Disquiet Junto Project 0507: In DD’s Key of C
The Assignment: Make music with 10 acoustic instrument samples all in a shared key.

Step 1: This week’s project is based on a great “construction kit” of WAV files in the key of C recorded for us by Disquiet Junto member Daniel Díaz. Access the files, of which there are 10, at this Dropbox link:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/fitxmqhkggxwpye/AADnKVkTbi4XejHRaqr_N1dsa?dl=0

Step 2: Listen through the tracks, which include piano, two electric guitars, melodica, bowed upright bass, and other instruments.

Step 3: Record your own track employing the source audio.

Background: Consider what the tracks have in common. They are in the same key of C and on a single chord, Cmaj13(#11). Daniel played the instruments in different registers from deep low C to a very high accordina note. Daniel says, “I didn’t listen to the other tracks while playing and didn’t pay attention to the length, so if all the tracks are pasted at the ‘one’ of a project the results will be random. I just used a metronome of 100bpm, so the rhythmic little bits would match, approximately.”

. . .More on this 507th weekly Disquiet Junto project — In DD’s Key of C (The Assignment: Make music with 10 acoustic instrument samples all in a shared key) — at: https://disquiet.com/0507/

Tracks made with samples created generously by Daniel Díaz.

More on the Disquiet Junto at: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements here: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0507-in-dds-key-of-c/

There’s also a Disquiet Junto Slack. Send your email address to marc@disquiet.com for Slack inclusion.

The image associated with this project is by Thorsten Sideb0ard, and used thanks to Flickr and a Creative Commons license allowing editing (cropped with text added) for non-commercial purposes:

https://flic.kr/p/bvKCrv

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

Disquiet Junto Project 0507: In DD’s Key of C

I decided to pull out one of my old favorite techniques for this one: using Paulstretch with unconscionably long windows (5 seconds, 10 seconds, 40 seconds...). This takes a sample and moves it from a musical gesture to a long harmonic drone. 

I started out with the ukelele track, and stretched it 2.5x with a 5 second window. I stretched the accordina 2.1x with a 10 second window to get the primary melodic and chordal motion. Both developed a melody within the drone as the stretch was done.

I then stretched the piano 1.1x but with a 30 second window, then copied it, reversed it, and duplicated this again to bring it up to approximately the length of the other two tracks.

At this point, I started layering things up in Audacity and adjusting relative levels. I decided I wanted to leave a little of the original samples audible as they were originally, so I brought in the electric guitar chords and the rhythmic bass. I realigned the chords to appropriate places against the piano/uke/accordina lines, then carefully edited the bass to duplicate one bar of the rhythm so I could repeat it to almost the end of the track.

I then took the hang sample and pitched it up 3 octaves, resulting in a funky phasing tone in the mid-register. I applied a little Valhalla Freq Echo to that to give it a little more motion, and last, I brought in the low electric bass, carefully lining it up against the hang, and duplicating notes as required to get it to the correct length.

Final mixdown was adjusting relative levels of the tracks and tweaking EQ lightly.

This was done 100% in Audacity, using the Paulstretch, fade in, fade out, and pitch shift tools, with Valhalla Freq Echo for a tiny bit of sweetening.

Partially Erased [disquiet0507]

Hey, so glad to be the source of this week’s junto. I decided to use my original “example” track as a submission for this one, where, after recording separately each sample, I just unmuted all the 10 tracks , turn the volume 6dB down and just listened: as expected, everything worked (sort of) alright together, providing a 6 octave massive Cmaj13(#11) chord. The I just moved each track more or less to the right of the timeline to provide some musical move to the whole set, but otherwise, the FX, reverb mostly, are the ones included in the sample’s take.
I played around the volumes in the end and that’s it, all the samples sounding here.
Looking forward to enjoy what others do with this.
Thanks @disquiet Marc and everybody, love
DD 

The instruments I used:
1.	Piano
2.	Electric guitar chords (Stratocaster)
3.	Electric guitar arpeggio (Telecaster)
4.	Electric Bass (Drake Custom)
5.	Acoustic Piano (Yamaha)
6.	Melodica (Hohner)
7.	Accordina (Marcel Dreux)
8.	Ukulele (Concert Kala)
9.	Bowed upright bass
10.	Hang (in C deep sky tuning)

Image by thorsten sideb0ard

Massive C  Major - disquiet0507

More on this 507th weekly Disquiet Junto project — In DD’s Key of C (The Assignment: Make music with 10 acoustic instrument samples all in a shared key) — at: https://disquiet.com/0507/

Tracks made with samples created generously by Daniel Díaz.

More on the Disquiet Junto at: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements here: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0507-in-dds-key-of-c/

There’s also a Disquiet Junto Slack. Send your email address to marc@disquiet.com for Slack inclusion.

The image associated with this project is by Thorsten Sideb0ard, and used thanks to Flickr and a Creative Commons license allowing editing (cropped with text added) for non-commercial purposes:

https://flic.kr/p/bvKCrv

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

In DD's Key of C - disquiet0507

Marco Lucchi : analog synthesizers

with
Daniel Diaz : bowed bass, hang drum and accordina

for Disquiet Junto project
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0507-in-dds-key-of-c/48744

In DD's Key of C - disquiet0507

paul.reiners