GMH's music-posting thread



  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    I forgot if I noted it yet, but the refrains of "Sexy, Naughty Bitchy" and "Mine Cart Madness" have (almost) the same chord progression.

    Of course, said progression is just Bbm F7 F7 Bbm Bbm F7 F7 Bbm (the last chord is replaced by GbM7 F7 Bbm in Mine Cart Madness).
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    i know precious little of the works of camille saint-saëns

    obviously there's the "organ symphony", symphony #3 in C minor, which famously features an organ.  and there's the carnival of the animals.  and there's piano concerto #2, with its slow first movement with its famously grand intro.

    i just now heard about his fourth piano concerto.  i have never yet heard about his first, or third, or any beyond the fourth.

    i have also yet to hear about his first or second symphonies.  or any beyond the third.
  • underwater moonlight
    you know more than I do
  • edited 2019-09-24 21:53:35
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    > discover Viktor Kosenko's piano concerto in c minor via YouTube
    > someone links a giant list of piano concertos and anything even vaguely of that sort (including even stuff from anime and FF concerts and even Castlevania: Symphony of the Night)
    > discover Vasily Barvinsky's concerto in f minor from this
    > discover Fernando Loyola's concerto in D major from this
    > discover some minor errors in the list
    > want to e-mail the person maintaining it, Prof. Allan B. Ho at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville
    > the name Dmitry Feofanov comes up
    > where have I heard this name before
    > I remember he had something to do with music
    > wasn't he also a pianist
    > i remember he did a recording
    > Prokofiev piano concertos?
    > no wait that's Dmitry Kitaenko
    > look him up on Google
    > a lawyer from Lyndon, IL named Dmitry N. Feofanov was censured by the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission for pursuing a settlement after a client's death
    > wait what
    > is this the same Dmitry Kitaenko
    > yes it is
    > oh actually he was the editor and compiler of a book of "Rare Masterpieces of Russian Piano Music" published by Dover Publications, back when he was teaching at the University of Kentucky
  • edited 2019-10-07 08:40:10
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    ...y'know it is quite possible that i've been listening to "video game lyrical rock" and anisong for so long -- particularly the former since my early childhood, which is also when I began learning classical (common-practice) music theory -- that i basically hear their harmonic language as "standard", rather than "unusual", and I basically incorporated an understanding of that music into my understanding of "normal" music theory.

    this is why subtonic-to-I (or i) cadences feel completely natural (no pun intended) to me, though i think they stick out a lot more to my old music theory teacher

    perhaps if i only grew up with classical music, they would feel foreign

    meanwhile, i just ran into someone who describes various features as a way to make something sound "japanese"

    i don't even think of them as "japanese" features, and it's actually a little awkward for me to say it that way, because while japan the country (and most of its culture) is foreign to me, these features are not foreign to my musical understanding
  • underwater moonlight

    glenn can you play this????
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    With the score, yes.

    With just this video to copy off of, it'll take a little longer.

    I do have my own arrangement of this track, though.
  • edited 2019-10-07 21:46:16
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    do you have any advice on how to set up myself to record myself into a video that can be respectably be posted on YouTube

    i can already tune my own piano but i don't have proper recording equipment yet

    i mean i have an old USB mike and an old USB webcam but i think my computer's built-in mike is better than the mike of either the dedicated mike or the webcam lol

    i get clicking noises when i record onto vocaroo
    but i think that's unique to vocaroo?
  • underwater moonlight
    I really have no idea

