Title 4:29 The Fear 5:00 1. Ensembles for Life 8:20 2. Articulate 10:55 3. Express(ion) 14:08 4. Timing 28:46 (notes starting) 5. Timbre 34:57 6. Empathy 38:57 (breathing/bowing) 7. Voices 43:05 8. The Lost Art of Tempo 48:22 9. The Glue of Life 51:29 (Splosh/reverb) 10. Listen 56:19 The Ear 57:58
What I really like about Christian is that he is natural and away from any kind of formal talking. And on top of that, he can't read music while his music is placed on TV shows and video games which gives me an extreme HOPE of getting there without reading music. I am exactly the same person as him, music is a soul language more than a paper language.
Reading music is not difficult and it is a notation we can share. The note-length symbols for example. How can we do without them? My only complaint is the staff is microscopic. Like really tiny handwriting!
@@smkh2890 I don’t think what he’s talking about is just the reading , it’s composition in general, where would a German 6th Chord go, how and when to use a neopolitan 6th how to voice it properly , what’s a chromatic mediant , what chords go to each mode , all the scales , how to chromatic modulation etc. ect. But your right reading music is easy.
@@worthingtonproductions2579 Ok. It's like the grammar of music, but , similarly, older English grammar was really based on Latin, so some constructions were judged 'wrong'.
Knowing how to read and write music for orchestras, let’s face it, makes you a complete musician. There is no denying it. Kid yourself all you want. There are no shortcuts.
This was terrific. Could we have a tutorial on “dropping down a minor third and all those cheesy tricks”? I suspect for many, and certainly for me, just generating the primary material to apply all of these techniques to, rather than the techniques themselves, is the greatest barrier to getting started.
A great idea for a video would be to have Christian sit down with a novice composer to help them realise their simple piano melody into a full orchestral score. That would really help me visualise the process from start to finish. Thanks as always Spitfire team!
Great tip re. the pre-delay function. I've always manually edited the actual midi notes of legatos to bring them forward in time, which is time consuming and also awkward when it comes to moving and copying MIDI sections. The pre-delay will save me having to do that so I've learnt something extremely useful from your video! :-)
I'm a bit late to the party here, but this 'pre-delay' tip interests me too, but I'm not quite sure what to do with it? is this predelay on a delay or reverb plug in, or something along the lines of adjusting latency in the DAW? I use Reaper and haven't yet found a method of adjusting a dealy (not delay plug in) on individual tracks. Any help or advice would be appreciated.
In fact, I think I have clarified it. Also known as Midi offset. Though it seems that Spitfire's 'Tightness' control is intended to do a similar job when playing in parts. Good stuff. I knew I was experiencing some kind of latency effect, but assumed it was something to do with my keyboard controller's velocity response. Makes sense now.
Christian, having watched many of your videos now, you are an absolute inspiration and Spitfire brings the sounds to evoke it. A very genuine human being.
Melody, texture, rhythm, support/harmony. It is just a big band. With an orchestra you have a massive band with a million wonderful choices/voices, but the principal is the same as a four piece rock band, they can all get a turn at playing the Melody, texture, rhythm, and support according to your taste. "YOUR TASTE" is all that defines you.
Absolutely GOLDEN, these 10 rules and how Mr. Henson presents them! (I very much enjoy listening to him, exactly the right pace, energy level, tone of voice in presentation and KILLER content!) Thank you so much, I'm learning a ton here!
I just caught this session, since I wasn't able to watch it live. This was excellent! I loved it. I am a guitar player who came to orchestral music later in life and you confirmed so many of the things that I've learned over the years of programming my own orchestral arrangements. Your youtube videos are constantly inspiring and informative.
I came back to watch this 18 months after watching it the first time (and writing a lot, every day) and I have received a great deal of useful info having the eyes of someone who has been hard at work trying to get better at the craft. I'll be back in another year to see what the next level is. Thank you!
Thank you, Chris -- this was so helpful. Truly appreciate it!! I tried to sign up for the live version of this, but by the time I got the email, it was already sold out. So glad it was recorded
That was probably the best instructive tutorial i saw about electronic orchestral programming, i will use all those rules for sure and it will be useful a lot ! Thanx to you Christian and all the Spitfire Audio team. it's 20:22 hours now here in Montreal, Québec, Canada, i'm going back to my Lab (music workshop) now, with my 1st and almost last St-Ambroise Pale Ale ! Chears everyone !!!
Thank you guys for the work and effort you made to provide us with this. I play by ear and enjoy recording music. I didn't do actual music training. I suspect I did this training in a past life and brought the gift into this lifetime. Love recording and creating orchestral tracks ❤🙏
What this demonstrates is that orchestral programming has a long way to go before it is like the real thing. Thank you to Christian for awesome ways to make the samples believable. It is fascinating to see how Christian provides ways to make everyting realistic. My suggestion is to go to Apple Logic Pro writers and see how they can provide some specific tools for this. As a computer software person I can see how there are easier ways to provide an orchestral tool kit. Christian’s knowledge of how to use Logic is admirable. Not sure I could remember everything he has taken years to discover!
For someone who says he isn't a good public speaker - he does better than many public speakers- but then you have a great deal to share and your passion is an inspiration and a lesson in expressing your passion because when it comes to public speaking - you seem to ACE it. Thanks for a great video and all the words of wisdom.
