Thursday, June 10, 2010

From Our Musical Correspondent

I asked Manfred, he of the funny hair, stolen library books, and blog and band Trip to Jerusalem, how one actually records music. I had no idea.

Manfred is usually at least amusing, but his response is more than that--it's a glimpse into the work of creation:

"...start with the beat.

"Being boring, say its four beats to the bar and about 100 beats per minute. Now you record on one of your tracks the timecode, more often than not using a drum machine, which is the 'guide' for everyone else to play to. This beat track will be excised from the final recording."

(Work where the final piece eradicates the original scaffolding intrigues me--like the lost wax process. Or parts of growing up?)

Read the rest here: "The Sound of Drums, Part One".

5 comments:

  1. "where the final piece eradicates the original scaffolding . . . parts of growing up"

    Yeah!

    In marching band, we used a mega-metronome to keep beats if one end of the field was getting ahead of the other, (during practice, not performance). The high pitched weight of it made you think your life or the white house was in the hanging. We called it the "MET" and everybody hated the noise, but I guess it was necessary to suppliment machine where man got loosey-goose.

    I like how in an actors script, a beat means silence.

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  2. I like this idea of what is holding everything up goes away in the end. But the whole being is still there and solid. (Solid, man, solid!)

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  3. MRGRT: Well there ya go--another thing I had NO CLUE about. All the work that goes on behind the scenes is fascinating.

    FMO: Solid! I like how you put that.

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  4. Good God, I'm a musical correspondent.....

    About time!


    and....you know....I will return those library books...soon......

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  5. MANFRED: Please, you must document the return of the Incredibly Overdue Library Books with your iPhone, when you do!

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