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The Word Became Flesh

from electrochristianmeditation by Jim Hanks

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about

This is my (very late) submission for Disquiet Junto Project 0050.

This week’s project explores invokes Morse Code for its rhythmic content. The instructions are as follows: Select a word or phrase. Encode that word or phrase by the Morse method. Record a rhythmic foundation in which the dash is represented by a long beat and the dot by a brief one. Use that rhythmic foundation as a loop for the length of your track, at the speed you desire - speed can vary over the length of the recording. Record accompanying drone/melodic material that takes the underlying rhythm as its compositional foundation.

More on this 50th Disquiet Junto project at:
disquiet.com/2012/12/13/disquiet0050-morsebeat/

In order to fit this piece into Electro Christian Meditation, the word chosen was "JESUS", which is .--- . ... ..- ... in Morse code. Using the conventions at
www.kent-engineers.com/codespeed.htm, I programmed this pattern into the DM-1 app. This pattern is played by itself to start the piece and continues throughout. The pattern used 50 16th notes for a time signature of 50/16 or 25/8. This is 1/8 note longer than a typical 4/4 signature which can be heard most clearly in the kick drum's "stutter" step at the end of the pattern.

The main pattern is also reflected in the relative timing of the EWI melody part, though not as exact as the drum pattern. The lead then goes through a number of variations departing further and further from the "theme".

Other parts were layered into the Loopy HD looping application from a variety of iOS apps (see below for details), but without regard to the main pattern.

Technical Details:

As a general rule, I try to incorporate new apps and techniques gradually in my projects so as not to get bogged down with learning too many new things at once. But for this project, I threw that rule out the window. With the arrival of AudioBus to the iOS platform, many new techniques opened up, so all the following were used for the first time by me:

1. AudioBus - the new standard for connecting multiple iOS music apps together

2. Loopy HD - one of the only apps available for AudioBus output to start

3. DM-1 - I thought about using FunkBox for drums but DM-1 went free just as a started this project. It is not AudioBus compatible yet so I pasted the drum loops into Loopy.

4. NLogSynth Pro - the chord pads and drones came from this synth, played live going through AudioBus into Loopy

5. Animoog - used for the melody part, I played the EWI using a wind-enabled version of the "Subtle Wholetones" patch, effected through the "Blackface Clean" model in JamUp, and recorded into Loopy. This resulted in a sort of muted trumpet sound.

6. ThumbJam - the bass part (all 4 notes :-)) came from this app, running through a bass amp model in JamUp Pro and into Loopy. Also, the melody was composed/discovered in ThumbJam first using the Harmon trumpet instrument and the Eb Blues Enneatonic scale.

7. JamUp Pro - as mentioned this was used to effect the bass and EWI parts

8. Auria - I copied the loops into Auria for mixing and mastering

9. AudioShare - even with AudioBus, I found myself needed to copy/paste certain things around, especially vocal bits which were recorded directly into AudioShare from a Blue Mikey Digital microphone this copied out to Meteor for clean up, and then into Auria.

It sounds like a lot, and it is, but the workflow started to make sense and I never felt stuck for long.

Along the way, I learned a lot of good techniques and lessons for future projects. The most important was probably the "M" button in Auria's master bus section. This is the "MONO" button and when I first pressed it after having worked up the mix pretty far, I was shocked to hear half my mix GONE! The NLogSynth parts and the EWI lead in particular virtually disappeared in mono. I didn't figure it out exactly, but something about the effects on those tracks in the source synths destroyed their mono compatibility. What I did to resolve this was to copy the bits to Meteor as split mono, take one half, and copy it back to Auria. Then I applied delay and chorus in Auria to get back some stereo-ness but without suffering as badly in mono.

lyrics

(from John 1, New International Version 1984)

1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

14a. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

4. In him was life, and that life was the light of men.

credits

from electrochristianmeditation, released July 17, 2013
track image : www.sxc.hu/photo/1041718

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about

Jim Hanks Raleigh

I like many styles of music but most of my own productions tend towards jazz with electronic elements. I play the Akai EWI4000s electric wind instrument, ukuleles, guileles, NAF, whistle, recorders, harmonicas, and various software instruments on Windows and iOS. ... more

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