So, if you've ever played an instrument, you will know how similar practicing combos and learning to play a song on your instrument are. You have a music sheet (the combo recipe) that helps you play the correct notes (motions to perform attacks) at the right tempo to make music (the combo). The techniques my teacher taught me for the piano when I was a kid actually work really well to make learning combos easier and make them more applicable in matches. I am french and this is not very easy to explain, but here are the 2 most relevant ones.

• 1/ Put your brain in control, not your fingers

So it may have happenned while you were practicing a combo that suddenly for a few attempts you began messing up completely, like your fingers didn't know how to do the combo anymore, and you had to relearn a lot. Why? That is because you learned the combo the wrong way. You learned the combo as a series of movements your fingers must do: you looked at the recipe, thought about which keys should be pressed and let your fingers muscle memory learn the motions necessary for the combo. Your brain should be the one in control, not your fingers. Your fingers should learn how to perform each specific move separately, not learn the combo. Accidentally learning through muscle memory entire sections of music (or combos) is a common shortcut beginners take when playing instruments because they don't yet know how to associate each note to a finger movement, or that more experienced musicians will accidentally use when playing harder pieces.

How do I fix this?

It will sound a bit dumb, but say the 'notes' you're playing out loud, which means saying out loud each move you want to input just as you're going to input it. You just need to say 'S' for Slash, 'H' for HS, 'Rev' for bandit revolver, Drift for drift RC... This ensures that your brain is in control: you say "Rev", then your fingers do the Bandit Revolver motion. This way your brain learns the combo, and your fingers learn the individual motions for every attack or special, and how to string them one-to-one. This was probably the most important techniques I learned playing the piano. A lot of combos are too fast for saying these out loud, so just 'say them in your mind' and skip saying RCs, go slow, or just talk for the part that gives you trouble. Highly recommend doing this if you're learning an instrument and noticing you rely to much on muscle memory. You can intentionally slow down and say t

In all the examples below you will hear it in the first ten seconds of the songs in the intro. The cadence and tune of the music is almost BOUNCY? Like the notes actually feel like they bounce up and down in my head when I listen. I realized a lot of my favorite dopamine-inducing dramatic songs have this same pattern, and I’m trying to identify it so I can understand why. It feels so good inside my brain when I listen to it.

Here’s an example of some songs that do it on piano: -Breathe Me by Sia -Where’s my Love by SYML -Colorblind by Counting Crows

And a couple that kinda have a similar sound but with guitar I think? The second one is similar in the bouncy feeling, but moves around with a bit more variation with the tune: -Cheap Motel Room by Margot and the Nuclear So and Sos -Shallow by Lady Gaga, Bradley Cooper

As a professional composer, I think an understanding of functional harmony is my choice as most important rudiment. It does not end there obviously, but if I had to choose one...

I'm interested in hearing your rudiments.

I'm using a narrow definition here:

-Compositional techniques, not combinations thereof. For instance, hip hop (the genre) didn't appear until the 1970s but its basic building blocks (deejaying/record manipulation and rapped vocals) are both older - with the latter arguably going back to slavery times. Ed note: However, compositional techniques include things like time signature changes (beloved during the 1950s by Moondog)

-In order to "count", it cannot have been commercially recorded before 1 January 1960.

-It has to be audibly different from anything that a listener would've experienced on 1/1/1960. Synthesizers do not automatically count as they often sound indistinguishable from early electronic music made with oscillators, organs, and tape manipulation - even if it's a helluva lot more efficient to record trance music with a synth and DAW as opposed to recording it piece-by-piece, Tom Dissevelt-style. A lot of modern electronic music techniques - as well as guitar effects pedals - are simply more efficient interfaces to achieve what would previously require a lot of manual amp/organ manipulation in 1959.

Here are the largest truly novel (and audibly novel to a listener from 1959/1960) music building blocks I can think of that were first recorded after 1960 off the top of my head:

-Auto-Tune. Although vocal manipulation is much older, Auto-Tune relies on software that was not invented until the 1990s. The closest pre-1960 analogue to it might be either the chipmunk effect or some old Alvino Rey records that use a sort of talk box.

-Slap bass, the sound used in the Seinfeld theme. Invented in the 1970s by some guy named Larry Graham. Slap double bass, though, dates back to jazz.

-Beatboxing. Although there are also older parallels (eefing, some old blues songs), beatboxing is intended to sound like a drum machine and is first documented in the 1960s.

-Record scratching. Invented in the 1970s by Grand Wizzard Theodore.

I'm completely open to corrections and additions so feel free to add them.

St. Vincent - Paris is Burning

The Parlor Mob - When I Was an Orphan

Modest Mouse - Parting of the Sensory

The songs start normally, have some sort of transition, either instrumental or lyrical, like a bridge, then end with generally a steady beat, the key here being very repetitive lyrics. The closest technique I can think of is a "crescendo", but it feels more distinct than "with a gradual increase in loudness".

Any help would be appreciated! Bonus points for finding similar songs as I love the style.

