Music and Audio

New Haven

Alan — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:26:37 +0100

I've been on the look-out for a Sci-Fi movie series a to get involved with. I wanted a side-project and after coming across a few old books I read and a few movies, I decided on the Space Opera theme. Lots of scope for over-the-top thematic music, a bit of rock and some atmosphere.

New Haven

I picked the New Haven project (previously known as Ticonderoga) as it fitted everything I was looking for out of a side-project. This had to fit alongside the normal jobs and projects.

New Haven's a good project. They had a gap for a composer, partly because the full feature's a long way off. That means there's a lot of other work to be done. The concept is original with a fresh perspective on sci-fi in space. It has potentially similarities with other sci-fi series (it's based around the military in space - hmm sound familiar?). It's difficult not to make comparisons really.

Fortunately, there are easily enough differences to make it stand out.

Firstly it's set in our own system, secondly there's no FTL travel, thirdly no aliens. Those three features alone set it apart from almost every other space opera. Add in a few other differences and it's easily headed to sit apart from the rest of the sci-fi series crowd.

What else?

I'm still looking out for other projects. Currently New Haven isn't taking up that much time. There's a long gap before I need to compose music for the soundtrack.

A more sci-fi oriented showreel

Alan — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 20:45:02 +0100

Another Showreel - this time for sci-fi projects

A short collection of mp3s forming the basis of several sci-fi themes.

Status

Just a short note. These tracks are currently unfinished. If a client decides they're the right style for their project, then they'll move up the list and become a much higher priority. Until then, I'll move them along in line with other priorities.

1. A space opera theme tune. It starts orchestral, ends up with rock. Not sure I'd ever use the two sequentially like that, but I can see a place to have both in the same movie/series

2. This one's more atmospheric. I imagine a typical moving shot as the camera viewpoint increases in altitude and/or distance, perhaps panning over to a more detail towards the end.

3. More ethnic than straight rock. Very fun to compose and record. Lots of potential, just depends on what it needs to sync to.

4. Indie Rock track with full-on guitars and drums. No bass in this version. I'm undecided whether it needs any. Usually I'd bass in for a rock track, but in this case the guitar parts fill the gap nicely.

5. Heavy, slow and moody. Imagine the main protagonist scanning a bar/gambling den. Could easily lead into a more violent or humourous ending.

6. A brief look into a modernised version of 80s sci-fi themes Synths, drums and heavy guitars bring cult sci-fi soundtrack into this century.

Licensing

Venn - Episode 1

Alan — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 21:14:12 +0100

Episode 1 of Venn has been released. View the episode online for free.

Related links

Use the wrong preset for a better sound - Musical Creativity 44

Alan — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 21:04:36 +0100

Opinion is divided as to whether presets in plug-ins are useful. From my perspective, they can be useful short-cuts to a starting point, but I'll usually need to tweak the parameters, sometimes quite extremely. I'm usually happy just starting from scratch, knowing what result I want to achieve.

However, I love putting an ordinary audio track through a plug-in and working through the presets, especially those presets that it's not designed for.

The Concept

Calling it a concept is too way too grandiose really. Basically, take an instrument channel, e.g. guitar and apply presets for other instruments, e.g. piano, drums, etc. Some work, some don't. Either way, they'll get you thinking about the sound differently.

Work Through the List

With the signal-processing power at our fingertips and the flexibility provided by the plug-in architectures of Logic, Cubase, etc, it's easy to apply a processor, change it, remove it, try another and so on. Rather than reaching straight for the standards of eq, compressor or reverb with their respective expected settings for the instruments I'm processing, I'll sometimes put a different effect on, just to hear what it sounds like. If I don't like the result, I can undo the changes and be back where I was.

Waste of Time?

It's worked often enough that 5 minutes or so spent assessing the impact of different plug-ins can be useful, especially if I've hit a block. The more I play with the effects, the more I can predict the sound I'd get. So this tends to be for the effects I don't use as often (e.g. various auto-filters) or more extreme parameters of effects that I do use.

BlockFish

The best example of this I've ever come across is to insert a compressor on a vocal preset onto a drum mix signal chain.

Digitalfishphone.com's BlockFish provides a great example of this. Choose the "Close-up Vocal" preset - I'm doing this from memory so I may have the name wrong, but it should be obvious which preset I'm referring to. I used to use this when using Windows as my DAW's operating system. I remember there were some issues with no OS X version, but it looks like there may now be. Will have to give it a try, not sure if it's Universal Binary though.

