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Producers' Corner

Article from Home & Studio Recording, January 1986

Neville Unwin attempts to shed some light on contemporary production and arrangement.


This month, Neville Unwin explores some of the possibilities open to today's composer and arranger.

How many times have you listened to a piece of music, only to compare it mentally to several others? Have you ever listened to something that seemed to be expressing absolutely nothing new? Was the time and effort put into the recording of that track really worthwhile considering the outcome? One of the most common diseases afflicting today's popular music is the 'It all sounds the same' syndrome. Usually this is through no fault in the recording process, but in the initial writing or arranging of the track, and it is a disease that can affect anyone from the megastar to the beginner. To avoid this pitfall, every parameter of the music must be examined to see if its treatment is justified within the context of the initial idea of the track. To take an obvious example, do you really want a fast pounding drum rhythm to accompany subtle lyrics?

However, not all problems are as easy to diagnose as this. Let's start the investigation with rhythm.

Rhythm



The different capabilities of rhythm are probably the most overlooked aspects in western popular music. With few exceptions, the only time signatures in use are two and four time, and changes in time signature are rare. The next most common time signature is three time, but there's no reason why experimentation should stop there, successful tracks have been written in five, seven or thirteen time. However, because they are rarely heard, it is more difficult to compose music from scratch in these time signatures. Changing the time signature is something that needs to be done with care if the track is not to undergo a violent change (though this might be just what you intend). Needless to say, if your track is intended as a dance number, no changes in time signature should be made. The best way to keep the feel of the track whilst changing the time is to allow as few other parameters as possible to alter at the same time. For example, if the time is altered from eight beats in a bar to seven, obviously the rhythm itself will change, but the same chords, the same texture and sometimes the same melodic phrase may be used in the new time. In a case such as this, the overall effect may simply be an adding of interest and unpredictability to the track at this point.

More usual is a change in rhythm, while the time itself remains constant. This can be used to good effect many times even within the course of one track. The change produced is one of variety without disorientation. This, of course, depends to a large extent on how radical the rhythmic change is: it might vary from a slight difference in snare rhythm to a complete change in the rhythm of every instrument. One trick that can produce unpredictability in a 4/4 time track without losing its feel is to transfer the greatest emphasis from the first to the third beat of the bar: a device commonly used by The Police.

These are all devices that can potentially change the entire nature of the rack you are writing or arranging. In the interests of continuity, therefore, they should be used with care. Too great a variety in the rhythm of the track can all too easily result in a bitty track with incongruous sections.

Melody



Melody is one aspect of music that can easily get overlooked in preference to rhythm and texture. A large proportion of chart songs have a very limited range in the melodic line. Take, for example 'Relax'. Nearly all the chorus is sung on two notes, and the verse hardly expands that range at all. This may not be a bad thing in itself, but it is all too easy to finish with a very limited melody because the notes happen to fit the chords underneath, and the rhythmic interest will le entirely in the accompanying instruments.

Melodic lines are necessarily limited, however, by the instrument or voice they are written for. The human voice in particular has a typical range of under two octaves, but there is no reason why the whole of that range should not be exploited, even in a short space of time. Of course the capabilities afforded by the voice depend entirely on the qualities of the singer, not simply in terms of range, but also of power, expression, tone and so forth, but surely most people are capable of singing 'Relax'...



"A balance has to be struck with regard to the amount of repetition in the track. Too much will result in boredom and too little can make the track lose direction."


There is no way of defining what makes a good melody, as this can be an extremely subjective area (though not completely so). It is, however, one to which it is worth giving a lot of thought. In terms of success, many records have become hits purely on the strength or appeal of their melody. The best guideline must be; 'if it works for you, try it' but melodies of very limited range, as well as those that use many arpeggios over their corresponding chords should be at best treated with care.

Harmony



Here again, the possibilities are enormous, and the composer or arranger must be aware of the choices open to them, even if they eventually turn out to be inappropriate. The chords of a track are inevitably linked to some extent to the bass line, and depending on how the track itself was written, each one should suggest the other. A fairly complicated bass line, assuming it fits with the melody, may well suggest interesting harmonies. When working from the harmonies, to construct a bass part however, the easiest trap to fall into is to use the root of the chord for each bass note. If, for example, the chord were E major, the bass note would be E, and if it were C# minor, the note would be C#, and so on. This is almost never appropriate, and in my experience invariably turns out a dull bass part that affects the feel of the whole track. Instead, it's worth treating the bass part in a similar way to the melody.

To do this, the chords will usually have been worked out in advance. Again, a line has to be trodden between blandness and over-sophistication where harmony is concerned. That line, however is very wide, and whatever type of music you're writing, harmonic experiments can result in some very poignant effects. Take for example the inclusion of a chord completely alien to the key of the piece. This will result in a measure of disorientation in the listener, and the skill of the writer will then be tested in returning the harmonies back to the original key centre. One violent chord change of this type at the beginning of a phrase will allow the rest of the phrase to be fairly conservative harmonically. The initial unusual chord change will then contain the necessary harmonic interest of the whole phrase. The same can be said of melodic interest with regard to irregular leaps in the melodic line.