    I guess you would need a decent camera
  • edited 2019-11-13 04:49:44
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    i love how darkly ominous this sounds, thanks to the chromaticism
    examples of this are the flattened 2nd scale degree ("neapolitan"), and the flattened 5th within a chord

    so the first four chords are:
    Edim7 (E G A# C#) (over an E pedal)
    FM7/E (E F A C) (over an E pedal)
    B7b5/D# (D# F A B) (over an E pedal)
    Emin (over an E pedal) (and there's also an A# in the accompaniment because they need a fourth note and this chord only has three notes)

    the first chord is the diminished 7th chord, which is like the classic though rather cliche "oh no! bad things are happening" chord.  however, when it's used in the usual way it's usually built using these scale degrees: the second, the fourth, the (flattened or natural minor) sixth, or the (raised, if in minor) seventh.  Here, on the other hand, it's built on the first, third, raised fourth (or flattened fifth, depending on how you hear it), and raised sixth (or flattened seventh, specifically flattened beyond natural minor).  I hear it as raised fourth and raised sixth, because that's a common formulation that resolves to the dominant chord (a B chord in this case), though a case could be made for spelling the A# as a Bb so as to serve also as a flattened scale degree 5 and in its leading down to A.  (but i think A# makes sense as we have A# to B later on, and not much in the way of bluesiness that'd justify a Bb.)  (meanwhile Db makes less sense IMO because we have D# soon, and Dnat later.)

    the second chord is a Neapolitan chord (a bII chord), with a major seventh added on top of it by virtue of having the E (the tonic note) basically just held from the previous chord.  The other three notes are all downward resolutions from the corresponding three notes from the previous chord.  This downward motion could result in iiø7 in 4-2 inversion (i.e. Fm7b5/E) if everything stayed diatonic, but the Neapolitan color of the flattened supertonic note (F instead of F#) lends a darker color to this and also clashes conspicuously with the E that's just a half-step away (and note that it's spelled so that they're played next to each other rather than spaced apart, and they're also right at the bottom of the chord so it's not just something used to give sonority to the top of the chord -- and besides, this is not the tonic chord so a M7 chord here is meant to be unstable).

    the third chord is a B7b5 chord.  (Not to be confused with any m7b5 chord.)  A typical progression from the Neapolitan would be to go to the dominant (or dominant seventh) then the tonic, but here, this chord substitutes for the dominant seventh.  This chord keeps the F natural from the previous chord (rather than resolving it upward to F#), thereby creating a chord that has two whole steps stacked together -- A and B on top, and D# and F (a diminished third, technically, but having the same interval length as a major second or whole step).  The result is a dominant seventh chord that feels unnervingly flattened.

    the fourth chord is the resolution to all of this -- it's just an E minor chord.  the figuration in the background adds an A# (or Bb, but for scoring convenience A# spelling is preferred since it occurs next to a B natural), which keeps some flavor of those clashes in earlier chords.

  • edited 2019-11-13 04:56:17
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    later on, when the main melody comes in, it outlines an E minor with major seventh and ninth (E G B D# F#), clearly working those dissonances.  the F# resolves to a G later, then there's a chord change to a B minor chord while the melody plays A#, A# F# D B (another chord that's minor with major seventh).  and then the next chord after that is an Amin chord with an added G# -- yet another minor chord with major seventh.  these major sevenths just keep coming, and have the result of really emphasizing that sense of tension.

    and the first long note in the melody is a major 9th above the bass.  or, in other words, a major 2nd, just spaced out.  it's still kinda dissonant.  the next long note is one of those major 7ths -- a G# on top of the bass A.  The next E minor chord features half-step appogiaturas going from major 7th to octave (D# E over bass E), augmented 4th to perfect fifth (A# B over bass E), major second to minor third (F# G over bass E), and then similar figuration over an A minor chord.

    and it gets more chromatic even later on.

    oh yeah, G to A# is an augmented second.  it sounds awkward because it's supposed to sound awkward(ly stretched).
  • edited 2019-11-13 05:24:53
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    oh gosh the end of the first phrase of the main melody is an evil resolution toward landing on the dominant chord.