Applying this preset immediately provides more energy and bite to the drums. If I wanted it a little more restrained, I'd patch the effect as a send and mix the return in to the required level. I remember slightly tweaking a few parameters to make it more suitable for drums, or at least the sound I was looking for. I think it was the Air Frequency and Air Level that were of most use. And of course, making it stereo since I'd be running a stereo drum-track through it.

OS X

In Logic 8, the Compressor effect can produce very similar results to the BlockFish effect. It doesn't have the same presets for the plug-in itself, so you'll have to play a bit more with it. In this case, changing the compressor type to Opto makes a drastic difference to drum-tracks. I'm not so sure I like it, I can hear the high-end clearer, but I can also hear too much compression, bordering on distortion with the optical variant, even after tweaking threshold and make-up gain for it to be more subtle.

Logic 8

Logic 8 has more emphasis on presets for channels rather than presets for plug-ins. On one hand, it makes the process of adding a preset chain of plug-in presets (yes, presets of presets) easier and it's a good way for learning how effects chain together. On the other hand, it's about chains of effects rather than a particular effect. In the end though, it's whatever works for you. There are still presets for plug-ins, the above image is the Compressor with a setting of Drum Kit Compression with the circuit type to Opto.

Part of a series by Award Sounds offering a selection of creative ideas to kick-start or rejuvenate a composition.

Using an Octaver for Easy Funk - Musical Creativity 43

Alan — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 15:23:43 +0100

Mention an octaver to a musician, especially a guitarist, and you're heading for a conversation about Hendrix.

It can be used for other styles. So here's a quick trick for writing funk. Forget the bass when you start. I half-expected to get lynched, but bear with me, at least until the end.

Background

I like the old P-funk of Funkadelic and Parliament. I think what made me hear it more was the inclusion of a distorted guitar in a funk show. This was often played in sync with the bass guitar.

Setting the groove

Find a sparse drum track. You want big drums (not 80s soft rock big though). Make sure it's a tight loop. Set it to loop as your background track. Now remove the click track if you've got one. You'll play better this way.

Setting up the guitar

We'll get the distorted guitar set-up first. That'll be a distorted guitar from the 70s, maybe even a distorted DI from the 80s. Keep the speaker simulation to a minimum. We're not looking for a modern hi-gain sound here so go for a raw guitar sound.

Next add an octaver effect. I've had better results recently with it placed after the amplifier/amplifier plug-in, but normally I'd place pitch effects before the pre-amp.

Set the octaver so it adds a note one octave (12 notes) below the signal.

Roll the tape

Now play and record. Use an extended pentatonic scale (i.e. blues scale with a few additional notes) to get started. The p-funk guitars had lots of semi-tone intervals.

Fill it Out

Add a second guitar with a modulation effect, most commonly a subtle phaser playing rhythmic, strummed part-chords.

Finish it off

I've added a club-type reverb to bond the 3 instruments tracks together, aiming for a live club feel.

Make it more complex

You could add the octaver as a send instead of a insert, allowing to mix the levels better and potentially (depending on the quality of the octaver effect) retain the character of the original signal with more clarity.

Make it more authentic

Put on the star-shaped shades, pick up the bass and record the part properly. The octaver gives you an easy way gets you started in the groove, but it really should be done with a bass.

Part of a series by Award Sounds offering a selection of creative ideas to kick-start or rejuvenate a composition.

Use of Tremolo - Musical Creativity 42

Alan — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 21:27:29 +0100

I've talked about tremolo as a musical feature before, this time I want to go into more detail.

First things first, let's sort out the guitarists: I don't mean using the tremolo arm/whammy bar or whatever you want to call it ("handle" as my girlfriend called it - and no she won't be picking up my guitars for a while). The whammy bar creates a vibrato feature, not a tremolo. Vibrato alters pitch.

Amplitude

Tremolo is the act of altering the volume of a note or set of notes. For an electric instrument, the simplest to hear is by regularly turning the volume knob up and down. The notes fade in, fade out, fade in, fade out and so on.

It's a great tool for livening up a piece of music. The previous article on the subject covered some more ways of using it.

Recordings

Tremolo features on a lot of famous recordings. Three extreme examples are:

How Soon Is Now - The Smiths

Crush with Eyeliner - REM

What's the Frequency Kenneth - REM

But it's used more subtlely on many, many more recordings. Think of any country song and listen to the guitar. Many of the 1950s and 1960s guitar recordings had tremolo on them. Think Duane Eddy (although he mixed it with vibrato by using the whammy bar a lot). Lots of Elvis recordings featuring Scotty Moore had tremolo. This situation was accentuated and facilitated by the inclusion of tremolo circuits in the guitar amps, e.g. Vox

Types of effect

The common tremolo effect alters the amplitude or volume of the incoming signal apply a regularly repeating pattern before output. The most common pattern is the sine wave, although some FX units also allow square and sawtooth. The output signal increases, decreases, increases, decreases, etc.

The waveform applied changes how fast the signal reaches the extremes and how long it stays there before beginning the journey to the other extreme.

Depth

If the signal is applied completely at 100% depth, then the output will have no signal at the points when the applied FX is at its lowest point, conversely it will have the maximum volume when the FX is at its highest point.

Lowering the depth introduces a less radical effect, to the point that if the depth were at 0%, then there would theoretically be no difference between the input and output. As with most effects, the most appropriate depth is usually somewhere between the two extremes.

Symmetry

The waveform applied so far has been the same on both sides, i.e. going up and coming down. Altering the phase allows more time for the signal to climb and a quicker fall or vice versa. This is great for imparting a slower or a rushed feeling to the track.

Phase

For a stereo tremolo, the default set-up is to have the signal applied equally, but alternately to each channel. Changing the phase control alters the timing displacement of the second channel compared to the first, which can be used to create panning echoes or dotted note rhythms.

No Depth?

I'd usually use a tremolo inline with the signal, either at the recording stage (e.g. between guitar and amp) or at the mixing stage (as an insert). If there's no depth control, then patch the tremolo into a send and emulate the depth by the relative values of the signal and send faders.

For guitarists, if there's no depth control, then you maybe able to use it in the amp's FX loop if you've got a variable dry/wet mix. This may not work well, since the FX would be placed after the pre-amp. Depends what equipment you're using.

Playing with fingers

A classical guitar tremolo technique involves repeatedly plucking the same string with the first, second and third fingers. This is often a bass and/or melody note plucked with the thumb followed by the three fingers or sometimes a fourth is employed but the fingering changes.

The most famous example is probably Recuerdos De La Alhambra by Francisco Tárrega, although I think Agustin Barrios Mangore's Una Limosna por el Amor de Dios (Alms for the Peace of God) shows the technique more.

Various forms of flamenco use a similar technique, sometimes using the thumb plus four finger notes (not necessarily four fingers, often three fingers with one repeated) to get a 5-tuplet pattern.

Pick

For electric guitar, rapidly repeated picking of the same note gives a tremolo effect that can be used in solos. Do it too often and you'll sound you can't move your fret-hand fingers. Best to intersperse it with other techniques. Check out the Ozzy Osbourne recordings with Randy Rhoads, e.g. Tribute, to get an idea of how to fit it into a solo. He doesn't use it that often, but when he does, it works well. Nowadays, watch Matt Bellamy of Muse. There are plenty of others, but they're not coming to mind right now.

In other forms of music, e.g. drag, it can be the main feature. This is more likely to happen on the lower strings of the guitar, with a springy/slap-back reverb. Think Dick Dale. Although perhaps not part of drag, Miserlou (as featured in Pulp Fiction) is a great example of how a simple riff can lead the track. The repeated picking comes from his experience with an oud (or ud).

Part of a series by Award Sounds offering a selection of creative ideas to kick-start or rejuvenate a composition.

43 Reasons for Collaborating - Part 4 - Musical Creativity 41

Alan — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 19:43:17 +0100

13. Meet Other people

13a avoid being recluse

Composing music can be a solitary activity. For some that works, for others it can be a lonely experience. Whatever the perspective, it can quickly turn into isolation. Collaborating with others reduces the isolation.

13b friends

I've met most of my best friends through music and music-related activities. Some of the people I met as acquaintances have turned into good friends over time.

13c balance

Working in isolation for too long can be bad for the health. It can be demotivating, lonely, On the other hand, working alone can bring out the best in some. But however you handle it, get some balance in there. Meeting other people will at least introduce somebody else's perspective into your world.

13d improve community projects

There are people in your community that could use music for their benefit. Some may just need an outlet to perform, some need instruments, some need training, some just need to play music with other musicians, others want music for their own community project, some need direction.....and the list goes on. Does a project exist near you? If not, can you create one?

14. Reputation

Think carefully before you take on working with someone else. Think about whether you can do what you set out to do, how much risk is there? Is it just fun for everyone involved? What's the impact on the people if you all fail?