I adore Dokyeom’s vocals. He has a smooth butteriness to the way he sings and is so emotive. I’ve seen lots of people pay backhanded compliments (usually from SM stans) on the fact that Dokyeom’s singing ability relies on his voice being really incredible to listen to while lacking in vocal technique (istg there was a whole post about this last week), but I think that’s actually false and no longer applies to Dokyeom even if it may have been true in his earlier years. He’s always had an excellent vocal tone right from debut but over the last five years we’ve seen him really develop his vocal technique. Rewatching rookie year Dokyeom sing, you could see how he would strain his voice to hit high notes and hadn’t quite figured out a good way to flicker back and forth between chest voice and head voice. You could also see the way he would tense up his face muscles in order to belt high notes. Three years after debut when he was covering a Yang Da Il song (called She Didn’t love me) you could see the immense improvement in the way that he was no longer straining his voice or scrunching up his face to hit high notes.

His musical gig in 2019 gave him a lot more experience, confidence and control over his vocal technique. People forget that he landed a lead role as King Arthur for his debut musical in a major production of Excalibur (he auditioned through his own initiative which is really impressive since the musical theatre scene in Korea is very prominent and exclusive, musical theatre singers are seen as much more skilled than idol singers). For the SM stans in the house, Dokyeom was co-lead with Kim Junsu (former TVXQ member) who’s been critically acclaimed as a musical artist and a great vocalist. Considering that DK’s never received SM’s special vocal training, I think landing a co-lead role with an experienced SM vocalist is a pretty huge achievement. Even comparing Dokyeom’s vocals in Habit during the 2018 Haru tour to Dokyeom’s vocals in Kidult or Smile Flower this year/2019, you could hear the improvement in his vocal technique. Especially with regards to singing in a lower register, Dokyeom has really stabilized his thicker vocals so that he can hit those lower notes without going off key. His range has gotten wider and I think it’s definitely because he’s challenged himself to improve his vocals. He’s no longer just a good singer, he’s a singer with great technique too.

Does anyone know if there's a specific name of the musical/melodical technique/element that IZ*ONE Yuri does in Fiesta at around the 0:57-0:59 mark of the MV? The way it kinda sounds like she shifts to a different scale/pitch? I'm sorry if I'm not making sense haha I didn't study music.

And if it is it's own sort of technique/element, are there are other similar songs that incorporate this? It was one of the main things that made me like Fiesta.

As the title says, I'm interested in learning about the musical techniques and theory used in the different Arctic Monkeys records. I'm most interested in the techniques in FWN, AM and TBH+C.

The songs I like most from these albums are:

• The Brianstorm b-sides
• Fluorescent Adolescent
• D is for Dangerous
• Arabella
• Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High?
• Batphone
• Anyways

I'm interested in:

• the techniques used for the bass and drums in FWN and AM.
• the techniques used for the guitar used in all three albums
• the piano and bass in TBH+C

I know this is kind of a big and broad question, but any help would be appreciated.

Hey!

I started producing music in September of 2018! I’ve been really fascinated by music theory and I was interested in assembling a list of techniques that have recognizable sound to the ear, but without previous understanding of the effect may be difficult to pinpoint why they sound the way they do.

At its most basic, the half step between a basic major or minor triad is a good example. But what prompted this post for me was when my piano teacher played a whole tone scale on the piano. It reminded me of “something mystical or magical appearing”, which I had always heard in movies but didn’t have the ear training to understand.

Ex. https://youtu.be/MotdhW3mMVM?t=52

Another example is Shepard tones where the sound seems to raise/lower indefinitely. It sounds like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzNzgsAE4F0

It’s achieved when you take a note and pitch bend so it reaches the next octave. Then you duplicate that effect but put each note at a sequential octave. Fade out the highest note and fade in the lowest note, and then you put it on loop! In case that didn’t quite make sense, Tom Cosm made a great tutorial on it back in 2009!

Part 1: https://youtu.be/XLdxUsSAzDU?t=240

Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJPexlIsZyo

When applied to chords it can also create really interesting (and sometimes sinister!) sounds!

Those are demonstrated in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwFUwXxfZss&t=166s

What other techniques have you learned over the years that have a very particular emotional, or otherwise interesting effect to them?

For my school assessment I’m doing a viva voce on how the Arctic Monkeys music has musically evolved over each album. What are some musical features/ideas etc that get added or lost over each album?

Hey guys, so this post isn't strictly all theory and I apologize if xposts aren't allowed, but I wanted to share a personal compositional reference sheet I've been working on.

As I've been learning more about music, it's dawned on me that the ultimate goal of making music is to express my emotions. I've seen a lot of discussion about technique → emotion, but when I'm writing a song, I want the opposite direction: start with emotions, then try to express them through music. So I decided to make a reverse mapping, from emotion to musical technique. I went through every emotion as listed on The Junto Emotion Wheel and came up with at least 3 ways to achieve that feeling.

