Intro and Reflection

The Explorations Unit allowed us to experiment with an idea or passion of ours and apply 21st century skills that we developed through Freestyle Academy. Over approximately a three week period, we pitched our idea to our media teachers and with their approval, delved into an area of interest. In English, we chose a research angle relating to our topic and found reputable sources that provided relevant statistics or information. In Design, we produced an infographic using this research. Finally, in Digital Media, we created a website using Dreamweaver to showcase our process and products. Given the individual nature of this project, class time was structured to give us complete independence and allow us to work on any part of the project at any time.

For my Explorations project, I chose to study music production. In particular, I wanted to focus on creating a more complex drum track and get a better understanding of what role different instruments should serve in a music composition. For the project, I worked with the music software Reason to produce a short song.

I enjoyed all the elements of this project. While I definitely struggled with some elements of producing the music in Reason – most notably, working to get each instrument to cohesively fit with the others – the process of actually playing with different samples and trying different chord progressions on the piano was very enjoyable. I attempted to work outside of my comfort zone for this project by varing my music style and expression. I also enjoyed designing an infographic and the website. While both productions happened over a very short period of time, I'm overall quite happy with my layout, concept, and color scheme.

Process

For the central part of the Explorations Unit, I worked with the music software Reason to produce a short song. I started with the drum track – it included a kick drum, two types of snares (one with more of a boom sound, the other with a more snappy sidestick sound), cymbals, and maracas. To create my drums, I used the Kong Drum Designer and placed each sample on a different patch.

Then, I used the pencil tooI to lay down bars in the sequencer panel. By double clicking on the bars, I moved into editing and was able to place down each instrument on the track. I knew I wanted a groovier, trippy sound with the drum, so I placed the kick drum on off beats as well as on beats 1 and 3. I also added 65% shuffle to the track to make it groovier.

My final production included piano, steel and acoustic guitar, and a bass.

I also produced a second song, which took much less time to produce. The chords were much simpler (1, 2, 6, 5 pattern in F major) but I wanted to try producing a less chaotic piece. This had only two piano trackds, a synth, the Kong drum track, and one special effect for white noise heard part way through the song.

Infographic

I chose to create an infographic detailing the process of producing music. I wanted the infographic to communicate the essential parts of any music composition, geared toward people with little to no experience in the area.