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Pico-8 Music Tutorial #55 – Feedback Series #4
🕑 Added 2020-03-16 14:00:04 +0000 UTCHey everyone!
This tutorial/feedback video features a hilarious cart on the forms called “Can’t Win With Cats.” It also reflects some fresh ideas I’ve been having about composition (which may eventually form a new tutorial series).
I still need to iron out the language, but I believe every action while composing, in Pico-8 or otherwise, is a process involving these five areas:
- Playing with sound/parts (melody, bass line, percussion, sound design)
- Playing with relations between parts (foreground, background, rhythmic relations, harmony, mixing)
- Playing with relations between larger sections (form, pacing, ratios, unity)
- Preparing and managing project assets & interfaces
- Taking breaks
All five of these actions are guided by some kind of “playback-reaction” feedback loop. These loops are dependent on both the composer’s disposition, and the way they interact with their tools. This is why with many software instruments and DAWs (including Pico-8), it’s important to learn hotkeys - to maintain fluid feedback loops.
In this tutorial, I talk specifically about the first three: Playing with individual parts, playing with their relations to other parts, and creating form by playing with relations between larger sections. Because framing composition in this way is a work-in-progress for me, feedback is welcome!
Time stamps:
- 0:00 Choosing & playing a random cart
- 1:48 Taking a survey of all the SFX and patterns
- 2:55 Introducing a general composition process
- 4:40 Polishing an individual part
- 6:40 Listening & polishing in relationship to other parts
- 7:50 Adding another part
- 9:50 Polishing parts, considering relationships to other parts
- 14:05 Polishing an individual part
- 16:30 Recapping process
- 17:35 Next steps: form & development
- 18:25 Changing keys as a means of development
- 18:55 Listening to relationships between larger sections, polishing
- 21:10 Using different rates of change and pacing to create form
- 25:30 Listening to entire song
- 26:05 Considering more areas for polishing
