So this might no be the most on-topic post in this thread, but having had this episode last night, I thought I might show how I acquire a lot of my recent melodic ideas & how they migrate into my work.
While this is not a dream journal, a majority of the musical ideas stewing in my head originate when I am unconscious. My previous job as a machine operator, there was no overhead music & loads of dull-roar machines running, so in my sequence of working, there was plenty of time to conjure melodies that worked out of my subconscious. My current occupation jeopardizes this with overhead music playing at certain locations. I hate overhead music; it kills any thoughts I might have developed.
The main reason I wanted to share this particular musical dream notes is due to the altered nature of the musical instruments presented to me. Normally there is music present, but not often when I view actual performers. The setting in short was something along the lines of me being on a piano sales floor & someone asked me to play such&such piece to which I anxiously scooted up to a piano & attempted to run my non-practiced fingers across the keyboard. Things changed when I was stopped my a man & a woman. Suddenly the nature of the piano changed. The main housing became … different. On my right (high notes hung a blue woven hammock-instrument that looked like it could support a cat. behind & underneath it was a guitar? that more resembled a flat koto. The main point on this device was the strings were replaced with 1 single wide clear ribbon connected at both ends that vibrated with an odd transient wave. The remainder of the belly of the piano was similar in that there were still wires remaining. However they were singled & spaced further apart. Mind you all these components were under the lifted lid (somehow). The man & woman began playing these “3” instruments. The man first utilizing the hammock, which gave darker plucky sounds with a very short decay (at least some physics still manifests in my dreams) then turned to the ribbon-guitar which gave some bendy tones similar to a pedal steel guitar. The woman shifted her feet under the opposite end of the pedal lyre & utilized the sostenuto & sustain pedals by lifting her feet (no physics for this) while simultaneously plucking the reformatted strings of the piano. I know the sound was unearthly but do not remember the details for events which shall manifest later. The 2 stared at me with somber faces as they played as if scolding me for being an inadequate musician, to which I readied a reply. I told them something around the lines of “it can feed into this:” before playing a “drop the bass” hard DnB riff in my head. I swear in my waking moments this song in my head was so horrifically loud the couple should have been able to hear my brainwaves. Having awoken (IRL) due to this at about 0245, motivation for writing these details was almost lost to a simple rollover-&-lose-consciousness-again but I’ve learned from the past that you will not remember a single thing if you do this.
So here is how I normally take notes post{dream}erous:
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2019.08.29 dream
man played mini hammock & wavy fretless guitar ribbon
woman played open piano chamber few thick strings
unique sounds, cannot replicate, dnb was my reply
180 BPM dnb drums
1 2 3 4
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
k k s k k k s k
Ab2 ~~~ hiQ cutoff rising sweep ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
k k s k k k s k
_ Abx Aby Abx Aby Abx G5 Abx A5 Abx Ab5
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
k k s k k k s k
_ Abx Aby Abx Aby Abx G5 Abx A5 Abx Ab5
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
k k s k k k s k
_ Abx Aby Abx Aby Abx G4 Abx A4 Abx Ab4What makes this particularly unique is the Ab{x,y} are notes struck almost dead (maybe a portamento up to the note, but release kills the sound before it reaches the destination pitch) but other than that it is pretty lackluster. I don’t normally write down percussion but that k/s was loud. All other cymbals were not observed in my dream so I have nothing to formulate.
So having given you that with no audible context (maybe I’ll write it out eventually) I will demonstrate something more tangible. Due to the header I’ll let you assess the nature of these notes.
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2018.11.14 dream
Ebm CbM
1 2 3 4
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Bb4 Cb4 Bb4 Eb4 Gb4 Bb4
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Ab4 Bb4 Ab4
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Cb4 Db5 Cb4 Eb4 Gb4 Cb4
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Ab4
So in this example if you hear how I accompany this melody, the Ebm & BM chords are not enough to provide a good structure for progression so I add in sus2 & authentic cadence. The melody is usually the 1st thing I type up followed by any anomalies needed for sound design / accompaniment. Then as you see I can amp up the riff into other material in my waking hours. Forgive the lack of quantization, as I have my BB102 open & played this riff right on through as an example. Maybe I’ll consider incorporating it into the tune.
1 last thing that I don’t think matters a great deal to you readers: timing. Sometimes if I don’t get the tune typed out in time it will begin to fade. I use emacs since I can set everything up faster than I can blink. I type out the raw notes w/ spaces in between e e e c d d d b then go back through & tab them out to rhythm.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
e e e c d d d b Lastly is capitalizing note names & assigning octaves
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
E4 E4 E4 C4 D4 D4 D4 B3Any chord structures then prepend to the tune.
Thanks for reading. I hope I wasn’t too much of a blowhard & didn’t derail the thread. Hope you enjoyed my zany dream