I must add that the pianist V. Horowitz explained how the instrument comes first, the piano evolved through history and inspired composers in different ways, in addition to the available theory and practices of the epochs. I experienced that myself: when I improvise on the piano and then change to orchestra, it may not work well, and when I play directly another instrument, I improvise something very different, and it works with this instrument. I must also add that Stravinsky was using the piano to compose, but very likely as a help, he would not compose for the piano and then do the orchestration. Others would compose without instruments. So to conclude, it's important to know the instruments of the orchestra, what their techniques and sound ranges and possibilities, and not necessarily start with the piano and being inspired by the piano.
The piece he initially built sounds like Yaman Raag from Indian Classical Music... mainly because he is using a sharp fourth... Teevra Madhyam. It's the Lydian Mode in western terms I think.
This session is amazing! The fact that you are taking your personal time to do this shows your work is your love. Thank you for the inspiration and the passion you put into music. At the end of the day a person can seem boastful to ones observation but in actuality and with thought applied its obvious that someone that experiences joy from anything will find the same result from spreading it.
I'm so glad I found your video, thank you! I am pivoting from years of songwriting to composing and it is very intimidating. Your humor and ease are very encouraging.
Wonderful presentation Christian you are a very skilled teacher. Relevant to so many different levels of understanding and skill levels. Loving my Spitfire libraries too! Looking forward to some more inspiration!
Wow, what a video! Really took a lot away from this being fairly new to orchestral programming. Just purchased your Spitfire Originals - Intimate Strings and I can't wait to use them in my music and upload more of my own compositions to RU-vid! Thanks Guys!
Thank you so much for this video. I definitely suffer from imposter syndrome as well, but I love to compose. My greatest challenge is figuring out how to make Logic Pro strings sound realistic. I have all these ideas in mind but still working on how to make them come to life.
I made the same comment to a similar video of yours, but I guess I will just have to repeat myself: you are an inspiration! Unfortunately, the dark side of the coin is that, after watching enough vids of you and Paul, I now say things like 'braaass', but I concede that it does feel more satisfying than saying it with a short 'a'.
Christian, thanks for this video! It montages at the beginning that you play with string ensembles, precisely to have an overall picture of the melody and the progress of the chords! After playing the strings, or even the winds, with the ensemble, do you disassemble the played material into sections? First second, violin, violas, etc.? I tried to compose by playing the first violins first, but I always got stuck when the other sections took place. I also like to play things with a string ensemble much better, but I feel the need to eventually divide the string vocals into separate sections, as the first and second violins may have slightly different tones, especially in the better sample libraries.
Thank you so much for this Christian (& Spitfire team)!!!! I'm at the v beginning of my journey into a career writing to picture. Bought Albion One. Listening to this has been invaluable! Huge thanks!
It is such an amazing source of learning , definitely helpful at all levels . Thanks a lot Spitfire , Christian , and everyone there for sharing such a vluable knowledge. You are inspiring and encouring musicians to do music at many levels. Thanks again
Hi Christian. Always informative and educational to watch your videos. How did you gain the exposure to get into media composing? Do you send a portfolio? Do they approach you? My son is aiming for the same idea, so any help would be welcome. Feedback from anyone would be great!
Thank you. Questions on Tempo. I've found that adjusting the tempo map can change where the music lines up with the film downstream (if there is already music up ahead). To avoid this, the tempo would need to only be adjusted before going on to a new section, and then avoid coming back and making changes to it later. Is that how it is for Christian? And perhaps you would need to keep the DAW or Logic Pro files to small sections of a piece of film, or one cue at a time I suppose. (How large of a section of video do you score at once?) I've also written music outside of scoring to picture via Logic's Adapt Project Tempo, where there is no click, I play as I feel, but then Logic automatically makes a tempo map to it, which is helpful for syncing other instruments, especially rhythmic elements like drums. Is this what Dario Marianelli is doing?: As you mention such composers do "not work with any click whatsoever, write against the picture, follow the tempo of the piece and then click their track up afterwards". I'm curious if anyone could tell me in more detail how Dario Marianelli is doing it?
Excellent video Christian - one thing that you never really discussed is getting the performer of their orchestral score to actually listen to a real orchestra - just listen to how various composers have treated a String orchestra (for example). Take the Pendereki's 'Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima' which is a tour de force of different playing techniques in 20thC music. Another for legato playing is a piece used by Stanley Kubrick's 2001 film score. The is the piece that accompanies the space ship on its journey towards the unknown. It's a piece by the Russian Khacaturian. Lots of interesting ways of using playing technique and or expression....
Really good overview for beginners. There are a lot of Young producers out there Who rarely forage into the orchestral world. This masterclass would be an excellent place to start. One area you could explore next is using the orchestra with songwriting.There hasn’t been much content on this. I used to love the string arrangements on Nick drakes music. Also, maybe look at rock and pop arrangements with strings....edm....disco....a whole series awaits! Really impressed with Miriam. Spitfire HR did a good job there! All the best.
Would it be possible to publish what the pre-delay times are for each articulation of each instrument that way we can build this into our templates, since it would be consistently delayed by the same amount for each articulation
Stravinsky and others told how an orchestra can express more that piano, but conversely many things that can be expressed on the piano won't be possible with an orchestra !