If you're not taking it as seriously as the others are, then that can damage your reputation. If you're too serious, again that can result in a damaged reputation.

Maybe pick a balance of projects; some more professional than others, but work appropriately.

In this industry, your name and the quality of the product count for everything. So make sure you have a good reputation and that product is the best product possible.

15. Technology

15a Support

I end up being the tech support guy for a few friends and family. It's part of what I give to them, I receive other things in kind. This isn't business, just friendship. If it takes too long, I can say I'm not interested in helping and they're better off with a formal support contract through a dedicated support company.

15b Tutorials

Teach others how to do things and learn from them what they don't know. Finding out what others don't know and helping them fill that knowledge can be a great way to build relationships. Learn something very advanced about an application and share it with friends or online. Or try looking at elements that you've struggled with, ask yourself why, then set yourself the task of making other people's lives easier by explaining it to them so they don't have the same journey you did.

15c Access Demos

Show someone else what you can do with your stuff. Watch out in case they've wearing a balaclava and sporting a swag bag on their back.

16 Mastering

Read Mastering Audio: The Art and the Science by Bob Katz. Honestly, it'll give you more insight that I can here.

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43 Reasons for Collaborating - Part 3 - Musical Creativity 41

Alan — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 19:40:32 +0100

7. Finances

Even arranging a loan with your bank manager is a form of collaboration. Ok, it's a purchase of a product by you from them, but if responsible, then the bank should be acting in partnership with you. I'm working on a few projects where I can see finances becoming an issue in the medium term. I could also see a few of the project members funding their own areas. None could fund the whole project, but as each could fund their own area, the project could still work. It's like pooling resources but more controlled.

8. Opportunities

People know people. Some of those people will have their own projects they want to proceed. It's back to the adage of being in the right place at the right time. By working with others, you'll pick up more contacts and build a reputation for yourself.

9. Exit - contracts

Whatever the collaboration, figure out how it can break up cleanly. It's one of the best pieces of advice I've ever heard about partnerships; the first thing to do when starting any partnership is to work out how to dissolve it. Working partnerships and collaborations do break up eventually, so you may as well put the time in now to understand who takes the rights to which pieces of work. If you can't agree that now, then maybe that particular collaboration's not for you.

10. Projects

Projects may just be the embodiment of a person's aims or that of a group of people. It gives them motivation and impetus to head towards a common goal. Set up a project if you're not sure about long-term commitment (either from yourself or the other members).

Think about using side-projects where you commit your time but not as much as you would to your main projects or your day-job. They can provide useful outlets for experimenting. Make sure everyone involved knows what level of commitment the others are providing. It can be mixed, but useful if everyone knows where they stand first.

11. Bands

Just as jamming with other musicians can be a great feeling, get yourself into a band. Remember it's not just about the music, it's also about the interaction of the people; their common aims, goals, their talent (or lack of it), their attitude to music, to the band and to life. Bands are a great vehicle for musicians and as a composer, you're missing out if you've never played in a band.

12. Other media

Doing everything yourself on a project nowadays is easy, but doing it well is out of the reach of most of us. Doing it to a professional, world-standard level on your own is out of the reach of everyone of us, unless you have a lot of money to spare and a few years to learn and implement everything you need.

Now that there are so many variations of the media product, it's getting more difficult to keep up. For instance you can write music, but can you produce it within the constraints of the media and making use of the quirks of the media?

radio plays
feature film/movies
shorts
tv - documentaries, comedies, adverts
games
promotional material - e.g. company annual events, wedding DVDs, Idents
theatre plays
musical theatre
phone ring tones
computer software
radio adverts
on-hold music

Collaborating with others means you can concentrate on the main parts you want to be involved in. Unfortunately you'll have to balance that with what your collaborators want.

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43 Reasons for Collaborating - Part 2 - Musical Creativity 41

Alan — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 19:37:13 +0100

4. Production

4a Fresh Pair of Ears

A producer should remain distant enough from the in-depth recording process to be able to bring a fresh opinion. Their view can suggest new directions or, at least, a validation of the current direction.

4b Motivation

Producing your own CD, DVD, whatever it is, can be a tiring and troublesome process. Many of us feel like giving up at various points in the journey. By using a producer, you can have someone else buoy up your own motivation. Beware of producers that suck your motivation.

4c Experience

A producer should have experience of other bands, other artists and/or other productions. This experience should come to bear on your production.