    So the basic structure of the phrase is

    E minor chord (8 beats)
    A minor chord (8 beats)
    E minor chord (4 beats)
    A minor chord (4 beats)
    [something to set up the dominant] (4 beats)
    B chord (4 beats)

    i'll get to the preparation before the B chord in a moment, but first, let's talk about that B chord.

    the B chord would typically be a B major or B7 chord (7 chord is major with minor 7th, so a B major chord is a subset of a B7 chord).  That's the thing that'll just lead naturally back to the tonic chord (in this case E minor, which does basically come next, though not before the intro is replayed.

    in this case however it's a B minor with...stuff.  first, it's B minor which feels sorta flattened from the usual.  if it's just a B minor chord alone with no chromaticism, it would sound like standard modal dominant minor chord from rock, and if you took out the chromaticism from here it'd just sound bland.  no, instead, there's something very "wrong" going on all around this, and that feeling comes from the chromaticism and heavy use of non-chord tones to give additional, clashing sonority.

    what's the melody doing?  A# B D F F# G# C#?????  what the flying hell is this?  not even if we respell the F as an E# (to lead to F#) does this make sense.  but of course, it's supposed to sound weird and creepy and "off", with the melody rising like it ends on a question like that.  The A# is an ornament on the B, the F (or E#) is an ornament on the F#, the B D F# are part of the B minor chord, and the...G# and C# just don't make much sense.  but in a way that feels appropriate here.

    the alto plays B....A D.  besides spelling out a pun (likely unintentionally, since there's nothing actually bad about it), it's actually done so that the A lines up with the melody's G#, a major seventh above, and the D lines up with the melody's C#, also a major seventh above.  this clashing effect keeps happening.

    so yeah, that's the B minor chord.  (the bass is just the B, and the tenor arpeggiates a B minor chord.)

    what prepares it?

    two chords of two beats each.

    first, look at the bass.  we could walk up from the A to the B, but instead, this track leaps DOWN, a third at a time...going from A to F (natural) to D to B.  in doing so, a tritone is outlined in the bass.

    so the first chord is an F something, and the second chord is a D something.  the tenor tells us what they are:
    F minor with major 7th (F Ab C E)
    D half-diminished (7b5) (D F Ab C, or here spelled as D Ab C F)

    the alto plays a straight Ab (or G#, whichever).

    the melody plays D# E F D# E F D# E F D# E F.  so we're putting a half-step ornamental note off of that dissonant major seventh (E) of the chord (F minor with major 7th).  more chromaticism.  and the two notes above that are the two clashing notes of the chord itself.  in the next chord, only the F is a chord note, so we've got D# and E as non-chord notes...while the bass is in the bottom playing D natural.  so we've got Dnat, D#, E, and Fnat all going at nearly the same time.  this cluster of notes is brief but sorta explodes into the resolution, that B minor with other stuff going on including a melody that flies off to an odd high C#.

    TL;DR how to write eeeeeeeevil music.
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    oh, i hsould say, the last two beats of the A minor (8 beats) actually have an F in the bass...which is that flattened second scale degree (which leads immediately to E, unsurprisingly) and also creates a brief major 7th clash with the tenor's A minor chord arpeggiation which includes an E.

    and the very next beat starts with E in the bass and D# in the melody.
  • underwater moonlight
    glenn how did you learn all this
  • edited 2019-11-13 05:33:30
    Well, it's not actually that cold.

    glenn how did you learn all this

    i dunno

    i got classical theory training up to ABRSM theory grade 8 (which i think is basically like college-level theory) and some stuff beyond that

    also having absolute pitch makes it easier to pick up on what notes are being played

    but i think i'm just sort of a harmony nut

    it really makes me FEEL the music in a way that is just really fundamental to my appreciation

    i don't respond quite so ardently to things like timbre or instrument choices for example

    and writing such a long analysis mostly from stream-of-consciousness like this isn't something that i even plan to do consciously; it just sorta happens because i'm feeling it
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    also i hadn't ever analyzed this before, so i didn't actually know that the major sevenths were such a big feature here

