Starting today, we are going to cover the basics of orchestration, namely instrument theory. I think I should write it down and organize it like this so I don’t forget what I learned less, and it will also be helpful to those who read it… haha.
The instruments that make up an orchestra can be likened to a four-tiered cake. Each instrument group has four voices: soprano, alto, tenor, and bass, and instruments are classified into four groups: strings, woodwinds, brass, and percussion.
It would be convenient to think of the string instruments that are the most foundational and almost indispensable as the 1st tier, the woodwind instruments that come next as the 2nd tier, the brass instruments as the 3rd tier, and the remaining percussion instruments as the 4th tier.
The historical order in which musical instrument groups were added is similar to this. Initially, string instruments were adopted, followed later by woodwind, brass, and percussion instruments.
Therefore, this article will also be written in the following order: string instruments -> woodwind instruments -> brass instruments -> percussion instruments.
I released my single album ‘Defective Product’ at 12 PM on Saturday, November 21, 2020. I will reorganize the work records I previously wrote on my Korean blog and write them in English.
Concept & Opportunity
It’s been so long that I can’t remember, but I first came up with the song between February and March 2020. Considering that the main guitar was recorded in mid-March, I think it’s probably about right.
This was a really mentally difficult time for me. Due to my mother’s sudden illness, I stopped all performances and outside activities, was eliminated from dozens of contests throughout 2019, and in the meantime, the coronavirus suddenly broke out again…
I couldn’t avoid doing household chores, and I didn’t have time to do stress-relieving activities like exercise. I was so busy and exhausted, but nothing came back to me.
In the meantime, there was a time when I was working hard all week to submit an orchestral piece for a contest, and suddenly I got so dizzy that I had a hard time even standing.
After going through this series of events, I suddenly felt like I was a person with a screw missing. When I was young, I went to many places and won awards at national competitions and quite a few awards at math and science competitions, but compared to who I am now, I felt like I had a flaw somewhere and was falling somewhere.
That’s how the first lyrics came out.
추락하는 모든 것들에는 날개가 있어. 그런데 난 날개 하나 없는데도 계속 아래로 떨어지는지. (Everything that falls has wings. But why do I keep falling even though I have no wings?)
And the next lyrics were written naturally.
‘I am a defective product, but my body is fine, right? So is my head broken? Or is my heart broken?’ The thoughts came together one after another and the lyrics came out.
With these lyrics, I wanted to quickly spit out what was in my heart.
And from the countless self-deprecatory lyrics that came out, I selected the ones that I felt were most appropriate for my situation. That’s how this song started.
Instruments
Percussion – Real Kick Sample, 808 Kick, 808 Clap, Battery Ride, Cabasa, Shaker, Cymbal, Reverse Cymbal, Chime, Reverse Tambourine, and other FX.
Bass – Real bass module, tremolo bass module (both sources from Trillian)
Synth – Pad synth with slow tremolo (Arturia Analog Lab)
Guitar – Acoustic guitar (recorded myself)
String instruments – I put in full orchestra size string instruments, but the string instruments seemed to be playing a little separately, so I mixed them with chamber size.
Vocal – pad, doubling, main vocal
Recording
Vocal & Guitar are recorded by ISA One, Peluso P87.
However, if there was something unusual, I wanted to test the dbx 160a at this time, so I set it so that when the vocal sound approaches the headroom, the compression is applied slightly. (It was so slight that it didn’t seem to have much meaning whether I put it on or not)
The reason we considered a compressor at this time was because the part shouting ‘down’ in the last chorus was so loud that it broke through the headroom. However, if you listen to it softly, there is a big dynamic difference between the small and loud sounds, so the part that connects to the front part feels different.
When recording vocals as a pad, I used the P87 as the main microphone and placed it facing the front, and installed the second microphone, WA-47jr, on top of it and placed it facing both sides for Mid/Side recording.
Album Cover
When the song was almost finished, I asked the person who had always taken care of my album covers to do the album cover this time.
He said he would create a rough draft and work on it in about a week, but personal circumstances suddenly arose, so I had to create it myself.
There were two concepts I initially thought of.
