Frankie Detergnt

this is a modern take on an old "lost land" song. lost against russia. there's that old saying: "Q:which are the neighboring countries of russia? A:whichever russia desires." there are some random occasions which give some insight into a war, like a person from Georgia i heard randomly saying "they all left that city empty because of the war. now it's part of russia, and those buildings are free for russians to live in." as the news from all the countries and even historical mentions "have an agenda", this folklore sayings and songs give an alternate insight. enough politics, here's the track: "canta cucu-n bucovina"

let the men have it a go with singing. this guy's performance i adore: adrian naidin: pan' la rai e cale lunga (it's also good for scarring the cats when they want to steal your food).

yeah, women's voices are so beautiful, i actually downloaded some songs just for the sake of their singing, like Tori Amos - Winter lotte kestner - alone lotte kestner - different stars .but to make this a little more on topic let me link something more traditional. maybe this is not a good enough link for this topic, but here we go, it has the traditional folklore feel: cand aud cucu cantand

i'm curious to hear some folk music that you really enjoy. lately i'm a little obsessed with this one (in my case i'm romanian so all my links will be romanian folklore): Liviu Vasilica - Fir-ai tu sa fii de murg

in general we (just like other animals) pay attention to change. if i wave my hand at my cat, she'll pay attention. but if i do this 2more times it will disregard it because she can anticipate it. it doesn't matter how complicated my movement is, if it repeats exactly the same, its predictable. so you can use quarter notes or eights or sixteenths it doesn't matter, it's the difference between a musical sentence and the next that counts, there're times when the rhythm of the piano is more structured than the flute. a sentence is in eights and it's companion is in sixteenths, < that's a good contrast (it grabs attention, as long as it's not continuously repeating). but the flute is too busy getting to some tones, that it disregards this contrast at times. if it gets "free" and doesn't follow any noticeable pattern, you may think its "out of the rhythmic game" but nothing is. if after a few phrases you don't change the rhythm in a contrasting way, it gets boring, no matter how free you think you are. the change effect gets amplified if you're backing it with contrasting harmonic change.

i think theory is the ultimate savior. (i refer to it as being almost supernatural). see (inspect) what you like in music, and think of other ways to accomplish it. "everything can be in a different way". for example these kids that make tracks replaced harmonic change with timbre change, or reverb change (thats crazy, although i personally predicted it a long time ago). theory predicted that one can use a change in speed of the track, which i havent heard yet, but it's a logicall path. theory can take you infinite distances. the other option would be practice without any theorizing. this is more "natural", and thus you would need to speed it up in order to evolve. (just like nature shortened the lifespan of flowers so they could die faster and make way for new offsprings with genetic modifications, and thus adapt much quicker). this means instead of doing one piece just do 10 pieces, even if the other 9 are not that polished. that will make change(evolution) happen 10x faster.

you could refer to a harmonic problem or to a rhythmic one.

so because i think harmony is somewhat studied, but rhythm is not, rhythm is the area which defines how "talented" you are as a composer. so a few quick notes i have to add after listening to (a few, not much) classical music: untalented so overrated composers: 1. beethoven. i listened to his music almost an entire day, and what a waste of time that was. if you're not paying attention to some tricks that he does, the music passes by without any notice. there are few very few pieces that are good. but when he really nails a melody line, it's the type of melody composed by a kid who's starting out at piano lessons. (see ode of joy) 2. chopin. there's nothing there.. i'm exaggerating now but, i found only one piece which interesting harmonically just for a quick study, and the melody is made out of quarter notes (if that can even be called a melody) 3. brahms. i appreciate this guy for struggling. he's no genius, but his efforts are extraordinary. harmonically he's doing nothing in his era. he's more undeveloped than pachelbel probably. 4. nothing stuck to me from listening to schubert. talented and underrated: 1. rossini. a force of nature. perfect. harmonically he may be far behind his time like brahms or tchaikovsky. 2. mendelssohn. perfect. 3. i didn't listen to that much classical music so this list is short. i can mention a guy completely untalented which is one of my favorites: erik satie.and there are also good composers from different nationalities which are not studied worldwide but they are good. (like enescu, etc) 4. maybe Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, i remember i thought he was especially talented. that's it. i only mentioned the underrated good ones, because bach, mozart, tchaikovsky, ravel, rachmaninoff, prokofiev, verdi, grieg, wagner, i find amazing.

aha, thanks guys. usually when i see a melody line in A minor i assume the chords with which is accompanied are also in A minor, or they could be in F major (because F is the root between F-A, so the harmony has it's root in the base). or they could be in D minor because D-A has D as the root also. i get intrigued when the melody is orchestrated with chords that don't have the base (or center) of the harmony in them. like if i would put the E minor chord/harmony underneath the A minor melody. i guess as a whole the A would be viewed as an added forth to the harmony of Eminor. i usually think of the melody as being the important part, and the chords just an orchestration (which can be done in all sorts of ways). so i view it like the A is orchestrated with the chord on it's fifth (the E). and this is how i view the add9 situation also. the melody not being the ninth of something, but the root of itself and is accompanied with a chord/harmony on it's (minor) seventh (C major is the seventh degree of the D minor key/harmony). this is the view from the melody perspective. i guess i have to further investigate, because what intrigued me the most in this song is that the melody of the verses and prechoruses are in the harmony of C (i think, but this is where i could be wrong). and the chorus comes in the harmony of D minor. (again from the melody/cantus firmus perspective). this modulation from C to D is what's unusual. when i was transcribing the melody i double and triplet checked because it sounded wrong, or unstable, especially for a chorus.