    all i knew was that this track was ominous and creepy as hell and i love it for precisely this quality and i think it's one of the best tracks i've ever heard for this atmosphere
  • underwater moonlight
    I wish I had absolute pitch
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    I wish I had absolute pitch

    are you at least good enough with relative pitch to be able to recognize the different "flavors" of various chord qualities/types?
  • underwater moonlight
    I think so, generally
  • underwater moonlight
    actually, that would be an interesting thing to test
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    actually, that would be an interesting thing to test

    i'd play you something on the piano right now but my dad's gone to sleep and i don't have my electric keyboard unboxed
  • underwater moonlight
    wake your dad up
  • edited 2019-11-15 08:58:43
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    [and now for something completely different]

    fripSide - "Black Bullet"

    I like the refrain's chords a lot.

    The chords are as follows:

    key: G minor

    phrase 1:
    Gmin (minor tonic chord, or i) (4 beats)
    Eb (major (flat) submediant chord, or (b)VI) (4 beats)
    F (major subtonic chord, or (b)VII) (4 beats)
    Bb (major (flat) mediant chord, or (b)III) (2 beats)
    2 beats of an A in the bass and the other instruments make it imply a Dmin chord on A (which would be a minor dominant chord, or v64) in passing

    phrase 2:
    Cmin (minor subdominant chord, or iv) (4 beats)
    Eb or Eb9 (major (flat) submediant chord with major 7th and 9th, or (b)VI9) (2 beats)
    F (major subtonic chord, or (b)VII) (2 beats)

    phrases 3 and 4:
    [repeat everything above] (32 beats)

    ending mini-phrase:
    Cmin (minor subdominant chord, or iv) (2 beats)
    Dmin (minor dominant chord, or v) (2 beats)

    (the flats in parentheses are depending on what people prefer to read: some people base their chord symbols on the notes of the major scale, while some people (such as myself) base their chord symbols on the diatonic notes of whatever key the context is. It just happens so that the 3rd, (neutral) 6th, and (neutral) 7th scale degrees are different between minor and major, with the minor versions being a half-step lower. So, for example, I would write this as "i , VI , VII , III v64 i , iv , VII , VI9 VII i , VI , VII , III v64 i , iv , VII , VI9 VII iv v i , " while other people would put a flat before each of the III, VI, and VII chords.)

    It's 18 bars long, assuming 4 beats to each bar. Neat sets of four-bar phrases like the first four phrases while already common in anisong (plus a variety of other music, even classical), are particularly characteristic (among other things) of fripSide songs, so I presume they're characteristic of Satoshi Yaginuma (a.k.a. Sat)'s songs since he's the composer.

    My favorite part of these chord progressions is the difference between phrases 1&3 and phrases 2&4. Specifically, the Eb chord vs the Cmin chord.

    Basically, the Eb chord has a particularly poignant quality to it, especially with the melody above it going "C Bb A G G". The Eb chord contains Eb G Bb as its chord notes. The melody's C resolves downward to the Bb, and the A is a passing note going downward from Bb to G. This figuration puts both of the chord notes on weak sub-beats, accenting the downward motion of the ornamental notes -- which could be called "appogiaturas" because they're non-chord-notes that arrive on a strong (sub)beat an resolve to a weak (sub)beat. The Bb A G sequence, particularly, has the A above the Eb in the bass, which produces a dissonant tritone -- particularly one that normally "wants" to resolve upward, considering its context as an augmented fourth interval, and the A also being the leading tone of the key of Bb major -- but here, it has to resign itself to resolving downward.

    (The tritone is so called because it is composed by stacking three "whole tone" intervals, i.e. two half-steps or a whole step, for example Eb-F, F-G, G-A.)