1) Torn paper airplane 2) Broken robot toy
Among these, the robot toy is actually too difficult for me to buy or draw myself, so I decided to make it with a paper airplane concept. And I worked hard at folding the paper airplane.
While I was making this and that, I thought the shape wasn’t right, so I looked for a paper airplane, and I found a paper airplane called a Stinger that looked just right.
Also, I thought it would be too boring to just use white paper, so I copied the sheet music I was working on on both sides, and as you can see, it came out pretty, which was nice.
When I folded it all up, I wondered how this paper airplane could represent the theme of ‘defective products’… After thinking about it for a while, I thought of a mirror.
I thought it would be a good contrast, like the lyrics of the song, to make the part in front look fine and the part reflected in the mirror behind look broken.
That’s how the song was released. It’s been so long since I made the song that I forgot how I made it, but while translating it into English, I feel like I took a trip down memory lane for the first time in a while.
These days, I can’t release it due to financial issues, but I’ve been working hard on making songs and stocking up on them. I will gradually release it later.
Hello? This is engineer and singer-songwriter Jooyoung Kim.
Today I’m going to review the old Dangerous 2Bus that I purchased a few months ago. Well, shall we begin?
Appearance
The highlight is the slightly old-fashioned purple color. It’s a little more dull purple than the product photo above, but it reminded me of the Evangelion animation.
Each channel is grouped in stereo, and when you press the mono button, you can use each of the two linked channels in mono.
Additionally, there is a function that can increase 6dB for each channel through the 6dB button. The final volume can be adjusted with the front step knob.
There are two outputs at the back, Main and Monitor, which can be used for different input sources.
REM/EXP is a terminal that expands the channel by connecting an additional Dangerous summing mixer via a D-Sub cable. A separate external power source is used for power.
Measurement
Basically, this is the frequency response graph that can be seen when the In Out volume is adjusted.
If the volume is low,
the frequency response appears like this. You can see that the low range is slightly emphasized and the high range is cut.
It’s a simple drum sound with BFD3 and guitar with bass and power chords. The sound is deteriorated because it’s Sound Cloud, but it would be good to see how it changes.
Harmonic distortion was almost non-existent.
The basic noise floor was also small.
Another feature is that if you use the stereo channel without pressing the mono button, the sound is reduced by about 6dB. That’s why I thought they made a 6dB button.
This time, I gained some understanding of the equipment while using it in the mix, and it has its pros and cons. I like it, but I think it might not be good for people who like a lot of high-pitched sounds.
Still, it seems to be worth the price of a used product.
I hope you enjoy my review. See you again in the next article..:)
I’m always open to reviewing hardware products! If you’d like me to review a product, please feel free to reach out at joe1346@naver.com.
※This article is a review written on July 21, 2021 after being selected for the FX Collection 2 experience group run by ‘Samick’ and receiving product support for a certain period of time. I only received support for the product and wrote the rest myself.
Finally, the last plugin, Phaser BI-Tron.
This Phaser is a clone plug-in of a pedal effect called Mu-tron Bi Phase, released in 1974. It consists of two phasers, and the routing of these two phasers can be adjusted to provide various effects. It is said that many famous musicians such as Stevie Wonder, Grateful Dead, Smashing Pumpkins, and Lee Scratch Perry (dub) used it, and the Expression Pedal of the original hardware was also reproduced so that the amount could be adjusted.
Routing through Phaser can be intuitively understood at a glance. When you change routing within the plugin, it is also shown on the display.
Signal Flow may seem a bit difficult, but actually handling the plugin is not that difficult.
Basically, BI-Tron Phaser uses an LFO called Sweep Generator to adjust the degree of the Phaser effect. This can be given by a pedal, or by using both a pedal and a sweep generator, and the above Signal Flow can be seen as showing that it can be adjusted with various parameters.
I think you can roughly understand the rest if you look at it. The Phaser BI-Tron plug-in has more parameters that can be adjusted than you might think, so it’s a bit confusing, so let’s take a look at them one by one.
Sweep Generators
BI-Tron Phaser has two LFOs. Adjusts the LFO that goes into Phaser A and B. As you can see, you can adjust the rate to sync or adjust it between 0.200 Hz and 20.0 Hz.
