VCV Rack Electronic Music & Sound Composition
This composition was created by me for my Year 1 Semester 2 "Electronic Music" Module's graded exam assignment.
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Firstly, we were given a brief, which is to design a futuristic musicscape that consists of music and sound elements solely using electronic synthesis techniques learnt in the module. Furthermore, we were told to pick a theme from the given list and I picked "The Milky Way".
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Then, I proceeded to write a short scenario synopsis based on the Milky Way theme and this helps me to decide how I would like to design and structure the musicscape:
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It’s the year 2070, space travel has not advanced much, but scientists have created a super telescope that people can buy, and it allows them to view the planets and stars in the milky way. Many people buy the telescope, including you and you decide to use it on a clear, starry night where the milky way is visible.
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You walk out into a field alone with the telescope, feeling rather lonely, and start the viewing session. The milky way looks beautiful and grand through the telescope, the planets and stars twinkling, and you can hear them twinkle in your mind as you view them.
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The vastness of the milky way seems so fascinating and you are just in awe but it’s also mysterious in a way, as you start to wonder about what lies there. As your viewing session comes to an end, you feel a sense of calmness and peace in your heart and suddenly, you feel more comforted, like you aren’t so lonely anymore.
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Then, I proceeded to break down the scenario into the following parts:
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1. You walk out into a field alone with the telescope, feeling rather lonely, and start the viewing session.
2. The milky way looks beautiful and grand through the telescope, the planets and stars twinkling, and you can hear them twinkle in your mind as you view them.
3. The vastness of the milky way seems so fascinating and you are just in awe but it’s also mysterious in a way, as you start to wonder about what lies there.
4. As your viewing session comes to an end, you feel a sense of calmness and peace in your heart and suddenly, you feel more comforted, like you aren’t so lonely anymore.
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These 4 parts became my main focus and I then designed the various musicscape sketches to fit these 4 sections such that I could then combine them together to tell this in a linear story.
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Section 1
You walk out into a field alone with the telescope, feeling rather lonely, and start the viewing session.
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I used the VCV rack to create this section. The VCV rack is a modular synthesizer and I can use it to help shape the 4 types of waves - sine, square, sawtooth, triangle - into various timbres and pitches.
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I wanted a melancholic like sound to start off the piece hence I felt that creating a sound with a high pitch and soft and round timbre would be fitting.
As seen here, I started off with a sine wave, which provides the sound with a round timbre, I then increased it's pitch and put it through a low pass filter to make it sound more round.
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Then, in order to play the sound like a piano, I used an ADSR as well as a MIDI-CV and it's V/OCT function to be able to enable the sound to play on cue when I press the laptop keyboard key. If this was not done, the sound would be playing constantly hence this allows me to control when the sound is played. I also added on a reverb module to help enhance the sound and give it a more space vibe.
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Then, I figured out the melody I wanted on a piano and played it out accordingly in the VCV rack and recorded it down. In addition, I also layered a bass track underneath the melody to help support it and provide some added ambience. This is the intro:
Section 2
The milky way looks beautiful and grand through the telescope, the planets and stars twinkling, and you can hear them twinkle in your mind as you view them.
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In this section, I broke it down into two elements, namely "beautiful and grand" and "stars twinkling" and these are the two elements that I would like to emphasize and convey in this section of the musicscape. For both elements, the VCV rack was used once again to produce the sounds.
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For "beautiful and grand", I wanted it to be very warm in tone, mid to low in pitch while having a slightly buzzy like timbre but still round sounding.
For this, I used a sine wave, and fed it through a low pass filter to help emphasize on the lower frequencies, and I opened the filter to allow the buzz to come through and not entirely be cut off. I also added reverb to help give it a space feel.
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I used the ADSR and MIDI-CV again such that I could play out the sounds like a piano.
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I then figured out what chords I wanted to be played using a piano, then played it out in the VCV rack and recorded it. This is what it sounds like:
For "stars twinkling", I wanted it to sound higher in pitch but smoother, rounder and a little thick in timbre.
For this, I used a sine wave, and fed it through a low pass voltage controlled filter to make it sound round and thick in timbre. I also increased the pitch such that it would sound like stars twinkling. Then, I fed it through reverb to give it a more space like effect.
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I used the ADSR and MIDI-CV again such that I could play out the sounds like a piano.
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Lastly, I figured out the melody on the piano and played it out on the VCV rack. This is what it sounds like:
Section 3
The vastness of the milky way seems so fascinating and you are just in awe but it’s also mysterious in a way, as you start to wonder about what lies there.
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In this section, I wanted to focus on the "fascinating" and "mysterious" vibe of the Milky Way and I really wanted to transition from this amazement and wonder at the start to something more curious and intriguing using the way the notes flow. With that, I felt as though the space atmosphere in this part would give off a cold tone and FM Synthesis was the perfect technique to help me achieve this cold tone since the sounds produced with FM Synthesis were metallic and cold sounding in timbre.
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This section was made up of 3 tracks, all made from FM Synthesis and they are varied in the way they are modulated as well as how each modulator modulates each other. This was done in Ableton Live as the DAW supports such synthesis techniques.
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For the first track, I wanted this layer to be a mid frequency chordal layer and it was the leading layer that helps to bring out the fascinating and mysterious aspect of this section. I also panned it such that it automated from left to right to create a more encapsulating sound scape. Besides this, I added reverb to give it a space vibe.
The next layer is a supporting chordal layer that is higher in frequency to give some shimmer and enhance the fascination to the sound. Once again, I added reverb to enhance the space vibe and did automation panning to encapsulate the audience.
The last layer is a bass layer to help fill up the frequency spectrum and provide a bass supporting structure to the entire soundscape in this section. Once again, I added reverb to enhance the space vibe.
For these 3 layers, I figured out a chord progression as mentioned above that helps to bring out the fascinating to mysterious vibe of this entire section. This is what this section sounds like when combined together:
Section 4
As your viewing session comes to an end, you feel a sense of calmness and peace in your heart and suddenly, you feel more comforted, like you aren’t so lonely anymore.
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In this section, it was rather simple as I wanted it to come full circle from the start now that we are ending on a slightly happier note, I used the same VCV rack design/setup except that I used a happier tone and it is conveyed through the way the melody is phrased.
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This is what it sounds like:
Final Composition
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For my final composition, I put everything together: