Music Collaboration

[abstract]

Holy crap in a pita! I just got home from work and found all these great posts! this will take a while to post but let's have at it!!

BRETON: love the idea bout the magician's sheep. It's wonderful that you found time to structure something like that.

then the peaceful guitar turns into a driving, metal inspired, guitar solo! Driving hard riffs! -I don't know how long)

(Then, music changes again --I don't know how-- and story continues:

Sweet! The "metal" part could fade out quickly and slowly fade in to whatever appears suitable for the song.

Well, one idea is popping up. What about creating a fotcm/sott... creativity group, over yahoo.com for example? Where everybody could join in and there can be projects discussed and so on (to have free space and also to have a chance to be a little bit more private)...
Anyway, I like to write a BUT because I don't like to split the ideas/ongoing discussions from the open forum, because it would in some way exclude others and in addition needs supervision from mods and admins.
Maybe there is a chance of creating a subforum in this forum for these discussions, besides that "creative acts" already exists?

I guess things will work out.

Okay, here's my thoughts on that.

If we do in fact intend to collaborate online to do music I must insist that a sort of system be used for writing.

First of all, will we have strict membership to the "band" or will it be open to anyone?

Next, we must make sure that "idea" songs and completed songs don't get confused with eachother, meaning that if someone posts something as "something i did for fun"

or whatever, people don't end up thinking it's a finished, polished version.

Next, whoever is joining needs to give the other members a list of their musical "arsenal", instruments, recording gear, etc.

That way we can work together better.

Also, we could write the songs kind of like this; almost like tossing a ball. Whoever comes up with a 1st part will then pass it (in some order?)

to another person and see what they come up with, and they take that work and pass it to someone else. That way everyone gets to give input and

have the time they need to come up with something.

Other than that, does anyone else know how we could keep things straight and smooth with the process?

 

[Turgon]

First of all, will we have strict membership to the "band" or will it be open to anyone?

I would think anyone that knows how to play an instrument or sing and is genuinely interested in creating music should be able to join the 'Cass Band'. Even if there are a large number of members involved, and some play the same instrument, it could be a matter of whenever one member has an idea and posts it, whoever resonates and believes they can add to the specific piece colloborates with the originator. So there can be a lot of different colloboration with different artists at the same time. Not everyone will/needs to be involved in every piece written, and in some cases people will take different roles. For example you might only add a specific lead guitar part for one song, and then another project, a full rhythm for the entire piece, depending on what you want the music to say?

Also, we could write the songs kind of like this; almost like tossing a ball. Whoever comes up with a 1st part will then pass it (in some order?)

to another person and see what they come up with, and they take that work and pass it to someone else. That way everyone gets to give input and.

have the time they need to come up with something.

I would think as long as we are practicing external consideration it can be a more natural process. In some cases with me, I'll write down an entire structure (verse, chorus, bridge, etc) and am really happy with it, and other cases will come up with a riff or 2 that I really like, but have no idea what to do with. But then again, someone could find an even better structure or improve upon what was originally written, so we shouldn't take offense as long the music is at the forefront of all the actions we take.

Or maybe even no expectations, and just sorta trust one another in regards to posting and than see where the creative process takes the song?

Next, we must make sure that "idea" songs and completed songs don't get confused with eachother, meaning that if someone posts something as "something i did for fun"

or whatever, people don't end up thinking it's a finished, polished version.

Definitely Sub-forums for 'Completed Works' and 'Work in Progress' or something along those lines.

If we do in fact intend to collaborate online to do music I must insist that a sort of system be used for writing.

I agree, I see there being a potential for things getting 'scattered around' if a certain amount of people get involved and there's no keeping track of who's working on what with whom. I think there'll be trial and error before a smooth way of colloborating is found.

Next, whoever is joining needs to give the other members a list of their musical "arsenal", instruments, recording gear, etc

Electric Bass & Acoustic Guitar (Hopefully will get a classical guitar soon as well). No recording equipment to speak of yet, but I'm working on that, depending on my job situation I would like to have some equipment to record with by early 2010. (Few months hopefully!)

 

[abstract]

I would think as long as we are practicing external consideration it can be a more natural process.

If this wasn't a place that actually put importance on externally considering, i'd tell you that this will never work.

However, forum members are supposed to externally consider anyway, so of course it should not be an issue.

K, so let me just list my equipment here since danielS got it started.

Randall 100 watt amp head, peavey speaker cabinet, i have a seven string guitar, a few sixers, a jackson and a kramer with emg pickups. boss noise supressor. boss super overdrive.

strat copy, ltd viper guitars. line6 echo/delay. m-audio fastrack USB recording interface, audix om5 vocal mic. numerous effects in my recording software.

danelectro fish n chips EQ, signature "slash" wah. and my crowning achievment, a peavey 6505+head. :)

 

[vinny]

it's great the way you guys have taken this idea and run with it. Now, that's networking :)

Breton, nice work with the voice-overs.