In addition, only Sweep Generator 1 can control the LFO rate with a pedal, and Sweep Generator 2 cannot be adjusted with a pedal. There are three LFO shapes to choose from: Sine, Ramp, and Square.
Phaser
It’s quite ironic that the plugin name is Phaser, but the parameter name is Phasor, but anyway, there are two Phasors, A and B.
Depth 1 and 2 determine the extent to which Sweep Gen 1 and 2 enter, respectively. At 1, the LFO will not be used at all, and at 10, the LFO will be used at the highest amount.
Through Feedback, you can change the feel of the Comb Filter, and through the Sweep button, you can decide whether to give the LFO to the Phasor with Sweep Gen, control it with the Pedal, or use a combination of both.
The Norm/Rev switch on Phasor B is a switch that reverses the polarity of Phasor B. If you only invert the phase of Phasor B like this, the effect will be more noticeable.
Arturia’s manual tells you to use R.INV in Advanced Control to create a fun Stereo Phasing effect.
Manual & Envelope
Manual Mode is a mode for manual control using the pedal. You can select it by pressing the button labeled MAN at the bottom left, and you can adjust it by pressing it with automation or the mouse.
Envelope mode is a mode that allows the pedal to operate according to the envelope of the audio signal. It will be easier to understand if you touch it a few times, but roughly speaking, you can think of it as trimming the envelope based on the input source and using it as a trigger for Phaser.
Right below the text that says Envelop Follower, there is a window where you can select the trigger source called SRC. Here, you can select the source that goes into A, the source that goes into B, a combination of both, or use Sidechain. You can also choose an external source.
You can see what these trigger sources sound like by clicking on the speaker shape on the right. However, what is a bit disappointing is that when you touch Comp, Input Gain, Attack Release, Delay, etc. below, you cannot hear the changing sound.
Delay is basically in ms units, but can be selected by beat through the Sync button, and the remaining units can be adjusted on a regular basis.
Advanced Control
Phaser BI-Tron’s Advanced Control includes controls for Hi Pass Filter and Phasor A and B.
Hi Pass Filter is a 12dB/Oct filter. Filters the low range at the input stage so that only high frequencies are modulated. Arturia says it can be used to keep the low range of sounds with low registers stable, such as bass or kick.
The part written in Poles is a parameter for how much All-Pass-Filter will be used. The more you use, the stronger the Comb Filter effect will be and the less bandwidth it will require. It is said that the original hardware used 6 All-Pass-Filters.
Mix, like other plug-ins, is a parameter that determines the ratio of the dry/wet signal to be given, and R.INV is a switch that inverts the phase of LFO 1 and 2 entering Phasor A or B. If you press this switch, you can get a much wider stereo image.
Samples
There are too many parameters in this, so it’s hard to know how to present it.
Phasor A, B routing can be done differently, and whether Depth 1, 2, and Feedback of each Phasor can be controlled with a pedal or Sweep Gen. If controlled with Sweep Gen, how to set the LFO shape and rate, and adjust it with the pedal. Whether to control with the envelope, select the Pole and R.INV buttons, and even mix…
Honestly, I think it would be very difficult to tell you about everything about the plug-in just by telling you a few of them. However, I can’t skip it without listening to the samples at all, so I’ll listen to one original track, one in the default state, and two that I’ve set up the way I want.
Honestly, I think it would be really difficult to judge based on this alone, and I also feel a bit disappointed, but I think it is an unavoidable limitation.
Phaser BI-TRON overall review
It’s not bad, honestly, it’s okay, but the plugin is too heavy. It’s a bit lighter than the Bus Force I mentioned in the previous article, but it’s still heavy.
In particular, modulation-type plug-ins such as Phaser are mainly used for individual instruments or tracks, but the question arises as to whether this can be applied to individual instruments in a flashy way.
When you install one plug-in… Of course, adding 2-3 more doesn’t mean it will consume the CPU twice or triple, but I still think it’s a bit excessive.
Therefore, if I were to use it, I would probably use it with the feeling that it would only be used for one or two instruments, a bit like MSG.
Jooyoung's Music Blog 