    This underlying progression -- i VI VII III -- is also my favorite progression. One of the reasons is because it is a minor key progression that tonicizes -- that seems to move toward or otherwise suggest temporarily -- its relative major key. If we don't change the notes but just change the key, this same progression is vi IV V I in the relative major (here, Bb major). And IV V I is a strong cadence in a major key, which gives the music a forward momentum. If this chord progression is in minor, this forward momentum is still present, but it feels like the minor key is trying to reach for something, trying to modulate to the major key, giving a temporarily brighter color to the harmony (though this is often fleeting). This swirl of emotional elements is often what lends this progression a strong sense of emotion, of pathos, in my opinion.

    The fourth above the fourth note (the subdominant) in a major key -- i.e. the seventh note, the leading tone (it's called a leading tone in major, but subtonic in minor unless raised), always forms this tritone with this subdominant note. (The subtonic forms a perfect fourth, which does not have the same effect.) Sure enough, A is the fourth note above Eb, and Eb is the subdominant of Bb major.

    So that's phrases 1&3: we've got C Bb A G G over an Eb chord.

    In phrases 2&3, we have the same melody...but instead we have a C minor chord (C Eb G).

    Here, the C is the chord note now, not the Bb. The G is also a chord note. But so our strong (first) subbeat has a chord note, not an appogiatura. And there is no longer a poignant tritone that wants to go up but is forced downward. A on C here is, while not a chord tone, relatively consonant (same as C on Eb earlier), and Bb on C (a minor 7th interval) is less dissonant than the tritone. (There's still somewhat of a tritone between the Eb in the chord and the A, but it's less prominent.

    Meanwhile, the bass is now C instead of Eb. The bass took a larger leap downward from G, and instead of stepping upward from Eb to F, it'll leap upward from C to F.

    This whole thing gives a different flavor to the chord -- it's still a pre-dominant chord setting up the F chord that is the dominant in the temporary key of Bb major and leads to the Bb chord (the temporary tonic) -- but this time it feels darker, but with more hardened conviction.

    TL;DR - change the harmonization of a melody and you change its color.
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    In music, the source code is the score, while the compiler is the performer.
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    things that don't(?) happen in music:

    source code adding a bunch of extraneous crap when you copy from one context to another

    <span class="MItem IPAddress"></span>                   
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                                In music, the source code is the score, while the compiler is the performer.</div></div></div>
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    wow something managed to be so screwed up that i have to cancel edit twice on that post just to leave it
  • underwater moonlight
    the compiler can improvise based on the source code though
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    the compiler can improvise based on the source code though

    sometimes the source code and the parameters of the language demand that the compiler make use of various limited ranges of random variation in the process of compiling
  • underwater moonlight
    unless the compiler is somebody like, I dunno, Frank Zappa
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    Ocean eye !
    1 month ago
    "Hey, what's the budget for this music video?"


    1 month ago
    makes it a lot better though lol

    Trevor Miles
    1 month ago
    @eunoia wayyyyyyyyyyyyy better.

    1 month ago
    It worked though

    1 month ago
    That's an easy one,  PRICELESS!
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    unless the compiler is somebody like, I dunno, Frank Zappa

    do please post something from frank zappa.  i know the name but am not hugely familiar with his work.
  • underwater moonlight

    well, this is probably his most popular instrumental tune
  • underwater moonlight

    I'm also fond of this one
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
  • edited 2020-01-03 04:03:04
    Well, it's not actually that cold.
    also Frank Zappa's stuff sounds pretty cool

    thanks for sharing it
  • underwater moonlight
    no problem
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    the unpitched last five syllables of the refrain of "Spice Up Your Life" can be easily replaced with "Hatsune Miku"

  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
    3 things that Olivier Messiaen is known for

    1. being very very Catholic
    2. inventing his own music theory
    3. birds
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.
  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    the following video works best if you don't look at the video but just listen

  • Well, it's not actually that cold.

    On December 15, 2012, the world achieved a state in which a video was made featuring Vítězslava Kaprálová's Military Sinfonietta with an anime image on the cover.
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