12 weeks, 12 songs: Month Three

It's finally over! Twelve songs in...14 weeks, not 12. Close enough!

I was crazy for doing this, but it was a unique experience. I'm planning on doing a retrospective on the ordeal in a future post.

I'm also not going to be as fancy with the links/downloads. You'll get an mp3 to download for each song at the end of this post, but aside from the summary, that's it. Let's begin, shall we?

Week five:

This began the month of movement-based songs, and also the worst piece I embarked on. The idea was to use martial-art-inspired movements as a base. I wanted the "hard" style of movements (sharp, linear, direct) on one side and "soft" (circular, softer, fluid) on the other. There would be contrast in patterns and visuals as well as a "sparring" section.

I found myself banging my metaphoric head against the table with this one. I was doing movement for movements sake. Nothing felt purposeful as patterns came out uninspired and I wound up forcing myself to push forward as the week went on. I rushed to end this piece and it left a sour taste in my mouth. Not a good start for movement month!

Week six:

I wanted to give movement another chance, but realized I needed to approach it differently from putting some drums down and making new motions next to them. So I looked at the slung okedo (katsugi okedo) and asked, "what can I do with these if used as props and not just drums?" Got some interesting ideas from that! Unfortunately there's nothing I can show you, and the music isn't all that interesting without the visuals, so...

The best I can do is summarize some of the movement ideas. I took the okedo atop one shoulder and flipped it forward, tumbling down and back up to the other shoulder. I had the idea of a row of players moving the okedo in large circles with both hands, in different directions but flat to the audience. I also wanted to play with heights of the okedo, low to the ground or held over the head. Playing them in this way isn't optimal, but that wasn't the point.

Not sure I can take this piece into a workable song, but the ji and some of the movements could easily fit into a different piece someday.

Week seven:

I gave up on movement-based songs at this point. In fact, I took a week off here because A) I was busier than normal and B) my brain needed a break from creating in ways I wasn't fond of (i.e., movement-oriented). I needed to start fresh, with something off-the-wall. I decided to write a taiko piece without taiko.

Well ok, specifically a taiko piece where no taiko head was struck. I wanted a row of players in front sitting or kneeling, using only bachi to make sounds, while two okedo behind them were played on the ropes or rims alone. I know the ropes aren't the best place to hit, but that's not the point. The clicking sounds you'll hear on the mp3 represent shime bachi or oak bachi, either struck together or hitting the floor. There are some cool acoustic effects I was able to come up with in angling and placing bachi in different angles and holding different grips, but I can't get those sounds out of my little notation program.

Week eight:

I wanted to go back to taking a musical idea or ideas and going wherever my mind wanted to take it. I got inspiration from listening to old videogame soundtracks (we're talking pre-Nintendo here) and the from the music came the visual/arrangement ideas.

I have two taiko on upstands at angles and one on a downstand in the middle. There are five players that rotate around, moving between drums, and whatever solos are played are always on that center drum. The song isn't particularly complex and the movements aren't even planned, but it has enough potential to "keep in mind".

Week nine:

I had a weird idea for this one which I'm still not sure if I like. I wanted four different types of taiko in the back, each person getting a single quarter note to improvise something short and simple. With four quarter notes per measure and four people on four drums, this would create a constantly changing ji, one improvised by gestalt.

I don't even know what I wanted the front row/rest of the song to look like; that was secondary. And the ability to have four people constantly improvising without losing the pulse or tempo is something yet to be tried.

I'm not sure what I think about this piece. It's a very unusual idea but does that mean that it's a good one? Or just a gimmick? Hmm.

Week ten:

I was listening to some Reverend Horton Heat, who play Rockabilly, and thought, "why not make a 'Taikobilly' song?" Rockabilly is full of swing and spunk, so what would a Taikobilly song be like?

The setup idea was to have four taiko on downstands, with one person behind and between each pair for a total of three players. The back row ji has a shime and sumo (or lower-tone shime) per pod, with two pods total. Again, I didn't focus (or care much) about the visuals even though some ideas came to mind. The song is more about conveying that infectious energy and having fun with the musical genre. The chappa are way too loud on this track, but I have them at the quietest dynamic on the score as it is.

I like this piece, it has some oomph to it, plays with a genre taiko doesn't normally have, and I like the speed-up section into the solo ji. Might do something with this one...

Week eleven:

So until now, all the songs were based in 4/4 time. There are some other meters within the songs, but never as a theme. I wanted to take an odd meter - in this case 5/4 - and make it uncharacteristically festive, or at least swung.

It wasn't a great result overall. It's in 5/4, it's swung, but there's nothing about the patterns that has any sort of pulse; nothing to latch on to. It's a bit chaotic overall. If I had more than a week to do something in an odd meter, I think I might have more luck.

Week twelve:

Home stretch! I promised myself that I would finish this project by doing a Yoshikazu Fujimoto-inspired piece. I did a post about him here. I wanted to make it a festive, catchy piece with kakegoe (shouts or calls) as well as kiai. The idea of having three distinct tones of taiko came about by accident, but there is a section with descending tones that I really like.

I didn't create any kakegoe or kiai in the piece but left parts quieter and/or simpler where I want them to go. I also realize that relying on tones in taiko is futile, because drums change pitch all too easily. As long as it's high/middle/low, I'm good. I might use katsugi okedo if I have a good idea for what I would do with them.

Summary of months 2 and 3:

Painful. Movement is so not my forte. I can come up with movements without too much trouble, but making them the focus of a piece is the quickest way to turn it rotten. Taking a musical idea or an unusual concept is what gets my creative juices flowing.

I was almost always scrambling by the end of the week to finish. That came from enjoying the first few days of concept and idea generation too much, not realizing (or wanting to realize) that it takes more time for me to get things down that I like. Often that meant just forcing the later parts of a song, especially endings. You'll notice a lot of songs have a really strong last two, four, or eight measures, and end on a big fat ONE of the next downbeat. That's because usually it was the last day and I hadn't time to be creative.

I'll talk about this process more and what fates await my 12 songs in an upcoming post, so I'll end the chatter here. Hooray for staying sane! I think...well, as sane as I ever am, anyways.

Downloads:

Full pack of 8 songs (zipped) Mirror pack of 8 songs (zipped)

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05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12