Music?

[NunoAle1]

Hey guys.

To all the musicians out there: what inspires you? What programs do you use to write the music for your games? How do you make it to fit the music (i.e. do you create the songs before the scenes or after)? These are some questions I'd be very interested to hear your opinions!

 

[Erie]

For me personally it depends on how I'm feeling at the time when I'm not playing anything in particular and find a melody or part I like I play it til I'm sick of it or my mood has changed and the melody itself has become a completely different song altogether. How about yourself?

 

[NunoAle1]

Well, I usually find something I like while playing guitar. Then I transpose it to the computer using Guitar Pro 5, and develop every other instrument on there. The final quality sounds horrible, that awful midi :P I haven't had the patience to use something like Cubase or Ableton Live to find a more real sound-engine.

Still, getting back to the creation part: I usually don't do one without another (music + story). Thinking about the story brings me the mood for the music, so I just develop everything from there. Of course I've never had enough of a full game to write enough music for, which makes my question seem pointless... But still, I'm curious about you more experienced people!

 

[Zebestian]

I'm a really intuitive composer. I just go with it as I compose. Most of the time, I don't really have a concept and if I have one, it's very rough. It's got something to do with how I compose and how I learned it. See, I'm self-taught and although I have some rudimentary knowledge in music I tend to not use it. Not very much at least. The only thing I'm really aware of most of the time while composing is the key I'm in. :D
I like to think of composing as capturing certain feelings and emotions in musical form and thinking too hard about the "science" behind music, kinda ruins the magic for me. It's rather hard to describe. "Intuition" is really the only word I can come up with for that. :)

 

[Wize1]

I begin with 1 instrument. That one instrument fills my mind with memories or visions of places, people, things, sounds. I add instruments from there, only ones that are compatible with the 1 instrument I begin with.

Writing for a particular scene, setting, character, theme-- it is easier because you already have your palette of colors and feelings.

If what I am composing does not feel right within the first few minutes, I start completely new with something else.

 

[w00dy]

i use logic (its got the most prepackaged tools - you can do so much without needing any plugins, but it's mac only) I've also used ableton (great for auditioning lots of loop parts). I've found the easiest method is noodling over a chord progression. using the roman numeral system and playing in the key of the I (or i) chord is an easy way to get an inspiration. I-V-vi-IV is soooo familiar. google 'four chord song by axis of awesome' on youtube to see what i mean. but as for actual music to fit a scene, id go with the poster above who said 'if its not working more or less straight away....' it's probably not going to fit that scene. though maybe it could form the basis of a track that fits another later on?

i found a link to a list of all time great rock and pop chord progressions ->here<- i know t's easy to consider pop "low brow", but isn't every musician really 'a communicator of the essence of emotion', so why not speak a language everyone already knows?