It took me a few sessions and was quite a bit of work so I'm excited to share. That being said, this list is not suggesting a right or wrong way to do things. These aren't rules. Rather, it's just a brainstorm of ideas to whet an appetite. It's subjective, an incomplete list of emotions, and biased to my tastes, but it's something that helps me, and I hope might help you too.

I'd really love to hear effective techniques that you guys have found too, please post them!

Anyways, here it is:

Joy

Higher energy, authentic cadences, meet expectations, and resolves tension.

Contented, Satisfied, Pleased - perfect authentic cadence, suspended chord resolution, leading tone resolution, hitting the tonic.

Happy, Amused, Delighted - violin trills, staccato, quick melodic movement, ending a melodic phrase on the tonic.

Cheerful, Blissful, Jovial - upbeat tempo, simple chords, reverb/echo.

Proud, Triumphant, Illustrious - loud, sustained or repeated notes, trumpet, minor to major, chorus of voices.

Optimistic, Hopeful, Eager - really hold out a IV or V, half cadence, play suspended notes in a major context.

Enthusiastic, Excited, Zeal - marching band drums, strong sense of tempo/percussion, increase dynamics, sweep a parameter or effect, use altered/borrowed chords e.g. secondary dominants.

Elation, Jubilation, Euphoria - sweep a high pass filter upwards, stay on the tonic and on resolved notes, do that EDM offbeat bass thing, get a modal feeling by sticking with one note/chord for a long time.

Enthralled, Rapture, Enchanted - dynamic swelling trills on e.g. a flute, add a sample of an "environment" e.g. running water + crickets + rustling leaves, reverb+echo+delay

I've been studying with my teacher just over a year, for opera. I asked him if we can cover different styles in the future, such as jazz and gospel (because he teaches both those too). My voice isn't suited for soul and R&B, but at some point I'd like to touch on those just for fun. If anyone can explain to me the differences in technique, placement, etc. between a musical theater style vs soul/gospel/R&B singing, I'd very much appreciate it.

The main thing we're working on is breath support exercises so I can sustain my notes, especially now since I'm learning coloratura singing (I'm an absolute beginner at it, so I tend to beat myself up over it and over-think, which is why I think I'm stuck at the stage I'm at. When I finally let go during a lesson, we make progress).

At the top of my list would probably be Un Sueno en la Floresta. Not only is it difficult and impressive, but it has an evocative, beautiful, magical quality to it that draws me in, that matches the title of the song.

The best rendition IMO on YouTube is the one by Kyuhee Park. Try sitting back and listening with some headphones.

Okay, firstly, I am sorry if I post in the wrong place/thread, but could you help me out for just a second?

I love this particular song from Japanese band OGRE YOU ASSHOLE (silly name, I know) titled "Yuurei"

Here's the link: https://youtu.be/8hept9CdvEE

There is this slight tempo changes that occurs from 2:51 where the bass feels off-tempo little by little until it feels natural. So, is there any term for this musical technique? I've read a bit about metric modulation but I don't think that's the right phrase to put it.

What do you guys think? Thanks for the feedback. Really appreciate it!

edits: thanksforthegoldkindstranger.jpg !!!! holy shit my first platinum! thanks guys. I'd love it if you gave me feedback on my latest song, thanks!

As I've been learning more about music, it's dawned on me that the ultimate goal of making music is to express my emotions. I've seen a lot of discussion about technique → emotion, but when I'm writing a song, I want the opposite direction: start with emotions, then try to express them through music. So I decided to make a reverse mapping, from emotion to musical technique. I went through every emotion as listed on The Junto Emotion Wheel and came up with at least 3 ways to achieve that feeling.

It took me a few sessions and was quite a bit of work so I'm excited to share. That being said, this list is not suggesting a right or wrong way to do things. These aren't rules. Rather, it's just a brainstorm of ideas to whet an appetite. It's subjective, an incomplete list of emotions, and biased to my tastes, but it's something that helps me, and I hope might help you too.

I'd really love to hear effective techniques that you guys have found too, please post them!

Anyways, here it is:

Joy

Higher energy, authentic cadences, meet expectations, and resolves tension.

Contented, Satisfied, Pleased - perfect authentic cadence, suspended chord resolution, leading tone resolution, hitting the tonic. Happy, Amused, Delighted - violin trills, staccato, quick melodic movement, ending a melodic phrase on the tonic.

Cheerful, Blissful, Jovial - upbeat tempo, simple chords, reverb/echo.

Proud, Triumphant, Illustrious - loud, sustained or repeated notes, trumpet, minor to major, chorus of voices.

Optimistic, Hopeful, Eager - really hold out a IV or V, half cadence, play suspended notes in a major context.

Enthusiastic, Excited, Zeal - marching band drums, strong sense of tempo/percussion, increase dynamics, sweep a parameter or effect, use altered/borrowed chords e.g. secondary dominants.

Elation, Jubilation, Euphoria - sweep a high pass filter upwards, stay on the tonic and on resolved notes, do that EDM offbeat bass thing, get a modal feeling by sticking with one note/chord for a long time.

Enthralled, Rapture, Enchanted - dynamic swelling trills on e.g. a flute, add a sample o