:laugh:

only the good ones. it's like they're done by another person. it's not natural to make beautiful music. because you cannot be attracted to yourself. if you can anticipate exactly what will happen, then it's boring to listen to. that means that when you composed the music you switched perspective in a way that was not intuitive to you, (probably thru a composition secret/technique, consciously or unconsciously).

i'm referring to a major chord: C-E-G with an added ninth D. is this considered a stable chord? the melody usually is on that ninth (D), but ..how does it get away with it? that should be tension. i've heard this taylor swift - style which has the chorus on the added ninth. normally that would be a major second (to the harmony), which is an unusual tone to start a *concluding melody* like a chorus, but it would be somewhat acceptable if it would resolve to the root. but here it "resolves" to the fifth, like a half cadence. finally it rests on the second/ninth as a conclusion (the second/ninth sounds more stable than the fifth) so what's with this added ninth, not just as chord embellishment, but as the central tone in the melody line?

like my signature says it. rhythm is the drawing and harmony the colors. thinking of harmony when composing music is like thinking of some interesting color combinations when coloring ..(what? ..nothing!) in a painting. ("kids, today you will color nothing, and i want you to think of some interesting colors for this") this produces crazy - weird - original i'll admit it results but mostly non relevant for the human listener. so i'd like to learn something practical about rhythm ..before i finish my own theory attempts.

thanx for the link. that's pretty well organized for a website. i red the chapters i was interested in in walter piston's harmony, but overall i must say i'll probably bug you guys from time to time with this sort of questions.. i'm not a stranger to the typical music theory, in fact i have a big book right on my desk which i red a couple of years ago and recheck from time to time, and i also read articles or theory stuff from time to time. the thing is i could never find the fruitfulness in these typical music theory. yes, i learned a few fancy chords/substitutions idk.. modulation.. but that's not the core of the music imo. especially now that i'm more interested in melody. that's why i'm searching for more unconventional theories, which make me astray from the general path, and that's why i ask with you guys, to see if something is clashing or some theory generated abnormalities. i'm happy with short answers too, like "yes" / "no" for my posts. and i keep writing thinking it's good for a forum to have text like this written (to bring visitors/new forum members). not to mention, writing these posts forces me to think more critically and find a big part of the answer by the time i finished asking the question. so don't feel bad if you don't have the patience to reply to my posts, i more than understand.. lol.. oh, lately i've also been watching this guys theory lessons. https://www.youtube.com/user/AustinTPatty/videos maybe the link could be of any help to someone. anyway, thanks for the links, and happy holidays.

i'm trying to study/analyze(cause i can't find information.. maybe you could recommend a link) choruses/verses and what differentiates them (harmonically). from the few song i studied i can draw a conclusion that choruses tend to start from a tonic point (c of e or g), then go to "dominant" or "tension" i would better say, then back to the tonic. while verses tend to go to a subdominant (or "away") (or maybe dominant too, i haven't concluded yet) place and leave you there hanging. but this requires me to simplify all the tones into 3 categories: 1tonic (or i would say "home"), 2subdominant ("away") and 3dominant (or "tension"). basically 1tonic/home tones are: 1 C, 3(M3/m3) E/Eb, 5 G. yes i view G as a tonic not a dominant. the reason why the G chord is dominant to C i think is because of the D and especially the B tone that bring the tension. that's why in a minor key like a minor, the e minor chord is not enough to be dominant, it has to have that major third (G#).. because that's the farthest tone (except the diminished fifth) that's the most unrelated to the tonic. from Hindemith's harmonic series: C-G-F-A-E-Eb-Ab-D-Bb-Db-B-F#. so it's like going to the edge of a boat to the point you tip over, and you wish to go back to the center. actually if i view it from hindemith's harmonic or related series, it's like this: 1. C is the root/tonic-home-. 2. G is the closest related tone, so it's a tonic-home- tone. 3. F. F is also very close related so it should be a tonic, but it definitely doesn't sound like tonic-home, but rather subdominant-away. why? i think it's because the fourth is the inversion of the fifth with the root changed! so root has shifted from C to F. that's why it feels like "another place". 4. A. it's also close related, but here's where my trouble is. the major sixth is the inversion of the minor third. hindemith says that the root between 2tones forming a minor third is none of 2tones, but a major third down from the low note(e.g.:F is the root of A-C). but he says that if we have to choose from the 2 we should choose the bottom tone from the minor third interval. meaning that the root between C and A is A. this means that once again the root has changed so we are in a subdominant - "away" place. (i hope this is somewhat correct) 5. E is also rather related, the root between C-E is C, so it's tonic/home. 6. Eb is the one with the problem but it's established that C is the root, so it's again a tonic/home. although it's starting to get farther from the tonic. 7. Ab (minor sixth) is the inversion of the major third, so the root changes => subdominant/away. (so in A minor harmony, hitting the F tone will sound subdominant/away) 8. D. hindemith says that's really no root from the seconds forward (minor second and sevenths).(again if he has to choose he would chose to upper tone as the root, like D being the root between C-D) so from now on, we're getting in the dominant/"tension" (distant related) tones. 9..the rest is more and more dominant/tension/distant. the last F# is rather unusable, i think he said. so that's how i would view the tones. a lot of hit songs have 1 tone per bar/chord, so a single tone is enough to play a tonic/subdominant/dominant function. think of the chorus of "yellow submarine" just an example..