Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Bad Music

Several months ago I discovered the Portsmouth Sinfonia, an orchestral experiment put together by a group of students in the 1970s at the Portsmouth School of Art in England. Anyone was allowed to join the orchestra, regardless of their musical talent, ability, or experience. Though their last public performance was in 1979, many of their infamous recordings can be found online for everyone's "enjoyment" (I use the term very loosely). To me, these recordings are absolutely hilarious to listen to. But to each his own.

As I've thought about it, I think part of what I find humorous about it comes simply from being a composer. Often in the industry of film music, there is a common assumption that live recordings, as opposed to sampled mock-ups, are always 100% better. Not to say that live performance is not superior, 99% of the time it is indeed--but it's important to note that a sloppy or badly performed recording can be just as damaging to a piece of music as a cheap mock-up. A fellow composer, Rick Holets, put it so:

"It is interesting to note that an amateur orchestra with unskilled players can completely destroy the performance of a classic, time-proven and loved piece of music. In the same way, it should be expected that poorly executed virtual mock-ups (often the final product in our world) can be just as devastating to musicality, quality, and emotiveness of a piece."

Of course, some modernists like to cheekily push the envelope and ask: is badly performed music really bad? And with that:

Saturday, May 10, 2014

Treble Makers

Sometimes when I am in the middle of scoring a picture (or otherwise) oftentimes it's nice to have a side project of my own which usually consists of a genre of music utterly different from that of the main project. It's like having a barrel of wine I can tap whenever I grow weary of working on the same thing for too long. For instance, currently I'm in the middle of composing bespoke music for some educational curriculum. The type of music required is of a very grand orchestral nature, so in contrast the particular vintage as of late has been a little folk melody I actually composed several years ago and recently decided to arrange for a small pit band (of sorts). Though small ensembles are rather difficult to replicate with synthesized instruments, due to the intricate tone of solo instruments, I'm actually rather pleased with how this short little piece turned out. The band consists of a tin whistle, trumpet, upright piano, tuba, harmonium (pump organ), cello, and double bass.

Check it out!



Cheers,
Daniel