4d Critical Analysis

The producer shouldn't have the same level of personal involvement in the product that the artist does during the recording stages. So if you're the artist and you really like a certain part of a track, a producer should be able to work with you and guide you in an agreed direction, even if it means losing that part. You use a good producer so that they can constructively criticise the product without criticising you.

4e Contacts

A producer can bring in industry contacts. Want a musician, want a mastering engineer, then the producer may know someone who will fit the bill.

4f Events

By having a larger base of artists than the artist would themselves, the producer will have access to events. In this way, they may be treading on the roles of managers or agents, but if you don't have either of those, the producer may be an appropriate start.

4g Project Management

This is what I see as being the key role for producers. It's the management of the final deliverable. They ensure that from the start to the end, you focus only on the tasks necessary for the product. If you need something for the product, they will arrange it. If you need a certain instrument, they can source that. And so on. They're not gophers, nor are they band managers, but I'd always ask any aspiring producer what they actually do. How much of the legwork would your producer do? Obviously, the more experienced and the more successful the producer, the less mundane work they'd do.

5. Writing

Maybe I should have put this at number 1 considering this is part of a series on Musical Creativity.

5a Lyrics

I like to concentrate on writing music and effects, I'm useless at lyrics. So I partner with someone else to write my lyrics. It works well, especially if I can provide a hint or description for the song in question. There are plenty of none musical people out there, who still have rhythm and feel enough to write lyrics.

One question you'll have to figure out is whether you want them to write the melody for the lyrics as well. I've used both situations. It depends on how I feel I can move the song along better.

5b Reasons for writing

Collaborating with someone else often provides a reason for writing. For instance, you could be asked to write a specific song for them or they may provide a challenge for you to complete. By accepting something out of the ordinary, you find the motivation to experience writing in different musical styles. Recently, I was asked to write something with the same feel as another song but not the same. It didn't need to sound the same, nor even have the same chord structure or instruments. Just had to feel the same. That in itself was an interesting challenge.

You can also collaborate with other composers when they're stuck and need to move tracks on. It's great when it works. Maybe your suggestions won't work, nor will they be accepted, but the simple act of making them think differently sparks off their own ideas that do work for them. That ends up being a good result all round.

5c Composing synchronously

Now that a lot of the audio can be recorded and transferred digitally, the concept of collaborating with others around the globe becomes a lot more realistic. There are still issues; if you're going to do it in a synchronous manner where you both (or all) write and play at the same time, then a lot of the rules for organising and recording a live jam session still apply, e.g.:

ensure you can hear what the others are playing - i.e. is your monitoring system sufficient?
ensure you can hear what the others are playing when they play it - i.e. timelags are a big issue
ensure you have a way of recording the complete music, not just one person's perspective
ensure you know what you're going to play, although this could just be a rough outline of chord changes, verses, choruses, etc
ensure you know who's leading
ensure you can communicate with each other in real-time - also means you may need a separate microphone for conversations.

For two composers instead of playing musicians, you'll need a way to describe thoughts to each other, a shared notepad and diagramming tool (such as groupware whiteboards) are useful. Whether it is usually truly synchronous may be picking hairs - I suppose both composers would have to write different parts, then combine them back together - it's more sequential but allows for a much quicker bounce of ideas back and forth than from asynchronous routes.

5d Composing asynchronously

Collaborating asynchronously opens up more opportunities. It's the modern equivalent of the guitarist walking into a rehearsal with some new riffs. You can record the instrument tracks you want to, then share or send the project file and associated audio. The other composer can import the project file and work on that, then share or send it back. This allows for recording overdubs, adding new loops, writing new sections of music.

Cross-platform composition, tracking and mixing is one area where few if any of the DAW manufacturers have pushed the boundaries far enough. If you can keep it to midi files, you'll get a lot further. The OMF import and export functions can work, but are often flawed depending on how the original project file was saved.

6. Live

6a Jamming

Bouncing ideas off another musician and taking the music in a new direction is one of the best feelings coming from being a musician. The more you play with someone, the more you'll know how they play, not just what they play, but how they think when they're playing. For instance, you'll understand their ideas of chord progressions, melodies, phrasing, timing. If you share in that, then the whole can be greater that the sum of the parts. It's a good way to learn new basic song. Just beware of falling into the 12-bar blues progressions. Actually, even if you have to do 12-bar blues, use some of the variations.

6b Support

The traditional headline and support roles for gigs has been blurred for a long time, e.g. with gigs showing double headline acts or 4 supports, but the concept of an established band using a new band to keep the audience entertained and warm them up definitely still exists.

