Sci-Fi Songs: Instrumentals

Showing posts with label Instrumentals. Show all posts

Sci-Fi Song #17: Sundog

Sci-Fi Song #17 is an electronic instrumental that was inspired by Bruce Sterling 's Schismatrix . If you want to know more about the book, here are some interesting reviews and thought provoking discussions:

Here are some of the tools that I used to compose this piece of music:

Apple Logic Pro 8 recording software:

Logic's included ES1, ES2, EFM1, and Sculpture software synthesizers
For this piece I sampled the sounds of a kickball, brushes against a drum pad, a plastic Coke bottle, wood scrapers, and a slap-harmonic on my acoustic guitar to create the library of sounds that I used for my percussion kit, which I then processed and sequenced using Logic's Ultrabeat.
Logic's included delay and reverb plug-ins.
Korg NanoKey MIDI controller

Hope you enjoy it,

John Anealio

Sci-Fi Song #1: "Before the End of Time": an electronic instrumental inspired by the artwork of Janet Chui.
Sci-Fi Song #12: "The Diamond Age" : another electronic instrumental inspired by Neal Stephenson.

Sci-Fi Song #12: The Diamond Age

The Diamond Age.mp3

Sci-Fi Song #12 is an electronic instrumental that was inspired by Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer . I tried to convey the novel's feeling of the "Victorian age of the future" by combining the sounds of traditonal orchestral string instruments (supplied by my software's sampler), with the more futuristic sounds of synthesizers and electronic percussion.

Here are some of the tools that I used to compose this piece of music:

Apple Logic Pro 7 recording software:

The EXS24 Sampler for the orchestral string sounds
The Sculpture software synth for the sustained pad sound that opens the piece.
Ultrabeat for the electronic percussion
The ES2 software synth for the bass and arpeggio parts
Logic's included phaser and reverb plug-ins.

Hope you enjoy it,

John

Sci-Fi Song #1: "Before the End of Time": another electonic instrumental inspired by the artwork of Janet Chui.
Sci-Fi Song #4: "The Return of Titus Quinn": a solo acoustic guitar instrumental inspired by Kay Kenyon's Bright of the Sky
Sci Fi Song #7: "Merithyn's Promise": another solo acoustic guitar piece inspired by Elizabeth Haydon's Requiem for the Sun

Sci-Fi Song #7: Merithyn's Promise

Merithyn's Promise.mp3

Sci-Fi Song #7 is a solo acoustic guitar piece played in the DADGAD tuning and was inspired by Elizabeth Haydon's Requiem For The Sun.

My initial interest in fantasy literature was fueled by the experience of reading Elizabeth Haydon's original Rhapsody trilogy. I vividly remember ordering the first book from Amazon when I discovered that the main character was a musician. For me, this trilogy functioned as a gateway to the works of Tolkien, George R.R. Martin, and Tad Williams. Here are a few links to a series of excellent reviews of the first three Rhapsody books at Dragons, Heroes, and Wizards.

Merithyn is a character of great importance to the history and backstory of the Symphony of Ages series. Merithyn's Promise refers to the oath that the sailor Merithyn made to his lover, Elynsynos, swearing that he would return to her from his long voyage at sea.

Hope you enjoy it,
John

Sci-Fi Song #4: The Return of Titus Quinn

The Return of Titus Quinn.mp3

This week's song was inspired by the protagonist from Kay Kenyon's excellent Bright of the Sky. The Return of Titus Quinn is a solo acoustic guitar piece played in the DADGAD alternate tuning.

In the novel, Titus Quinn takes on the identity of Dai Shen, a Chalin man. The Chalin are a race of people that bear a strong cultural resemblance to earth's Asian population. I tried to interpret this by taking my initial "Titus" theme of the A section and transposing it into the Chinese pentatonic scale of the B section.

This piece is a bit of a departure for me. Many of my formative influences (Steve Morse, Alex Lifeson, Steve Howe, Leo Kottke, John Fahey, and Michael Hedges) have recorded numerous solo acoustic guitar pieces. As much as I love this style, I've never given a serious attempt to compose and record one of my own. I had great fun putting this together, and I hope you like it.

Has a novel ever inspired you to write a piece of music? Has a song ever inspired you to compose a novel, short story, or piece of visual art?

-John

More info on Bright of the Sky

Sci-Fi Song #1: Before the End of Time

Before the End of Time.mp3

Here is a composition of mine that was inspired by the visual artistry of Janet Chui. I find Janet's angel art to be compelling and referring to this visual made composing this piece a gratifying experience. Please check out Janet's other work here.

Click on the play button to listen or click on the MP3 link above to download the file. I encourage you to download the MP3 and if you like it, please share it with your friends.

All of my original music is housed under a Creative Commons License. (check sidebar for more details) That means that my music is completely free and you can do whatever you want with it. Share it with friends, post it to your blog, use it in your podcast, use it in a video project, etc. I only ask that you attribute it back to me and send me an e-mail to let me know what you'd like to do with it.

For those who are musically curious, I composed this piece on my old piano and recorded/sequenced it entirely in Apple's Logic Pro 7 recording software. All of the sounds that you hear were created using Logic's included software synthesizers and samplers.

I hope you enjoy it!
John