I think it is fine to keep this on the forum, here, where anyone can see what's going on, and join in as appropriate. No need for a separate yahoo group, IMO. Threads can be created as needed, for projects that are being worked on, or for showcasing the finished results.

I'll gladly contribute my own efforts, whenever inspiration strikes. Equipment I use includes: Yamaha Clavinova Piano (CLP 270, which I used for the strings on Abstract's improv), various guitars including: Peavey Millenium Bass, Hohner Strat copy, Yamaha acoustic. Also, I use a Mac for multi-track recording.

 

[Breton]

I detected from the discussions here sort of two ways of proceeding:

1) "Cass Band" or sort of project oriented approach: Focus on a goal of making an album or some sort of focused, coherent musical selections.
2) "Cassiopaean Forum Collaboration". Unfocused, non-anticipatory, open, ever-changing and evolving collaboration to just see what happens.

I am sorta leaning towards the second way - it is kind of like Daniel S's suggestion:

Or maybe even no expectations, and just sorta trust one another in regards to posting and than see where the creative process takes the song?

It is a Cassiopaean Forum Collaboration: in the spirit of a forum, people contribute little, or lots, as they have energy. There is so much happening in forum participants lives these days! Some are having shamanic experiences for goodness sake, as they identify their programs and do the EE breathing program!

Results: all works get posted online and each work stands on its own under the umbrella of Cassiopaean Forum Collaborations. CFC.

Next, we must make sure that "idea" songs and completed songs don't get confused with each other, meaning that if someone posts something as "something i did for fun" or whatever, people don't end up thinking it's a finished, polished version.

However I guess if we follow 2) it makes it very hard to figure out what is finished, as Abstract pointed out. Something is never finished! Instead after some time, it is just "mature".

Yes, I am not sure what to do about this.

 

[Breton]

Identification and ---- Re: Music Collaboration

Additional side note - identification:

Something occurred to me that there may be one benefit in participating in this, that I observed in myself: practising non-identification!
Perhaps when one exposes themselves by showing some act of creativity, they have a chance to see how well they will react to praise and criticism. They can watch how much they identify with their work.
Part of the practise of non-identification might be: "I am not my ideas" or "I am not my creation". Are we not something other than what we create? For most of us we are barely beginning to find out what we really are! Therefore criticism or rejection of our work is not a criticism or rejection of us. Praise for the work is not praise for the real us.
Or something like that: hey I am still a newbie at this stuff.

"'Identifying' is one of our most terrible foes because it penetrates everywhere and deceives a man at the moment when it seems to him that he is struggling with it. It is especially difficult to free oneself from identifying because a man naturally becomes more easily identified with the things that interest him most, to which he gives his time, his work, and his attention. In order to free himself from identifying a man must be constantly on guard and be merciless with himself, that is, he must not be afraid of seeing all the subtle and hidden forms which identifying takes.

Of course, I might just be desperate to put into practise some of the concepts I have been studying. So don't pay too much attention to me, I think too much... heh heh.

 

[Breton]

Enemy of souls Re: Music Collaboration

Breton, nice work with the voice-overs.

Thanks!

"The Real Enemy of the Souls" as you describe it sounds like an opera or a huge composition. Maybe with a central theme with different variations in one single piece of music. Do you have such a theme in mind? The other approach is to have different pieces of music, different compositions, that are related by lyrics? How do you imagine it?

I first imagined "The Real Enemy Of the Souls" as a single selection with mainly a focus on the Evil Magician story. In a way it is "earth shattering" enough by itself. The implications to everyone who, like me, spent a lifetime believing in a Good Shepherd, this is a major earthquake to our world view.

Then it could be followed by other selections with their own name that would expand on the STS theme.

This whole idea is really very open, since nothing has been started, and an opera or composition could even form, although I never thought of it that way at first.

So future might see something like:
Selection 1: The Real Enemy of Souls
- Evil Magician
Selection 2: Predator
- focus on the predators' mind, negative introject and so on
Selection 3: Black Holes are not only in Space
- focus on Ra quotes and basic entropic, light eating, knowledge eating, illusion promoting, free-will violating concepts of STS from the C transcripts
Selection 4: ...
[... you get the idea.]

 

[cholas]

Thank you all for getting the ball rolling on this creative project.

Kinda late getting caught up on this thread, but feeling very excited about the potential. I know this idea has been mentioned numerous times in the past and it's truly wonderful to listen to a very fine example of how this collaboration can take shape.

Abstract, your guitar parts just sing and Nomad, love the multilayered string sounds. Thanks Breton as well for the lyrical addition. It sounds like y'all have been playing together for years! And just the beginning.