Want to expand your area for gigs, then get in touch with the manager of reasonably well-known, but still upcoming local band and suggest your band do a support slot for them. Make sure the musical styles and audiences of both bands are similar enough to work.

6c Recording

There will be other people starting out, trying to learn their trade. In many cases, they may be learning whether they want to continue or not. Some will be trying to branch out, so keep an eye out for people who are looking at recording gigs. A combination of inexperience, little knowledge and arrogance will often yield bad results whatever the industry, so look for someone who's actively learning and wanting to progress in recording.

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43 Reasons for Collaborating - Part 1 - Musical Creativity 41

Alan — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 19:22:07 +0100

A short series of articles on collaborating with other people to make your music better, make it heard or to help them move their music forwards.

1. Recording

1a Engineer

It's so much easier to play, record, change settings, do another take and all those other tasks when there's an extra pair of hands doing the engineering. It means you can focus on feeling comfortable and ensuring that you play to the best of your ability without having to change position and move a microphone, listen to the output, try again, etc. The more you work with an engineer, the more familiar you'll become with their way of working.

1b New outlook

Work with other engineers will remove some of the familiarity of the recording process or familiarity with a particular engineer but will open up new ideas. If you're acting as the engineer for someone else, then it may force you to think back to basics and undo some of your own habits that work well for you in your setting, but no so well for others in their own setting.

1c New kit

Not only do engineers have their preferred choices of recording techniques and equipment, some will have that equipment to hand. It's at the beginning and aspiring levels that it can make more difference since it's at the amateur and semi-pro levels that you're still learning which combinations work best for you. Perhaps you work with an engineer to try out their mics and return the favour later by recording them using your kit. The reciprocal nature opens up new opportunities and learning experiences.

1d Location or studio

Just as the engineer may have kit and techniques, they may also have access to other locations and studios. Want a good drum room, then you're probably better off with a studio, but want a particular type of sound, maybe even just a decent vocal booth and you may have luck with other musicians and engineers.

1e Crowd and audience

If you're thinking of recording a live gig, then the engineer may have access to a different audience (maybe bigger) than you're used to. Lots of live-recording engineers will have regular gigs. Getting a slot in one of those, could provide a ready-made, if not totally accepting, audience.

2. Mixing

2a Remix

Letting someone else mix your tracks has a few of advantages

provides a fresh pair of ears to your music
means you can focus on recording and playing
brings a different tone to your music if you use a mix engineer who has their own sound

Sometimes the mix you have just doesn't work, giving it to a mix engineer may help you out of that rut.

2b Revamp

Think of this being the use of "remix" that's becoming more prevalent nowadays. Hardly mixing in the traditional sense of setting faders, processing and effects, but getting involved in cutting-and-pasting the arrangement. In this case, the re-mixer would be chopping verses up, perhaps interspersing them with samples from elsewhere. Is there a better word for this?

2c Mashups

Taking the revamp approach a step further for a more extreme result.

2d Different mixing skills

There are a few tricks to mixing for 12 inch vinyl. Although many of these may be properly found within the mastering engineer's remit, knowing about them from a mix engineer's perspective will help move things along more quickly.

3. Playing

3a Skill

There are times when you have to admit you can't play an instrument well enough to be able to record what you want to. This is where the session musicians come in. At the more amateur level, it's more about finding a friend or a contact who can do it for you. Just beware of contractual implications if you go that route.

3b Extra Instruments

An extension of 3a, sometimes you just want a different instrument in your recording; one that you can't play. The most common for these would be real violins or cellos to augment sampled strings, or real trumpets or horns to augment brass sections. While you can get friends to fill in, again beware of contractual implications.

3c Vibe and Groove

Different players have different styles of playing. Compare the rock bassist to the jazz/funk bassist. Different styles and often even a different sense of timing. Actually, that should probably read that they can have a different interpretation of timing. By bringing in a musician who can add a different vibe, you can dramatically change the feel of a song.

3d Name and Kudos

This is the guest slot. Having someone with a known name can introduce you to their audience, but also give you the reputation of being able to work with others.

3e Broaden your Horizons

Playing or working with other musicians is a great way to expand your own horizons. Watch what they do, how they set-up, how they approach the gig, what kit they use and how they use it to produce the sounds requested of them. And that's without learning from the notes they play or the phrasing they employ.

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Part of a series by Award Sounds offering a selection of creative ideas to kick-start or rejuvenate a composition.