software to help me line up the music to picture. In the old days, I’m told that composers had to understand math and even actually cut and splice the recording tape they were using. I'll consider myself lucky that I didn't have to hone those skills!
So if you really want to geek out: for audio software, I’m currently composing in DP; and recording audio into ProTools HD. There are many other great pieces of software out there - these happen to be the ones I use right now.
Here is a partial list of some of the sounds I use. I plan to talk about orchestration and choosing instruments in a separate post. I use a bunch of current sound libraries for orchestral, jazz, world, drum and piano sounds, including Vienna Symphonic, Sonic Implants, East West, Garritan, and a handful of others.
I’m excited and generally inspired to have some great audio software and wonderful sound libraries to use with them. But those great tools are merely that – tools to help me compose. The actual composition happens with me sitting at the piano, or sometimes the “piano”. My goal is always to be so proficient with the tools that I’m working with, that the technology will “get out of the way”. It’s tempting to get lost in computer-land, sifting through sound libraries, or exploring the intricacies of software plug-ins, but when I’m composing, my focus needs to be on making actual music. Of course, that doesn’t mean that someone necessarily needs all (or any of) this technology to create great stuff. I’ve heard some wonderful music made on some pretty primitive homemade instruments.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
No Moon, No Stars, Just Rain
I was driving South on the 280 in the rain with my son - he was two or so. We were on our way to Target, his favorite store. He was at the age where he could find the moon in the sky, and he'd point to it and say, "Moon!" He was also just learning that the moon wasn't always in the sky - it's not always night - and even if it is night, the moon still might not be visible. So he's looking out the window, and there's rain and an overcast sky. After careful observation, he exclaimed, "No moon." I agreed with him. We decided to check to see if there were any stars. He exclaimed, "No stars." And we both verified, "Just rain." And here's what that sounds like.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Creating Music for the Happy Tree Friends
I've had the great pleasure of composing music for the Happy Tree Friends for awhile now - the first episode that I worked on was in 2005. If you're keeping score at home, it was #49, "Stealing the Spotlight". Since that first episode, I've gone on to compose the music for the TV season, False Alarm!, the Ka-Pow! episodes and most of the new episodes that have been released via the internet. I thought I'd use this space to explain a little bit about how approach composing the music for the Happy Tree Friends, and perhaps answer any questions about the process.
I'd be remiss if I didn't thank Kenn Navarro and Jim Lively, who never fail to impress me with their insight and humor.
Creating the Music
When I create music for the Happy Tree Friends, I take my inspiration from the sugary-sweet design and bright cheery coloring of the characters. To me, this approach gives greater impact to the hard hitting sound design and extreme (and extremely funny!) shenanigans that the characters get into. I feel like the syrupy singable melodies allow the sound design to have greater impact and in turn, more humor. Basically, I try to create really sweet sounding music to contrast the painfully realistic sound design impressively created by Jim Lively.
I try to keep in mind that the music has to serve a bunch of purposes. Most of the time, I need to make sure I'm helping tell the story. Sometimes I want to accentuate the action and I try to add more impact to what's happening with musical jolts and stingers, for instance, when something falls out of the sky and one of the characters gets smashed to bit. I'll do this sort of thing especially toward the end of the episode when really bad stuff is happening. On the other hand, sometimes I do exactly the opposite - sometimes I want the music to be unassumingly light and happy, to set up a surprise hit - something that the character (or you, the audience) doesn't know is coming. And sometimes, the music just needs to sort of stay out of the way.
I like to play around with the "voice" of the music. I ask "does the music know what's happening next"? Sometimes, the music is omniscient and all-knowing, other times, the music is as clueless as Lumpy.
"But How Do You Actually Create the Music for the Happy Tree Friends?"
Here is the general process of creating a finished piece: Usually I have a conversation with Jim Lively about the episode, although sometimes we just talk about the title. And sometimes we talk about audio gear. I really like audio gear, and that conversation can last a pretty long time. Jim knows a lot.
At this point, I burn the animation to a VHS tape, then take it out back to my garage where I keep my Music Maker XT4 and an old RCA black & white TV. I put the video on in front of the "music making machine" and let it watch the episode a couple of times, then it usually makes some pops and whirring noises, then spits out some sheet music. (One time, I put an episode of "Three's Company" in front of the machine - you should have heard what it came up with!) By then, I'm usually pretty tired, so I take a nap, but not before I arrange for my neighbor, Mrs. Picklebottom to record the piece for me on a cassette tape. After my nap, I play the cassette recording over the phone to Jim and Kenn to see what they think. They usually say it's good, but that I should make it better. After my call, I put it in the "Orchestrator 2000", then take another nap. By then I'm usually hungry for some cereal. I usually wait until the next day to turn my music in, since I don't want the guys to think I'm working too fast.