Modulation (changing key) is another very useful device for adding variety to music without having to change the piece radically. This can be achieved either by passing through a sequence of chords to reach the new key, or by making a clean break and starting again in a different key. If using the first method, a chord, or at least a note in a chord must be found that is common to both the old and new keys. For example if passing from C to G, a chord of A minor could be used, because it would not sound out of place in either key. Making a 'clean break' into another key is a method much favoured in popular music; (it's a speciality of Nik Kershaw's). In some situations, though, it has become a cliché, such as repeating a whole chorus up by a semitone or a tone.

Depending on the style of music, and just what impression you want to create, much more daring chords can be introduced. Modal pieces (in neither major nor minor scales, but using a different key scheme), polytonality (using several keys at once) and atonality (using no key structure) are all avenues relatively unexplored in modern western popular music, but for this very reason you're unlikely to have a hit with any of these.



"...it is all too easy to finish up with a very limited melody because the notes happen to fit the chords underneath, and the rhythmic interest will lie entirely in the accompanying instruments."


Texture



With the continuing increase in musical technology, this must be the most carefully thought out aspect of the modern rock song. In spite of this, the criticism made that a certain group continually sounds the same is sometimes quite valid. If the technology is available, there's no excuse for an artist not to make full use of it, but how many groups end up using nothing but the presets on their DX7s? Surely no two songs should portray exactly the same things, therefore no two songs should sound best using exactly the same sounds, (given that the technology is available to you).

This, of course, supposes that the artist is thinking of the texture of the piece after writing the music. However, an equally valid method of composition is to start from a texture, and build up a piece of music from it. This is the case where the artist is inspired specifically by the medium for which he or she is writing, such as the classical composer might be when writing a string quartet or a piano sonata.

Whichever method is adopted by the artist, synthesisers are undoubtably a great asset when it comes to textural variety, as are effects, whether in the form of guitar-type pedals or rack mounting units. It's as well to bear in mind as many different instruments as possible for variety's sake. One day you may find exactly the right piece for your Egyptian occorina.

As far as the arrangement of the texture is concerned, it's worth taking care over the placing of instruments within the overall frequency range. It's all too easy to end up with too much in the middle range, such as guitars and keyboards, with only (for example) bass and bass drum below and cymbals and hi-hats above.

Variety may be added to repeated riffs by having the main instruments all playing different melodic phrases. Care must be taken, though, not to give all these instruments equal importance in the mix, or the impression given can easily become one of confusion.



"Too great a variety in the rhythm of the track can all too easily result in a bitty track with incongruous sections"


Form



The structure, or form of a track must be closely related to all other musical aspects of that track. Chart singles tend to have quite well defined forms, one of the most common being: short intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, middle section, chorus. Some types of classical music also have clearly defined structures, such as sonata form, ternary form, binary form, minuet and so forth.

Songs have their own limitations imposed on their form by the lyrics, and so if the lyrics are written first the music will often follow their structure. In instrumental pieces, though, structuring can prove a problem. A balance has to be struck with regard to the amount of repetition in the track. Too much will result in boredom and too little can make the track lose direction. Unconventional forms tax the listener's ear more on first hearing and often means that the track is more difficult to get to know, but appreciation of that track is more likely to last than if it had a conventional form. Conventional forms themselves are more predictable, but easier to get to know. This is not to say that predictability is necessarily a bad thing. Peter Gabriel's 'Biko' contains one drum rhythm, which is repeated throughout, three different chords and a very simple form, and yet manages to work very well as a piece of music. Yet more extreme is Steve Reich's or Philip Glass's styles of minimalism. Here, repetition is so extreme that the form becomes comparatively unimportant.

Coda



As with recording, it's impossible to describe the rights and wrongs in writing or arranging music. The only crime is to be unaware of the all possibilities at your disposal. Texturally, these will necessarily be limited by the equipment used; it's not an easy task to make a Casiotone sound like a DX1. In all other respects, however, the musical possibilities are endless. Even bearing this in mind the arranger may encounter difficulties. With so many choices available it's often difficult to make any sort of original decision.

One solution to this is to deliberately limit the parameters you're working with. Stravinsky adopted this approach for this very reason. This is best done, however, in an unconventional way. If, for example, you limit yourself to the instruments of a rock group, regular phrasing, 2/4 time signature, common chords and a melody revolving around one note, you're probably not going to come up with a highly original musical composition, because these are all very common traits of modern rock. If, though, you set yourself the much harder task of limiting one parameter, like, for instance, melody, to a certain group of notes, rhythm, to one or two interesting rhythms, or time, to an unusual time signature such as 5/4 or 7/8 you may well find that, given these limited choices, it's far easier to write originally.

Another possible approach would be to start with just one aspect of the piece and build from there. For example, you might decide to start with the melody, and try to construct a melody as interesting as possible, before moving on to, say, harmony, rhythm and finally texture.

When arranging a piece of music, you have to decide for yourself what type of arrangement suits the piece most. This, although a personal opinion, must be made carefully, and not be confined to what is easy, convenient or currently in vogue.

There's no easy way out; each person has their own ideas about how they write or arrange their music and the methods they adopt to help themselves. Only guidelines can be offered, which might serve to help those who find their music sounding like 'all the rest'.


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An APT Solution

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Tascam 246 - an Un-Reel Machine


Publisher: Home & Studio Recording - Music Maker Publications (UK), Future Publishing.

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Home & Studio Recording - Jan 1986

Donated & scanned by: Mike Gorman

Feature by Neville Unwin

Previous article in this issue:

> An APT Solution

Next article in this issue:

> Tascam 246 - an Un-Reel Mach...


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