3. Composing Music (Tutorial) - Arranging

A videolog and guide on how to compose following 5 steps hour by hour. This is a live tutorial of how I compose an orchestral piece in a day.

2. Arranging

a) Step1:
- Create basic drum patterns (e.g. timpani)

b) Step2:
- Refine the strings structure (from previous tutorial) to go along with the drums.

c) Step3:
- Add Brass, Cymbal and Woodwind parts.

Tip: Don't use any compression/reverb or effects. Leave that to the mixing stage (Tutorial 5). It will waste your time and energy.

Concentrate on your role as 'Producer'. Fix chords that don't match. Fix timing. Think of some creative arrangement ideas you can use for the instruments (e.g. trills, glissando..)

Try and make it complete in an hour. Though you are still not satisfied with your piece, take a 30min rest and work on it again.


//Go to www.ctplr.bandcamp.com to download the track 'Victory'

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• music
• composing
• arranging
• tutorial
• guide
• steps
• logic

[TheHevquip]

Is this the normal kind of music you make? I work on electronic dance tracks and some people will play their acoustic guitar or might sit down at a piano and compose something, but you are the first person I've heard that makes this type of music outside of movie scoring, and that's really cool.

[treycwong]

@TheHevquip Thanks! I started out making electronic music remixes too.. and my way of starting a new track was fiddling with sounds that interest me. It's fun in that way because you can choose how you would like your track to structure. For orchestral music, I do not have a 'sense' of how it should be arranged (Im a noob!), therefore.. one of the ways to play 'safe' is to imitate another composer's piece. I believe you can do this for any music too :)

[Sulli00700]

Nice video, but one question... What program are you on?

[treycwong]

@Sulli00700 Thanks.. Im using Logic Express ;)

[treycwong]

@DjDonWone The techniques are based on my style of workflow.. I like to get the job done as efficiently so that I can expand the creative elements more. I believe this is what composer strive for and to be not tangled into too many technicalities. Thanks, appreciate it!