I detected from the discussions here sort of two ways of proceeding:

1) "Cass Band" or sort of project oriented approach: Focus on a goal of making an album or some sort of focused, coherent musical selections.
2) "Cassiopaean Forum Collaboration". Unfocused, non-anticipatory, open, ever-changing and evolving collaboration to just see what happens.

Why not a little of both, using the former to 'complete' works for a CD etc, the latter for a truly collective experience without boundaries/structure.

I would very much like to contribute, time allowing of course. Admittedly though, the recording aspect is a bit confusing as far as 'tracks' being sent to one another or posted on the forum goes. I play about 3-5 hours every day(my job). Guitar(electric and acoustic) and vocals mostly, but love percussive instruments as well. Through bandmates and friends, I have access to just about 'anything' in the instrument/recording realm.

 

[987baz]

I would like to be invoved, been playing, producing and recording music for about 10 years. I have 2 electric guitars, one acoustic, an electric bass, midi keyboard, yamaha groove box, sampler.
I run cubase, protools and reason on my pc and logic pro on my mac.

here's one of my solo projects, the song is called "see for" (which is about coming into contact with the cass material) as in c for cassiopaea..anyway i have 5 musical projects that i work on, ranging from metal to folk and electro
I aso made the music video for this song as i am a film maker http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuTZB8mPkxw

this whole collaboration sounds really interesting, and when ever i have some free time i would love to be involved

 

[abstract]

This is great! Overflowing with ideas already! This is so cool.

 

[cholas]

Hey folks.

I just borrowed a Tascam G4 for some recording. Anybody use one of these or similar?

I'm guessing I can put the recording on Reverbnation or send it to this thread for others to add to. But still a bit confused, not having done this before. How did you all do it?

If everyone thinks it's a good idea, I'd very much like to play an original or two on guit(rhythm), singing as well, and have anyone interested adding what they feel fits. Should I make 2 different tracks, one vocal, one voice?

Any help would be appreciated.

As an aside, I wanted to add my thoughts to Breton's idea of being unattached to any outcomes or where the music in general('identification'). Well spoken, and imho, a very valuable tool in the ability of others to alter the course of the song(s), possibly to areas where the 'originator' never dreamed.

I'm in and(hopefully) fully unattached.

Thanks again.

 

[mkrnhr]

Hi cholas,
Usually it is better to record the original sound with no special effets so the reverbs, chorus and other effects can be introduced in the end mix so that it matches with other instruments. This is for mixing.
If it is to suggest an idea (pre-mixed) you can play with the effects (it's super funny) in order to see what could be a possible final result.

 

[RyanX]

I just wanted to mention a service that I've been testing out that might be useful to some of the folks here for musical collaboration.

_http://www.digitalmusician.net/

I've been testing this out to see if it would make collaborating on songs with my friend from Phoenix any easier. So far I like what I've seen.

The service is free for anybody to use. They do have an "Pro" account for 2.49 Euros/month which allows one to have more Projects as well as faster file transfer rates to their server. All project files (wav files, settings, etc) are stored on their server as well as locally and there is a process that keeps all people involved in a project in sync with updates.

To use this service, one must create and account and download their "container" software or DMC as it's referred to. Once you download and install this, you can connect to their server and collaborate on other musicians that are part of their network. The DMC software itself is pretty featureless. It's about as minimal an audio tracker as one can get, but it does a pretty good job of managing the audio files and allowing one to easily connect up their DAW (via Rewire) or any audio inputs to the DMC for recording. The only program I use is Reason and so far it's worked great recording from the Reason mixer output.

Right now I'm trying to test out the communication piece of this. It has a basic chat function, but it also allows you to connect via webcam to three other musicians in a live fashion. So while network latency prevents one from live "jamming", one can get a feel for what the other person is working on and get detailed feedback on new parts or whatnot. They recommend at least 256kbps UPLOAD for this webcam feature. The more the better obviously.

I don't know if this tool would be useful for any of the folks here, but so far I've managed to make some use of this program.

 

[abstract]

Not everyone has a webcam, but cool if you have one. I'd like to be able to chat in real time at least some of the time.

What else can the service do?

 

[Breton]

Next, we must make sure that "idea" songs and completed songs don't get confused with each other, meaning that if someone posts something as "something i did for fun" or whatever, people don't end up thinking it's a finished, polished version.

However I guess if we follow 2) it makes it very hard to figure out what is finished, as Abstract pointed out. Something is never finished! Instead after some time, it is just "mature".

Yes, I am not sure what to do about this.

-- Actually this is not so hard. Some kind of central repository is simply needed to put something "finished". Something "finished" might still be an early revision, but it will be "done" as far as it was intended.

So when collaborators are passing tracks or loops around that are just "IDEAS" -- they clearly are not finished.

And that service mentioned by RyanX, or one like it, might be appealing if it allows good sharing of these intermediate tracks and loops amongst the collaborators.

FWIW...