Ok, so none of that was true, except the part about the cereal. I really like cereal. What really happens is that after I talk to Jim, I watch the episode a couple of times. By this time in the process, the episode will already have been animated to the timing of the voice-over session. Usually the visual stuff is mostly done. Sometimes there are some small timing changes.
Dancing About Architecture
While I watch the episode, I'll get a general idea of what the cartoon is about, and I put a temporary piano track together. This is a scaled-down version of the composition that hopefully captures what I'm trying to do - tell the story, stay out of the way, react to the action, etc. After I record this, I send it off to Jim and Kenn for a listen. Thankfully, these guys can "translate" the piano track into orchestra. This is where I can show what I think the music should do. Sometimes I ask Jim or Kenn some questions before I start composing, though I usually find that with this show, it's easier for me to compose something and use that as a starting point to ask questions. It's like it's easier to show them my questions with music, rather than try to explain it in English. English is good for some things (like ordering a milk shake, or calling your dog - though I imagine your dog wouldn't care if you spoke to it in another language), but it isn't very good at trying to explain what music should do. "Talking about music is like dancing about architecture." - Elvis Costello (maybe).
I'd be remiss if I didn't thank Kenn Navarro and Jim Lively, who never fail to impress me with their insight and humor.
Creating the Music
When I create music for the Happy Tree Friends, I take my inspiration from the sugary-sweet design and bright cheery coloring of the characters. To me, this approach gives greater impact to the hard hitting sound design and extreme (and extremely funny!) shenanigans that the characters get into. I feel like the syrupy singable melodies allow the sound design to have greater impact and in turn, more humor. Basically, I try to create really sweet sounding music to contrast the painfully realistic sound design impressively created by Jim Lively.
I try to keep in mind that the music has to serve a bunch of purposes. Most of the time, I need to make sure I'm helping tell the story. Sometimes I want to accentuate the action and I try to add more impact to what's happening with musical jolts and stingers, for instance, when something falls out of the sky and one of the characters gets smashed to bit. I'll do this sort of thing especially toward the end of the episode when really bad stuff is happening. On the other hand, sometimes I do exactly the opposite - sometimes I want the music to be unassumingly light and happy, to set up a surprise hit - something that the character (or you, the audience) doesn't know is coming. And sometimes, the music just needs to sort of stay out of the way.
I like to play around with the "voice" of the music. I ask "does the music know what's happening next"? Sometimes, the music is omniscient and all-knowing, other times, the music is as clueless as Lumpy.
"But How Do You Actually Create the Music for the Happy Tree Friends?"
Here is the general process of creating a finished piece: Usually I have a conversation with Jim Lively about the episode, although sometimes we just talk about the title. And sometimes we talk about audio gear. I really like audio gear, and that conversation can last a pretty long time. Jim knows a lot.
At this point, I burn the animation to a VHS tape, then take it out back to my garage where I keep my Music Maker XT4 and an old RCA black & white TV. I put the video on in front of the "music making machine" and let it watch the episode a couple of times, then it usually makes some pops and whirring noises, then spits out some sheet music. (One time, I put an episode of "Three's Company" in front of the machine - you should have heard what it came up with!) By then, I'm usually pretty tired, so I take a nap, but not before I arrange for my neighbor, Mrs. Picklebottom to record the piece for me on a cassette tape. After my nap, I play the cassette recording over the phone to Jim and Kenn to see what they think. They usually say it's good, but that I should make it better. After my call, I put it in the "Orchestrator 2000", then take another nap. By then I'm usually hungry for some cereal. I usually wait until the next day to turn my music in, since I don't want the guys to think I'm working too fast.
Ok, so none of that was true, except the part about the cereal. I really like cereal. What really happens is that after I talk to Jim, I watch the episode a couple of times. By this time in the process, the episode will already have been animated to the timing of the voice-over session. Usually the visual stuff is mostly done. Sometimes there are some small timing changes.
Dancing About Architecture
While I watch the episode, I'll get a general idea of what the cartoon is about, and I put a temporary piano track together. This is a scaled-down version of the composition that hopefully captures what I'm trying to do - tell the story, stay out of the way, react to the action, etc. After I record this, I send it off to Jim and Kenn for a listen. Thankfully, these guys can "translate" the piano track into orchestra. This is where I can show what I think the music should do. Sometimes I ask Jim or Kenn some questions before I start composing, though I usually find that with this show, it's easier for me to compose something and use that as a starting point to ask questions. It's like it's easier to show them my questions with music, rather than try to explain it in English. English is good for some things (like ordering a milk shake, or calling your dog - though I imagine your dog wouldn't care if you spoke to it in another language), but it isn't very good at trying to explain what music should do. "Talking about music is like dancing about architecture." - Elvis Costello (maybe).
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