little-scale
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adelaide

Okay, so of course the challenge here is to write a track a week for all of 2012. I was thinking that some of us probably have some goals that we want to achieve via WeeklyBeats - e.g. explore new ways of writing music, improve composition skills at one particular instrument, learn how to use new software or hardware etc.

Let's share some!

For me, I want to learn a few pieces of software that I've never used, including Renoise and PD for example. I would also like to write more music for interesting combinations of instruments, e.g. cello and chiptune. Additionally, I want to spend maybe a month or so building a piece of hardware each week, and then writing a new track for it each week.

I am not sure how feasible these ideas will be once the year actually begins, but it's nice to dream big_smile

Lazerbeat
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I have a couple of primary goals:

- Get better at structure and theory -
I appreciate the first goal is a pretty lofty one but I feel my songs tend to meander a bit, I would like to be able to write short 3 or 4 minute songs with a clear hook or theme where you know what each part of the track is meant to be.

- Learn to use my 4 or 5 synth modules better -

The second one should be fairly straight forward, I have a few synths which I know the basics on but really need to get deeper into them!

Secondary goals

- Try some new genres -

I want to write some blues or some dub or some dance music rather than just slow and crunchy all the time.

- Vocals? -

I have often thought about doing a track or two with vocals but never gotten around to it. This seems like a good chance to try.

Also I did a year long music challenge once before and I feel I planned it fairly badly, being regularly productive without being under enormous pressure seems like a lot of fun.

godinpants
Offline
Sydney, Australia

My goals.

- Be more melodic. I have a tendency to focus more on rhythm or just the general sound of things, rather than melody. I've never been able to write melodies well and I feel like that may be letting me down.

- Move back to where I was in music a few years ago, just for a while. I used to write more chilled stuff and dreamed of sounding like Jean Michel Jarre. Somewhere along the way I got trapped in hardcore.

- Spend more time "perfecting" a track. It sounds like a stupid thing to bring up in this sort of context, but there was a track on Schrodinger's Punk that took under 15 minutes between me turning on the Gameboy, and exporting the rendered file.

- Additionally I too would like to get back into PureData. I had a good thing going there, I knew how to make it do what I wanted.

- Finally, one song a month will involve my banjo.

spry
Offline
Cincinnati, Ohio

my personal goals for this contest are pretty simple.  i have been considering doing something like this on my own for a while, but when i saw this it was a no-brainer.  Its like AA for music!  a community born of chiptunes to publish to and get feedback from people that are real musicians- yes please!  over the course of this year i hope to:

-generally get better at writing, recording and producing tracks

-expand my skills in lsdj, and become comfortable with writing and performing with nanoloop (1.6 cart arriving soon!!)

-experiment with integrating other instruments into gameboy compositions (classical guitar, trumpet, keyboard, live drums, vocals, etc)

-experiment with recording and production techniques

-get feedback from awesome artists

-meet, talk with and/or collaborate with the other artists participating in Weekly Beats

-hear weekly experimental music from awesome artists

i already have my first song in the works!

AWESOMECAT
Offline
Olympia, WA

My main goal is just to not miss a week. If I can do that, I will be very satisfied. Other than that...

- I'd like to work on incorporating other instruments with LSDJ, rather than using it by itself.
- Focusing on improving specific technical skills, e.g. harmony, counterpoint, orchestration
- Trying new instruments/hardware, taking advantage of my neglected resources
- Building my own chiptune hardware that is a standalone system allowing for the playback of compositions, not necessarily allowing for composition on the hardware

We shall see what else!

Scott Kellogg
Offline
Bloomington, IN

Learning to work quickly enough to get a polished track per week.  That alone would be major.

kedromelon
Offline
iowa city

I think the big thing I'm gonna try to do is expand my skills to software other than LSDJ -- been messing around with Ableton with a Launchpad recently, and I also have Logic Pro and Nanoloop 1.3 which I have never REALLY used.

edit: OH and I guess I'll be taking a class on Max/MSP this coming semester, so I'll likely be making use of that as well.

Last edited by kedromelon (December 29, 2011 6:12 pm)

starpause
Offline
SF/CA/USA

i want to keep my tracks short, beat or theme sketches, but also make a video for each one. for hanukkah i was doing a track a day with a video and that was going well but i burnt out after day 4... i think a weekly track & vid is much more feasible.

pulsn
Offline
Hamburg, Germany

Oh...throughout the year i have a good amount of output...but...i want to become more fluent with it, try new things, focus on certain gear in my studio, use a different approach, experiment with styles, built new equipment (sammichSID and sammichFM waiting in the box as kits) and in general evolve the musical part of me to become better and be even more me. The main goal however is to get a much better connection to the musical me inside me and turn my creativity flow into a big fat stream of ideas.

Last edited by pulsn (December 27, 2011 9:53 pm)

Chromacle
Offline
Philadelphia

I'm going to try and get better at melodies, and trying to understand what makes a certain melody fit with a certain theme. I also want to work on differentiating my tracks, as I feel they can get a bit samey at times. Also like what godinpants said, I want to work on really crafting my songs, often times I just get very impatient and kick something out after just a bit of time working on it.

A versus B
Offline

As a personal challenge, I will try to use different software for my tracks EVERY MONTH. For example, LSDJ January, Nanoloop February, Renoise March, etc. If I run out of software, Ill start mixing softwares, like Nanoloop and LSDJ together. I will also try my hand for the first time in blending a live instrument with a Gameboy track.

popsicle
Offline
NSW

My aims?

"Learning to work quickly enough to get a polished track per week.  That alone would be major."

Polished being the key term here.

I also view this opportunity as a much needed kick in the bum to create more music but also to explore music as a method of research; my focus has been on writing/traditional research methods for way too long.

Trash80
Offline
Los Angeles

I think I'm going to first try a systematic approach to composing music, and see how that goes, maybe something like:

Day 1: Pick theme / Studio setup / Create DAW template
Day 2: Chord structure / Mood / Maybe 2 movements / Key sig / etc
Day 3: Intro & solid structural guideline
Day 4: Finished song structure / movements / transitions
Day 5: Tweeking any bits, working on mix
Day 6: Render / upload

Lazerbeat
Offline

and on the 7th day rest?

Trash80
Offline
Los Angeles

Indeed.

phesago
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Not suck at making music, lol